I happened to be riding up with a message for mother, to borrow some soap, when I heard a little cry like a lamb's, and there was poor little Gracey struggling in the water like a drowning kitten, with her face under.

Another minute or two would have finished her, but I was off the old pony and into the water like a teal flapper.
I had her out in a second or two, and she gasped and cried a bit, but soon came to, and when Mrs.Storefield came home she first cried over her as if she would break her heart, and kissed her, and then she kissed me, and said, 'Now, Dick Marston, you look here.

Your mother's a good woman, though simple; your father I don't like, and I hear many stories about him that makes me think the less we ought to see of the lot of you the better.

But you've saved my child's life to-day, and I'll be a friend and a mother to you as long as I live, even if you turn out bad, and I'm rather afraid you will--you and Jim both--but it won't be my fault for want of trying to keep you straight; and John and I will be your kind and loving friends as long as we live, no matter what happens.' After that--it was strange enough--but I always took to the little toddling thing that I'd pulled out of the water.

I wasn't very big myself, if it comes to that, and she seemed to have a feeling about it, for she'd come to me every time I went there, and sit on my knee and look at me with her big brown serious eyes--they were just the same after she grew up--and talk to me in her little childish lingo.