“When we arrived at the Fairleys’ house, there was a to-do, as you may imagine. He was carried upstairs, while I went for the doctor, taking a groom with me, because humans are so stupid that they only understand each other. I taught that groom a thing or two about what a horse can do in the way of speed that I don’t believe he has ever forgotten.”
“Did you do better than 1.35½?” inquired the Kentuckian; but Reveille paid no heed to the question.
“After that sprint I had about the dullest month of my life, standing doing nothing in the Fairleys’ stable, while nearly dying of anxiety and regret. The only thing of the slightest interest in all that time occurred the day after our attempted runaway, when Mr. Lewis came down to the stable, and gave orders about having the big grey sent after him. He wasn’t a bit in a sweet temper—that I could see; and though I overheard one of the grooms say that he was to come back later, as soon as the nurse and doctors were out of the house, the big grey thought otherwise, and predicted that we should never see each other again. Our parting was truly touching, and put tears in the filly’s eyes.
“‘Friends,’ said Solitaire, ‘I don’t think he will ever forgive me, and I suppose I am in for a lot of brutality from him; but I am not sorry. If you ever give me another thought please say to yourself: “He did his best to save a woman from having her life made one long night-mare by a cruel master.”’
“Nothing much happened in the weeks my Major was housed, with the exception of one development that had for me an extremely informing and delightful quality. One day, about a month after our cropper, Felicia came down to the stable, and without so much as a look or a word for Miss Gaiety, came straight into my stall, flung her arms about my neck, and laid her soft cheek caressingly against it, for some moments. Then she kissed me on the nose very tenderly, and offered me what I thought were some little white stones. I had never tasted sugar before, and nothing but her repeated tempting and urging persuaded me to keep the lumps in my mouth long enough to get the taste on my tongue. (I have to confess that since then I have developed a strong liking for all forms of sweetmeats.) What is more, she came down every day after that, and sometimes twice a day, to caress and feed me. There was no doubt about it, that for some reason she had become extraordinarily fond of me!
“It is awfully hard in this world to know what will turn out the best thing. As a matter of fact, the tumble off my back was about the luckiest accident that ever befell my Major; for it broke open the old wound, and as the local doctors did not have six hundred other injured men under them, they could give it proper attention, which the hospital surgeons had never been able to do. One of them extracted all the pieces of bone, set the arm, and then put it in a plaster jacket, which ought to have healed it in good shape very quickly. But for some reason it didn’t. In fact, I became very much alarmed over the length of my Major’s convalescence, till one day I overheard one of the stablemen say:
“‘Lor’! He won’t get well no too fast, with Miss Felicia to fluff his pillers, an’ run his erran’s, an’ play to him, an’ read aloud to him, an’ him got nothin’ to do but just lay back easy an’ look at her.’
“Then I realised that it would be some time before he would feel strong enough to go back to his ordnance inspecting.
“Finally, one afternoon, the filly and I were saddled and brought round to the front door, and there were Miss Fairley and my Major, both looking as well and happy as their best friend would want to see them. It was a nice day, and away we went over the New England hills.
“There wasn’t much surliness or coolness on that ride, and what they didn’t talk about is hardly worth mentioning. After they had fairly cantered, conversationally, for over three hours, however, they slowed down, and finally only Felicia tried to talk, and she did it so jerkily and confusedly, with such a deal of stumbling and stammering, that presently, try her best, she had to come to a halt, too. Then there was a most awkward silence, until suddenly my Major burst out, more as if the sentence were shot from a gun than as if he were speaking it: