Part 51 (1/2)
Cautious, indeed,--with that giant of Pytchley fame running neck to neck by him; cautious,--with two-thirds of the course unrun, and all the yawners yet to come; cautious,--with the blood of Forest King las.h.i.+ng to boiling heat, and the wondrous greyhound stride stretching out faster and faster beneath him, ready at a touch to break away and take the lead: but he would be reckless enough by-and-by; reckless, as his nature was, under the indolent serenity of habit.
Two more fences came, laced high and stiff with the s.h.i.+re thorn, and with scarce twenty feet between them, the heavy ploughed land leading to them, clotted, and black, and hard, with the fresh earthy scent steaming up as the hoofs struck the clods with a dull thunder. Pas de Charge rose to the first: distressed too early, his hind feet caught in the thorn, and he came down rolling clear of his rider; Montacute picked him up with true science, but the day was lost to the Heavy Cavalry men. Forest King went in and out over both like a bird, and led for the first time; the chestnut was not to be beat at fencing, and ran even with him; Wild Geranium flew still as fleet as a deer, true to her s.e.x, she would not bear rivalry; but little Grafton, though he rode like a professional, was but a young one, and went too wildly--her spirit wanted cooler curb.
And now only, Cecil loosened the King to his full will and his full speed. Now only, the beautiful Arab head was stretched like a racer's in the run-in for the Derby, and the grand stride swept out till the hoofs seemed never to touch the dark earth they skimmed over; neither whip nor spur was needed, Bertie had only to leave the gallant temper and the generous fire that were roused in their might to go their way, and hold their own. His hands were low; his head was a little back; his face very calm; the eyes only had a daring, eager, resolute will lighting in them; Brixworth lay before him. He knew well what Forest King could do; but he did not know how great the chestnut Regent's powers might be.
The water gleamed before them, brown and swollen, and deepened with the meltings of winter snows a month before; the brook that has brought so many to grief over its famous banks, since cavaliers leapt it with their falcon on their wrist, or the mellow note of the horn rang over the woods in the hunting days of Stuart reigns. They knew it well, that long dark line, skimmering there in the sunlight, the test that all must pa.s.s who go in for the Soldiers' Blue Ribbon. Forest King scented water, and went on with his ears pointed, and his greyhound stride lengthening, quickening, gathering up all its force and its impetus for the leap that was before--then like the rise and the swoop of the heron he spanned the water, and, landing clear, launched forward with the lunge of a spear darted through air. Brixworth was pa.s.sed--the Scarlet and White, a mere gleam of bright colour, a mere speck in the landscape, to the breathless crowds in the stand, sped on over the brown and level gra.s.sland; two and a quarter miles done in four minutes and twenty seconds. Bay Regent was scarcely behind him; the chestnut abhorred the water, but a finer trained hunter was never sent over the s.h.i.+res, and Jimmy Delmar rode like Grimshaw himself. The giant took the leap in magnificent style, and thundered on neck and neck with the ”Guards' crack.” The Irish mare followed, and, with miraculous gameness, landed safely; but her hind-legs slipped on the bank, a moment was lost, and ”Baby” Grafton scarce knew enough to recover it, though he scoured on nothing daunted.
Pas de Charge, much behind, refused the yawner; his strength was not more than his courage, but both had been strained too severely at first.
Montacute struck the spurs into him with a savage blow over the head; the madness was its own punishment; the poor brute rose blindly to the jump, and missed the bank with a reel and a crash; Sir Eyre was hurled out into the brook, and the hope of the Heavies lay there with his breast and fore-legs resting on the ground, his hind-quarters in the water, and his back broken. Pas de Charge would never again see the starting-flag waved, or hear the music of the hounds, or feel the gallant life throb and glow through him at the rallying notes of the horn. His race was run.
Not knowing, or looking, or heeding what happened behind, the trio tore on over the meadow and the ploughed; the two favourites neck by neck, the game little mare hopelessly behind through that one fatal moment over Brixworth. The turning-flags were pa.s.sed; from the crowds on the course a great hoa.r.s.e roar came louder and louder, and the shouts rang, changing every second, ”Forest King wins,” ”Bay Regent wins,” ”Scarlet and White's ahead,” ”Violet's up with him,” ”Violet's past him,”
”Scarlet recovers,” ”Scarlet beats,” ”A cracker on the King,” ”Ten to one on the Regent,” ”Guards are over the fence first,” ”Guards are winning,” ”Guards are losing,” ”Guards are beat!!”
Were they?
As the shout rose, Cecil's left stirrup leather snapped and gave way; at the pace they were going most men, ay, and good riders too, would have been hurled out of their saddle by the shock; he scarcely swerved; a moment to ease the King and to recover his equilibrium, then he took the pace up again as though nothing had changed. And his comrades of the Household, when they saw this through their race-gla.s.ses, broke through their serenity and burst into a cheer that echoed over the gra.s.slands and the coppices like a clarion, the grand rich voice of the Seraph leading foremost and loudest--a cheer that rolled mellow and triumphant down the cold bright air like the blast of trumpets, and thrilled on Bertie's ear where he came down the course a mile away. It made his heart beat quicker with a victorious headlong delight, as his knees pressed closer into Forest King's flanks, and, half stirrupless like the Arabs, he thundered forward to the greatest riding feat of his life. His face was very calm still, but his blood was in tumult, the delirium of pace had got on him, a minute of life like this was worth a year, and he knew that he would win or die for it, as the land seemed to fly like a black sheet under him, and, in that killing speed, fence and hedge and double and water all went by him like a dream, whirling underneath him as the grey stretches, stomach to earth, over the level, and rose to leap after leap.
For that instant's pause, when the stirrup broke, threatened to lose him the race.
He was more than a length behind the Regent, whose hoofs as they dashed the ground up sounded like thunder, and for whose herculean strength the plough has no terrors; it was more than the lead to keep now, there was ground to cover, and the King was losing like Wild Geranium. Cecil felt drunk with that strong, keen, west wind that blew so strongly in his teeth, a pa.s.sionate excitation was in him, every breath of winter air that rushed in its bracing currents round him seemed to lash him like a stripe--the Household to look on and see him beaten!
Certain wild blood that lay latent in Cecil under the tranquil gentleness of temper and of custom, woke, and had the mastery; he set his teeth hard, and his hands clenched like steel on the bridle. ”Oh! my beauty, my beauty,” he cried, all unconsciously half aloud as they clear the thirty-sixth fence; ”kill me if you like, but don't _fail_ me!”
As though Forest King heard the prayer and answered it with all his hero's heart, the splendid form launched faster out, the stretching stride stretched farther yet with lightning spontaneity, every fibre strained, every nerve struggled; with a magnificent bound like an antelope the grey recovered the ground he had lost, and pa.s.sed Bay Regent by a quarter-length. It was a neck-to-neck race once more, across the three meadows with the last and lower fences that were between them and the final leap of all; that ditch of artificial water with the towering double hedge of oak rails and of blackthorn that was reared black and grim and well-nigh hopeless just in front of the Grand Stand.
A roar like the roar of the sea broke up from the thronged course as the crowd hung breathless on the even race; ten thousand shouts rang as thrice ten thousand eyes watched the closing contest, as superb a sight as the s.h.i.+res ever saw, while the two ran together, the gigantic chestnut, with every ma.s.sive sinew swelled and strained to tension, side by side with the marvellous grace, the s.h.i.+ning flanks, and the Arabian-like head of the Guards' horse.
Louder and wilder the shrieked tumult rose: ”The Chestnut beats!” ”The Grey beats!” ”Scarlet's ahead!” ”Bay Regent's caught him!” ”Violet's winning, Violet's winning!” ”The King's neck by neck!” ”The King's beating!” ”The Guards will get it!” ”The Guards' crack has it!” ”Not yet, not yet!” ”Violet will thrash him at the jump!” ”Now for it!” ”The Guards, the Guards, the Guards!” ”Scarlet will win!” ”The King has the finis.h.!.+” ”No, no, no, NO!”
Sent along at a pace that Epsom flat never saw eclipsed, sweeping by the Grand Stand like the flash of electric flame, they ran side to side one moment more, their foam flung on each other's withers, their breath hot in each other's nostrils, while the dark earth flew beneath their stride. The blackthorn was in front behind five bars of solid oak, the water yawning on its farther side, black and deep, and fenced, twelve feet wide if it were an inch, with the same thorn wall beyond it! a leap no horse should have been given, no steward should have set. Cecil pressed his knees closer and closer, and worked the gallant hero for the test; the surging roar of the throng, though so close, was dull on his ear; he heard nothing, knew nothing, saw nothing but that lean chestnut head beside him, the dull thud on the turf of the flying gallop, and the black wall that reared in his face. Forest King had done so much, could he have stay and strength for this?
Cecil's hands clenched unconsciously on the bridle, and his face was very pale--pale with excitation--as his foot where the stirrup was broken crushed closer and harder against the grey's flanks.
”Oh, my darling, my beauty--_now_!”
One touch of the spur--the first--and Forest King rose at the leap, all the life and power there were in him gathered for one superhuman and crowning effort; a flash of time, not half a second in duration, and he was lifted in the air higher, and higher, and higher in the cold, fresh, wild winter wind; stakes and rails, and thorn and water lay beneath him black and gaunt and shapeless, yawning like a grave; one bound, even in mid air, one last convulsive impulse of the gathered limbs, and Forest King was over!
And as he galloped up the straight run-in, he was alone.
Bay Regent had refused the leap.
As the grey swept to the judge's chair, the air was rent with deafening cheers that seemed to reel like drunken shouts from the mult.i.tude. ”The Guards win, the Guards win;” and when his rider pulled up at the distance with the full sun s.h.i.+ning on the scarlet and white, with the gold glisten of the embroidered ”Coeur Vaillant se fait Royaume,”
Forest King stood in all his glory, winner of the Soldier's Blue Ribbon, by a feat without its parallel in all the annals of the Gold Vase.
Over there in England, you know, sir, pipe-clay is the deuce-and-all; you've always got to have the stock on, and look as stiff as a stake, or it's all up with you; you're that tormented about little things that you get riled and kick the traces before the great 'uns come to try you.
There's a lot of lads would be game as game could be in battle, ay, and good lads to boot, doing their duty right as a trivet when it came to anything like war, that are clean druv' out of the service in time o'
peace, along with all them petty persecutions that worry a man's skin like mosquito-bites. Now here they know that, and Lord! what soldiers they do make through knowing of it! It's tight enough and stern enough in big things; martial law sharp enough, and obedience to the letter all through the campaigning; but that don't grate on a fellow; if he's worth his salt he's sure to understand that he must move like clockwork in a fight, and that he's to go to h.e.l.l at double-quick march, and mute as a mouse, if his officers see fit to send him. _That's_ all right, but they don't fidget you here about the little fal-lals; you may stick your pipe in your mouth, you may have your lark, you may do as you like, you may spend your _decompte_ how you choose, you may settle your little duel as you will, you may shout and sing and jump and riot on the march, so long as you _march on_; you may lounge about half dressed in any style as suits you best, so long as you're up to time when the trumpets sound for you; and that's what a man likes. He's ready to be a machine when the machine's wanted in working trim, but when it's run off the line and the steam all let off, he do like to oil his own wheels, and lie a bit in the sun at his fancy. There aren't better stuff to make soldiers out of nowhere than Englishmen, G.o.d bless 'em, but they're badgered, they're horribly badgered, and that's why the service don't take over there, let alone the way the country grudge 'em every bit of pay. In England you go in the ranks--well, they all just tell you you're a blackguard, and there's the lash, and you'd better behave yourself or you'll get it hot and hot; they take for granted you're a bad lot or you wouldn't be there, and in course you're riled and go to the bad according, seeing that it's what's expected of you. Here, contrariwise, you come in the ranks and get a welcome, and feel that it just rests with yourself whether you won't be a fine fellow or not; and just along of feelin' that you're p.r.i.c.ked to show the best metal you're made on, and not to let n.o.body else beat you out of the race like. Ah! it makes a wonderful difference to a fellow--a wonderful difference--whether the service he's come into look at him as a scamp that never will be nothin'