She could teach, if she could obtain a position; but she had no influential friends in the city to whom to apply for aid to secure a school. She studied the papers every day, with the hope of finding some want or advertisement that would come within her capabilities; but it was late in the season—the public schools were all supplied with teachers, and nothing else seemed to offer without requiring her to be absent from home too many hours during the day, and the outlook seemed dark.
One morning she had an errand to do at a bank on Pennsylvania Avenue, and, after attending to it and making one or two necessary purchases, she walked swiftly to a corner, to wait for a car to take her home. A pretty French maid, who was trundling in an elegant perambulator a lovely child of about three years, was standing talking with a young man, evidently of her own nationality.
They became so absorbed in each other that they appeared to be wholly unmindful of the child, who, however, seemed to be safe enough, for all Mollie could see, although she felt that the girl was neglectful of duty.
Presently an ice-cart drove to the curb and stopped. Almost at the same instant a strong gust of wind swept around the corner, catching the perambulator and sending it rolling to the very edge of the sidewalk, and within three feet of where Mollie was standing. But before she could stretch forth her hand to save it, it went off, was overturned, and the child, with a shriek of fear, rolled to the ground, directly in front of the powerful gray horse that was attached to the wagon.
The animal tossed its head with a startled snort, and reared upon his hind legs. The driver, a powerful man, with great presence of mind snatched at his reins and, by sheer muscular strength, held the animal back upon his haunches, with his forefeet madly pawing the air.
“For God’s sake, grab that young one, somebody!” he shouted wildly.
The French maid and her companion both appeared to be paralyzed with fear. Neither seemed able to move from the spot where they stood, although the girl filled the air with her shrieks.
Mollie, without a thought of anything save the precious life of the little one, bounded forward, and crouching low under the formidable hoofs, seized the tiny form by its clothing and sprang back upon the sidewalk, just in season to escape being crushed to death as the ponderous animal, now beyond the driver’s control, came down upon its forefeet.
It was a close shave, and had Mollie hesitated an instant, the child would have been beyond the reach of human aid. As it was, the fright and the fall had rendered it unconscious, and a slight abrasion on one plump little cheek, where the iron shoe had just grazed it, showed how very narrow had been the escape. Mollie’s skirt was badly torn where the descending hoof had caught and taken a piece out of it.
The nurse was almost beside herself with mingled joy and fear, and would have snatched her little charge from Mollie’s arms, but she gently repulsed her, and said in French—the language in which the girl had been conversing with her friend: “Be quiet, the baby is not hurt, and I am sure she will soon be quite herself. I will take her into this drug-store and have her cared for—secure the carriage and then follow me.”