As always when he walked in the woodland, Darcy’s thought turned to his great-grandfather. The charm of the woodland for that long-dead George Darcy must have lain partly in the wood’s diversity, its secret footpaths and unexpected vistas. Here in his remote tree-guarded refuge where the birds and small animals could come unimpeded to his home, he could believe that he and nature were one, breathing the same air, guided by the same spirit. As a boy playing in the woodland, Darcy had always sympathised with his great-grandfather and he had early realised that this seldom-mentioned Darcy, who had abdicated his responsibility to the estate and the house, was an embarrassment to his family. Before shooting his dog, Soldier, and himself, he had left a brief note asking to be buried with the animal, but this impious request had been ignored by the family and George Darcy lay with his forebears in the enclosed family section of the village churchyard, while Soldier had his own woodland grave with a granite headstone carved simply with his name and the date of his death. From childhood Darcy had been aware that his father had feared that there might be some inherited weakness in the family and had early indoctrinated in him the great obligations which would lie on his shoulders once he inherited, responsibilities for both the estate and those who served and depended on it, which no elder son could ever reject.

Colonel Fitzwilliam set a slow pace, swinging his lantern from side to side and occasionally calling a halt so that he could take a closer look at the occluding foliage, searching for any signs that someone had broken through. Darcy, aware that the thought was ungenerous, reflected that the colonel, exercising his prerogative to take charge, was probably enjoying himself. Trudging in front of Alveston, Darcy walked in a bitterness of spirit broken from time to time by surges of anger, like the rush of an incoming tide. Was he never to be free of George Wickham? These were the woods in which the two of them had played as boys. It was a time he could once recall as carefree and happy, but had that boyhood friendship really been genuine? Had the young Wickham even then been harbouring envy, resentment and dislike? Those rough boyish games and mock fights which sometimes left him bruised – had Wickham perhaps been deliberately over-boisterous? The petty, hurtful remarks now rose into his consciousness, beneath which they had lain untroubling for years. How long had Wickham been planning his revenge? The knowledge that his sister had only avoided social disgrace and ignominy because he was rich enough to buy her would-be seducer’s silence was so bitter that he almost groaned aloud. He had tried to put his humiliation out of mind in the happiness of his marriage but now it returned, made stronger by the years of repression, an intolerable burden of shame and self-disgust made more bitter by the knowledge that it was only his money that had induced Wickham to marry Lydia Bennet. It had been a generosity born of his love for Elizabeth, but it had been his marriage to Elizabeth which had brought Wickham into his family and had given him the right to call Darcy brother and made him an uncle to Fitzwilliam and Charles. He might have been able to keep Wickham out of Pemberley but he could never banish him from his mind.

After five minutes they reached the path which led from the road to Woodland Cottage. Trodden regularly over the years, it was narrow but not hard to find. Before Darcy had time to speak, the colonel moved at once towards it, lantern in hand. Handing his firearm to Darcy, he said, “You had better have this. I am not expecting any trouble and it will only frighten Mrs Bidwell and her daughter. I will check that they are all right and tell Mrs Bidwell to keep the door locked and on no account to let anyone in. I had better let Mrs Bidwell know that the two gentlemen may be lost in the woodland and that we are seeking them. There is no point in telling her anything else.”

Then he was gone and was immediately out of sight, the sound of his departure deadened by the density of the wood. Darcy and Alveston stood still in silence. The minutes seemed to lengthen and, looking at his watch, Darcy saw that the colonel had been gone for nearly twenty minutes before they heard the rustle of parted branches and he reappeared.

Taking back his gun from Darcy, he said curtly, “All is well. Mrs Bidwell and her daughter both heard the sound of gunfire which they thought was close but not immediately outside the cottage. They locked the door at once and heard nothing more. The girl – Louisa is it not? – was on the verge of hysteria but her mother managed to quieten her. It is unfortunate that this is the night when Bidwell is not at home.” He turned to the coachman. “Keep a sharp eye and stop when we get to the place where Captain Denny and Mr Wickham left the chaise.”

He again took his place at the head of the little procession and they walked slowly on. From time to time Darcy and Alveston raised their lanterns high, looking for any disturbance in the undergrowth, listening for any sound. Then, after about five minutes, the chaise rocked to a stop.

Pratt said, “About here I reckon, sir. I remember this oak tree on the left and those red berries.”

Before the colonel could speak Darcy asked, “In which direction did Captain Denny go?”

“To the left, sir. There’s no path that I could see but he just charged into the wood as if the bushes wasn’t there.”

“How long before Mr Wickham followed him?”

“No more than a second or two, I reckon. Like I said, sir, Mrs Wickham clutched at him and tried to stop him going, and kept hollering after him. But when he didn’t come back and she heard the shots she told me to start moving and get to Pemberley as quick as possible. She was screaming, sir, the whole way, saying as how we was all going to be murdered.”

Darcy said, “Wait here, and don’t leave the chaise.” He turned to Alveston, “We had better take the stretcher. We shall look fools if they’ve just got lost and are wandering unharmed, but those shots are worrying.”

Alveston untied and dragged down the stretcher from the chaise. He said to Darcy, “And bigger fools if we get lost ourselves. But I expect you know these woodlands well, sir.”

Darcy said, “Well enough, I hope, to find my way out of them.”

It was not going to be easy to manoeuvre the stretcher through the undergrowth but, after discussion of the problem, Alveston shouldered the rolled canvas and they set off.

Pratt had made no reply to Darcy’s command that he should stay with the chaise but it was apparent that he was unhappy at being left alone and his fear communicated itself to the horses, whose jostling and neighing seemed to Darcy a fitting accompaniment to an enterprise he was beginning to think ill advised. Thrusting their way through the almost impenetrable bushes, they walked in single file, the colonel leading, slowly casting their lanterns from side to side and halting at every sign that someone might recently have passed that way, while Alveston manoeuvred the long poles of the stretcher with difficulty under the low-hanging branches of the trees. Every few steps they halted, called out and then listened in silence, but there was no reply. The wind, which had been hardly heard, suddenly dropped and in the calm it seemed that the secret life of the woodland was stilled by their unwonted presence.

At first, from the torn and hanging twigs of some of the bushes and a few smudges which could be footprints, there was hope that they were on the right trail, but after five minutes the trees and bushes became less thick, their calls were still unanswered and they stopped to consider how best to proceed. Afraid to lose contact in case one or other of them got lost, they had kept within yards of each other, moving west. Now they decided to return to the chaise by turning eastward towards Pemberley. It was impossible for three men to cover the whole extensive woodland; if this change of direction produced no results they would go back to the house and, if Wickham and Denny had not returned by daylight, call in estate workers and perhaps the police to institute a more thorough search.

They trudged on, when suddenly the barrier of tangled bushes was less dense and they glimpsed a moonlit glade formed by a ring of slender silver birch trees. They pressed forward with renewed energy, crashing through the undergrowth, glad to break free of the imprisonment of the tangled shrubs and the thick unyielding trunks into freedom and light. Here there was no overhanging canopy of boughs and the moonlight silvering the delicate trunks made this a vision of beauty, more chimera than reality.

And now the glade was before them. Passing slowly, almost in awe, between two of the slender trunks, they stood as if physically rooted, speechless with horror. Before them, its stark colours a brutal contrast to the muted light, was a tableau of death. No one spoke. They moved slowly forward as one, all three holding their lanterns high; their strong beams, outshining the gentle radiance of the moon, intensified the bright red of an officer’s tunic and the ghastly blood-smeared face and mad glaring eyes turned towards them.

Captain Denny lay on his back, his right eye caked with blood, his left, glazed, fixed unseeing on the distant moon. Wickham was kneeling over him, his hands bloody, his own face a splattered mask. His voice was harsh and guttural but the words were clear. “He’s dead! Oh God, Denny’s dead! He was my friend, my only friend, and I’ve killed him! I’ve killed him! It’s my fault.”

Before they could reply, he slumped forward and began a wild sobbing which tore at his throat, then collapsed over Denny’s body, the two bloody faces almost touching.