CHAPTER XXV. THE AMAZON HAS A FALL
They were a well-matched pair: he, the perfect type of the elegant and always youthful soldier; she, the most dashing of all the Amazons in the Bois, to quote the words of Edmond Delorme.
Everyone was familiar with the personal appearance of both riders, and recognized them, but until now Mademoiselle de Vermont had always ridden alone, and now to see her accompanied by the gallant General, whose embroidered kepi glittered in the sunlight, was a new spectacle for the gallery.
The people looked at them all the more because Seaman was still prancing, but without unseating his mistress, who held him at any gait or any degree of swiftness that pleased her.
“What a good seat you have!” said Henri.
“That is the first real compliment you ever have paid me. I shall appropriate it immediately, before you have time to retract it,” Zibeline replied.
At the circle of Melezes, Henri proposed to turn to the right, in order to reach Longchamp.
“A flat race! You are joking!” Zibeline cried, turning to the left, toward the road of La Vierge,
“You don’t intend that we shall run a steeplechase, I hope.”
“On the contrary, that is exactly my intention! You are not afraid to try it, are you?”
“Not on my own account, but on yours.”
“You know very well that I never am daunted by any obstacle.”
“Figuratively, yes; but in riding a horse it is another matter.”
“All the more reason why I should not be daunted now,” Zibeline insisted.
When they arrived at the public square of the Cascades, in front of the Auteuil hippodrome, she paused a moment between the two lakes, uncertain which course to take.
It was Thursday, the day of the races. The vast ground, enclosed on all sides by a fence, had been cleared, since early morning, of the boards covering the paths reserved for pedestrians on days when there was no racing; but it was only eleven o’clock, and the place was not yet open to the paying public. Several workmen, in white blouses, went along the track, placing litters beside the obstacles where falls occurred most frequently.
“Do you think the gatekeeper will allow us to enter at this hour?” Zibeline asked.
“I hope not!” Henri replied.
“Well, then, I shall enter without his permission! You are free to declare me the winner. I shall be left to make a walkover, I see!” And setting off at a gallop along the bridle-path, which was obstructed a little farther on by the fence itself, she struck her horse resolutely, and with one audacious bound sprang over the entrance gate. She was now on the steeplechase track.
“You are mad!” cried the General, who, as much concerned for her safety as for his own pride, urged on his mare, and, clearing the fence, landed beside Zibeline on the other side.
“All right!” she cried, in English, dropping her whip, as the starter drops the flag at the beginning of a race.
The die was cast. Henri bent over Aida’s neck, leaning his hands upon her withers in an attitude with which experience had made him familiar, and followed the Amazon, determined to win at all hazards.
Zibeline’s groom, an Englishman, formerly a professional jockey, had already jumped the fence, in spite of the cries of the guard, who ran to prevent him, and coolly galloped after his mistress, keeping at his usual distance.
The first two hedges, which were insignificant obstacles for such horses, were crossed without effort.
“Not the brook, I beg of you!” cried Henri, seeing that, instead of running past the grand-stand, Zibeline apparently intended to attempt this dangerous feat.
“Come on! Seaman would never forgive me if I balk at it!” she cried, riding fearlessly down the slope.
The good horse gathered up his four feet on the brink, took one vigorous leap, appearing for a second to hover over the water; then he fell lightly on the other side of the stream, with a seesaw movement, to which the intrepid Amazon accommodated herself by leaning far back. The rebound threw her forward a little, but she straightened herself quickly and went on.
The General, who had slackened his pace that he might not interfere with her leap, gave vent to a sigh of relief. He pressed Aida’s flanks firmly, and the big Irish mare jumped after her competitor, with the majestic dignity of her race.
Reassured by the ‘savoir-faire’ of his companion, the former winner of the military steeplechase felt revive within himself all his ardor for the conflict, and he hastened to make up the distance he had lost.
The two horses, now on the west side of the racetrack, were almost neck-and-neck, and it would have been difficult to prognosticate which had the better chance of victory. Zibeline’s light weight gave Seaman the advantage, but Aida gained a little ground every time she leaped an obstacle; so that, after passing the hurdles and the third hedge, the champions arrived simultaneously at the summit of the hill, from which point the track extends in a straight line, parallel with the Allee des Fortifications.
Feeling himself urged on still harder, the English horse began to lay back his ears and pull so violently on the rein that his rider had all she could do to hold him, and lacked sufficient strength to direct his course. Seeing Zibeline’s danger, Henri hastened to slacken his horse’s pace, but it was too late: the almost perpendicular declivity of the other side of the hill added fresh impetus to the ungovernable rush of Seaman, who suddenly became wild and reckless.
The situation was all the more critical for the reason that the next obstacle was a brook, only two metres wide, but of which the passage was obstructed on the farther side of the track by heavy beams, laid one on top of another, solidly riveted and measuring one metre and ten millimetres from the base to the summit. The excited horse charged obliquely toward this obstruction with all his might. Paying no more attention to the pressure upon his bit, he rose in the air, but as he had not given himself sufficient time to take plenty of room for the leap, his hoofs struck violently against the top beam, the force of resistance of which threw him over on one side; his hindquarters turned in the air, and he fell in a heap on the other side of the obstacle, sending up a great splash of water as he went into the brook.
Had Zibeline been crushed by the weight of the horse in this terrible fall, or, not having been able to free herself from him, had she been drowned under him? Henri uttered a hoarse cry, struck his spurs into the sides of his mare, crossed the brook breathlessly, stopping on the other side as soon as he could control his horse’s pace; then, rushing back, he leaped to the ground to save the poor girl, if there was still time to do so.
Zibeline lay inanimate on the grass, her face lying against the earth. By a lucky chance, the horse had fallen on his right side, so that his rider’s limbs and skirt had not been caught. Unhorsed by the violence of the shock, Zibeline had gone over the animal’s head and fallen on the other side of the brook. Her Amazon hat, so glossy when she had set out, was now crushed, and her gloves were torn and soiled with mud; which indicated that she had fallen on her head and her hands.
Henri knelt beside her, passed his arm around her inert and charming body, and drew her tenderly toward him. Her eyes were half-open and dull, her lips pale; her nose, the nostrils of which were usually well dilated, had a pinched look; and a deadly pallor covered that face which only a moment before had been so rosy and smiling.
These signs were the forerunners of death, which the officer had recognized so many times on the battlefield. But those stricken ones had at least been men, devoting themselves to the risks of warfare; while in the presence of this young girl lying before him, looking upon this victim of a reckless audacity to which he felt he had lent himself too readily, the whole responsibility for the accident seemed to him to rest upon his own shoulders, and a poignant remorse tore his heart.
He removed her cravat, unhooked her bodice, laid his ear against her breast, from which an oppressed breathing still arose.
Two laborers hurried to open the gate and soon arrived at the spot with a litter, guided by the groom, whose horse had refused to jump the brook, and who since then had followed the race on foot outside the track. While the General placed Zibeline on the litter, the groom took Aida by the bridle, and the sad procession made its way slowly toward the enclosure surrounding the weighing-stand.
As for Seaman, half submerged in the stream, and with an incurable fracture of the leg, nothing was left to do for the poor animal but to kill him.