Alice fought back with all her strength the inclination to faint, and forced her brain to compel her body to do its work. She did her best to aid Paul in the rescue, but he was having a hard struggle. For Alice was rather heavy, and her feet, entangled as they were with the fish line, were of no aid. Then, too, the blow on her head had not been a light one, though it developed later that her heavy hair had prevented the log from bruising her.

"I have you! Don't worry! I'll save you!" she could hear Paul murmuring in her ear. Then her head cleared, and she was able to recognize the voice and make out the words of someone on the opposite bank, toward which Paul was swimming with his burden.

For the voice was the voice of Russ Dalwood, and his words sounded strangely enough under the circumstances.

"That's it! Come right over here!" the young moving picture operator called. "I'm getting a dandy film! That's it, Paul, a little more to the left! That's the finest rescue scene I ever got! It's great acting!"

"Why—why you—you don't mean to say you're filming us!" cried Paul, for he was now in shallow water and could stand upright, holding Alice in his arms.

"Of course I'm filming you!" exclaimed Russ. "Do you think I'd let an act like this get past me? Not much!" and he continued to grind away at the crank of his machine, which he had hastily set up on the edge of the stream, where he commanded a good view of those in the water.

"But this isn't acting!" said Paul, ready to laugh, now that the danger was over. "This is real! Alice fell in, and I went in after her. It's the real thing!"

"Great Scott!" cried Russ. "I thought you were rehearsing for some play, and as I came along I thought I might as well get the scene, even if it was only a rehearsal. For I had plenty of film left, and sometimes the rehearsal comes out better than the real thing. And so it was an accident?"

"Of course it was," answered Paul. "But as long as you've got it on the film I suppose there's no help for it."

"It's a fine scene, all right," went on Russ, "and Mr. Pertell can work it into some of his plays." He ceased operating the camera now, as Paul and Alice were too close.

"Are you much hurt?" asked the young rescuer, anxiously, as he looked for a grassy spot whereon to place his burden.

"No—no," returned Alice, "I was more frightened than hurt. Will you please cut that line?" she asked, pointing to the tangle of the fish cord around her feet.

In an instant Paul had out his knife, and cut the string.

"Well, you two are pretty wet," said Russ. "How did it happen?"

"The bank gave way with us," explained Paul. "It's too bad, Alice. That dress is spoiled, I'm afraid," he added, ruefully.

"It doesn't matter," she answered. She could laugh now, but she could not repress a shudder as she looked back at the deep water of the eddy. They were on the other side of the stream now.

"It was an old one, Paul," Alice went on, "and I can save it to do some more water-scenes with. For probably, after Mr. Pertell hears that Russ has the basis for a drama with someone in it being saved from drowning, he'll want the rest, and we may have to do some more swimming."

"I wouldn't mind in the least," he said; "but next time I hope, for your own sake, you don't get entangled in a fish line."

"That was pretty risky," said Russ. "But you two had better be getting back to the farmhouse now, and into some dry things."

"Indeed, yes," agreed Alice. "I'm sure I must look like a fright. Papa will be so worried, and Ruth, too. I wish I could slip in the back way so they wouldn't see me until I had time to change."

"I'll manage it," spoke Russ. "I'll go on ahead, and if any of our folks are in the back I'll bring them around to the front and hold them there while you slip in. I guess, Paul, you don't care to be seen in that rig; do you?"

"I should say not! That water was certainly wet!"

He had taken off his coat and was wringing it out, while Alice managed to get some of the water from the lower part of her skirts.

"Then you aren't going to swim back?" asked Russ.

"I should say not!" exclaimed Paul, with energy. "Isn't there a bridge somewhere around here, where we can cross?"

"About half a mile down," answered Russ, "I came that way."

"Are you sure you're all right, and able to walk, Alice?" Paul inquired, anxiously. "If not, I could go for a carriage. That is, if you will wait."

"Of course I can walk," she answered, promptly, as she tried to arrange her hair in some sort of order.

"Don't worry about that," said Paul, quickly. "It looks nicer that way."

"As if I would believe that!" she challenged. "Well, if we're going, let's go. Don't forget, Russ, what you promised about getting us in the rear entrance. I wouldn't have Miss Pennington and Miss Dixon see me this way for anything—I'd never hear the last of it!"

"Does your head hurt?" asked Paul, coming closer to examine the spot where the floating log had hit Alice.

"Just a little," she admitted. "It's lucky, though, that my hair is so thick."

They set off, Paul and Alice following Russ, who went on ahead with his moving picture camera.

"I certainly have a fine film," he said, "but I don't believe I would have taken it if I had known it was the real thing in the way of a rescue. I'd have jumped in and given a hand myself."

"It was very good of you, Paul," murmured Alice, but when he looked into her eyes she turned her own gaze away.

"I—I wouldn't ha............