Chapter 7
There was a split second when Rupert pounced at her that Beatrice had absolutely no idea what to think. This man, who had now rescued her twice, and who had only ever behaved toward her in the most respectful, gentlemanly behavior, was now diving toward her.
He was about to slam into her, and in the hair’s breadth of a moment before he hit her, she felt fear stab through her, more painful than the blow she was anticipating.
And then she heard it.
Bang.
So loud that her eyes rang, that she felt the vibrations go through her skin and rattle her bones. A sound that wrenched open the air. A sound that she knew well, from the many afternoons she had watched her brother practice targets on the back lawn of their estate.
A gun.
A gun fired from a very close distance.
The next second, Rupert had slammed into her, and then they were falling.
She hit the ground hard, and all the air was knocked out of her.
Rupert fell on top of her, his body covering hers, and she realized, even in the confusion, that he was trying to protect her, to cover her from the gunshot.
The weight of him was enormous. She was crushed, not even able to cry out in fear.
And then another gunshot rang out. She wanted to scream, but she couldn’t. She wanted to see what was happening, but all she could see was the black of Rupert’s traveling cloak. She wanted to hear if the attackers were getting closer, but all she could hear was the ragged sound of Rupert’s breath.
There were a few, long moments of silence.
Enough that Beatrice began to wonder if their assailants were gone.
And then one more bang ripped open the air.
And this time, the bullet found its mark.
She felt his body jerk, and then he was thrown off of her. He had been hit.
“Rupert!” she cried, his given name ripped from her throat before she could stop herself.
He grunted loudly, and then rolled away from her, onto his back.
At the same time, she heard hoofbeats moving away from them.
Looking up, she saw the back of a horse disappearing down the road in the direction they had come, back toward the village.
The man on the horse was wearing a dark cloak, but she could not make out anything else distinguishing about him.
It was too late to try and chase him. And anyway, Rupert needed her attention. Praying that there was only one attacker, she turned back to Rupert.
He was clutching his arm, where she could see the bullet had torn through the jacket, exposing his skin. She could not tell if the bullet had gone into his flesh or nearly grazed him, though, because there was too much blood. It was gushing from his arm.
There was so much more of it than she would have imagined, dark red, thick, and putrid. The smell was the worst part, but she knew she could not let it bother her.
He needed her help now.
After rescuing her twice, it was her turn to rescue him.
Her fingers shaking, she grabbed the sash from around her waist and untied it as quickly as possible. Then she brought it to his arm, just above the wound, and tied it tightly, creating a tourniquet. She then tied another strip of cloth, which she ripped from her dress, directly over the wound.
Rupert’s face was very pale, and his eyes were closed, his teeth clenched together as if to keep himself from crying out. But as she fastened the tourniquet around him, he opened his eyes. They were watery and foggy with pain, but they found hers.
“You have to keep pressure on it,” she said, raising his other hand and pressing it against the wound.
He nodded slowly. “Thank you.”
Her throat tightened.
“We just have to stop the bleeding,” she said. “But if the bullet is in you, I cannot try to get it out by myself. We need to take you to a doctor.”
“The village…”
“A village that size does not have a doctor,” she said, shaking her head. “No, we have to get you to Pendleton Manor. Vivienne will be able to call her personal physician. Can you walk?”
Rupert’s face scrunched tighter, but then he nodded. Holding his other, uninjured arm, she helped him to stand, then supported him over to his horse.
“We are not far,” she said. “But we must move quickly. I do not know how good that tourniquet is.”
It seemed to do the job, however, because once they were on the road, the bleeding seemed to have lessened.
Lessened, but not entirely stopped. And by the time they turned down the long, tree-lined drive of Pendleton Manor, Rupert was dangerously pale, and his sleeve was covered in blood.
The tourniquet seemed tight still, but it was not entirely working.
The moment the horses came to stop in front of Pendleton Manor, Beatrice jumped down and ran, flat-out, toward the front door. It opened just as she arrived, and the butler stepped out.
Beatrice remembered this man, Mr. Harrow, vaguely from the years when she had visited Pendleton Manor regularly. He was elderly and stooped, with kind brown eyes and an easy smile.
He was not smiling now, however.
“Miss Ashford!” he cried, his eyes very wide. “W-what are you doing here? And with…” His gaze swept over Rupert, and his mouth fell open. “Is he…?”
“He is not dead,” she said. “But he is in need of a doctor! Please, Mr. Harrow, we must fetch one at once!”
“I shall do it right away,” he said.
“And tell Vivienne we are here!”
But there was no need to tell her, because at that moment, Beatrice heard her name cry out, and she looked up to see her friend coming down the long, winding staircase in the entrance hall toward her.
“Beatrice?!” Vivienne gasped. She looked exactly the same as Beatrice remembered, short and slender, almost nymph-like with light blonde hair and wide light blue eyes.
But it had been so long since Beatrice had seen her that, for a moment, she was struck with a powerful desire to simply sit down and talk to her friend, to tell her everything that had happened to her in the past four years.
But there was no time for any of that.
“You must help, Vivienne!” Beatrice cried. “We have been attacked!”
Vivienne’s mouth fell open. “You and Theodore?”
But when she came out into the drive and saw the strange man sitting horseback, she looked even more shaken. Her eyes slid to Beatrice’s, a curiosity and also a wariness there that made Beatrice’s stomach curl with guilt.
She was the one who had brought this strange man to her friend’s house, and she knew not what consequences this might bring.
“Get him inside at once,” Vivienne said, putting aside whatever curiosity she had. “And get the doctor!”
Things moved quickly after that. Footmen came rushing forward, and it was they who got Rupert down from his horse and carried him into the house. Vivienne directed them to take him to one of the family bedrooms, which were a little closer, while Mr. Harrow ran for the doctor.
Upstairs in the bedchamber, a maid carefully removed Rupert’s jacket, first having to cut around the tourniquet, while Beatrice and Vivienne watched on fearfully.
The jacket was sticky with blood, and Vivienne gave instructions for it to be burned.
Rupert had passed out by then; his eyes occasionally flickered open, but he seemed beyond speech or coherence.
His skin was now almost gray, and fear was clawing its way up through Beatrice, making it difficult for her to think straight.
Please, do not let him die, she kept repeating to herself, over and over again, like a prayer. Please, do not let him die.
He could not die. Not after how many times he had saved her life. He was owed a miraculous recovery. The scales of the universe had to be balanced out.
At last, after what felt like an eternity, the doctor arrived.
He was a heavily mustachioed man in his mid-sixties with gray hair streaked with black and a no-nonsense attitude.
The moment he saw Rupert lying in the bed, his jaw set, and he pulled open his medical bag and began to look through it for instruments.
“I will need alcohol,” he said to Vivienne, “to anesthetize the wound. And then I will need to ascertain if the bullet is still inside. If it is, I will remove it. If not, then I will stitch up the wound to stop the bleeding.”
“He has lost so much already,” Beatrice said uncertainly, searching the doctor’s face for any sign of what this might mean.
The doctor nodded, his expression grim. “I cannot guarantee any outcome,” he said, without preamble. “But I shall do my best. You ladies might not want to see this. It will be quite gruesome.”
Beatrice did not move. “I do not want to leave his side,” she said. But then she felt Vivienne’s hand on her arm.
“Come, darling,” her friend murmured. “You have done all that you can for him. Let the doctor work. We will only be a distraction.”
Reluctantly, Beatrice followed Vivienne out of the room. Before the door closed, she caught one last look at the doctor bending over the bed to examine the arm, Rupert’s face gray and still as a stone.
Then the door was closed, and Beatrice felt her legs begin to give out beneath her. She nearly fell, but Vivienne’s grip on her tightened, keeping her upright.
“Come,” her friend murmured, and she led her down the hall to a small parlor, where she sat her on a green velvet sofa and handed her a glass of cognac that she had poured from the bottle on the side table.
“Drink,” Vivienne said. “It will do you good.”
Beatrice took a long drink. The burn was so intense she nearly choked, but when she finally swallowed it, a pleasant, warm sensation spread through her, dulling her panic. She looked up at Vivienne, who was leaning against the unlit hearth, and smiled weakly.
“Thank you,” she whispered. “That does help.”
“I cannot believe you are here,” Vivienne said, shaking her head. “And in such a dramatic fashion! I thought that you were still in France.”
“Theodore wanted me to come home for the Season,” Beatrice said. Her voice was soft and hoarse, her throat very dry. “He wishes me to take a husband.”
That all felt so far away and unimportant now, compared to what she had just experienced.