reins.

Prince tossed his head and gave an expostulatory amble. Mollie set her
lips and pulled the stronger. She was not conscious that the right hand
pulled more strongly than the left, but that it did so was proved by the
fact that the horse gradually abandoned the path and directed its course
across the grass. The watchers behind gave cries of warning as they saw
what was happening, but in her agitation Mollie mistook their meaning
for more applause and dashed headlong on her way.

She was so much occupied in keeping her seat that she had no eyes to
discover danger ahead, but the groom looked with dismay at the low-
spreading trees on right and left, and raced across the grass to
intercept her progress. He was too late, however. Maddened by the
incessant dragging of the reins Prince galloped ahead, skirting so
closely a clump of trees that it was only by crouching low over the
saddle that Mollie escaped accident. The watchers drew deep breaths of
relief, but renewed their anxiety as once more horse and rider
disappeared from sight behind a giant elm, whose branches hung
threateningly towards the ground.

Ruth gripped her habit in both hands and sped across the grass after the
groom; the two young men galloped ahead; and from one and all came a
second cry of alarm, as a moment later Prince sounded his appearance
careering wildly along riderless and free.

What were they going to see? A helpless form stretched on the ground; a
white unconscious face; a terrible, tell-tale wound? A dozen horrible
pictures suggested themselves one after the other in those breathless
seconds; but when the fatal spot was reached there was no figure upon
the ground, senseless or the reverse; no Mollie was seen to right or
left.

It seemed as if the earth had opened and swallowed her up, until a
feeble squeak made the rescuers lift their eyes suddenly to the heart of
the tree, where a black skirt and two small kicking feet were seen
swinging to and fro in the air. Another step forward showed the whole
picture, gauntleted hands clutching wildly to a bough, and a pink
agonised face turned over one shoulder, while a little pipe of a voice
called out gaspingly--

"Catch me! hold me! take me down! oh, my arms! I'm falling, falling,
I'm falling! oh, oh, oh--I'm falling down!" And fall she did, so
suddenly and violently that the groom, although a stoutly built man,
tottered beneath her weight.

The ordinary heroine of fiction i