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Charlotte carefully watched Arthur prod the ground with the end of his bow.
“A deer came through here,” he noted, “fairly recently.”
“Fresh droppings?”
“Mhmm,” Arthur nodded. He had taught her well. He eyed the ground, searching for an indication of direction, but Charlotte caught the trail first.
“This way, I think.”
Arthur smiled to himself and let her take the lead. They slowly and quietly traipsed through the woods, parallel to the railway that ran through the land. Then, out in the small clearing, the whitetail was grazing. Charlotte looked back at Arthur who had his eyes locked on the animal as he crept closer. As he pulled the bowstring back, he was so focused on aiming that he wasn’t looking where he was going. His foot went down and caught the edge of a tree root with a sharp twist.
“Shit!”
He went down immediately, losing the bow when he put his hands out in front of him, but not the arrow, which snapped in his grasp. Charlotte laughed, but stopped being amused when, obviously in pain, he muttered,
“Damn.”
“You okay?”
“I’m fine,” he said, already standing up. But then he put his weight on his right foot,
“Ah! Shit.”
It was a pulsing pain, ebbing and flowing as he moved, the smallest pressure sending a pain like a flaming arrow to his ankle inside his boot, though it seemed to be easing. Charlotte was at his side now, taking the bow and placing it over her own shoulder.
“You can’t hunt like this, and you’ve scared off the deer anyways. We should head back. Can you walk?”
“Ah,” he hissed, “I think so.”
Charlotte rolled her eyes, already knowing how this was going to play out. He took a step by himself, and the pain made his leg give out, but Charlotte caught him.
“Lean on me,” she said, and he did. Together, very slowly, they walked back to Willard’s Rest. Charlotte grew to be more and more hunched with Arthur’s weight on her shoulder as they walked. When the homestead was in sight, Arthur said,
“We tell Albert I got bit by a wolf. A really big one.”
“Of course you did.”
Lady was there to greet them. The border collie barked and ran around them, her eyes firmly on Arthur as he hopped up the slope.
“Hey, girl. I’m okay.”
With the barking, Albert emerged from inside the house. When he saw them both struggling, Charlotte under Arthur’s arm and Arthur hopping on one leg, he ran to the gate, arms awkwardly flapping like a swan taking flight.
“What on Earth happened?!”
Albert ducked under Arthur’s other arm, and Charlotte sighed in relief at the shift in weight. The hunters exchanged a brief look. The wolf story would make Albert worry so much more than the truth.
“Ah, I twisted my ankle on a root or something. I’m fine.”
“And you say I’m prone to accidents. Maybe I should be the one going out there.”
“In your dreams, Mason.”
They made it inside, the dog following them closely the whole time. Charlotte finally got out from under his arm and pulled out a chair for him, where Albert sat him down and raised the injured ankle up on the table. He looked at Arthur for permission, who granted it with a nod, and he carefully pulled the boot off his foot and rolled the bottom of his jeans up. It didn’t hurt much, only a twinge, but Arthur still pet Lady as a comfort. She wasn’t going to leave his side, and neither, it seemed, were Albert and Charlotte.
“Is it broken?” she asked.
“It could be broken.”
“It don’t even hurt,” Arthur sighed. They both ignored him. Albert inspected the ankle even closer and pointed at a patch of dirt down by his heel,
“That looks like a bruise, right?”
“Does that mean it’s broken?”
“I told you it don’t even hurt,” stressed the man with his foot on the table, “Just calm down and give me the medicine, will ya?”
Albert pulled his hand away and got up, his own joints creaking.
“Oh right, sorry,” and he went to fetch a tonic.
“Keep your foot elevated,” instructed Charlotte as she lifted Arthur’s foot even higher onto Albert’s small pile of books that never left the table, Arthur almost losing his balance and feeling an ache in his calf in the process as the muscle stretched.
“What about a compress?”
“A what?”
And they kept talking like that. Back and forth for some time, deciding what to do. On the surface, Arthur was annoyed by the persistent attention and obsessiveness. But really he was glad. Glad that he had two people who cared about him and would do all they could to make sure he was all right, even over something as unserious as this. Even Lady looked worried, bless her heart. How’d he ever get so lucky?