As the forest rapidly approached, the group of three split, Jacob continuing along the path beside the trees while Percy’s and Edmund’s horses ran neck and neck on the dirt path through the woodland. At a fork, they split again and raced off down different routes.
“Bad choice, Ed!” Percy shouted. “See you at the lake this afternoon!”
“Nonsense!” Edmund threw back cheerfully, remembering the path well enough to call Percy’s bluff. It would rejoin the main path further along, and if he could just go faster than Percy for a couple of minutes, he could still beat him to the lakeside.
He did, indeed, reach the main path again a couple of lengths ahead of Percy, and he laughed at his good fortune.
“Dammit, Colborne!” Percy shouted, pressing his own mount to go faster until they were once again level. Percy might have lacked some of the more intellectual and practical skills in life, but no one could say that he was not as fine a horseman as Edmund.
With a yell of mutual triumph, they both burst out of the trees and onto the lakefront, sending a mass of panicked ducks quacking loudly into the air around them.
“Well, that was clever,” Jacob deadpanned, having clearly arrived ahead of either of them, and waited quietly in the brush. “I can tell that you both really want to bag some ducks today.”
After a few heartbeats of gasping silence, they all burst out laughing as their horses stood catching their breath.
“Even without the ducks, it’s so good to be out here with the two of you,” Percy said happily. “Look at that sky! Look at the lake. And I couldn’t have better friends to share it with—”
A gunshot so loud cut off whatever Percy was going to say, causing all three of the horses to rear and buck. Jacob and Edmund managed to hold their seats. But Percy jerked so violently in his saddle that he was thrown onto the rocky lakefront.
“Percy!” Edmund cried, jumping down quickly from his horse, and running to his friend. Blood was already seeping into Percy’s blonde hair and running down the pale pebbles around him. His face was pale, and he was unresponsive.
“Jesus Christ!” Jacob exclaimed, also dismounting, and rushing over to the pair. “Is he hit? Percy!”
Edmund was already speedily examining Percy’s head. A small graze was visible on his temple, but he seemed to be bleeding from the back of his head, which lay beside a piece of protruding stone.
“I don’t think he’s been shot, but he’s hit his head badly on this rock. Look.”
Jacob had already ripped off his own cravat and Percy’s to try and stem the bleeding.
“Who the hell would be shooting around here?”
Looking up, Edmund caught a glimpse of movement in the trees and leapt to his feet without hesitation.
“Hey you! Stop!” he shouted furiously, running into the trees in pursuit of the rapidly vanishing figure with a rifle slung across its shoulders.
Edmund’s speed was also driven by anger and love for his injured friend. However, the other man had both a head start and a plan for escape. Being tall and long-legged, Edmund began to gain on him, coming close enough to observe the presumed culprit’s rough clothing, overlong hair, and unkempt appearance. But the man untied a horse that was tethered in a glade and rode swiftly away.
“Damn you!” Edmund shouted as the man retreated into the distance ahead of him. Gazing at the figure, Edmund realized two things: one was the fact that this had been a premeditated attack, two was that he had seen that man somewhere before…
Without pausing to think further, he ran as quickly as he could back to Jacob and Percy.
With Percy’s head now bandaged as well as could be done with cravats and shirts, Jacob tried to pull him up from the ground but failed. Percy seemed to be semi-conscious and moaned fitfully, his face frighteningly pale against the growing scarlet staining his bandages.
“He got away,” Edmund panted in response to the question on Jacob’s face.
“We need to get Percy back to the house and get the doctor out here as fast as possible. My horse is best able to carry two. Help me get him up.”
After the struggle to lift and steady Percy’s weight between them, they managed to get him onto Jacob’s horse. Edmund tied him to the saddle for further security.
“Get him home, Jacob. Perhaps I can still find that man on horseback or at least some clues. I know I’ve seen him somewhere before.”
As Jacob moved off at a careful trot and Edmund swung himself into his own saddle, the memory he was searching for came back like a bolt of lightning.
“Hayward House!” he exclaimed. “That supposed gardener…”
At the thought of Lord Birks, and with the sight of Percy bleeding dangerously, Edmund’s anger now ran very, very cold. His hand instinctively reached out and fingered the pistol in his saddlebag holster.
* * *