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Upon feeling it, he instinctively started to turn in order to confront the pickpocket who had likely noticed the gold chain of his pocket watch hanging from within his pocket. The watch was one of the few things his father had personally left him in his will, and there was no way he was going to give it up without a fight.
“How dare…” he began, reaching for the wrist of the hand that had slipped into his pocket. Yet his fingers barely brushed the arm as it was yanked away. A searing pain pierced his flank and he felt a grinding as though something had slipped between his ribs. All of a sudden Gabriel felt himself being pushed.
All too late he realised the consequences of his actions as he heard the horse and carriage speeding towards him. In the instant before the carriage hit him, he found himself thinking of two things: how annoyed he was that he could not see the face of the cloaked black figure who had pushed him, and how he wished he was back atop that hill with Miss Julia.
Seconds before pain and darkness overwhelmed him, he saw her face smiling back at him through the snow and knew he would take that moment to his grave.
Gabriel never expected to wake again. But he did. Sore, aching and with a throbbing headache, he found himself back in his bed as though the entire thing had been nothing but a bad dream. Yet the aches and pains of his body were enough to tell him that it had not been.
He most certainly did feel as though he had been trampled by a team of horses and hit by a carriage. Though he couldn't have said whether or not that had actually happened as the severely sore patch on the back of his head suggested he had hit the ground hard and become unconscious well before.
Upon clearing his throat and making a painful attempt to sit up, he heard an exclamation that proved he was not alone. "Oh, Gabriel! Gabriel! Jonathan, Barnaby! He is awake!"
At that, footsteps came rushing and his mother, who had obviously been sitting upon an armchair at his bedside, leaned over to look down at him closely. The concern upon her face was reflected in the faces of his brother and cousin who appeared at the far end of the bed, both gripping hold of one of the posts as if it was all they could do to hold themselves up.
"Thank the lord!" Jonathan said, breathing a sigh of relief, though he still looked concerned.
Again, Gabriel tried to move only to realise that his right arm felt heavy and stiff. He glanced down and saw it was heavily wrapped in bandages. No wonder it was throbbing so terribly with pain. He grimaced, and as though she saw it immediately, his mother said, "Does it hurt monstrously?" Before he could respond, she turned to his brother and instructed quite authoritatively, "Go and have someone call the doctor back. Quickly!"
"Madre, there is no need to be so hasty," Gabriel insisted though his voice was croaky and hoarse, barely more than a whisper and not authoritative at all. Jonathan looked slightly relieved while their mother looked annoyed.
Barnaby seemed insistent upon ignoring them both and instead explained to Gabriel, "The doctor advised that you not move unless absolutely necessary."
"Well, in that case," Gabriel said, trying to chuckle only to realise it caused his chest to hurt agonisingly, "it is necessary for me to sit up."
Even as he attempted to move, using only his good arm, his brother hurried around the side of the bed to help prop him up. Though it was painful to move, it was far easier with his brother's help, and once he was settled against the mountain of pillows, he gasped, "Thank you, Jonathan."
Breathing deeply against the effort it had just taken to right himself, he struggled to ask, "What happened?"
Though he remembered bits and pieces, the memories were jagged and like loose puzzle pieces, none quite fitting together perfectly enough to create a picture of what he had endured.
"Eyewitnesses say they saw you fall into the road in front of a moving carriage," his mother explained, her voice fraught with emotion. "Luckily, the carriage driver was able to avoid you head on but one of the horses clipped you and your injuries are still quite extensive."
"Yes, I can feel that,” Gabriel commented, trying and failing to lift his heavy arm. He grunted, stifling the pain, and thought back again."Though I did not fall. I was pushed."
His mother gasped in sheer horror while the two men looked silently disgusted.
"Why ever would somebody push you into the road?" his mother exclaimed and Gabriel had to stifle disgruntled laughter. Jonathan too looked as though he was trying to hide his own amusement at their mother's comment. The both of them knew all too well the little nudges and jabs that had been offered to them over the years thanks to the circumstances of their birth and their place in society.
And although their mother was often well aware of the challenges faced, the two had agreed long ago to at least attempt to shield her from some of it now that she was growing older and without the love of her life to staunch the flow.
“I would be more concerned with the fact that you were stabbed,” Jonathan pointed out and for the first time memory brought back the pain of something being slipped between his ribs. With that memory came a new kind of pain, a burning and tugging sensation in his side that suggested the wound had been sealed with stitches.That would be why I am not allowed to move,he thought grimly.
For once, Gabriel thought this had far less to do with him personally and far more to do with the fact he had been a nobleman in the wrong place at the wrong time. "My jacket! The one I was wearing during the accident, where is it?" Again, forgetting his injuries, he attempted to clamber from the bed only to be stalled by a fresh wave of pain.
"You must stay in bed, Gabriel!" his mother scolded, and she came to his side to place her hand on his shoulder. Luckily, it wasn't quite so sore as the one attached to his broken arm because she added pressure to force him back against the pillows. "The doctor says you must remain in bed for a few weeks, at least."
A lump formed in Gabriel's throat at that. The very last thing he wanted right now was to be bedridden, what with all that had finally been going well in his life. In fact, a part of him couldn't help but think it had been the memory of Miss Julia's kiss that had brought him back from the brink when the pain had been too much for him to wake.
Even now, worried as he was about his pain and what had been taken from him, he thought of her.I cannot very well see her if I am bedbound,he thought grimly, though a part of him hoped desperately that she might hear of his accident and come to see him. At least then, he would not have to come up with some excuse for running into her or even calling upon her.
It was Barnaby's voice that brought him back to the present as his cousin explained, "Your jacket is fine, though exceptionally dirty. Your mother had it sent along with the rest of your things straight to be washed."
Gabriel's stomach clenched. "Were the pockets emptied beforehand?"
"I checked them myself," Jonathan announced, and the grim look upon his brother's face suggested he knew very well what was troubling him so.
“Was… was it…” Gabriel stammered, unable to say the words aloud for fear he would not like the answer.
