At last the wire I struck at bent outward further, and when I next brought the boot heel down there was a metallic ringing as one strand parted, and I shouted in breathless triumph, knowing the other must follow. The fire was close behind the pent-up herd now, and I guessed that very shortly my life would depend on my horse's speed. Just then Steel dashed up, mounted, shouting: "Into the saddle with you. The fence is going!"
I saw him unhitch my horse's bridle and struggle to hold the beast ready between himself and me, but I meant to make quite certain of my part, so I brought the boot heel down thrice again. Then I leaped backward, clutched at the bridle, and scrambled to the saddle as a black mass rolled out of the gap where the wire flew back. I remember desperately endeavoring to head the horse clear of it along the fence, and wondering how many of the cattle would fall over the remaining wires and be crushed before their carcasses formed a causeway for the rest; but the horse was past all guidance; and now that the fence had lost its continuity more fathoms of it went down and the dusky mass poured over it. Then something struck me with a heavy shock, the horse stumbled as I slipped my feet out of the stirrups, and we went down together. I saw nothing further, though I could feel the earth tremble beneath me; then this sensation faded, and I was conscious of only a numbing pain beneath my neck and my left arm causing me agony. After this there followed a space of empty blackness.
When I partly recovered my faculties the pain was less intense, though my left arm, which was tied to my side, felt hot and heavy, and the jolting motion convinced me that I lay in the bottom of a wagon.
"Did you get the stock clear?" I gasped, striving to raise my head from the hay truss in which it was almost buried; and somebody who stooped down held a bottle to my lips.
"Don't you tell him," a subdued voice said, and the man, who I think was Steel, came near choking me as he poured more spirit than I could swallow down my throat and also down my neck.
"That's all right. Don't worry. We're mighty thankful we got you," he said.
Then the empty blackness closed in on me again, and I lay still, wondering whether I were dead and buried, and if so, why the pricking between shoulder and breast should continue so pitilessly; until that ceased in turn, and I had a hazy idea that someone was carrying me through an interminable cavern; after which there succeeded complete oblivion.
CHAPTER VII
A BITTER AWAKENING
The first day on which my attendants would treat me as a rational being was a memorable one to me. It must have been late in the morning when I opened my eyes, for the sun had risen above the level of the open window, and I lay still blinking out across the prairie with, at first, a curious satisfaction. I had cheated death and been called back out of the darkness to sunlight and life, it seemed. Then I began to remember, and the pain in the arm bound fast to my side helped to remind me that life implied a struggle. Raising my head, I noticed that there had been changes made in my room, and a young woman standing by the window frowned at me.