t within, he plunged off once more upon his furious gallop.
He was out on the heather slopes again and heading for Weydown Common.
On he flew and on. But again his brain failed him and again his limbs
trembled beneath him, and yet again he strove to ease his pace, only to
be driven onward by the cruel spur and the falling lash. He was blind
and giddy with fatigue.

He saw no longer where he placed his feet, he cared no longer whither he
went, but his one mad longing was to get away from this dreadful thing,
this torture which clung to him and would not let him go. Through
Thursley village he passed, his eyes straining in his agony, his heart
bursting within him, and he had won his way to the crest of Thursley
Down, still stung forward by stab and blow, when his spirit weakened,
his giant strength ebbed out of him, and with one deep sob of agony the
yellow horse sank among the heather. So sudden was the fall that Nigel
flew forward over his shoulder, and beast and man lay prostrate and
gasping while the last red rim of the sun sank behind Butser and the
first stars gleamed in a violet sky.

The young Squire was the first to recover, and kneeling by the panting,
overwrought horse he passed his hand gently over the tangled mane and
down the foam-flecked face. The red eye rolled up at him; but it was
wonder not hatred, a prayer and not a threat, which he could read in it.
As he stroked the reeking muzzle, the horse whinnied gently and thrust
his nose into the hollow of his hand. It was enough. It was the end of
the contest, the acceptance of new conditions by a chivalrous foe from a
chivalrous victor.

"You are my horse, Pommers," Nigel whispered, and he laid his cheek
against the craning head. "I know you, Pommers, and you know me, and
with the help of Saint Paul we shall teach some other folk to know us
both. Now let us walk together as far as this moorland pond, for indeed
I wot not whether it is you or I who need the water most."

And so it was that some belated monks of Waverley passing homeward from
the outer farms saw a strange sight which they carried on with them so
that it reached that very night the ears both of sacrist and of Abbot.
For, as they passed through Tilford they had seen horse and man walking
side by side and head by head up the manor-house lane. And when they
had raised their lanterns on the pair it was none other than the young
Squire himself who was leading home, as a shepherd leads a lamb, the