Then the black mare slid past her, and, with a bound, her horse followed.  The young man on the chestnut was away on the left.  Only the hunts-man and one whip—­beside their three selves!  Glorious!  The brown horse went too fast at that first fence and Winton called back:  “Steady, Gyp!  Steady him!” But she couldn’t; and it didn’t matter.  Grass, three fields of grass!  Oh, what a lovely fox—­going so straight!  And each time the brown horse rose, she thought:  “Perfect!  I can ride!  Oh, I am happy!” And she hoped her father and the young man were looking.  There was no feeling in the world like this, with a leader like Dad, hounds moving free, good going, and the field distanced.  Better than dancing; better—­yes, better than listening to music.  If one could spend one’s life galloping, sailing over fences; if it would never stop!  The new horse was a darling, though he did pull.

She crossed the next fence level with the young man, whose low chestnut mare moved with a stealthy action.  His hat was crammed down now, and his face very determined, but his lips still had something of that smile.  Gyp thought:  “He’s got a good seat—­very strong, only he looks like ‘thrusting.’  Nobody rides like Dad—­so beautifully quiet!” Indeed, Winton’s seat on a horse was perfection, all done with such a minimum expenditure.  The hounds swung round in a curve.  Now she was with them, really with them!  What a pace—­cracking!  No fox could stand this long!

And suddenly she caught sight of him, barely a field ahead, scurrying desperately, brush down; and the thought flashed through her:  ’Oh! don’t let’s catch you.  Go on, fox; go on!  Get away!’ Were they really all after that little hunted red thing—­a hundred great creatures, horses and men and women and dogs, and only that one little fox!  But then came another fence, and quickly another, and she lost feelings of shame and pity in the exultation of flying over them.  A minute later the fox went to earth within a few hundred yards of the leading hound, and she was glad.  She had been in at deaths before—­horrid!  But it had been a lovely gallop.  And, breathless, smiling rapturously, she wondered whether she could mop her face before the field came up, without that young man noticing.

She could see him talking to her father, and taking out a wisp of a handkerchief that smelled of cyclamen, she had a good scrub round.  When she rode up, the young man raised his hat, and looking full at her said:  “You did go!” His voice, rather high-pitched, had in it a spice of pleasant laziness.  Gyp made him an ironical little bow, and murmured:  “My new horse, you mean.”  He broke again into that irrepressible smile, but, all the same, she knew that he admired her.  And she kept thinking:  ‘Where have I seen someone like him?’

They had two more runs, but nothing like that first gallop.  Nor did she again see the young man, whose name—­it seemed—­was Summerhay, son of a certain Lady Summerhay at Widrington, ten miles from Mildenham.