“I won’t die!” cries Miss Gower wildly.  “I won’t be dignified.  Ho! there!  Help! help!”

She is appealing to the shores on either side, but no help is forthcoming.  She turns at last a pale glance on Randal.

“Randal!” cries she, “you say you are tired of life.  But—­I—­I’m not!”

“This is folly,” says Mr. Gower.  “It is born of an hour, filled with a sudden fear.  In a few moments you will be yourself again, and will know that you are glad of a chance of escaping from this hateful world that you have been for so many years reviling.  Just think!  Only yesterday I heard you abusing it, and now in a very few moments you will sink through the quiet waters to a rest this world has never known.”

“You are wrong.  It is not folly,” says Miss Gower wildly.  “I don’t want to die.  You do, you say.  Die, then!  But why sacrifice me?  Oh, goodness gracious, Randal, the boat is sinking!  I feel it.  I know it is going down.”

“So do I,” says Gower, with an unearthly smile.  “Pray, aunt, pray!”

“I shan’t!” cries Miss Gower.  “Oh, you wretched boy!  Oh, Randal, what’s the matter with the boat?”

“It’s settling,” says Mr. Gower tragically.  “There is time for a last prayer, dear aunt.”

Miss Gower gives a wild shriek.

“Forgive me, my beloved aunt,” says Mr. Gower, with deep feeling.  He is standing up now, and is doing something in the bottom of the boat.  “Honour alone has driven me to this deed.”

“Honour!  Randal!  Then it isn’t madness.  Oh, my dear boy, what is it?  Oh,” shrieking again to the irresponsive shore, “will no one save us?”

“You can!” says Mr. Gower.  “At least you could.  I fear now it is too late.  I gave you a hint about that before, but you scorned my quotation.  Therefore, thy death be on thy own head!”

“Oh, it can’t be too late yet.  You can swim, my dear good Randal.  My dearest boy!  I can help, you say.  But how, Randal, is it—­can it be that the debt you spoke of a while ago has driven you to this?”

“Ay, even to this!” says Mr. Gower in a frenzied tone.

“How much is it, dearest?  Not very much, eh?  Your poor old aunt, you know, is far from rich.”  As a fact, she hardly knows what to do with her money.  “Oh, speak, my dear boy, speak!”

“It is only seven hundred pounds,” says Mr. Gower in a voice full of depression.  “But rather than ask you to pay it, aunt I would——­” He bends downwards.

“Oh, don’t!" screams Miss Gower.  “For Heaven’s sake don’t make any more holes!”

“Why not?” says Randal.  “We all can die but once!”

“But we can live for a long time yet.”

“I can’t," says he.  “Honour calls me.  Naught is left me but to die.”

Here he stands up and begins to beat frantically upon the bottom of the boat, as if to make a fresh hole.