With the sound of the horn and the moving away of Erpwald the horse had waxed restive, as horses will at a cover side when the time to move on seems near.  I think that it had probably reared a little and that she had tried to check it, for now it was backing slowly and uneasily toward the edge of that awesome cliff that was but ten paces from its heels.  Even now the girl was backing him yet more in her efforts to make him stand still, and I dared not make a move to catch the bridle lest he should swing round at once from me and go over.

“Spur him, Elfrida.  Let his head go, and spur him,” I said as quietly as I could, but so that she must needs hear.

It was all that I could do.

She spurred him, and then as he made a little leap forward, checked him, and that was yet worse.  Then I saw Erpwald, with an ashy face, dismount and go hastily toward the edge behind her, sidelong, and I swung my horse away from him, so that by chance hers might follow me out of danger.

But that was useless.  The brute was yet backing, and his heels were almost on the brink.  It seemed that his rider did not know how near she was.

“Get off!” I said hoarsely.  “Get off at once!”

Then she knew, but could only turn and look.  The hinder hoofs lost hold on the rocky edge as the horse made its first slip backward, and even as the loosened stones rattled down, and it lurched with one leg hanging over the gulf, Erpwald leapt forward and tore Elfrida from the saddle, and half threw her toward me.  I do not remember when I dismounted, but I was there and grasped her hand and dragged her back out of the way of the lashing fore feet.

Then Erpwald was gone.  The horse struggled wildly in one last effort to save itself, and swept my friend over with it.  There was a rattle of stones, a silence, and then a dull crash in the depths below.

One moment later and all three would have gone.  I heard the shout of the man on the track below, and I wondered in a dull way if he had been killed also.

And now I had Elfrida to tend, for she had fainted.  What she had seen I could not tell, but I hoped that at least she knew nought before Erpwald went.  It was as if she had lost consciousness when he reached her, for I saw the hand on the rein loosen helplessly.  I carried her back from the cliff and tried to bring her to herself, vainly, though indeed I almost wished that she might remain as she was until we were back in Glastonbury.

Then I wound my horn again and again to bring some to my help, and I tried not to think of that which surely lay crushed on the road below.  There could be no hope for either man or horse.

Then came the sound of swift hoofs, and there was the ealdorman and one or two others, coming in all haste to know what the urgent call betokened, but by the time that he had dismounted and asked if there was any hurt to his daughter I could only gasp and point downward.  My mouth was dry and parched, and I did not know how to put into words the thing that had happened; but he saw that Elfrida’s horse was not there, and that Erpwald’s ran loose with mine, and he guessed.