They bumped against a curb and nearly overturned. Then one of their wheels caught another vehicle. The hansom was whizzed half round, but the pitiless hoofs still tore on and almost miraculously the worst was still averted.
Archie's hold was close and nearly suffocated her; but over his shoulder Nina still managed to look ahead.
And thus looking she saw the most wonderful, and the most terrifying, episode of the whole adventure.
She saw a man in faultless City attire leap suddenly from the footway to the road in front of them. For a breathless instant she saw him poised to spring, and in her heart there ran a sudden, choking sense of anguished recognition. She shut her eyes and cowered in Archie's arms. Deliverance was coming. She felt it in every nerve. But how? And by whom?
There came a jerk and a plunge, a furious, straining effort. The fierce galloping ceased, yet they made still for a few yards a halting, difficult progress.
Then they stopped altogether, and she felt the shock of hoofs upon the splashboard.
Another moment and that, too, ceased. They stood still, and Archie's arms relaxed.
Nina lifted her head and saw her husband hatless in the road, his face set and grim, his hands gripping the reins with a strength that evidently impressed upon the runaway the futility of opposition. In his eyes was a look that made her tremble.