And the two small boys, intoxicated by the movement, the joy, and the keen air, shouted shrilly. The horse, frightened by this clamour, finished by taking to the gallop, and while the cavalier tried to stop him, his hat rolled on the ground. The coachman had to get off his seat to pick up this headgear, and when Hector had received it from his hands, he addressed his wife from a distance:

‘Keep the children from shouting out like that, will you: you’ll have him run away with me!’

They had lunch on the grass in the Vésinet woods, on the provisions stowed away under the seat.

Although the coachman took care of the three horses, Hector got up every moment to go and see if his had everything he wanted: and he stroked him on the neck, giving him bread, cakes, and sugar to eat.

He declared:

‘He’s a hard trotter. He even shook me a little in the first few minutes: but you saw that I recovered myself quickly: he recognized his master, he won’t forget now.’

As he had resolved, they came home by the Champs-Élysées.

The vast avenue was swarming with carriages. And on the paths the pedestrians were so numerous that you would have said that there were two long black ribbons stretched out from the Arc de Triomphe to the Place de la Concorde. A burst of sunshine illuminated everything, and made the varnish of the barouches, the steel of the harness, the handles of the carriage doors gleam.

A mad love of movement, an intoxication for life, seemed to stir the crowd of people, of carriages, and of horses. And the obelisk rose straight up in a mist of gold.

Hector’s horse, as soon as he had passed the Arc de Triomphe, was suddenly seized with a new ardour, and he slipped in and out between the wheels, at a full trot, towards his stable, in spite of all the efforts of his rider to calm him.

The carriage was far away now, far away behind; and then when he was opposite the Palace of Industry, the animal, seeing the coast clear, turned to the right and began galloping.

An old woman in an apron was crossing the road tranquilly. She was exactly in Hector’s path, and he was approaching at full speed. Unable to control his beast, he began to cry with all his might:

‘Hullo, hullo there!’

She was deaf, maybe, for she peaceably continued on her way until the moment when, struck by the horse’s chest, rushing on her like a locomotive, she went rolling ten steps farther, her skirts in the air, after turning three complete somersaults.

Voices cried:

‘Stop him!’

Hector, aghast, hung on to the mane and shouted:

‘Help!’

A terrible heave made him shoot like a cannon-ball over the ears of his charger, and fall into the arms of a police sergeant who had just flung himself into his way.