I struck to the right some way, and then quitted the road altogether for a glade in the wood which seemed to lead to denser shelter.
I had scarcely left the track when I was startled by the sound of a voice and a groan close by.

Had I wanted to retreat I could hardly have done so unseen, but a glance in the direction from which the sound proceeded held me where I was.
A horse stood quietly nibbling the grass, and on his back, fallen forward, with arms clasping the beast's neck, and head drooping helplessly downward, was his rider, bleeding from a pistol wound in the neck, and too weak even to disengage his feet from the stirrups.

In a single glance I recognised the horseman who had ridden ahead of the coach.
A pistol, evidently dropped from his hand, lay on the grass, and his hat lay between the horse's feet.
If life was not already extinct, it was fast ebbing away.

I lifted him as gently as I could and laid him on the grass.

He opened his eyes, and his lips moved; but for a moment he seemed choked.