As Connie passed the judges’ stand she was well up with the tail-riders and gaining steadily. Her face was pale and tense. A smear of red showed on her arm, and a little stream of blood trickled down her forehead from the wound invisible in the thickness of her hair.
The crowd became suddenly quiet as Connie thundered past—a silent tribute to her glorious pluck. But as she crept toward her original position they roared their applause. Pegasus was showing an endurance and speed that had never been equalled in all of that district. As they turned to come down the home-stretch Connie was a good fifty yards behind the leaders. Lafonte’s wiry cayuse was again in the lead by a few feet.
The shock and strain were beginning to tell on Connie. She leaned forward and in a broken, trembling voice she cried: “Oh, Peggy! Win, Peggy! Please! Please! I don’t want to lose! I’ve got to win! Go! Go!” She was sobbing hysterically now, and her small hands were patting the horse’s neck.
Pegasus had never heard that tone of supplication in the sweet voice of his mistress before. Nobly he responded to the call. She felt his body lower under her as he set himself to the herculean task of overcoming his rival’s enormous lead.
Lafonte was using the whip. Paul John, hanging so persistently to his flank, angered him. They thundered across the corduroy, and at the sound of Pegasus’s hoofs on the cedar poles Lafonte turned to glance behind. A look of astonishment crossed his face as he saw the golden-haired rider so close. With a curse he struck his horse a brutal blow that caused the animal to lose its stride momentarily and fall back in line with Paul John.
Slowly, but surely, Connie’s spotted cayuse was closing the gap between himself and the two leaders, sweeping along at a terrific pace, his body and limbs moving with the rhythmic grace of a thoroughbred. Connie was leaning so low that the heavy white mane of her horse was brushing her face. Her hair was streaming in the wind like fine-spun gold. The party in the judges’ stand rushed to the railing, leaned anxiously forward to get a glimpse of the running horses as they turned the corner, and cheered lustily as the three riders thundered over the small bridge and came toward the finishing line. Connie was at Lafonte’s flank now.
Pegasus’s remarkable speed fanned the spectators’ excitement to a fever heat. Andy had done so much shouting that his voice was reduced to a whisper. Standing on the top rail, his arms waving, he was shouting huskily, “Come on, Connie! Come on, Connie!”
Donald’s dark eyes were glowing as he watched the slender figure clinging to the flying horse’s bare back. “What a pity if she loses,” he said under his breath. Leaping to the rail, he joined in the shouts of encouragement to the straining Pegasus.
With one hundred yards to go, Connie uttered one last appeal to her flying steed. Above the drumming of hoofs the spectators heard her voice ring in passionate entreaty. “Now, Peg! Now! Go! Go!”
With nostrils distended, his breath coming in choking gasps, his eyes bulging, and the voice of his adored mistress ringing in his ears, the gallant animal with a burst of speed that made the onlookers marvel, ranged himself alongside his labouring rivals.