Meanwhile the second whip had rushed out from his cottage to render assistance and the whistling of the long-lashed hunting-crops drove through the air, gradually forcing the yelping hounds into submission.  In the midst of the shouting and commotion Nan felt herself lifted up by Roger as easily as though she were a baby, and at the same moment the whirling lash of one of the men’s hunting-crops cut her across the throat and bosom.  The red-hot agony of it was unbearable, and as Trenby bore her out of the yard he felt her body grow suddenly limp in his arms and, glancing down, saw that she had lost consciousness.

When Nan came to herself again it was to find she was lying on a hard little horse-hair sofa, and the first object upon which her eyes rested was a nightmare arrangement of wax flowers, carefully preserved from risk of damage by a glass shade.

She was feeling stiff and sore, and the strangeness of her surroundings bewildered her—­the sofa upholstered in slippery American cloth and hard as a board to her aching limbs, the waxen atrocity beneath its glass shade standing on a rickety table at the foot of the couch, the smallness of the room in which she found herself.

“Where am I?” she asked in a weak voice that was hardly more than a whisper.

Someone—­a woman—­said quickly:  “Ah, she’s coming round!” and bustled, out of the room.  Then came Roger’s voice: 

“You’re all right, Nan—­all right.”  And she felt his big hands close round her two slender ones reassuringly.  “Don’t be frightened.”

She raised her head to find Roger kneeling beside the sofa on which she lay.

“I’m not frightened,” she said.  “Only—­what’s happened? . . .  Oh, I remember!  I was in the yard with the hounds.  Did one of them bite me?”

“Yes, Vengeance just caught your ankle.  But we’ve bathed it thoroughly—­luckily he’s only torn the skin a bit—­and now I’m going to bind it up for you.  Mrs. Denman’s just gone to fetch some stuff for me to bind it with.  You’ll be quite all right again to-morrow.”

With some difficulty Nan raised herself to a sitting position and immediately caught sight of a bowl on the ground filled with an ominous-looking reddish-coloured liquid.

“Good gracious!  Has my foot been bleeding like that?” she asked, going rather white.

“Bless you, no, my dear!” Mrs. Denman, a cheery-faced countrywoman, had bustled in again, with some long strips of linen to serve as a bandage.  “Bless you, no!  That’s just a drop of Condy’s fluid, that is, so’s your foot shouldn’t get any poison in it.”

“That’s right, Mrs. Denman,” said Roger.  “Give me that linen stuff now, and then get me some more hot water.”

Nan watched him lift and skilfully bandage the slightly damaged foot.  He held it carefully, as though it were something very precious, but delicate as was his handling she could not help wincing once as the bandage accidentally brushed a rather badly scratched ankle.  Trenby paused almost breathlessly.  The hand in which he held the white, blue-veined foot shook a little.