Beth, at the climax, had gone down suddenly, leaning against the tree.
She had not fainted, but was far too weak to stand. Her eyes only
moved. She watched the two, that seemed welded into one, go racing
madly against fatigue.

At last she beheld the look of the conquered--the utter surrender of
the broken and subdued--gleam dully from the wilted pony's eyes. She
pitied the animal she had feared and hated but a few brief moments
before. She began to think that the man was perhaps the brute, after
all, to ride the exhausted creature thus without a sign of mercy.

She rose to her feet as the two came at last to a halt, master and
servant, conquered and conqueror, man and quivering beast.

Then Van got down, and her heart, that had pitied the horse, welled
with deeper feeling for the rider. She had never in her life seen a
face so drawn, so utterly haggard beneath a mask of red as that
presented by the horseman.

Van nearly fell, but would not fall, and instead stood trembling, his
arm by natural inclination now circling the neck of the pony.

"Well, Suvy," he said not ungently, "we gave each other hell.
Hereafter we're going to be friends."

Beth heard him. She also saw the chestnut turn and regard the man with
a look of appeal and dumb questioning in his eyes that choked her--with
joy and compassion together. She someway knew that this man and horse
would be comrades while they lived.