For Your Arms Only (2 page)

P
enford didn’t appear to have changed much. Three stories of limestone, stately but comfortable, with a pitched roof he had once skidded off on a sled when the snow was particularly deep. The grounds still ranged somewhat wildly about the house, as if the gardener had been let go, but it was all by design; his mother had always favored an almost wilderness air to her grounds, and her children had loved it, spending hours scampering through those woods when they were supposed to be at their studies.

Penford looked almost too much the way he remembered it, as if time had not passed at all. Alec shifted in the saddle, ashamed that he had unconsciously expected to see some sort of decay, some sign that he—and now Frederick—had been missed. Instead it appeared just as it always had, at least from this distance. Perhaps it was comforting that it was more ageless than he was, that it was still a safe and secure home for what remained of his family.

He hoped the next few days wouldn’t shake that security too badly.

Alec gathered the reins and urged the horse forward. He had had a whole week to prepare for this day, which ought to be filled with joy. He’d only been dreaming about it for five long years. Instead he let the horse walk, and tried to quell the sudden urge to turn and go back the other way, back to the inn where he had stayed the previous night or even all the way back to London. He had sent word that he was arriving today, and Peterbury had written them as well. Even without Stafford’s mission to pursue, Alec had no choice but to go forward.

When he reached the curve in the drive, a figure emerged from the house. He shaded his eyes and watched Alec for a few minutes, then strode down the graveled drive to meet him, the tails of his coat flapping behind him in his haste. Alec drew up the horse when they met, and looked into the curious, wary eyes of his cousin John.

For a long moment they just studied each other. John had grown tall and solid, his fair hair cut short and his complexion ruddy from the sun. He was dressed as any country squire might be, the image of a hardworking landowner. He had an honest face, Alec thought, though his expression was pure amazement at the moment.

“Alec? Alexander Hayes?” said John slowly. “Is it really you?”

There was no denying it now, and no going back. He swung down from the saddle. “It is good to see you, John.”

John’s light green eyes moved up and down, taking him in. “By God,” he said softly. “It is. It really is.”

Alec’s hand stiffened on the horse’s bridle. “Yes.”

“By God,” murmured John again.

He cleared his throat when the pause wore on too long. “Is my mother…?”

His cousin shook himself, still seeming dazed. “Yes. We received James Peterbury’s letter a few days ago, and then yours a day later. It was quite a shock, but of the happiest kind. My aunt has been beside herself awaiting this moment. You must come in to her at once.” He stuck out his hand, and when Alec took it, he threw his arm around Alec’s shoulder, pulling him into an awkward embrace. “Welcome home, cousin,” he said in a voice muffled against Alec’s shoulder.

It was far more cordial than he had expected. He hadn’t seen John in nearly a dozen years, and they had never really been friends. But after a moment he returned the embrace, then stepped back and collected the reins. John fell in step beside him and they walked toward the house. “I understand you’ve been looking after things here,” said Alec, for lack of anything better to say while John still watched him from the corner of his eye as one would watch a circus curiosity. He told himself to get used to seeing that expression.

John jerked around to face him, eyes wide, but then he laughed, a bit ruefully. “Oh—yes. Freddie invited me for the Christmas holidays, and then after he fell ill…” He pursed his lips and looked at the ground. “My condolences on his death.”

Alec nodded once. Freddie, John called him. Clearly John had had a closer relationship with his brother than Alec had, even allowing for the void of the last years. “Thank you,” he murmured. “I am pleased he was not alone or consumed by estate business.”

It took a moment for his cousin to reply. “No, no, he was not burdened by it.” He kicked a rock from the drive, sending it bouncing into the neatly trimmed lawn. “I shall be happy to go over the books with you at your convenience. I believe they are still kept in the same manner as your father kept them. Freddie never changed, and I…Well, I assumed he would return to form in due time and come thrash me if I changed his accounting.”

Frederick had never been one to thrash, and they both knew it. Frederick would have frowned and pinched his lips together, then gone off and redone the books the way he wanted them. Alec felt a stab of pain that he’d never see that disappointed look again. “I’m sure everything is fine.”

“I have tried to run things properly, as your father and brother would have done…” John’s voice died abruptly as Alec stopped.

“And because you thought they were to be yours,” he said quietly. “John—”

“No, no.” John held up one hand, his smile grim and tight. “I thought that, yes. But it is a far greater happiness that you are still alive. Losing Frederick was very hard on your mother.”

Alec looked toward the house. Other people had come out. His mother, leaning on his sister, Julia’s arm. His sister-in-law, Marianne, holding a child in one arm with another child clinging to her black skirts. Abruptly he felt suffocated, hemmed in, and gripped by a mad desire to mount his horse and ride far from all of them before he could see the expressions on their faces. Frederick had died honestly; Alec had just disappeared, letting them believe him dead because it suited him, and for a brief horrible moment, he wished he’d had the decency to succumb to his injuries on the field of Waterloo.

“Come.” John nodded at the welcoming party. “They are anxious to see you.”

As they drew near, Alec began to focus on telling details. Marianne’s children hid their faces at his approach. Marianne, more lovely and fair than ever in her widow’s weeds, seemed on the verge of tears as she stared at him, her knuckles white where she held her smaller child. Julia watched him almost belligerently, her chin high and her eyes blazing, looking taller and thinner than before. But his mother…

“Mother,” he said softly, stopping an arm’s length in front of her. “I’ve missed you.”

She reached out her hand to touch his sleeve. She was smaller than he remembered, more stooped and wrinkled. Her gaze lifted to his face in wonder, the same deep blue eyes that peered from his mirror every morning. Funny how he had forgotten until now that he had her eyes. “Alexander,” she whispered. “You
have
come back.” She released Julia and took two steps forward until she could lean on his outstretched arms. Her hands trembled as her fingers curled into the fabric of his coat, digging into his arms. “Oh, Alexander,” she said again, tears beginning to stream down her face. “My
son
.”

Alec felt the first real bite of despair as his mother laid her cheek against his chest and wept. She was his mother, as familiar as his own flesh, and yet not. A deep shame swept over him. No matter that he knew he was innocent of treason; his family could not have known, and if they had believed him innocent nonetheless, they had done so without any proof or even assurances from him that it was so. In his outrage and humiliation and even fear, he had simply vanished and left them to face the public scorn for him. “Mother,” he said again, helplessly. “I am so sorry.”

She raised her head to look at him. “Never,” she said fiercely, through her tears. “Never apologize. Whatever grief I have endured cannot match my joy at your return. I lost both my sons, and now one has returned to me. I don’t care how or why, I only care that you are alive and well and home.”

“What you must think,” he began, until she put up her hand, touching his cheek.

“Not now,” she said gently. “Today is a day for celebration, nothing else.”

Her words only made him feel worse somehow. If she had demanded to know if he truly had sold secrets to the French…if she had asked where he’d been for the last five years and what he’d been doing…If she had only asked why he hadn’t sent her even a whisper of a suggestion that he was still alive…All those questions would have been her right to ask, and the fact that she didn’t ask one, but merely gathered him into her arms as she had done so many times when he was a boy, rent Alec’s heart. He was better as a spy now, alone and unfettered, when he didn’t even have to pretend to any sort of honesty. Gingerly he held his mother and let her weep.

“Oh, but I’ve gone and turned maudlin,” she said, raising her head and dabbing at her eyes with a handkerchief. “On this, the happiest day in many a month.” She stepped back, and Alec saw her make a small hand motion urging Julia on.

His sister didn’t appear nearly as pleased to see him. “Alec,” she said, ducking her head in a stiff curtsey.

“It is good to see you again, Julia,” he replied. She pressed her lips together and said nothing. “And you, Marianne.”

Frederick’s wife jumped as he said her name. The child she was holding clung tighter to her neck and started to whimper. “Welcome home, Alec,” she said quietly. “We were overjoyed to hear of your return.”

“Thank you,” he murmured. Everyone was looking at him, and with such naked curiosity and emotion. It made his skin crawl to be the focus of so much attention, after years of avoiding all notice.

“Well,” said his mother brightly, “shall we go inside? You must be tired, Alexander dear, and in want of a drink.” Clinging to his arm, she steered him into the house. He couldn’t help glancing up and around as he passed through the high arched door into the main hall. He might have left only a month ago; the house was just as he remembered it inside as well as out. The butler and housekeeper were waiting within, and from the quick patter of footsteps, the rest of the servants had also been loitering about the hall, hoping to catch a glimpse of the man come back from the dead. Alec tried to rein in his dark mood, but it all began to seem quite ghoulish.

“Farley, see to Major Hayes’s things at once,” his mother told the butler. “Mrs. Smythe, send tea to the drawing room, along with…” She glanced up at Alec. “A bottle of port, and some brandy.” The servants bowed and hurried off. “Come, dear,” she said to Alec. “Won’t you sit with me?”

Like a funeral train, everyone filed into the sitting room. Marianne followed after sending her children upstairs with a nursemaid. The thought that he was attending his own funeral grew more pronounced; irrationally, Alec felt like saying it aloud to provoke any other reaction. Only his mother seemed oblivious, settling herself in the chair that had always been hers, beaming at Alec as he sat next to her.

But then no one seemed to know what to say. The silence grew more and more ominous as they all sat and hardly looked at one another. Alec finally forced himself to speak. “I only recently heard of Frederick’s death. If I had known—”

“Then what?” Julia said under her breath.

Perhaps if they had a loud screaming row, it would air out the grievances everyone must be feeling, like ripping a bandage from a festering wound in one painful swoop. Alec turned to face his sister. “What do you want to know, Julia?”

She lifted her chin, taking up his challenge. “The same thing we all want to know, I daresay. Where you’ve been for five years and why the bloody hell you didn’t send Mother even a single word that you were alive—”

“Julia!” cried her mother.

Julia’s mouth pursed. “I was just answering his question, Mother. Didn’t you say we must go on as if nothing had changed?”

Anthea Hayes flushed. “Not today, Julia,” she said with steel in her voice.

“No, no,” Alec replied, watching his sister’s face burn red. “Let her speak. Julia and I were never coy with each other.”

Julia’s hands balled into fists in her lap. “Weren’t we?” she retorted. “And yet you’ve been exceptionally coy these last five years, neglecting to tell us you still lived.”

His sister was seething with fury, and oddly it made Alec feel better. This was better than sitting and being stared at with amazement and suspicion. “I wouldn’t call it coy or neglectful—”

“Oh?” She sniffed. “Perhaps willfully deceitful, then.”

“Julia,” said Marianne softly.

His sister opened her mouth, then closed it. She lurched to her feet. “Pray excuse me, Mother. I feel a headache coming on and would like to retire to my room.” She shot a furious glare at Alec before sweeping from the room.

He clenched his jaw as the door slammed shut behind her. He saw the worried look Marianne sent John, and the way John replied with a tiny shake of his head. “I am so sorry,” said his mother, reaching out to put her hand on his. “Julia is…Well, it was a tremendous shock…”

“Mother, I understand.” Alec shook his head. “I don’t expect her to be overjoyed.”

“Julia always loved you so; this has been a very hard week for her,” she replied. “She was distraught after Waterloo, when we heard…But she will come around in time.”

In time. The thought of the weeks and days ahead made Alec’s head ache. If this was the reaction from his family, how much worse would it be when he met neighbors and old friends? He might as well have come home with the word “traitor” branded on his forehead. “I’m sure it has been very hard on you as well.”

“Oh, no!” His mother’s face lit up. “When the Peterbury boy wrote to us, telling us you were alive and well—Alexander, you cannot know what happiness I felt, and then doubly so when your letter arrived a day later. This has been the longest week of my life, waiting to see for myself. Your father…” Her voice wobbled. “He would have been overjoyed as well.” Tears glimmered in her eyes.

“Excuse me,” John murmured, rising to his feet. “I have some things to see to…” He trailed off and coughed, looking ill at ease.

“And I should go to the children.” Marianne rose. “You must wish to have some time together. Welcome home, Alec.”

In the silence after their departure, Alec turned to his mother. “I know everyone will have questions, Mother. You mustn’t tell Julia she should go on as if nothing has happened.”