Nicolas Reyburn's rescue is a tale of many heroes: the 10-year-old Île Bizard boy, who ventured onto thin ice to save his drowning dog; his frantic father, Tom Reyburn, who waded into the freezing Lake of Two Mountains, fully clothed, to save his son; and two strangers, Adam Wyroslak and his uncle, Andrew Oles, who pulled them both to safety.

"I was stuck in the water, and my son was stuck in a frozen paralysis, and they got us out of that trap," Tom Reyburn said yesterday at the family home. "It was serendipity - the rescuers were well-equipped, they were calm and in control. I really have to thank them."

It was the family's shih tzus, Candy and Sushi, that started it all, Reyburn recalled.

Nicolas was taking the dogs for a walk with a 7-year-old friend on Wednesday when the dogs bounded onto thin ice near Monk's Point and crashed through, into the water.

Sushi, older and stronger, pulled himself out, but year-old Candy floundered in the lake.

"My son told me she was shrilly screeching and treading water - she was drowning," Reyburn said. "Nicolas is a feet-on-the-ground kind of guy, but his impulse was, 'I don't care what happens, I want to save her.' "

The boys ventured onto the ice, which cracked under their weight. The younger boy retreated to the shore and eventually ran to summon help, but Nicolas kept going until he was up to his chin in water and had reached Candy and scooped her onto firm ice.

The boy then found, to his dismay, that he was too wet and heavy to lift himself out.

"I thought of dying," Nicolas recalled. "I tried to get out of the water but the ice kept breaking. I took off my boots because they were heavy, and then I couldn't feel my legs."

Nicolas bears scratches on his wrists and chin where he tried to get some purchase on the thin ice. But, after spending more than 20 minutes in the freezing water, the boy appeared to have suffered no other ill effects.

"The best Christmas gift imaginable is that everyone is here and alive," his father said.

Tom Reyburn was working on his accounts after lunch Wednesday when Nicolas's playmate called for help.

Reyburn tried to find a path to his son but there wasn't enough of a solid surface to bear his weight. Father and son were both soon in the frigid lake.

The fragility of the ice shocked Reyburn, whose home faces a small bay that is usually rock-solid by Christmas.

"I keep track of these things, and the earliest freeze-up was Nov. 21 and the latest was Dec. 22. I've never seen anything like this before."

Reyburn went into the water up to his chest before he reached his son and hoisted him onto the ice. But Nicolas was, by then, dazed and near-frozen.

"I said, 'Please, Nico, you're on the ice and it can hold you.' But he just sat there, in a kind of frozen paralysis.

"He said he couldn't move and wanted to sleep."

That's when two strangers - the Reyburns call them "guardian angels" - approached cautiously from shore and threw them a long, looped belt.

Reyburn put the belt around his son. The rescuers pulled him in and handed him to a waiting ambulance crew.

Wyroslak and Oles, partners in a Ste. Geneviève construction firm, just happened to be visiting friends on Île Bizard when a woman flagged them down and said a boy was drowning.

The men linked a pair of construction belts they had in their van and went to the rescue.

"I'm a big boy - I weigh 240 pounds," said Wyroslak, 29. "My uncle is smaller, so he went farther."

Once Nicolas was ashore, the rescuers pushed a fallen tree to Reyburn, who pulled himself onto the bank.

Candy, soaked and shivering, came to Reyburn when he called her, and he whisked her into the house.

Nicolas spent about four hours at the hospital, where staff slowly raised his core body temperature - which had fallen to 30C - to a normal 37C.

After a good night's sleep at home, Nicolas was eager yesterday to thank his cool-headed rescuers.

Wyroslak awoke yesterday with his own sense of reward. "I feel like I did a good thing," he said.

- Ann Carroll's E-mail address is acarroll@thegazette.southam.ca.

© Copyright 2001 Montreal Gazette