Felisa screamed hysterically. She sobbed and choked, and amid her shrieks were heard the disjointed words, "I--will--_not_--die!"
In her frenzy the fastening at her throat gave way, and Agueda caught sight of the diamond pendant at her neck. Agueda, with her eyes on Beltran, nodded her head toward the boat, as if to say, "Do as she asks." When she spoke, she said:
"I will hold it steady, as steady as I can."
Felisa cast another horrified look around her upon the moonlit, shoreless sea.
"Oh, God!" she sobbed, as holding frantically to Beltran's hand, she stepped into the boat. She drew him toward her, so that he could with difficulty resist the impelling of her hand. Beltran tried to release his fingers from the grasp of Felisa. He turned to Agueda, and motioned toward the one hope of succour.
The boat pulled and jerked like a race horse. Even Felisa's slight weight made a marked difference in its buoyancy.
Agueda's position was made the more unstable by her skirt, which fluttered in the wind.
"I can hold it but a second more," she said. She was still stooping, holding the boat in as firm a grasp as her footing would allow.
"I cannot leave you here, Agueda, to die perhaps--for--her--for me."
"I died long weeks ago," she muttered, more to herself than to him, and motioned again with her head toward the boat.
The water was rushing past them. It was ankle-deep now. Agueda steadied herself more firmly against the chimney.
Felisa, shivering with fright, stretched out her arms appealingly to Beltran, her cheeks streaming with tears. Beltran glanced at Agueda, with a look that was half beseeching, half apologetic, as if to forestall the contempt which he knew that she must feel for him, and--stepped into the boat. His weight tore it from Agueda's grasp. It began to float away, but before it had passed a span from where Agueda stood alone, he turned and shouted, "Come! Agueda, come! Throw yourself in, I can save you!"
Ah! that was all that she cared to hear. It was the old voice. It sank into her heart and gave her peace. For in that flash of sudden and overwhelming remorse which is stronger than death, Beltran had seen that which he had not noticed before, the sad change in her girlish figure. Felisa clung to him, threatening to upset the skiff. He thrust her from him. "Come!" again he shouted, "Come!" He stretched out his arms to Agueda, but as the words left his lips he was whirled from her presence.