“Yes, yes. He’s lying here, half dead. We must get him to the side of the road at once.”
Arthur slipped from his saddle, and holding the reins of the two horses, approached the group as nearly as the frightened beasts would let him. “Quiet, fools!” he cried angrily. And then, “Good heavens!” in a whisper, as he peered awe-stricken at the injured man. “Is he dead?”
“No, but he’s terribly mauled. And we must get help. Help, man, and quickly, if it is to be of any use. Shall I go?”
“No, no, I’ll go,” Arthur answered, recoiling. What he had seen had given him no desire to take Clement’s place. “Garthmyle is the nearer, and I shall not be long. I’ll tie up your horse—that’ll be best.”
There was an old thorn-tree standing solitary in the waste not many yards away: a tree destined to be pointed out for years to come as marking the spot where the old Squire was robbed. Arthur tied Clement’s horse to this, then together they lifted the old man and carried him to the side of the road. The moment that this was done, Arthur sprang on his horse and started off. “Back soon,” he shouted.
Clement had not seen his way to object, but it was with a heavy heart that he resigned himself to another period of painful waiting. He was cold, his face smarted, and at any moment the old man might die on his hands. Meantime he could do nothing but wait. Or yes, he could do something; chilled as he was, he took off his coat, and rolling it up, he slipped it under the insensible head.
Little had he thought that morning that he would ever pity the Squire. But he did. The man who had driven away from him, hard, aggressive, indomitable, asking no man’s help and meeting all men’s eyes with the gaze of a master, now lay at his feet, crushed and broken; lay with his head on the coat of the man he had despised, dependent on him for the poor service that still might avail him. Clement felt the pathos of it, and the pity. And his heart was sore for Josina. How would she meet, how bear the shock that a short hour must inflict on her?
He was thinking of her, when, long before he had dared to expect relief, he heard a sound that resolved itself into the rattle of wheels. Yes, there was a carriage coming along the road.
Arthur had been fortunate. He had come upon the Squire’s horses, which had been brought to a stand with the near wheels of the curricle wedged in the ditch. He had found them greedily feeding, and he had let his own nag go, and had captured the runaways. He had drawn the carriage out of the ditch, and here he was.
“Thank God!” Clement cried. “I think that he is still alive.”