Within twenty paces of the cottage she saw the horse and horseman. The former was a beautiful creature, almost thoroughbred, as she knew; for every woman in the district was a horsewoman by instinct and association. The latter was a gentleman in a well-made riding suit of cords. He was riding slowly, his whip striking against his leg absently, his head bent. That he was not one of the local gentry Nell saw at the first glance. In that first glance also she noted a certain indescribable grace, an air of elegance, which, as a rule, was certainly lacking in the local gentry. She could not see his face, but there was something strange, distinguished in his attitude and the way he carried himself; and, almost unconsciously, her pace slackened. Strangers in Shorne Mills were rare. Nell, being a woman, was curious. As she slowly reached the gate, the man came almost alongside. And at that moment a rabbit scuttled across the road, right under the horse's nose. With the nervousness of the thoroughbred, it shied. The man had it in hand in an instant, and touched it with his left spur to keep it away from the girl. The horse sprang sideways, set its near foot on a stone, and fell, and the next instant the man was lying at Nell's feet. CHAPTER II. For a moment Nell was too startled to do anything but cry out; then, as the man did not move, she knelt beside him, and still calling for Molly, almost unconsciously raised his head. He had fallen on his side, but had turned over in the instant before losing consciousness; and as Nell lifted his head she felt something wet trickle over her hand, and knew that it was blood. She was very much frightened--with the exception of Dick's boyish falls and cuts, it was the first accident at which she had "assisted"--and she had never longed for any one as she longed for Molly. But neither Molly nor any one else came, and Nell, in a helpless, dazed kind of fashion, wiped the blood from the wound. Then suddenly she thought of water, and setting his head down as gently as she could, she ran to the stream, saturated her handkerchief, and, returning, took his head on her lap again, and bathed his forehead. While she was doing this she recovered her presence of mind sufficiently to look at him with something like the desire to know what he was like; and, with all a woman's quickness of perception, saw that he was extremely good-looking; that he was rather dark than fair; that though he was young--twenty-nine, thirty, flashed through her mind--the hair on his temples was faintly flecked with gray. But something more than the masculine beauty of the face struck her, struck her vaguely, and that was the air of distinction which she had noticed in his bearing as he came down the road, and an expression of weariness in the faint lines about the mouth and eyes.