And then
in the midst of our talk there came a pretty frightening interruption,
for all at once the old butler rushed into the room, most
extraordinarily pale:
"'Miss Mary, sir! Miss Mary, sir!' he gasped. 'She's screaming ... out in
the Park, sir! And they say they can hear the Horse--'
"The Captain made one dive for a rack of arms and snatched down his old
sword and ran out, drawing it as he ran. I dashed out and up the stairs,
snatched my camera-flashlight and a heavy revolver, gave one yell at
Parsket's door: 'The Horse!' and was down and into the grounds.
"Away in the darkness there was a confused shouting and I caught the
sounds of shooting, out among the scattered trees. And then, from a patch
of blackness to my left, there burst suddenly an infernal gobbling sort
of neighing. Instantly I whipped 'round and snapped off the flashlight.
The great light blazed out momentarily, showing me the leaves of a big
tree close at hand, quivering in the night breeze, but I saw nothing else
and then the ten-fold blackness came down upon me and I heard Parsket
shouting a little way back to know whether I had seen anything.
"The next instant he was beside me and I felt safer for his company,
for there was some incredible thing near to us and I was momentarily
blind because of the brightness of the flashlight. 'What was it? What
was it?' he kept repeating in an excited voice. And all the time I was
staring into the darkness and answering, mechanically, 'I don't know.
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