My first thought was, irrationally, “Oh, no. He’s missed.” But then I recalled that missing, or certainly not killing me was what I wanted.
Shorty yelled out: “Christ! Somebody’s shooting in those bushes. Get down!” and he summarily shoved me to the grass.
Wesley and David ran up to see what all the fuss was about. Shorty shouted the same to them. We all four lay flat on the ground.
Ben slowly approached Ginger, who was quite still, but of course that could have been a ruse that could enable him to shoot back at his attacker. Ben’s movements were very cautious, walking in a crouched posture towards the man. As Ben neared Ginger, he could see no sign of movement; he was lying on his side, half facing Ben and clearly had a wound in his back where the bullet had entered his body, and another in his chest where it had left. It clearly hadn’t touched any bone on the way through. Both the front and back of his torso were bleeding. There was still no movement and the man’s gun was lying beside him.
Ben knelt down and touched Ginger. His body did not react in any way, except to move slightly as if it were a large soft toy.
Ben had killed Ginger. This was not his intent at all; he had merely meant to disable him so that he couldn’t shoot at his father. The full horror of what he’d done suddenly hit him. He had killed the man!
After a few moments, his broken voice managed to call out: “It’s Ben. Please come and help me. I’ve just killed someone.”
David, Shorty, Wesley and I slowly rose to our feet and saw Ben walking dazed from the undergrowth, a gun in his right hand.
Ben came up to me, dropping the weapon, and hugged me. David and Shorty went into the trees and found the body. I heard David pronounce that the man was definitely dead. Meanwhile Wesley stood around not knowing what to do.
“Did you shoot this man,” DCI ‘Shorty’ asked Ben.
“Yes,” he admitted.
“Then I’m going to have to arrest you, young man.” Ben was on reflection not surprised by this. He hadn’t seen the consequences of his plan and his actions. At least he had saved his father.
From the bottom of the previous column
“Look, Josh, don’t jump ahead,” I said. “There must be an explanation for all this. It’s just that none of us know the full story. Before you take any action, let’s just hear what Ben has to say.”
“Well, this is most irregular,” Shorty objected. “He’ll be taken to the nearest Police Station and interviewed there. I won’t be able to help, as I’m a witness.”
David asked: “Has anyone got a mobile phone? Call an ambulance, please.” Wesley immediately obeyed. “And ask to put me through to the Police,” Shorty added. “Now everybody well away from this area; I am declaring a crime scene; sorry to say this to my friends, but if anyone so much as touches anything, I’ll have to arrest them.”
We all moved back, and explained to some other golfers who were approaching the area that there had been an accident, and would one of them please tell the club manager to close the course.
Ben was charged with murder, but pleaded guilty to manslaughter.
A rather sympathetic judge gave a lengthy summary of the case, and accepted his ‘not guilty’ plea to murder, and so directed the jury. He eventually sentenced Ben to five years in prison for manslaughter, one year to be served in an institute for young people, and the remainder to be suspended, and monitored by a probation officer.
After a year Ben returned to his old school, where his courage was admired by just about everyone; and, though his name never came up in court, Hughie Rushton, the supplier of the firearm, turned against crime and resumed a normal school life, having seen the damage that his way of life could affect others.
After leaving school, Ben studied Chemistry at Brighton University, near enough to home that he could see his mother most weekends, and later joined a large pharmaceuticals company.
Have you read my other stories: “The Green Flash”, “Millennium” and “The Plutonian”?