F. Crawford - Via Crucis

The Queen glanced scornfully to each side as she passed in a gale, and the dear sense of power soothed her stirred pride. Still the line opened, and still she rode on, scarcely rising and sinking with the mare's wonderful stride. But the way that was made for her was not straight to the King now; the throng was more dense there, and the people parted as they could, so that the three ladies had to follow the only open passage. Suddenly, before them, there was an end, where the rolling ground broke away sharply in a fall of forty feet to the edge of the lake below. The heads of the last of the crowd who stood at the brink were clear and distinct against the pale sky. The Queen could not see the water, but she felt that there was death in the leap. Her two companions looked beyond her and saw also.

Eleanor dropped her lance quietly to the right, so that it should not make her followers fall, and with hands low and weight thrown back in the deep saddle she pulled with all her might. Her favourite black horse, broken to her own hand, would have obeyed her; she might have been able to stop Beatrix's great Hungarian, for her white hands were as strong as a man's; but the Arab mare was trained only to the touch of an Arab halter and the deep caress of an Arab voice, and at the first strain of the cruel French bit she threw up her head, swerved, caught the steel in her teeth, and shot forward again at twice her speed. Eleanor tried in vain to wrench the mare's head to one side, into the shrinking crowd.

The Queen's face turned grey, but her lips were set and her eyes steady, as she looked death in the face. Behind her, Beatrix's little gloved hands were like white moths on her steadily jerking bridle, the Hungarian's terrific stride threw up the sods behind her, and there was a hopeless, far-away look in her face, almost like a death-smile. Only the strong dark woman of the South seemed still to have control over her horse, and he slowly slackened his speed, and fell a little behind the other two.

In the fearful danger the crowd was silent and breathless, and many men turned pale as they saw. But none moved.

One second, two seconds, three seconds, and to every second two strides; the end of three women's lives was counted by the wild hoof— strokes. The race might last while one could count ten more.

Gilbert Warde had at first tried to press nearer to the King, but he saw that it was useless, because the latter was already shoulder to shoulder with the nobles and knights. So he had turned back to face the crowd with those about him, and with the flat of his blade he had beaten down some few swords which men had dared to draw; but he had wounded no one, for he knew that it was a madness which must pass and must be forgiven.

Then he found himself with his horse on the very edge of the open track made by the dividing people, and he looked and saw the Queen, and Beatrix three or four lengths behind her, as the matchless Arab gained ground in the race. He had been above the deep fall and understood. Instantly he was on his feet on the turf, a step out in the perilous way; and he wished that he had the strength of Lancelot in his hands, with the leap of a wild beast in his feet, but his heart did not fail him.

In one second he lived an hour. His life was nothing, but he could only give it once, to save one woman, and she must be Beatrix, let such chance befall Eleanor as might. Yet Eleanor was the Queen, and she had been kind to him, and in the fateful instant of doom his eyes were on her face; he would try to save the other, but unconsciously he made one step forward again and stood waiting in midway. One second for a lifetime's thought, one for the step he made, and the next was the last. He could hear the rush of the wind, and Eleanor was looking at him.

In that supreme moment her face changed, and the desperate calm in her eyes became desperate fear for him she loved even better than she knew.

"Back!" she cried, and the cry was a woman's agonized scream, not for herself.

With all her might, but utterly in vain, she wrenched sideways at the mare's mouth and she closed her eyes lest she should see the man die. He had meant to let her pass to her death, for the girl was dearer to him, and he had gathered his strength like a bent spring to serve him. But he saw her eyes and heard her cry, and in the flash of instinct he knew she loved him, and that she wished him to save himself rather than her; and thereby is real love proved on the touchstone of fear.

[Illustration: "HE… HELD, WHILE EARTH AND SKY WHIRLED WITH HIM."]

As he sprang, he knew that he had no choice, though he did not love her. The fall of her mare, if his grip held, might stop the rest. He sprang; he saw only the Arab's bony head and the gold on the bridle, as both his hands grasped it. Then he saw nothing, but yet he held, and, dead, he would have held still, as the steel jaws of the hunter's trap hold upon the wolf's leg-bone. He knew that he was thrown down, dragged, pounded, bruised, twisted like a rope till his joints cracked. But he held, and felt no pain, while earth and sky whirled with him. It was not a second; it was an hour, a year, a lifetime; yet he could not have loosed his hands, had he wished to let go, for there were in him the blood and the soul of the race that never yielded its grip on whatsoever it held.

It lasted a breathing-space, while the mare plunged wildly and staggered, and her head almost touched the ground and dragged the man's hands on the turf; then as his weight wrenched her neck back, her violent speed threw her hind quarters round, as a vane is blown from the gale. At the same instant the great Hungarian horse was upon her, tried to leap her in his stride, struck her empty saddle with his brown chest, and fell against her and upon her with all his enormous weight, and the two rolled over each other, frantically kicking. The standard bearer's horse, less mad than the others and some lengths behind, checked himself cleverly, and after two or three short, violent strides, that almost unseated his rider, planted his fore feet in the turf and stood stock-still, heaving and trembling. The race was over.

With the strength and instinct of the born rider, Eleanor had slipped her feet from the stirrups and had let herself be thrown, lifting herself with her hands on the high pommel and vaulting clear away. She fell, but was on her feet before any man of the dazed throng could help her. She saw Gilbert lying his full length on his side, his body passive, but his arms stretched beyond his head, while his gloved hands still clenched upon the bridle and were pulled from side to side by the mare's faintly struggling head. His eyes were half open toward the Queen, but they were pale and saw nothing. The Hungarian had rolled half upon his back, little hurt, and the pommels of the saddle under him kept him from turning completely over.

Beatrix lay like one dead. She had been thrown over the Arab's back, striking her head on the turf, and the mare in her final struggle had rolled upon her feet. The light steel cap had been forced down over her forehead in spite of its cushioned lining, and the chiselled rim had cut into the flesh so that a little line of dark blood was slowly running across the white skin; and her white gloved hands were lying palm upward, half open and motionless. The Queen scarcely glanced at her.

Many men sprang forward when the danger was past, and they dragged Beatrix out and began to get her horse upon his feet. Eleanor knelt by Gilbert and tried to take his fingers from the bridle, but could not, so that she had to loose the buckle from the long bars of the bit. Her hands chafed his temples softly, and she bent lower and blew upon his face, that her cool breath might wake him. There were drops of blood on his forehead and on his chin, his cloth tunic was torn in many places, and the white linen showed at the rents; but Eleanor saw only the look in his face, serene and strong even in his unconsciousness, while in the dream of his swoon he saved her life again.