When she recovered, her soul was calm and cold, without feeling. The
trucks were still rumbling by, and the man and the mare were still
fighting. But she herself was cold and separate, she had no more
feeling for them. She was quite hard and cold and indifferent.
They could see the top of the hooded guard's-van approaching, the sound
of the trucks was diminishing, there was hope of relief from the
intolerable noise. The heavy panting of the half-stunned mare sounded
automatically, the man seemed to be relaxing confidently, his will
bright and unstained. The guard's-van came up, and passed slowly, the
guard staring out in his transition on the spectacle in the road. And,
through the man in the closed wagon, Gudrun could see the whole scene
spectacularly, isolated and momentary, like a vision isolated in
eternity.
Lovely, grateful silence seemed to trail behind the receding train. How
sweet the silence is! Ursula looked with hatred on the buffers of the
diminishing wagon. The gatekeeper stood ready at the door of his hut,
to proceed to open the gate. But Gudrun sprang suddenly forward, in
front of the struggling horse, threw off the latch and flung the gates
asunder, throwing one-half to the keeper, and running with the other
half, forwards. Gerald suddenly let go the horse and leaped forwards,
almost on to Gudrun. She was not afraid. As he jerked aside the mare's
head, Gudrun cried, in a strange, high voice, like a gull, or like a
witch screaming out from the side of the road: 'I should think you're proud.' The words were distinct and formed. The man, twisting aside on his
dancing horse, looked at her in some surprise, some wondering interest.
Then the mare's hoofs had danced three times on the drum-like sleepers
of the crossing, and man and horse were bounding springily, unequally
up the road.
The two girls watched them go. The gate-keeper hobbled thudding over
the logs of the crossing, with his wooden leg. He had fastened the
gate. Then he also turned, and called to the girls: 'A masterful young jockey, that; 'll have his own road, if ever anybody
would.' 'Yes,' cried Ursula, in her hot, overbearing voice. 'Why couldn't he
take the horse away, till the trucks had gone by? He's a fool, and a
bully. Does he think it's manly, to torture a horse? It's a living
thing, why should he bully it and torture it?' There was a pause, then the gate-keeper shook his head, and replied: 'Yes, it's as nice a little mare as you could set eyes on--beautiful
little thing, beautiful. Now you couldn't see his father treat any
animal like that--not you. They're as different as they welly can be,
Gerald Crich and his father--two different men, different made.' Then there was a pause.