There was a bare twenty minutes before the ninth race. Jack, the pacific, plunging down to the basement, abruptly became the despot of the stables. He stripped the roan of the cumbrous saddle, patted him, divested himself of shoes and doublet, bound the broad blue sash of the maharaja round his waist, fastened Miriam’s rose over his heart, vaulted at a bound astride the great horse, and was ready for the ring five minutes ahead of the bell.
Some of the best horses and riders in the world faced the starter—seven of them. The champions of England and of Australia; a black from Morocco, carrying a Berber prince as black as he; a famous Chinese mare bestridden by a mandarin’s daughter; a wiry brute from Russia backed by a Cossack. But where was Miriam?
Jack’s heart sank. Without her his presence was a farce. True, honor bound him to defeat her if he could; but he believed her Arab was unbeatable. The riders took their places, while a murmur of admiration from tens of thousands of lips created a soft but thunderous vibration in the enclosed space. The starter’s arm was uplifted!
“Miriam, my soul, where art thou?” Had Jack spoken aloud? At all events, as if in response to a summons, and to Jack’s unspeakable delight and agitation, out she paced, quietly, from behind the barrier and moved to a place directly at his side!
She gave no sign, however, of recognizing his presence. She tossed back over her shoulder a heavy strand of her hair, leaned forward and whispered in her stallion’s ear, then straightened her limbs and lifted her body, alert with life and vigor. At the second signal she crouched forward over the withers and threw up one arm, keen for the signal. It came—the race was on!
Jack, with a hoarse shout of love and war, made himself one creature with the roan, and they hurled forward. His blood thundered in his veins, the frenzy of his pulse was answered by the leap of his steed. They flew forward smoothly, and the ground swept beneath them like the fleeting of a cataract. Hippomenes and Atalanta—a memory of that, read in a shadowy corner of his father’s library, sped through Jack’s mind. Triumphant power, mingled with the exquisite sense of Miriam’s companionship, made him greater than himself. He knew, without looking, that she was still at his side, riding with elastic ease. What a girl! What a rider! What a queen of heart and soul, whom he with heart and soul was striving to overcome!
The first circuit was a free course; after that, obstacle succeeded obstacle, each of increasing difficulty. Few would survive the finish! The great ring seemed to speed round like the rush of a whirlpool. The riders were trying out one another’s powers. As yet there was little change in their relative positions. With the first obstacle, foresight and strategy began to match themselves against mere swiftness.
Jack suddenly felt that Miriam had changed her place, but at the jump a waft of her hair touched his cheek and something like a great white bird swept past him; she alighted just ahead of him, closely followed by the mandarin’s daughter on her gray. The two girls had outmaneuvered him.
Rapid vicissitudes followed. At the third fence the Englishman collided in mid air with the Berber and both came down in a headlong ruin. As Jack swung into the fourth circuit a tall, white fence with a ditch beyond it rose before him; some one was at his shoulder; but Miriam and the Chinese girl had already passed it. The roan leaped a thought too soon, and his hind feet failed to reach the edge of the ditch; in regaining it he was passed by the Cossack, with the Australian at his heels. Jack was last in the race!
But the roan was fresh as ever, and two circuits of the course remained. Jack, moreover, knew by a sixth sense that he and Miriam would finish together, with the rest nowhere. A glimpse of Miriam flashed before him, leading the field by a scant head, her hair streaming out like a sable oriflamme to lead him on. Like a bolt shot by Hercules, the roan answered his call. The Cossack and the hardy Australian fell to the rear, but Jack and the former swung around the corner nearly abreast; the two girls were close in front; all four would take the final jump almost together!