"I shan't detain you, I promise you. But this must be bandaged before you can go home. Ah, is this basket yours, too?"
Someone had handed up the basket from the tram-track, where it had lain disgorging cabbages and other articles of food.
"I will send you home as soon as I have seen to your arm," the doctor said, pushing her gently towards his carriage. "And the little dog—is he your own? I suppose he is, since you nearly gave your life for him?"
"He is not mine," said Mary faintly. "He belongs to Lady Anne—Lady Anne Hamilton. She lives at No. 8, The Mall. She will be distracted if she misses the little dog. She is so very fond of it."
"Ah! Lady Anne Hamilton. I have heard of her. We can leave the dog at home on our way. Come, child."
The Mall was quite close at hand. They drove there, and just as the carriage stopped at the gate of No. 8, which had a long strip of green front garden, overhung by trees through which you could discern the old red-brick house. Lady Anne herself came down the gravel path. Over her head was a little shawl of old lace; it was caught by a seed-pearl brooch with an amethyst centre. She was wearing a quilted red silk petticoat and a bunched sacque of black flowered silk. She had magnificent dark eyes and white hair. Under it her peaked little face was the colour of old ivory. She was calling to her dog, "Fifine, Fifine, where can you be?"
A respectable-looking elderly maid came hurrying after her.
"I've looked everywhere, my lady, and I cannot find the little thing," she said in a frightened voice.
Meanwhile, the doctor had got out of the carriage and had taken Fifine gently from Mary's lap. Now that Mary was coming to herself she began to discover that the doctor was young and kind-looking, but more careworn than his youth warranted. He opened the garden gate and went up to Lady Anne.
"Is this your little dog, madam?" he asked.