Two or three gentlemen now came running up the street, amongst them her uncle, Colonel Vaughan, who, standing at the door of the hotel, had witnessed the escape of the bull, and the pursuit of him by the excited throng of market people. Remembering that his niece had but a few moments previously passed up the street, he too ran in the same direction, and arrived on the scene as promptly as his short legs and shorter breath permitted him. In a fever of fright and flurry he approached, the crowd making way for him as he snapped out a cannonade of irrelevant questions.
"Good heavens! Gwenda! What is it? My darling, are you hurt? Who did it? How very careless!"
"'Tis her foot, I think, sir," said Will. "She has not been gored, and if you will send for your carriage I will lift her in as I am already holding her."
"She'd have been killed for certain," said one of the crowd, "if this young man had not rushed at the bull and saved her life. I saw it all from the window of the Market Hall. He risked his life, I can tell you, sir, and you've got to thank him that the young lady is not killed."
"Yes, yes, a brave young fellow, pommy word. There comes the carriage, now raise her gently," and Will lifted the slender form as easily as he would have carried a swathe of corn.
Slipping her gently into a recumbent position in the carriage, he endeavoured to rest her foot on the opposite seat, but she moaned and opened her eyes as he did so, crying out with evident pain.
"'Tis plain the position hurts her," said her uncle.
Will lifted the foot again, and the moaning ceased.
"That's it," said the colonel; "sit down and hold it up."
Will did as he was bid in a maze of bewilderment, and while the colonel continued to wonder, to lament, and to congratulate, Will made a soft cushion of a wrap which he found beside him, and resting the foot upon it he held the two ends, so that the injured limb hung as it were in a sling, thus lessening very much the effect of the jolting of the carriage over the rough road.