CHAPTER XXXVIFrancisco stood at the horse’s side on the dark road. The animal, nervous and restless at first, had quietened to his voice and hand, and was still now, as, with the rein twisted round his arm, he leaned on the saddle, conscious from that sudden effort that he was near the end of his physical strength.
Alert and conscious of his new master’s condition, as a good horse will be likely to be, the animal remained quiet as he gained the saddle with an effort which seemed near to fail, after which control cannot have ceased, for how then should the horse have gone by ways it surely would not have chosen by its own will? But it was a ride which he could not afterwards recall, beyond a dim memory of once having been followed by shouts and shots; and it must have been at a slow pace,
