Nell is attacked beside the canal

Nell’s attack on the canal towpath turns the danger surrounding Biddy Spooner’s household from a threat watched at a distance into violence suffered by one of its most vulnerable residents. Nell is left injured and afraid, while the masked assailant escapes identification. The household responds with care and tighter precautions, but suspicion falls on Albert Pinnegar without proof that he was responsible.

Background and vulnerability

The attack occurs while Sunday is away in London. In her absence, Biddy Spooner sends Nell into town on a Wednesday; on the way home, Nell takes a shortcut along the canal towpath. The choice places her on a quiet stretch where help is not immediately at hand. The account emphasizes that Nell is slight and has little chance of defending herself against an adult attacker. Her isolation is therefore practical as well as social: she is alone on the path, and the people who might protect her are elsewhere.

The canal already carries a painful association for Sunday because of what happened to Daisy. Sunday now avoids it, and even hearing it mentioned makes her feel sick. Nell’s assault consequently enters a landscape that has already been marked by loss. The novel does not make the two events identical: Daisy’s death and Nell’s attack have different outcomes, and the assailant in Nell’s case is not identified. But the canal’s return connects present danger to an earlier trauma and helps explain the force of Sunday’s reaction when she learns what happened.

There is also a wider atmosphere of unease around the household. Pinnegar has been seen lurking nearby, silently watching the house, although he has not come to the door again. On an earlier occasion, Sunday also witnesses hostility toward Mickey at the cattle market, including abuse from one of Pinnegar’s associates. These incidents establish a climate of intimidation, not proof of a coordinated attack. That distinction matters when the household later considers who may be responsible for Nell’s assault.

The attack and interruption

Nell is walking along a quiet part of the towpath when a man suddenly steps out from a hedge, knocks her down, and beats her. He then begins to lift her skirts, making his apparent intention clear. The narrative reports the assault without identifying the man or presenting it as a witnessed confrontation: Nell is its sole direct victim, and the facts reach the household afterward through Annie’s account and Nell’s conversation with Sunday.

A horse pulling a barge approaches along the towpath at the same moment. The attacker flees, leaving Nell on the ground. The bargee brings her home, but does not catch the man; Mickey also goes looking for him after Nell arrives, only to find that he has already escaped. The arrival of the barge interrupts the assault, but it does not produce an arrest or a reliable identification. The assailant’s escape leaves the household with an immediate safety problem and very little evidence to resolve it.

Care and the aftermath

When Sunday returns, she goes to Nell’s room and finds her curled beneath the blankets. Nell’s face is visibly bruised, and she has a cracked rib. Sunday holds her, rocks her gently, and offers reassurance; she also promises that someone from the household will accompany Nell whenever she goes out until the attacker is caught. The promise turns friendship into a practical protective arrangement, while Nell’s fear makes clear that physical recovery is only part of what follows the assault.

Mickey had fetched the doctor, and Nell remains in bed for the rest of the week. Annie reports that she is beginning to mend physically, but cannot say how long it will take before Nell feels confident enough to go out alone again. Nell herself says that the police see little chance of catching the assailant. Neither the attempted pursuit by the bargee nor Mickey’s search has succeeded, so the household’s concern is sharpened by the likelihood that the person who attacked her remains free.

Biddy responds by deciding that the girls must no longer go out alone. She asks Jacob and Mickey to keep watch, orders that the front and back doors stay locked, and considers placing a guard dog in the yard. The proposed dog is a practical, if uncertain, answer to a danger the household cannot yet name; Biddy recognizes that Mabel, the household’s existing dog, is unlikely to deter an intruder. These measures register a change in daily life: ordinary errands and access to the house are now treated as matters of security.

Suspicion and significance

When Biddy asks whether the attacker was Pinnegar, Annie explains that Nell could not see his face clearly because a scarf covered the lower half and he wore a hat. Nell does not think it was Pinnegar, because the man seemed too thin. Biddy nevertheless suspects Pinnegar may be behind the recent run of incidents. The narrative preserves the difference between suspicion and identification: the timing and the broader history of intimidation raise concern, but the available description does not establish who attacked Nell.

The episode thus closes without a culprit, arrest, or assurance that the danger has passed. Its immediate resolution is communal rather than judicial: the bargee brings Nell home, Mickey obtains medical help, Sunday comforts her, and Biddy reorganizes the household around protecting the girls. Nell’s recovery remains incomplete even after her physical condition begins to improve. By leaving the assailant unidentified and the police response uncertain, the event shows how fear can persist beyond the moment of violence, shaping movement, household routines, and the relationships through which the vulnerable seek safety.