"What is that noise ?" For a second they all sat as still as equestrian statues, and for a second--for two or three or four seconds--heaven and earth seemed equally still.

Then all their ears, in an agony of attention, heard along the road that indescribable thrill and throb that means only one thing--horses! The Colonel's face had an instantaneous change, as if lightning had struck it, and yet left it scatheless.
"They have done us," he said, with brief military irony.

"Prepare to receive cavalry!" "Where can they have got the horses ?" asked Syme, as he mechanically urged his steed to a canter.
The Colonel was silent for a little, then he said in a strained voice-- "I was speaking with strict accuracy when I said that the 'Soleil d'Or' was the only place where one can get horses within twenty miles." "No!" said Syme violently, "I don't believe he'd do it.

Not with all that white hair." "He may have been forced," said the Colonel gently.

"They must be at least a hundred strong, for which reason we are all going to see my friend Renard, who has a motor-car." With these words he swung his horse suddenly round a street corner, and went down the street with such thundering speed, that the others, though already well at the gallop, had difficulty in following the flying tail of his horse.
Dr.Renard inhabited a high and comfortable house at the top of a steep street, so that when the riders alighted at his door they could once more see the solid green ridge of the hill, with the white road across it, standing up above all the roofs of the town.