A few farmers, bringing in their produce from their gardens, gazed with keen interest at the beautiful animal and her gallant rider. The hour was indeed early for such a fine gentleman to be about.
Soon the rough paving of the town was left behind; the sun, who at first had hidden his newly-awakened glory behind a bank of clouds, now burnt his way through these heavy veils, and threw across the morning sky living flames of rose, of orange, and of vivid gold and tipped the towers and spires of distant Paris with innumerable tongues of fire.
Far away the clock of Notre Dame tolled the hour of five. Gaston cursed inwardly. It was later than he thought, later than he had intended to make a start. That business of the duel had kept him up longer than usual and he had felt lazy and tired in the morning. Now he would have to make top speed, and he did not feel as alert, nor so well prepared for the fatigues of a long day's ride, as he would have been two years ago, before the enervating dissipations of court life at Versailles had undermined the activity of his youth.
Fortunately the ground was soft and dry, the air keen and pure, and Gaston spurred his horse to a canter across the fields.
CHAPTER XXXIII
THE RIDE
It is one hundred and fifty leagues from Versailles to the harbour of Le Havre as the crow flies, one hundred and eighty most like by road and across fields.
Gaston had twelve hours in which to cover the ground, a good horse, and the enthusiasm born of empty pockets when two and a half million livres loom temptingly at the end of the journey.
The fields, after the corn harvest, were excellent for a gallop, yielding just sufficiently to the mare's hoofs to give her a pleasant foothold, but not in any way spongy, with good stubble to give resistance and the sandy soil below to prevent the slightest jar. Riding under such conditions, in the cool hours of the morning, was distinctly pleasant.
Gaston reached Nantes soon after seven, having covered close on forty leagues of his journey without unduly tiring Belle Amie. He was a good rider and knew how to ease her, and there was Arab blood in her. She made light of the work, and enjoyed her gallops, being of the breed that never shows fatigue, own daughter to Jedran who had carried Maurice de Saxe on his famous ride from Paris to Saargemund, three hundred leagues in eighteen hours.