The man who drove the cab was more than half intoxicated, and upon turning a corner, he ran into a heavily loaded team. More by luck than by any good wit, he turned quickly aside, and the cab was almost miraculously disengaged from the other vehicle; but the animals had now become unmanageable from excessive fright. They gave a sudden leap into the air, then bounded forward in a mad and furious race. The cabby was thrown from his seat into the gutter, and in turning another corner, the carriage was upset. Now, wholly beside themselves, the horses kicked themselves free from the _débris_, and plunged out of sight, leaving poor Brownie in a state of insensibility, buried beneath the ruins. The accident had happened in a quiet, aristocratic street of the city; consequently there were few to witness it, and the young girl escaped the curious gaze of the crowd which always gathers about any such event in the more frequented portions. The massive door of a grand house swung open, and an old lady of over eighty, very peculiar in appearance—for she was bent nearly double, and walked with a cane—appeared, attended by the gray-haired butler of the house. “Go and bring her in instantly, James,” she was saying, when another woman came forward and seemed to protest against the order in a very emphatic manner. “I tell you it’s inhuman, Helen, to let her lie there, to be carried off to some hospital by the police,” cried the old woman, in shrill, almost angry tones. “But, aunt, the house is full now; and if she is badly injured it will not do to move her from here after she has been once attended to.” “I don’t care if there are five hundred in the house; that girl shall not be left there to be carried off by the police, I tell you. James, go bring her in this instant. Get some one to help you, and take her up to my bedroom.” “But, aunt——” “Hold your tongue, Helen. You were always hard-hearted as adamant. Go along, I say!” And she flourished her cane about the grave butler’s ears in a way to make him move more quickly to execute her orders than was his wont. He beckoned to two under-servants, and together they proceeded to the overturned carriage, where Brownie could be seen lying prone against the window, her white face upturned and motionless. They extricated her, and bore her into an upper room, where, in the presence of the brusque and energetic old woman, she was kindly ministered unto, while awaiting the arrival of the family physician. For three days she continued very ill, being feverish and somewhat delirious, but after that she began to mend rapidly, and at the end of a week she was able to sit up. Evidently she could not have fallen into better hands, for she was surrounded by every luxury imaginable, and upon questioning the servant who attended her, she was told that she was in the house of Lady Randal.