She did not answer me. No doubt the fall had dazed her. Instead, she turned in the direction of her horse and took two steps forward. But I was too quick for her.
“Have a care, madam!” I cried, barring her further progress. “This is no woman’s task, and the ground is dangerous. Trust me,” I continued earnestly, “to do all that is possible to save your favourite.” I turned from her as I spoke and made my way to the edge of the bog.
With eyes dilated with terror and blood-red nostrils distended, the mare still struggled to regain her footing. At no little risk to myself of being drawn into the bog, I succeeded at length in laying hold of the rein, and I drove my heels into the turf and exerted all my strength—aye, till the muscles of my back and arms cracked beneath the strain—in a vain endeavour to assist her efforts. But though her forefeet, indeed, rested upon the more solid ground, her struggles were growing fainter and she was sinking rapidly. I saw that it was a question of moments only, and there was but one expedient. Loosing hold of the rein with my right hand, I drew my sword and thrust her lightly in the breast.
At the touch of the steel she gave a snort of mingled pain and terror and rose from her knees. Her hoofs caught, slipped upon the soft, wet turf, caught again as I threw my weight into the scale, and the next moment I was on my back upon the grass, and the hollow spun round me in a golden mist. ’Twas but a second or two I lay there, however, for the mare’s head had caught me fairly in the chest and the breath was gone from my body. Then I slowly rose to my feet and turned to look behind me. Twenty paces away my lady stood soothing the frightened animal, that now stood quivering with terror from head to foot.
I approached her slowly, with a feeling of exultation in my breast. For had I not proved my words to her and succeeded? Had I not by service rendered placed her in my debt? Surely I had earned this woman’s gratitude, and I would take it as my just reward. She did not look at me as I approached. Instead, she drew a snow-white kerchief from the bosom of her gown and with ostentatious care began to staunch the blood that welled from the wound I had inflicted upon the mare’s breast. One might almost have supposed that she thought more of this slight wound than if the animal itself had been engulfed. Three paces from her was a large flat boulder, one of many that lay scattered upon the turf. By the side of this I halted. Still she did not turn her head.
Her hat had fallen back, revealing the tresses of golden hair straying in wild disorder upon her neck. I had leisure to observe more closely the exquisite symmetry of her figure, displayed as it was to its best advantage by the tight-fitting riding coat she wore.
Feeling, I suppose, my eyes upon her, she deliberately turned her back on me and continued her task as before. I waited two—three—minutes, still she did not speak.
“Am I to have no thanks, madam?” I said at length in a low voice.
“It was a praiseworthy action,” she answered icily; “and as such doubtless carries its own reward.”
On a sudden my exultation vanished at her words. It was borne in on me that she would rather have been beholden to the meanest beggar upon the road than to me. Yet I would not be discouraged so easily. Again I broke the silence: