On a silver night under the moon I had raced him again, to see which of us would be the first to find a traveler, loveliest of all on whom the moon looked down, and take her for his own. Isabel Gazelle, do you remember? Wherever you are, will you pause a moment, and think of me, and perhaps know my terrible need, and help me? My babe is hardly old enough to leave your arms. You have taken a husband, of youth and beauty and laughter, but remember our rite on the desert, and how your kisses transfigured my jagged face of stone. Mount Farishti and ride once more with me!
Death, whom I had met while flying from the Sepulcher, later among the mimosa trees, later amid the thorn, glided beside me once more. I could not see him, but now and then his shadow flicked across my path as some warning I could not quite seize plucked at my brain. The two mighty stallions, night-black and ocean-gray, seemed more primordial forces than tamed beasts, and they had become wildly aroused by signs beyond my ken. Their pace was too fast for so long a run, yet I checked El Stedoro only enough to keep him at Donald's heels. If the race was not stopped by some interference, both great hearts might fail.
Yet reach after reach of the course dropped behind us. We came to the water gap, and as the black set foot on the far bank the gray flew in mid-air. "Good jump!" came Dick's voice, blithe, close to exultant as he checked to turn. He looked small as huge Donald Dhu reared up, wheeling, but graceful and gay, and the pair made one centaur of fantastic proportions.
As he took off, boldly back across the jump as when he had gone forth, I was not as afraid as before. Partly this came of an insistent working of my mind. The bet Dick had asked me to make would have been uncollectible unless I survived the race. It seemed incredible that he could either rig or unrig a deadfall between then and the start. The course itself was not very hazardous, possibly but not readily lending itself to ambuscade; and he knew I would be on guard. It seemed far more likely that the race was intended to reassure me until the moment I could be taken by surprise.
Thus the war would go on. My enemies could choose the time and place to strike or, discovering my impotence, brush me from their path. I had dreamed that this wintry race across the dismal moors was the last trick that Jim and I must stand; then we could go off watch. But the gods had not come down. There was no goddess named Nemesis, ever the stars looked down and never cared; today the skies grayed, and the mists drifted in ghostly clouds. The wind had run with me on the outward run. Now it beat into my face, its low wailing in my ears.
As we began the long turn making toward the gap in the woods, Donald Dhu seemed to be near collapse. With a savage look on his face, Dick struck him at every surge. I was watching this in great chaos of mind when El Stedoro took fright at something and went into his fastest pace, thundering down the track in prodigious bounds. It was as though he shared my sudden horror of that drawn, dark face and contorted form and flailing bat, and was striving to escape their malign presence. I had the impression of trying to check him, but knew I had not exerted great strength. His ears laid back as we swept by, then pricked forward as we rounded the bend in sight of the jump.
It looked different than when I had seen it less than four minutes ago. Its top had a crook in it and not as much light came through the gaps in the boards. El Stedoro was driving toward it full force. He meant to take it in a great proud leap. But when we were fifty yards away, rushing through low heather that crackled like fire—when I still had time to force him off the track into rough ground and over a gully beyond—I saw that the only change was a branch of a larch tree fallen or laid across its top board.
Gazing at it in perplexity and dread, I had not seen a brown serpent in the heather. It had lain close to the ground at first—perhaps I would not have seen it anyway. Hardly his length in front of El Stedoro's flying hooves, the deadfall sprang into view. It was a heavy, rusted wire, held rigid a foot off the ground. I did not know then how it was secured, for there was no time to look; but there seemed to be time for a memory from long ago to flash and burn. Would the little lord with his little stick stoop to a horse coper's trick? Sophia had told me by Calypso's cave he would play it without stooping.
El Stedoro struck the wire and appeared to break like a billow against a reef. He pitched head first and somersaulted on, I trying to fall clear. That try, instinct-driven, largely succeeded. Only one leg was caught under the fallen giant, and the saddle left enough space that it was not crushed or broken. And although stunned and half blind and seeing streaks of fire, I did not lose consciousness for one instant. I dared not let the haze in my brain wipe out my sense, and in the first rallying of my inward forces, I clambered to my feet.
Even so, it was a feeble and useless effort. Down upon me rode Dick, a horrid grin on his face and his racing bat upended and winging. He struck at my head with murderous fury. Its leaded knob missed my crown, but grazed my temple and flayed my cheek. The blow knocked me to my knees. I tried to lift my arms to shield my head, but they hung limp at my side. I tried to rise, but my muscles failed. I perceived the flame of my spirit burning very low, foretelling it would soon expire. The smell of my blood had caused the black stallion to shy away, but Dick was wheeling him back with a masterly hand, the bat raised and ready. I saw him take good aim. If one blow was not enough, he would dismount and give me a sufficiency; it was as though he had told me so. My head would look as though it were crushed by a flying hoof. I could almost hear the little lord telling the people...
Instead I heard sound terrible and real. It was somewhat like a human scream, but louder and invoked by fury beyond measure. I looked up out of blood-filled eyes in time to see El Stedoro rushing upon Dick. He had gained his feet in one raging bound; his ears were laid back, his eyes white, his great teeth bared and agape.
I saw them close in Dick's arm. Jerking him out of the saddle, he shook him in his jaws as a terrier shakes a rat, then flung him with frightful force to the ground. Up he rose then, high and higher, screaming with fury; down lashed the terrible front hooves.
It was not enough to vent his hate, his only answer to a blow against one he greatly loved, and the smell of the blood it had made flow. Again his teeth closed in the shoulder of the now supine form; whirling, he flung it with a great snatch of his neck clear across the track. Running up, he struck and pawed and trampled it until it was a blood-soaked blob, hardly recognizable as a human form. Only then did my voice cut through his screams and balm his maddened brain.
He ran up to me, whinnying. By clutching first the stirrup and then his mane, I pulled myself to my feet. To quiet him more, I stroked his head and then slipped my hand into his bloodied jaws. When the great teeth closed on it gently, I knew that hate had gone out of his heart and he had forgotten what it was, and all he remembered was love, and it was his law.
Although I could not clearly remember seeing him, I had been aware of someone springing up from the bushy gully and running into the woods. It was almost certainly Pike, appointed to the task of raising the wire already bighted about the tree beside which he lay. This part he had done well, with perfect timing, and holding the bighted end in his powerful hands. Beyond doubt his further orders had been to loose the wire from its hitch on a tree trunk across the track and to make away with it. These he had failed to carry out in terror of El Stedoro.
He would certainly report to his master as soon as possible. However, I had little doubt that Lord Tarlton was already started to the scene. The terrible outcries had carried far, unmistakably the screams of a maddened stallion; and although he might still hope for the best, his heart must be cramped in the vise of terror of the worst.