to her. The oncoming horse had
the speed of a racer.

A spirit of mad defiance possessed her. She steered straight as an
arrow before her. Then, like a flash, she veered, dodging from under
the horse's very nose. She had accomplished her feat very cleverly.

But alas, for Nan!

Even as she sped on, full of the exquisite thrill of exultation in her
own prowess she heard behind her the sound of a dull, fear-thickened
cry. Then a sudden confusion of voices and the cessation of rolling
wheels. She stopped and turned.

The onward sweep of the mass of vehicles had been instantaneously
checked. The road was clear for some rods before her and in the centre
of this open space lay--a broken bicycle.

A little group of men crowded close about some central object on the
ground. Women were wringing their hands and weeping hysterically, and
one woman--it was Mrs. Newton--was crying wildly,

"Let me go to her! Let me go!"

The circle of men upon the ground made way, and then Nan saw what it
was around which they knelt.

She gave a quick, fierce cry of pain. The little governess lay quite
still and motionless. Her eyes were closed; her face was white as
marble. All her bright hair was lying loose about her temples--and it
was streaked with blood.

CHAPTER XIX

IN MISS BLAKE'S ROOM

Nan never forgot that scene. It seemed to her afterward, that even in
the midst of the horror that almost stupefied her and made her blind,
it had been indelibly photographed upon her brain to the merest detail
with torturing distinctness.

She could see Mrs. Newton's drawn, livid face, and the stern, set
expression of the men who gathered about in knots here and there
discussing the accident in whispers, or arranging the best means of
getting back to town. A doctor, who happened to be near at hand, had
sprung forward at the first moment of alarm, and he and a strange,
kind-faced woman were together bending over the prostrate form between
them, while over all arched the high dome of the blue October sky,
beyond them stretched the level road, narrowing in the distance to a
point that seemed to pierce the sea, and on either side spread the
branches of bordering maple trees, each shining brilliant and gorgeous
In the autumn sunlight.

Presently, in response to a demand from the doctor, a low-hung carriage
drew out from the ranks of waiting vehicles, and into it was lifted,
oh, so carefully! the inert form of the governess,