In the silence I could hear my own labored breathing and the muffled sound of my boots as I ran and from somewhere what I thought was someone weeping.
At last my torch illuminated the shining metalwork of the Graham Rolls, the motor still ticking over. But there was no sign of Jonathan or Peregrine or the policemen. Something was glittering in the rear seat, and I lifted the light for a better look.
It caught the buttons of a constable’s uniform. The man didn’t stir, and I could see as I came closer that he was slumped to one side, as if he were badly hurt.
Oh, Peregrine…why didn’t you trust me?
But he had never been taught trust.
I shone my light full in the constable’s face and realized that he was unconscious, his jaw slack. I could hardly see his features for the spreading mask of blood, almost black in this light, that ran down from a long furrow at his temple and dripped onto his tunic. His helmet was askew, knocked to one side, strap dangling. It was Constable Mason. I pulled off my driving gloves and probed the wound, touching bone. I could even see it briefly, white-and not splintered.
Four bullets… That’s what Peregrine had said: he had four shots, and he could kill three other people before he turned the pistol on himself.
The poor, unsuspecting Constable Mason must have been the first victim. But Peregrine had missed his shot, thank God, and the man would live.
Where were the others?
I reached into the motorcar for the headlamp switch, and suddenly there was a brightness that opened up the night.
The other constable was just ahead of the motorcar, perhaps ten feet from the bonnet, as if he’d been trying to follow his attacker. He lay on his face, not moving. I bent over him. He was dead, there was nothing more to be done for him. I moved on.
That made two…
Where was Jonathan? Where was Peregrine?
I turned to scan the fan of light, my own shadow cast like a black monster far ahead of me.
Something moved, then rose from the ground, hunched over as if in pain, and then the figure dashed out of the glow of the motorcar’s headlamps, into darkness.
“Peregrine-!” I cried. “No, please wait-”
But he was gone, vanished into the night.
I ran forward to where I’d first seen him, and there was Jonathan, lying on his side on the ground, his military greatcoat almost blending into the trampled earth around him. One arm was flung across his face, concealing it. Falling to my knees beside him, I gently lifted it, and he rolled over onto his back with a grunt that told me he was still alive.
More than anything at that moment, I wished I could bring Mr. Appleby here and make him look at the consequences of his spiteful telephone call. I wanted him to see what men do to each other when goaded beyond what they could bear.
I ran my hands over Jonathan’s chest, looking for a wound, and I found it, bleeding freely but not heavily. Pulling off my scarf, I wadded it in a ball, unbuttoned his coat and then his tunic. I shoved the scarf against his shirt, jamming it as best I could against the place where the bleeding was heaviest, then buttoned the tunic over it to hold it in place.
As I worked, I realized that something was hurting my knee, and looked down. There was Jonathan’s service revolver-it had been drawn and was lying under him. He must have tried to defend himself and the two unarmed constables.
I had to get these men to a doctor as quickly as possible. And there was no one to help me.
I sprang to my feet, trying to judge whether I could bring the motorcar this far without bogging down, and how best to loop back to the road. And only then did I notice that someone else was lying in the field, outside the perimeter of the headlamp’s reach. I could only make out the shape of a man’s boot and a lump beyond it that was his body.
I blinked.
Peregrine hadn’t made it to safety after all. As I hurried toward where he lay in a crumpled heap, wounded or dead, I knew that Jonathan wouldn’t have missed his own shot. He was too good a soldier for that.
Then I was beside him, kneeling in the hard earth again, calling his name. His face was in deep shadow, but as I shone my torch into it, his eyelids fluttered, and he said, quite clearly, “Diana?”
“It’s Bess Crawford, Peregrine.”
“So it is.” He winced and lay still.
I could smell burnt wool, sharp and strong. Setting down the torch to search for a wound, I felt blood warm on my hands on both sides of his shoulder, high up. The bullet must have gone through. To get to his coat buttons, I had to turn him over. He cried out, and said something I couldn’t catch. His breathing was fast but steady, and there was no froth of blood on his lips that I could see. I didn’t know whether to be relieved or dismayed that he would live.
I rocked back on my heels, thinking. I could do nothing more here, in the dark, without bandages or good light.
But where to find help?
Peregrine had told me once that there was only a skeleton medical staff at the asylum in the evening. Would anyone come back with me? It would take too long to drive to Owlhurst and bring Dr. Philips here.
The best I could do was try to ease the motorcar forward and somehow manage to get everyone in it.
Beside me, Peregrine stirred. “Watch-”
I took his hand. “It’s Bess Crawford, Peregrine. Can you stand? If I help you, can you get to your feet?”
“Where’s my brother?” His voice was terse, angry.
“Just there. He’s badly hurt. Please, Peregrine, you must help me.”
He frowned, dark lines across his forehead, giving him a sinister look in the torch’s light. I’d seen the same shadows once in his sickroom. “No-”
I turned and hurried back to the motorcar. It was my only hope now. When I got there, I looked at Constable Mason. He was awake, his eyes wide and frightened in the light of my torch. I didn’t think he knew where he was, and proof of that came quickly as he lost consciousness again.
No help there. I got behind the wheel, and just barely touching the accelerator, I felt the tires bite and the motorcar move forward. Thank God. A month or so earlier, and the earth would have been soft enough that I wouldn’t have made it.
I’d have to leave the other constable. It would be nearly impossible to get the two living men into the motorcar, much less a dead man. But I guided the car toward him and examined him again to be certain.
As I knelt there beside him, the torch in my hand died. I thought, Oh, God, what next?
A man’s voice broke the silence, from some distance away, and I nearly leapt out of my skin.
“What’s happened? I heard shots.”
It sounded a little like Robert’s voice. The baritone of a big man.
I couldn’t see him, but he could see me, quite clearly.
I crouched by the constable, a frisson of uncertainty running through me. What was he doing here? “Robert? Is that you?”
To my left, Peregrine tried to shout something, and I was momentarily distracted.
“I say-you there-what’s going on?” the man called again, closer this time.
And then something was hurtling toward me from outside the rim of light. I could hear it coming, breathing hard, and as I got to my feet, braced to meet it, a large dog rushed up, tongue lolling, barking as if to say, Look what I’ve discovered.
Its owner stepped into the edge of the motorcar’s headlamps and stopped, staring. He carried a shotgun, broken, over his arm.
“What’s going on here? Is that a policeman?”
I’d never seen the man before. Relief washed over me and I could almost feel my heart slowing to its normal rhythm.
“I was driving by when I heard the shots,” I said. “My own motorcar is on the road. I’m a nurse-these men are badly hurt. Can you help me get them to a doctor?”