Chapter XIX The High Jump
From the crush of the great crowds around the grand stand at the race-course, lining up far down the in-field, and jamming the betting sheds, I saw my Aunt Lucretia forcing her sorrel horse through the gathering. She had been a familiar figure at every fair and race meeting as far back as I could remember. No secretary for twenty years had questioned her judgment or her orders; they were too glad to have her help. I was in the judges’ stand helping them out. I had ridden over early, leaving Satan to my Aunt’s stable boy, who had already worked him out with a stiff gallop of two miles, and rubbed him down for the hurdle race and the high jump.
My Aunt Lucretia rode up close to the little canopied stand and beckoned to me. “Ever see such a crowd?” she said, smiling proudly. “I told Roswick this special high jump and hurdle would draw ’em. I’ll bet there are twenty thousand people in that crowd.”
“What is the programme?” I asked indifferently, though I knew it as well as she. I had come out under protest with myself as it were; I would rather have been deep in the heart of my wood where I might not see Eloise. I had tossed all night on my bed. If I dozed it was only to awaken, feeling that I held Eloise fainting in my arms. I did not want to see her, for in my heart, since I last danced, there had been such a tempest of conflicting emotions as made me pace the floor all night; and by day I knew not my own mind. Yet somehow it was not all sorrow. For I knew now that Eloise loved me and at thought of it my heart almost burst with gladness. Gladness was mingled so with sorrow that I wondered if both were not sweeter for the mingling.
“Colonel Goff and I have put up a few three-foot hurdles,” my Aunt said, sweeping the track with her hand, “and he and Eloise and a few of the younger people are going to gallop over them just for fun. Goff really wants to show off his record-breaking jumper and his fiancée at the same time,” she said, smiling carelessly at me. “The hurdles will be for any of them who care to go over them, but the high jump,” and she pointed to a movable gate of bars, flanked with high panels on each side, “will be put across the wire at the finish for Goff and his hunter only,” and she laughed, winking at me slyly. “The record is five feet six; Goff thinks that is what he is going after again; but I’ve put up another bar for fun. I want to see Goff’s imported record-breaking ‘lepper,’ as he calls him, break his blooming knees on that top bar.”
I turned impatiently. “Aunt Lucretia, that’s dangerous, six feet—and under the whip, after a mile dash!”
Aunt Lucretia smiled. “None of them is supposed to go after the high jump but the Colonel, and he swears he can do it. H-u-s-h!” she whispered. “Not a word of this. Just let Eloise fix him. I’ve been twenty years arguing with him about importing these worthless brutes and the superiority of our own horses, now I am going to make him pay for his obstinacy—s-sh! There they come now,” and she pointed to the in-field, through which a jolly group of riders came, society people mostly, girls and boys and members of the hunting club who were out for the mile gallop over the short hurdles.
“There are ten couples of them in all,” she said, “our smartest boys and girls. Many of them will not even try the low hurdles and none of them the high jump except the Colonel.”
“You ought not to try it,” I said resolutely. “Don’t you know that nothing can keep Eloise and Satan from trying that gate of bars?”
“Of course,” said my Aunt, “but Goff doesn’t know it, and that is where he will part with his ducats. He has even forgotten the bet, he has been so happy; but I’ll remind him. He hasn’t the least idea that Satan could jump over his shadow in the road. O-h, no!”
As we talked they rode up. “Now see here,” said Colonel Goff to his crowd, as he lined them up, “some of these hurdles are going to take a bit of going, and you boys must give the ladies the front, for your dust might blind the horses to the hurdles and make them rush over them with chances for bad tumbles and broken knees. We’ll finish the last quarter flat; but I’ll go over the gate and bars here for exhibition. It’s a pretty stiff affair and will take a bit of going, so the rest of you will please be so kind as to give me the lead here and an open field; just hack around this last quarter, following me, and dodge the gate. There’s plenty of room.”
The Colonel sat his horse near me as I stood, watch in hand in the judges’ stand. Eloise had not looked my way. She sat her great, steel-limbed mount as unconcernedly as if she were going on a fox chase. The others were laughing and excited, the untried horses nervous and restless, but Satan stood still, looking as if carved out of the black granite of the hills. Eloise glanced up and saw me. I turned my head quickly, but she came over, her face pale, but her eyes smiling kindly into mine. The old fun was in them, the old daring, colt-breaking fun I had not seen there since my return.
“Jack,” she said, laughing, “if I could only get you behind the barn to split my skirts again; this side-saddle is too heavy.” She was looking me bravely in the eye, laughing as she said it. Then all at once I saw all the make-believe go out of her face and her eyes fall before mine.
Riding up softly she whispered, “Jack, do you remember the Story of Atalanta?”
I nodded.
“If he doesn’t beat me this mile, and over that high jump he shall never have me, I have told him so.”
There are little things even in big events that count more than the big things themselves. I sat utterly wretched. I heard her calling her horse pet names, and saw her rubbing his neck with her whip. I saw the old daring nervousness that showed in the very shoulders of her, the keen, fine play of her eyes, and the white lines that lay like a rim of moonlight around the red of her lips. The next five minutes were spent by the starter telling of the record of Goff’s horse.
They lined up ready for the word. It was I who gave it. Instantly from Eloise, even in the thunder of the great leap of her horse I saw two fingers fly to her lips in a kiss to me in her old daring, fun-loving way. “Go!” I had cried.
“But I am coming back, Jack. Good-by.”
The Colonel’s horse, trained as he was, strode easily ahead of the noisy, awkward bunch. I saw Eloise turn Satan loose, and in an instant he had collared the imported one. They went over the first hurdle like a pair, the field behind Nestor and Satan running neck and neck. With my glasses I could see that Goff was smiling in the delight of the race she was giving him. They were not going fast—it was more of a gallop—for the Colonel set the pace to suit the slower field of amateurs behind him. They mounted the last hurdle together, and came into the back stretch for the last quarter of the mile. The six-foot gate sat in the middle of the track. The judges rose and stood with their timers in their hands. I heard the grand stand hum and buzz with expectancy.
“Now, hold back!” shouted Goff to all as he turned his horse loose in the stretch. “Give me the right of way!”
He came the last quarter with great speed, and then I saw the grand stand rise to its feet, and a wild roar followed, for Eloise had passed him as a full-set yacht a tug, headed straight for the bars. I heard Goff shouting to her; he had lost his head in the fear for her safety. They rose for the leap, Eloise two lengths ahead. I saw Satan rise high, true to his stride, high up—straight up, his great form silhouetted against the sky, Eloise smiling, triumphantly, beautifully, splendidly lifting him over.
It was Goff’s horse that did it. In the excitement his rider did not hold him true; he wavered a moment, dodged faint-heartedly, ducked, shied the perilous leap before him, and, bolting, struck the nigh post of the movable gate, hurling it forward ten feet, full under the flanks of Satan, who had cleared it. It caught him cruelly as he came down, under the flanks, making him turn a summersault, hurling Eloise into the fence. I heard the grand stand groan.
It was I who held her lifeless form in my arms....
I remember but little of the tent and the surgeons. I heard someone say, “She’ll die, her back is broken!”
A horse, riderless, had followed us to the tent’s very door; he had thrust his head in, whinnying. It broke my heart to feel his cold nose against my cheek. It was then I led him away, so blinded by tears that I did not see where we went.