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“Robert.”
He realized he’d just heard his name stretched taut like a rubber band and thumped on the last syllable a yoctosecond earlier. He glanced up from Purchas His Pilgrimes and into his reflection that wavered through a pair of wide coffee-brown eyes.
“You’re up early, aren’t you?”
Ernest caught the edge of Robert’s book and shoved it down. “Don’t tease me. It’s half past noon.”
“I’m pleasantly surprised.”
“Where’s Auntie?”
“She took the girls out to the market. They’re bringing in the shellfish haul today and Margaret always knows how to pick the best ones.” Robert reached past Ernest for his teacup. “Why do you ask?”
Ernest folded his arms and took a stance, squared in front of Robert, the toe of one shoe aimed like a compass needle at Robert’s chair. He went from a pale sliver that could be brushed aside with a maid’s duster to Mont Blanc’s immovable twin peak instantly.
“I want a bath run and my banyan hung by the fire.”
“Why do you need Margaret for that?” Robert sipped his cold tea and grimaced. He gingerly returned the cup to its saucer.
“It’s best when she does it. And I can’t lift your big awful bucket.”
“I can heat water too, you know.”
“Not like Auntie can.”
“You’ll be waiting a while for her to come back.”
Ernest glanced at the corner of the carpet, considering. He relented. He blew a puff of air up his forehead to dislodge a stubborn curl.
“All right. Fix my bath, Robert. Oh, and I want something to eat.”
“You always do.” Robert rose to put his book away. “Why don’t you cut yourself a slice of bread to curb the appetite until supper? Margaret made that loaf this morning and it’s one of her best yet.”
As he turned to take a kettle from its hanger, an insistent hand snagged his cuff.
“Will you do it, Robert?”
“Don’t you want me to get your—” A thought struck. He clamped his mouth shut. Ernest’s hand on his arm was light and unsteady.
Ernest looked up at him through his lashes, blinked a couple of times, and Robert found himself drowning in the coffee again.
“Of course.”
He let Ernest tug him by the sleeve to the counter. Under Ernest’s appraising supervision, Robert obediently sawed off half the loaf and impastoed it with an inch of butter. Light glared harsh and ugly off the knife blade. Robert’s stomach twisted into a clover knot. The knife was cold as a new penny. Margaret had cried to him after she’d wrapped the cut on Ernest’s shaky hand. It’d bled and bled and Ernest only watched it.
Ernest hoisted himself onto the counter to sit and chew away at his bread in contentment. Robert clanged pots and sloshed water. Ernest swung his legs.
“Robert?” he said through a mouthful. “Did you put extra butter on Victor’s bread?”
Robert halted. He stared into the translucent square of ceiling that broke up into white confetti on the water’s mirror surface.
“Yes,” he said at last.
“How come?”
“Because he was ailing.”
“And?”
“I wanted him to know that I loved him.”
Ernest examined the last corner of his bread. Robert leaned against the counter and crossed his ankles. The crackle of burning kindling warmed the room.
“I recovered once before,” Ernest said. “It’s only relapse. I’ll be fine.”
Robert stared at the red glow from the firebox. “You’ve thinned out since you stepped from the chaise with your duffels last month.”
“Have I?”
“The fresh air and change of scenery were intended to help you.”
“Oh, don’t fret.” Ernest popped the last bite of bread into his mouth and settled back. He watched his shoe buckles glint off rainbow stars. Finally he swallowed.
“I was well for quite the while. I could stay outside in the cold wind all day and roam the hills with barely a stop for lunch. The improvement couldn’t have been better, I suppose. Mama didn’t want to invest too much in me since nobody expected I’d still be here.”
The jab at humor fell flat as a dropped cutting board with a resounding bang.
“I liked rowing boats in Lake Geneva. It was ever so peaceful. I could forget everything and stare at the sky until it made me dizzy struggling to fathom how big it really is, and realize all over again how everything around me would stay the same if I were gone, and not notice I’d ever existed at all, but it didn’t feel bad. Being on the water is nice, isn’t it?” Ernest blew a wistful sigh. “I wish you’d take me sailing.”
“I would love nothing more than for you to come with me. Heaven knows I can’t bear to have you from my sight for months on end.”
“Then take me on your next voyage.”
“You know I can’t, Ernest.”
“Why so?”
A million thoughts drifted through Robert’s mind, slow and aimless like dead leaves gliding along a current. He rested his hand atop Ernest’s head and rumpled his hair.
“You’d eat your way through all the hardtack and flour like a ravenous little weevil.”
“You’re teasing me again.”
Robert sobered. He brought his fingers down the ponytail that draped over Ernest’s shoulder, skimming softly. The rhythmic motion soothed him. Robert wished he could leave.
“For the longest time I believed I couldn’t sail again,” he said. “I didn’t love it anymore.”
“You’d love it again if you took me with you.”
“I can’t, Ernest.”
“It’s not because you think I’m an idler.” Ernest inclined his head toward Robert. The coffee burned.
“It’s a hard life. Many men aren’t suited to it. Shipmates can be uneducated and rough. The work is exhausting for even the strongest men, and there’s never a reprieve from danger. Each time a sailor leaves the harbor, he has to kiss his family farewell as though it will be his last chance.”
“I’m not afraid.”
“I’ll be afraid for you.”
Ernest looked down. He picked at a loose thread on the seam of his breeches. The pale fingers trembled. He was too thin, and looked tired; premature wrinkles creased the bottoms of his eyes and too many threads of hair were bleached-bone white shining under the sunlight and he looked like Victor. A stone wedged behind Robert’s heart.
“I think of him every day, Ernest.” The words were tart and thick as dough in his mouth. “He died on my ship, in my cabin, under my watch, in my arms, with a smile lighting up his face that made him look like an angel. I held him while he drank the draught. When his hand shook too much I steadied the cup and wished I had been the one to drink it instead. I could taste the camphor and lavender tingling on his lips when—”
His tongue still burned cold.
Ernest tightened his shoulders. A sheet of loose hair slipped like a stage curtain to hide his face just before his eyes flooded. A couple of drops hit his lap with a quiet plick and made starburst cherry-wine stains on his breeches.
Robert stood in his daze. He reached and felt as though he were watching someone else. Ernest’s coat rustled when Robert tucked his arms around him and pressed him into his strong saltspray embrace.
He rested his cheek atop Ernest’s head. A halo of sunlight had warmed his hair. Stray white strands caught on his eyelashes and blurred into a bokeh string of sequins. Ernest rubbed his nose into Robert’s collar with a long, shuddery sigh.
“I’m all right,” he said quietly. It was muffled.
Wood in the firebox snapped. Big bubbles made the water roll over itself in the kettle. Robert left it.
“Tell me about Victor,” Ernest said. His voice lulled dreamy and tired and small. “Not the bad things. Not any more. Tell me the virtues you saw, the ones that I remember too.”
“You’re always welcome to see the letters that he dictated."
They were bound with twine in a heavy stack, locked in the mahogany desk drawer, yellowing. Too many hours of reading and re-reading had faded the ink and torn some edges. One day the paper would be worn through. Who would read his letters ten years from now and feel what he did? A hundred years? The world looked exactly the same as it had when Victor died.
He ached.
“He mentioned you,” he said. “He told me how he loved you.”
Ernest pressed his nose harder against Robert’s shoulder. His breath hitched in a hiccup.
“He was so unlike anyone I’ve ever known,” Robert said.
He stared through the window at the stringy willow leaves that swayed in the breeze.
“He knew worlds and wonders I’ve never so much as fathomed could exist, yet he put them aside to ask me about my favorite books. He wanted to know how I grew up, and what I dreamed about, and what I hoped for. His voice was sweet as cake and calmed storms of discord. One word from him held more than all the dissertations of others. When I looked at him, he answered back in silence, in a way that no one before ever has.” He inhaled sharply. “He made me happy.”
“I’m nothing like him, am I?”
Robert buried his face in Ernest’s hair. His throat was full of soap and thumbtacks.
“Robert . . . ?”
He tightened his arms, clasping Ernest close on impulse to keep himself from crumbling.
“It’s all right, Robert,” Ernest whispered. “I never wanted to be like him, you know. Even when I was a child, they all told me, ‘you need aspirations; you’ll grow into a little fool. Why don’t you study more like Victor?’” His tone was as calm as a glassy lake. “I loved Victor more than anyone. I just didn’t want to be him.”
His grip on Robert’s sleeves went lax. His fingers slipped.
“And that’s a shame, isn’t it?” An embarrassed lilt fluttered his voice in a halfhearted laugh. “I was the only one with no real motivations or talents. Maybe they were all smothered out of me. Victor could have been one of the world’s greatest minds. William could have been anything he strove for. Nobody ever said it, but they wondered why it couldn't have been me instead."
Robert drew a breath that scratched up his windpipe like a mouthful of glass.
"You wonder too, don't you?"
The discernment cut. He remembered how red had filled in all the fine lines and wrinkles in Ernest's palm, and how Ernest didn't seem to care.
"I could have taken William's place," Ernest said. "We were playing together that day. It could so easily have been me instead. When they carried him in, I somehow hated him, because if he only hadn't pulled me along to play, he would still be here, alive and vibrant and happy. I hated him for dying. Isn't that horrid?"
The words boiled out in a deluge, hot and fast, tangling like an unraveled skein.
"I thought Victor would come home someday. I planned around that. I didn’t anticipate I would ever receive a letter from a stranger telling me that my brother is dead and my fare to London was already paid. Why did he tell you goodbye and not me? I could have taken his place, or William’s—or Justine’s or Elizabeth’s or Mama’s or Papa’s—and it would have been fine, and there wouldn’t be any empty places left behind and you would still be happy.”
Robert stood in place, heels hard against the floor, bruising, listening to the rustling of leaves that sounded like far-off waves breaking over ice. Ernest’s shoulders bounced silently in choked sobs. Robert’s blouse was tacky with snot and tears. The kettle on the stove spewed steam, going dry.
Ernest wasn't small enough in his arms, and he didn't smell like wind and salt and oranges, and he didn't apologize in that pleasant cakey voice that still echoed in Robert's head.
He let Ernest cry and thought of Victor.