The parson is feeling sick at heart with his long night's vigil, and as though he could hardly face the dreadful end. He shrinks back, not to see more than he need. Then from the depths of the lock comes the crackling sound of the ice that breaks beneath the pick. Then the tension of the growing excitement as those on the brink watch for a result they feel confident of.
"Nothing there?"... "Nothing that side."... "Now you keep steady across with your peck--right you are!--across the middle ... don't go to sleep!... yes, now right up in the corner.... Something there?"... "Ah!--easy a minute till I catch holt ... have that cord ready.... Got him?"
"You are quite certain nothing can be done?"
"Absolutely certain. He was ready for heart-failure, without being an hour under the ice."
"Will you tell the poor woman, from me, that I had no choice but to go? And that poor baby...."
"Well--little girl of six then! Say I'll come at three to take her to see her father at the Hospital. You're sure it's the same case?"
"Not the least doubt. A blind sailor beggar--there couldn't be two. You know the wards at St. Brides.... Never mind--you'll find out.... What is it, my good woman?"
It is a woman with a tale to tell. Briefly, that she looked out of her bedroom window about an hour and a half since, and saw what must have been the unhappy inebriate running across the field, looking back, time and again, as if he see some party follering of him. Then he come to the lock, and stood close over the edge--back to, as you might say. So standing, he went wild, on the sudden, and threw up his arms, and there!--he was over in the lock, afore you could reckin him up like--clear over! Both her hearers are indignant, or perhaps incredulous about the truth of the story. For if she really saw this, why in Heaven's name did she give no alarm?--the man's life might have been saved! She expresses contrition as for an error of judgment, but no great remorse. She told her master--meaning her husband--who said it was a queer start. But it was that early! The exact bearing of this fact on the matter was far from clear.
"She'll have to tell her tale before the coroner, anyhow," said the doctor, as he showed his companion a short-cut into his road home. "Well!--now keep straight on--you'll be in the main road in five minutes. I hope you'll get a good breakfast and a good sleep before you marry those two sinners. Good-bye! Remember, straight on!"