And what about the agent of Mycroft who had died in our presence? This bizarre occurrence combined with the invasion of our quarters had been momentarily jettisoned it would seem, though I knew Holmes's manner too well not to accept the fact that the two cases had connective tissue. The association of all this with one John H. Watson in Surrey was remote indeed. But if Sherlock Holmes's nostrils had quivered, there was a scent in the air.
My musings were suddenly interrupted with an energizing thought. My activities on this night had just begun, and I hastened to my feet to don my riding habit, on loan, to be ready for the action when it came.
It did come, finally, with a rush and a roar of sound that snapped me awake and out of the chair that I had been slumbering in. There were indistinguishable shouts transformed to alarms by their tone of anguish and terror. There was a smell in the air and, for a ridiculous moment, I thought it might be Holmes's pipe. But no, it was not the scent of his shag, but there was smoke. As I made for the stairs, it became more apparent. My God! It came from a conflagration!
Darting out the side entrance by the porte cochere, it being the most readily at hand, I saw flames lighting up the night sky. They were at or adjacent to the horses' barns wherein the racers were stabled. Despite a tumult of sound and running footsteps, I was completely alone. Every man jack on the place was at the fire, desperately trying to save the priceless thoroughbreds.
I made an instinctive move to rush to join the rescuers, but Holmes's instructions came to mind in the nick of time, and I bolted to the stalls of the riding horses, somewhat removed from the center of activity. There were whinnies and neighs as I made my way to Fandango, for the horses, sensitive to the aura of excitement, nay panic, were moving nervously in their places. Fortunately the wind was such that the smell of the fire had not reached them, or they might have been unmanageable. My presence seemed to have a calming effect on the chestnut mare, and I led her from her stall and then secured the reins of her neighbor.
When I mounted Fandango, the tenseness of the moment lent springs to my legs. With the other animal in tow, I urged the mare into motion. The moment we cleared the barn door, Fandango spied the not-so-distant flames. I was urging her in a direction that would take us around the country mansion, and she cooperated in a manner that jarred my back teeth. We swept by the house at a full gallop and thundered down the main road leading from Mayswood. I had all I could do to hang onto the reins of our companion animal, who was in just as much of a hurry as my mount.
I dropped my curb and was riding to the snaffle, and that was not true in a moment, for in desperation I dropped my bridle entirely and gripped the pommel of the saddle with one hand. For no reason, the name of the other horse flashed through my mind. "Mystique" she had been referred to. A suitable mount for Holmes, but Mother of Heaven, would I ever reach him!
Out of the night loomed a complication. The white-picket horse-gate was closed across the driveway to Mayswood as it would be in the night hours. The gallant Fandango, flanked by Mystique, was bearing down on the obstacle at a speed that defied stopping in time, nor were there reins in my hand to try it or the strength in my arms to do it if they had been there.
The gate, a low affair, assumed the proportions of a Grand National hurdle as we thundered towards it. Its white planking, touched by a spring moon that suddenly sailed free of high clouds, assumed a ghostly glow. To think that I, dedicated to the saving of life, was to end my days with a snapped neck or speared by a broken plank! Little did my dear, departed mother picture my emulating one of the ill-fated riders of that desperate charge in the Crimea!
The gate was upon us. Still gripping the saddle with one hand and Mystique's reins with the other, I instinctively leaned forward as I had seen huntsmen do when clearing a stone wall in pursuit of the elusive fox. Then the thunder of hoofs ceased, and for a glorious moment I had the feeling of flying, soaring through the air as if in fulfillment of man's age-old dream. I was suspended in a nothingness as those two splendid horses with their muscles uncoiled, their legs outstretched, cleared the barrier in unison. Oh, it must have made a wondrous sight—which I never saw, for my eyes were screwed tightly shut and I was just hanging on for dear life without even time for a fervent prayer.
The moment of weightlessness passed with a crash as we made contact with the road beyond the gate. I was jarred to my heels and lost a stirrup, coming within an ace of losing my seat as well. Then, by some miracle, the loose iron snapped back over the toe of my riding boot and I had the support of two legs, which allowed me to regain a portion of my balance.
As though in relief at clearing the obstacle, Fandango slackened her headlong rush and I was able to loosen my death-hold on the saddle and snatch at her flying reins. Leaning back in the saddle with the reins as support, I succeeded in slowing my mount and Mystique as well even further, and it was then that I heard the call. "Watson! Over here!"
I saw Holmes in the semidarkness waving a white handkerchief by the side of the road. I was so startled at hearing his voice, so amazed at even being alive, that a surge of unknown strength welled up within me. My left arm, which a moment ago had threatened to fall off, swung the reins to the right and I leaned in that direction as well, throwing the head, neck, and withers of Fandango against Mystique and somehow bringing both animals to a skidding, sliding halt right where Sherlock Holmes stood.
The great sleuth grabbed Mystique's reins as I let them drop. Securing the animal by the bit, he anchored Fandango in the same manner, all the time looking upward at me in complete amazement. The horses were sucking in air in great breaths and their forequarters were lathered a foamy white. Somehow my riding bowler was still on my head, though askew. I was as drenched and as breathless as the steeds but managed to keep my backbone straight. Had I sagged a smidgen, I would have fallen headlong from the saddle like a sack of grain. The moment was tense and the situation critical, but Holmes stole time to gaze at me as though unsuspected vistas had suddenly been revealed to him. I have always contended that my intimate friend had the rare ability to seize a situation at a glance, to read the book of a happening in a fleeting second, but this time his instant appraisal deserted him.
"Watson, good fellow, were it possible for me to be rendered speechless, I'd be as mute as an oyster! That gate is fully five pegs high and I could but think, as you came upon it, of a Cossack in full flight. And to clear it with not one horse but with two, in perfect form! If Deets were to give you a mount, I'd place my wager on your colors, dear friend."
I was goggle-eyed, but the sincere conviction of Holmes's words and the light in his eyes kept me from swaying. I could not and would not destroy an image nurtured, however incorrectly, in the mind of the kindest man I have ever known. I made a weak half-gesture towards the breeding farm in the distance. "Holmes, Mayswood is afire."