The noise of the clattering hoofs died away in distance and in the greater uproar of the storm, and Mr. Merl thought no more of them. How often happens it, dear reader, that some brief interruption flashes through our seasons of enjoyment; we are startled, perhaps; we even need a word or two to reassure us that all is well, and then the work of pleasure goes on, and we forget that it had ever been retarded; and yet, depend upon it, in that fleeting second of time some sad episode of human life has, like a spectre, crossed our path, and some deep sorrow gone wearily past us.
Let us follow that rider, then, who now, quitting the bleak shore, has entered a deep gorge between the mountain. The rain swept along in torrents; the wind in fitful gusts dashes the mountain stream in many a wayward shape, and snaps the stems of old trees in pieces; landslips and broken rocks impede the way; and yet that brave horse holds ever onward, now stretching to a fast gallop, now gathering himself to clear some foaming torrent, or some fragment of fallen timber.
The night is so dark that the rider cannot see the horse's length in advance; but every feature of the way is well known, and an instinctive sense of the peril to be apprehended at each particular spot guides that hand and nerves that heart. Mary Martin--for she it is--had ridden that same path at all seasons and all hours, but never on a wilder night, nor through a more terrible hurricane than this. At moments her speed relaxed, as if to breathe her horse; and twice she pulled up short, to listen and distinguish between the sound of thunder and the crashing noise of rocks rolling from the mountain. There was a sublimity in the scene, lit up at moments by the lightning; and a sense of peril, too, that exalted the adventurous spirit of the girl, and imparted to her heart a high heroic feeling. The glorious sentiment of confronting danger animated and excited her; and her courage rose with each new difficulty of the way, till her very brain seemed to reel with the wild transport of her emotions.
As she emerged from the gorge, she gained a high tableland, over which the wind swept unimpeded. Not a cliff, not a rock, not a tree, broke the force of the gale, which raged with all the violence of a storm at sea. Crouching low upon the saddle, stooping at times to the mane, she could barely make way against the hurricane; and more than once her noble charger was driven backward, and forced to turn his back to the storm. _Her_ courage never failed. Taking advantage of every passing lull, she dashed forward, ready to wheel and halt when the wind shot past with violence.