“She has never-r-r been r-r-ridden befor-r-e, Miss Veter-r-inar-r-y, that’s all zat is ze matter wiz her-r-r. Why do you not have a tr-r-y?”
“Why not indeed? I had a bucking waler at home once, which was miles worse than that mare. Tell the men to stand clear, and tell the one holding her to turn her head from me. I don’t want her broadside on.”
Final and terrific betting took place as the men heard their mistress issue the last orders and rushed back to their places; then complete silence fell as Helen walked towards the mare, then bent to adjust a strap on her riding-boot. She looked back suddenly at Zarah and caught the expression of her face, and bent and adjusted yet again the strap upon her boot.
She could not interpret the Arabian’s mocking smile, but she understood, in a lightning flash of intuition, that she was to uphold her country’s reputation for riding in the eyes of the finest horsemen in the world, and, great horsewoman that she was, became suddenly lost to everything outside a fierce determination to do her country credit.
“My last goat to thy new shoes,” a groom of the kennels whispered feverishly to his neighbour at the sight of Helen’s laughing face as she backed a yard or so; he nearly broke the neighbour’s arm in the terrific grip he gave it when Helen ran, caught the mane, vaulted into the saddle, and throwing her left leg over the beautiful black head, slipped to the ground on the off-side just before the beast reared with a scream.
“Wah! wah!” yelled the men. “Wah! wah!” and rose to their feet and fought each other in their great excitement.
“Allah gives us the victory!” yelled a groom of the stables. “If she cannot even sit a horse, how can she ride? Hasten, O my brother, with a cushion upon which this white woman may rest safely upon the earth!”
“‘Advice given in the midst of a crowd is loathsome,’” quoted brother, his hand upon his knife, which he forgot to draw as he watched Helen. She stood talking to the mare; she beckoned a child with a tray of dates, and took a handful and held them out. The mare stretched her beautiful head and sniffed at them, then nibbled them, showing the red depths of her nostrils; then, when Helen gave a pull at the saddle, lashed out and flung herself sideways.
“I thought so,” said Helen.