

PHANTOM FALLS. 161 



Devil or saint, spirit or flesh, we had her ! I thrust 

 my hand out to grasp the garments of the girl. I 

 clutched the empty air ; the girl was gone full 

 twenty yards away, and speeding toward the point. 

 Not thus were we to be eluded. John had not 

 missed his stroke, and, seizing my paddle again, we 

 sent our boat flying over the surface of the lake in 

 hot pursuit. Never, as I believe, was boat of bark 

 or cedar sent faster over the water. Our paddles 

 were of choicest ash, smooth as ivory, three feet in 

 the staff and thirty inches in the blade, while the 

 shell that floated us turned barely sixty pounds, with 

 a bottom like polished steel, and so cork-like that, 

 balanced carefully at stem and stern, as it was now, 

 it seemed to rest upon, rather than part, the water 

 on which it sat ; and as we cast our utmost strength 

 into our paddles as only boatmen can, the lithe thing 

 fairly flew, while its delicate framework of cedar 

 roots and paper-like sides quivered under the ner- 

 vous strokes from stem to stern. Around the point 

 ^ve rushed, pursuer and pursued. Into the swift 

 suction we shot almost side by side ; down over the 

 verge and through the white riftanto the gloom of 

 overhanging pines, leaped a cascade, and with hands 

 lid faces wet with spray, and garments flecked 

 with patches of froth and foam cast high over us as 

 we splashed through the rapid torrent, plunged 

 down the second reach and over a second fall 

 without losing a stroke. Still, just ahead, the boat 



