class="x-ebookmaker-pageno" title="[Pg 10]"/>all when they saw that it stopped about a hundred feet this side of the spot that they had reached.

"She didn't beat us!" cried Bess exultantly.

"Too close to be comfortable, though," murmured Nan, as her eyes measured the distance.

"Well, a miss is as good as a mile," declared Rhoda.

"We're all right so far, as the man said as he was passing the second floor after falling seventeen stories," put in Laura.

"Let's get every ounce out of the Silver Arrow on the next try," adjured Grace, as, after having taken off their skates, they were trudging up the hill.

By the time they reached the top, most of the other sleds had been sent off and they had not long to wait. They settled themselves firmly in their seats.

"Let's clinch it now," laughed Nan, as she took the wheel. "Just put on your wishing caps and wish as hard as you can, and the Silver Arrow will do the rest."

"I'm wishing so hard that it hurts," gurgled Bess.

"If wishing will do it, we've won already," chimed in Laura. "We're all ready, Professor."

A clear call from the bugle, a helping hand over the ridge, and the Silver Arrow was off again.

It may have been due to the more slippery condition of the hill caused by the sleds that had already passed over it, but there was no doubt in the minds of the girls that the bobsled was going even more swiftly than it had at first. They were almost frightened at the speed it developed, and yet they were delighted, for they had set their minds on beating their earlier mark.

Halfway down the hill they passed Linda and her group, who had drawn up at one side to let them pass. Even at that breakneck rate of speed they could see the sneer on Linda's lips as she recognized the sled and its crew.

But they were nearing the curve now and Nan's eyes were fastened on the path ahead while she tightly gripped the wheel.

"Hold fast, girls!" she warned, as they neared the bend in the road and the sled swerved at her touch.

The next instant they rounded the curve, and a cry of horror burst from their lips.

Directly in their path was an elderly woman who had just started across the road.

She looked up as she heard them scream. Terror and bewilderment came into her face. She started back, then forward. Then, utterly paralyzed with fright, she stood helpless in the path of the bobsled that was rushing toward her with the speed of an express train.

The girls shouted at her, but her brain, numbed by fear, refused to act.

"Oh, she'll be killed!" wailed Grace.

"Oh, Nan, can't you do something?" cried Bess frantically.

Nan's brain was working like lightning. She was white to the lips, but never for an instant did she lose her presence of mind.

At the left of the road was an almost solid row of trees. It was certain death to turn that way. At the right there was an opening that led into a little glade. She determined to steer into that.

She swerved the sled in that direction. She could have made it if the woman had remained where she was. But just then she backed a step to the right. The sled struck her and hurled her aside, and she went down with a scream.

CHAPTER II

NEARLY A TRAGEDY

The collision changed the direction of the bobsled, and by the merest fraction it escaped striking a tree. Nan, however, despite her mental anguish, kept her head and dexterously guided it into the glade, where it found soft snow and gradually came to a stop.

Then the frightened girls rose and rushed as fast as they could toward the victim of the accident, who was lying still in a heap of snow at the side of the road.

Nan dropped on the snow beside her and took her head in her arms, while Rhoda put her hand on the woman's heart.

"Oh," sobbed Grace, "we've killed her!"

"No, we haven't," replied Rhoda. "I can feel that her heart is beating. She's fainted, either from pain or fright or both, poor thing. We must help her."

"Here, Bess," directed Nan, "you hold her head while I see if any bones are broken. And you other girls take turns in chafing her hands. If she lives near here we'll take her home and send for a doctor. If not, we'll take her up to the Hall."

The others followed Nan's directions and worked with frantic energy. And while the girls are trying to revive the unconscious stranger, it may be well for the sake of those who have not yet read the earlier volumes of this series to tell who Nan Sherwood is, and what experiences and adventures she and her friends have had up to the time at which the present story opens.

Mr. Sherwood was a foreman in the Atwater Mills in Tillbury, and "Papa Sherwood" and "Momsey" and Nan were a devoted and happy family in their pretty little cottage on Amity Street. Then the mills shut down for an indefinite length of time. The Sherwoods, with others even less well able to face the future, were staring poverty and the loss of their pretty home in the face, when suddenly, in the case of the Sherwoods, fortune took a hand and sent relief in the shape of a legacy from a distant relative of Mrs. Sherwood's.

To settle the business in connection with this legacy, Mr. and Mrs. Sherwood were called to Scotland. To the grief of all three, it was necessary that Nan should be left behind, but it was arranged that she should stay with her Uncle Henry, her father's brother, in a lumber camp in the Michigan Peninsula. What exciting adventures Nan had there and what she accomplished for good, can be found in the first volume of this series, entitled: "Nan Sherwood at Pine Camp; or, The Old Lumberman's Secret."

Nan's best girl friend in Tillbury was Bess Harley. Bess was looking forward to going to school at Lakeview Hall, and, never having known any lack of money, could not understand why Nan would not say that she, too, would go. When the loss of Mr. Sherwood's position made even Bess see that it would be out of the question for Nan to go, she was inconsolable, for she was devoted to her friend, and rather dependent on her.

Nan Sherwood herself wanted to go to Lakeview Hall more than she had told either Bess or her parents, and when the legacy from Scotland made this possible the two girls were delighted and went wild with joy.

What they did at the Hall, the plucky spirit Nan showed on more than one occasion, and the friends they made are told of in the volume entitled: "Nan Sherwood at Lakeview Hall; or, The Mystery of the Haunted Boathouse."

Among the girls Nan and Bess met at Lakeview Hall was Grace Mason of Chicago. In "Nan Sherwood's Winter Holidays; or, Rescuing the Runaways" is described the visit that Nan and Bess made to the Mason home during the midwinter holidays. It is a record of parties and girlish fun, but in the midst of this Nan succeeded in helping two foolish girls who had run far away from home.

On the opening of Lakeview Hall after those winter holidays a new girl came to the school. She was from the far West, and she did not at first understand or enter into the fun of the other girls. For a while she was without friends there, but gradually Nan Sherwood's sympathy and tact worked a change and Rhoda Hammond became one with the other girls.

She was not only grateful to Nan, but she became very fond of her. By this time Mr. Sherwood was well established in a business of his own, so when Rhoda asked Nan and Bess and Grace Mason and her brother Walter to go with her to her home in the West on a ranch, Nan, as well as the others, was able to accept. What