Lavender stood in the doorway and looked at the fair exterior of the small domain where for the last five years she had led so luxurious an existence. The sound of the traffic outside was subdued in here, and The Vale was like a green island in the great river of London life; all of the houses were creeper-covered, and in the flower-beds in the lawns were brilliant geraniums and petunias and giant sunflowers. Lavender's own garden was as pretty as any of them, with ribbon grass and flaunting lilies, and a gnarled wistaria stretching brown arms over the porch. It seemed a pity to be leaving home when it was all so sweet and dainty, and yet August had never before found her in London.
She got into the cab, and, smiling a farewell to Lucille, told the man to drive to the Café d'Autriche. It was a lovely evening, and already, early as it was, the stream of cabs and carriages was setting in the direction of the great hotels and restaurants. Lavender leaned back in her seat and watched the familiar scene with the keen interest of the intelligent Londoner, but as she travelled along the Brompton Road a wistful look stole over her face. Good as her lot had been until these later days, it might have been better still if as a child she had been taught more self-control. If Sir Geoffrey had been more patient with his impetuous child-wife, and she herself had been less self-willed and passionate, she might now be driving through the town, not as a practical adventuress masquerading under a name to which she had no right, but as the wife of an honoured and honourable old man—not as a supposititious Mrs. Sinclair, but in her true guise as Lady Holt.
They had got nearly to the end of the road when suddenly, with a deafening rattle and clanking of chains and a throbbing pulsation of machinery, a heavy traction engine, drawing a trolly laden with an enormous cylindrical boiler, came panting towards them. At the same moment the horses attached to an omnibus, between which and the pavement Lavender's cab was passing, shied and swerved, the axle of the hind wheel forcing the cab against the curb. Startled by the slight collision, and terrified by the hammering din of the ungainly locomotive, the animal behind which Lavender was sitting—a wiry Irish mare—threw back her ears, and, letting fly with her heels at the splash-board, dashed madly forward, jerking the bit between her teeth and getting absolutely out of hand.
A spasm of fear gripped Lavender's heart, and then, sitting bolt upright with hands pressed against the two sides of the cab, she braced herself to await the catastrophe. Even in the wild rush of the moment she noted with admiration how the driver managed to keep some semblance of control over the terrified mare, guiding her, he certainly knew not how, past cabs and omnibuses. But foolish people on the pavement began to shout, and only scared the little mare into a wilder pace. Crossing the top of Sloane Street they avoided by a hair's breadth a green omnibus full of people, and raced on towards the huge Hyde Park Hotel; they skidded over the edge of the island in the road, but already the cab was swaying from side to side with a rhythmical swing that grew more dangerous every time, and in Lavender's mind two words kept ringing in rhythm with the swinging of the cab, Lavender Holt—Lavender Holt—Lavender Holt.
She was kept in no suspense as to what the end would be, but even her stout heart quailed as she saw in what shape death was coming to her. Just by the railings of the Park the road was up, and policemen were diverting the traffic on to the other side of the road; but now the mare was blind and deaf and mad, only struggling to get faster and farther away from the hellish clangour of that horrible machine behind. Lifting herself together she charged full at the barrier of stout pines, upsetting a brazier full of charcoal and crashing anyhow into a maze of broken poles and blocks of karri-karri.
The impact threw the driver clear over the cab and forced Lavender through the window folded up above her. Shivering glass and splintering wood tore and rent their way into her face and neck and hands; one sob escaped her as a blaze of red flashed up before her to die away in utter hopeless blackness, and she was lying crushed and bleeding in the wreckage of the cab, as motionless as the mare that lay dead beside her.
There is no city in the world where help is so speedily forthcoming for the injured as it is in London. Almost before the crowd that ran shouting after the runaway came up to the spot where the dead mare lay amid the havoc she had wrought, Lavender and the cabman were taken to the nearest hospital. Tender hands took the jewels from her torn neck and shoulders, unclasped the winking serpent from her arm, and cut the stained gown from her broken frame. Her wounds were dressed and she was already laid in a spotless little bed ere she recovered consciousness.
"Who is she?" said the house-surgeon. "Does anybody know?"
"There are only initials on her linen," one of the nurses said; "perhaps the cabman may be able to tell us by-and-bye."
The house-surgeon shook his head.