Then she remembered in what cause she had spent herself. "What of--The Hundredth Chance?" she said.
He caught his breath. His lips were quivering. "He's safe enough. But--my girl--what made you do it?"
She looked at him wonderingly. "But it was all I could do," she said.
He bent his head over something that he was holding, and it came to her with a little start of surprise that it was her own hand swathed in bandages.
"Oh, Jake," she said, "am I ill? Have I been hurt?"
He did not look at her. "Thank God, not seriously," he said, speaking with an odd jerkiness. "The colt knocked you down. You were stunned. You scorched your hands over that infernal bolt. But the wind blew the fire away from you. You weren't actually burnt."
"Is the fire out?" she asked anxiously. "Tell me what happened!"
Jake's head was still bent. She thought that he suppressed a shudder. "Yes, they soon got it under. There wasn't much left to burn that side. It was a good thing the wind held, or the whole show might have been gutted. It's all safe now."
Maud's eyes wandered round the panelled parlour and came back to his bent head. "I feel so strange," she said, "as if I had been a long, long journey, and as if it had all happened ages and ages ago. Is it so very long ago, Jake?"
"About four hours," said Jake. "Dr. Burrowes has been in. He chanced to be passing in his dog-cart. He was on his way to a case, and couldn't stay except to give you first aid. He is coming back presently."