‘I don’t see it,’ I said. I had already eyed the nags all round, and assured myself that, ugly and blemished as they were, they were up to their work. But I had discerned no special merit among them. I looked them over again now, and came to the same conclusion--that, except the led horses, which I had chosen with some care, there was nothing among them to vie with the Cid, either in speed or looks. I told Fresnoy so. ‘Would you like to try?’ he said tauntingly. I laughed, adding, ‘If you think I am going to tire our horses by racing them, with such work as we have before us, you are mistaken, Fresnoy. I am not a boy, you know.’ ‘There need be no question of racing,’ he answered more quietly. ‘You have only to get on that rat-tailed bay of Matthew’s to feel its paces and say I am right.’ I looked at the bay, a bald-faced, fiddle-headed horse, and saw that, with no signs of breeding, it was still a big-boned animal with good shoulders and powerful hips. I thought it possible Fresnoy might be right, and if so, and the bay’s manners were tolerable, it might do for mademoiselle better than the horse I had chosen. At any rate, if we had a fast horse among us, it was well to know the fact, so bidding Matthew change with me, and be careful of the Cid, I mounted the bay, and soon discovered that its paces were easy and promised speed, while its manners seemed as good as even a timid rider could desire. Our road at the time lay across a flat desolate heath, dotted here and there with, thorn-bushes; the track being broken and stony, extended more than a score of yards in width, through travellers straying to this side and that to escape the worst places. Fresnoy and I, in making the change, had fallen slightly behind the other three, and were riding abreast of Matthew on the Cid. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘was I not right?’ ‘In part,’ I answered. ‘The horse is better than its looks.’ ‘Like many others,’ he rejoined, a spark of resentment in his tone--‘men as well as horses, M. de Marsac. But What do you say? Shall we canter on a little and overtake the others?’ Thinking it well to do so, I assented readily, and we started together. We had ridden, however, no more than a hundred yards, and I was only beginning to extend the bay, when Fresnoy, slightly drawing rein, turned in his saddle and looked back. The next moment he cried, ‘Hallo! what is this? Those fellows are not following us, are they?’ I turned sharply to look. At that moment, without falter or warning, the bay horse went down under me as if shot dead, throwing me half a dozen yards over its head; and that so suddenly that I had no time to raise my arms, but, falling heavily on my head and shoulder, lost consciousness.