"B---- shame!" shouted another. "Tryin' to rattle the lad!" And a howl of indignation went up to the unheeding heavens. To Silver it was no longer a race: it was the world-struggle, old as time--Right against Wrong, Light against Dark. He was watching it like God; and, like God, he could do nothing. His voice was lost in his throat. Outwardly calm, he was dumb, tormented, and heaving like a sea in travail. A tumult of waters surged and trampled and foamed within him. Then the nightmare passed. The boy on the brown rallied; and, it seemed, a fainting nation rallied with him. He steadied himself, sat still as a cloud for a moment, and then stirred deliberately and of set purpose. He was asking his horse the question. There was no doubt of the reply. Four-Pound shot to the front like a long-dammed stream. His vampire enemy clung for a desperate moment, and then faded away behind amid the groans of his maddened supporters and the acclamations of the triumphant Englishmen. "Got her dead to the world!" cried Old Mat, a note of battle resounding deeply through his voice. "What price Putnam's now!" And he thumped the rail. But the end was not even yet. The great English horse came moving like a flood round the corner and swooped gloriously over the last fence. The roar that had held the air toppled away into a sound as of a world-avalanche, shot with screams. The jockey in green had pitched forward as his horse landed. He scrambled for a moment, and somehow wriggled back into his seat--short of his whip. The Grand Stand became a maelstrom. Men were fighting, women fainting. The Americans were screaming to Chukkers to press; the English yelling to the nipper to ride--for the Almighty's sake. The brown horse and his jockey came past the Open Ditch and down the straight in a hurricane that might not have been, so little did either heed it. The little jockey was far away, riding as in a death-swoon, his face silvery beneath his cap. His reins were in both hands, and he was stirring with them faintly as one who would ride a finish and cannot. "That's a little bit o' better," said Old Mat cheerfully, preparing to move. "My little Fo'-Pound'll see us 'ome." And indeed the young horse, with the judgment of a veteran who knows to a yard when he may shut up, had eased away into a canter, and broke into a trot as he passed the post. CHAPTER XLIX The Last Card Chukkers was beaten out of sight. The Oriental in him blurted to the top. He lost his head and his temper and began to butcher his mount. As he drove the mare down the run home, foaming and bloody, he was flaying her. The Americans had all lost money, some of them fortunes: that didn't matter so much. Their idol had been beaten fair and square: that mattered a great deal. But she was still their idol, and Chukkers had butchered her before their eyes. And he was Chukkers!--the greaser!