“Did he come in later?”
“No, never,” replied Rimmer, lowering his voice, as a man sometimes does when speaking very seriously. “He never came in again.”
“They say Gisby can’t recover. Is that true, or not?”
“It is thought he’ll not live through the day, sir.”
“And where can Westerbrook be hiding himself?”
“He’s safe inside the hut of one or other of the poachers, I should say,” nodded the landlord. “Not that that would be safe for him, or for them, if it could be found out who the villains were. I think I could give a guess at two or three of them.”
“So could I,” said Tod. “Dick Standish was one, I know. And Jelf another. Of course, their haunts will be searched. Don’t you think, Rimmer, Mr. Fred Westerbrook would rather make off, than run the risk of concealing himself in any one of them?”
Rimmer shook his head. “I don’t know about that, sir. He might not be able to make off. It’s thought he was wounded.”
“Wounded!”
“Gisby fired his own gun in the act of falling, and Shepherd thinks the charge hit young Mr. Westerbrook. The poachers were running off then, and Shepherd saw them halt in a kind of heap like, and he is positive that the one on the ground was Mr. Westerbrook. For that reason, sir, I should say the chances are he is somewhere in the neighbourhood.”