And in that moment Barnabas casts off the numbness, and
his brain clears again.
"Hold on, Dick!" he cries.
"Can't Bev,--I--I'm done. Tried my best--but--I--" Barnabas reaches
out suddenly--but is too far off--the Viscount lurches forward,
loses his stirrups, sways--and "Moonraker" gallops--riderless. But
help is at hand, for Barnabas sees divers rustic onlookers who run
forward to lift the Viscount's inanimate form. Therefore he turns
him back to the race, and bends all his energies upon this, the last
and grimmest part of the struggle; as for "The Terror," he vents a
snort of joyful defiance, for now he is galloping again in full view
of Sir Mortimer Carnaby's foam-flecked gray.
And now--it's hey! for the rush and tear of wind through the hair!
for the muffled thunder of galloping hoofs! for the long, racing
stride, the creak of leather! Hey! for the sob and pant and strain
of the conflict!
Inch by inch the great, black horse creeps up, but Carnaby sees him
coming, and the gray leaps forward under his goading heels,--is up
level with Slingsby and the Marquis,--but with "The Terror" always
close behind.
Over a hedge,--across a ditch,--and down a slope they race together,
--knees in, heads low,--to where, at the bottom, is a wall.
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