Without hurrying, I was close enough behind her to watch her reception. Dick turned his back on her in open disdain. From Sophia it was warm—I felt sure she loved her—while Harvey looked anxiously from her to Lord Tarlton. The little nobleman gazed from her to me, and it must be that some inner force failed him for a few seconds, for suddenly he looked old. The debility passed, and he spoke to Eliza in an exasperated but not harsh tone.
"What in the devil are you doing here?"
"I was invited, and you practically promised I could come. Holgar said he was glad to have me, didn't you, Holgar?"
"I certainly did, Eliza."
But this frivolous interplay was forced and out of place, as she knew full well. Meanwhile, she could not look at Pike, and instead gazed at Lord Tariton—small, perfect, delicate but indestructible, his hunting habit handsome as a fop's, but stronger than the thorns; his white hair gracing his pretty face, and his white hand toying with his stick; but the east wind at his call, and the icy blue of winter sky serving his glance. Was she reassured? Although lost and forgotten things sometimes cast their shadows over her ways, she could never doubt his love. Believing in that, how could she doubt him?
Yet I watched her in deepening anxiety and suspense. Meanwhile, the face of nature began to change. Her mood became dark and her voice sorrowful and her signs ominous. The yellow stubble lost its cheerful winter color under cloud-shadows. The rising wind made the boughs of the gaunt trees rattle.
"Blackburn, has my daughter your permission to address you by your given name?"
"My lord, we've both agreed to employ first names, since she's been my guest before."
"Well, miss, I don't think your stay will be very long. There's a change of weather coming, unkind to bones as old as mine. If it turns out as I think, I'll have to forego our host's good cheer and return to London tomorrow."
"I think you should. Papa, since you look worn and nervous, but you'll have Pike and the servants to look after you, so I don't see why we others shouldn't stay on."
She spoke in a clear young voice, without hint of entreaty, her head high, her eyes fixed on his and very bright, and a high flush on her cheekbones. Her little gesture of defiance against the evil and tragedy thickening about her should have cut to the quick even Godwine and his malign son.
He doesn't love you, Eliza. Evil can love nothing but itself. He only covets you and wants to command you as he did your namesake. It is too late for Sophia to escape. Is it too late for you?
What if I should love you, a last hostage-giving to fortune? I could learn to easily, for love of woman is the mother spring of my nature and manhood, and you are woman in her young and declared beauty. You grace the ground on which you tread. I could easily see you as personifying the beaut)' of woman everywhere, the thrill of life, the joy of youth. And you remind me of Isabel Gazelle.
Such love might be only an ideal which I would cherish in the days to come and smile over by my lonely hearth. Thus it could not harm you, and in the final fury of the storm just now beginning to break, it might save you. But fate is not satisfied with this kindly and due conclusion. You are lovely and touching, but your color is very bright. You have golden hair and snowy skin which flushes crimson and wide red lips and luminous gray eyes. As you stand there, fearing my gaze, you cause a brightness in the lowering gloom.
There are surgings through me of great power. I cannot deny them, I do not try to master them. Like wild horses I have roped and would ride across the desert, I give them free rein.
The wind shrilled, and some kestrels, seeking shelter from a gale breaking on the rugged Kentish coast, cried overhead.
"Why, Eliza, if you and the others wish to stay a few days, I'd have no objection, and would get along well," the nobleman had answered.
"We'll talk it over later," This soon she was penitent.
"Now let's go to the fire," Sophia said with a little shiver.
"Eliza, if you want to walk with your father, I'll have Perkins take your horse to the stable."
"Thank you, I do."
"We can pass the stables without going out of our way, and I'll show you a gray stallion almost as handsome as your bright-bay mare. Lord Tarlton, I've been wondering how he'd run against your magnificent black—in some not too-distant future. Perhaps you'd like to see him, too."
"There are few sights I like better than a good horse."
I had Perkins turn El Stedoro into the paddock and he came whinnying to the gate where I stood. He was in fine fettle, his dappled skin like satin, and the wind made him skittish and tossed his black mane and tail; still he was too big, raw-boned, and ungainly-looking to please these lovers of the classic type of English hunter. As they took in his long, gaunt neck, big feet, block-shaped head, and Roman nose, they did not know what to say.
"Look at those quarters!" Lord Tarlton exclaimed. "He's a 'chaser, or blow me down! But you called him handsome!"
"I think that was Blackburn's little joke," Dick said.
"What is he, if you'll tell me. There's a hint of Arab about the ears and the tail, and those shoulders are pure English."
"An agent of mine got him in Alexandria. His name is El Stedoro, and though he's not much to look at, I've gained a deal of confidence in him when the going's rough. If you're a little cold, maybe you'd like to warm yourself and Donald Dhu, setting him a pace." Donald Dhu, meaning Black Donald, was Tarlton's great 'chaser.
"I'm not cold in the least, but amenable to the suggestion."
"A good course is down this road, across the brook, over the pasture gate, on the grass to the hedge, jump it and return—straight out and back just over a mile. You took all three jumps riding to the duck blinds yesterday afternoon."
"That's not too hard for me, but Dick rides in my place when the course is long and the jumps cruel. Both nags need a sweating, and 1 a limbering. Shall we put a small premium on coming in first?"
"That would be agreeable."
"Would a hundred guineas suit you?"
I expected him to say ten guineas at the most. He had been over the course, but had never run it.
"It would suit me well."
"Then, Pike, get him out here; and I'm glad you thought of it, Blackburn, to round out the day."
El Stedoro and I had learned to communicate freely concerning my riding and his running. I could give a good show of letting him go while he understood perfectly he must hold back from his most furious bounds to save strength for some trial beyond. I had plotted to let Donald Dhu win, then have the excuse of seeking revenge. Now, although Lord Tarlton's wager was intended to persuade me he hoped and expected to win, I was quite sure he was out to lose, in preparation for a coup de main. He was an old turfman who ran no foolish risks. He had a higher opinion of my mount and me than the rash bet would have me believe.
So I decided to come in first provided I could do so without turning the gray brute loose, and if I could not, the game was not worth the candle.
In a few minutes Dick cried, "Go!" I had already known that Donald Dhu was a superhunter, the supreme product of the English and Irish stud farms, developing the type, and hence one of the great 'chasers of the age. His pedigree was awesome, a returning again and again of the blood of the Byerly Turk and the Darley Arabian, with the magic name of Eclipse mixed with parvenus of great achievement. He and his few peers took turns at beating one another—the slightest mishap or fault by horse or rider could decide the issue—and only the phenomenal horse could put him in the shade. I owned a phenomenal horse, unless the hard-bitten horsemen of the Beni Kabir missed their guess. Both Donald Dhu and his lordly owner would be surprised to know that the gray fright was the splendid black's cousin on both sides of the family.