All things considered, walking home was perhaps one of Zac’s worst ideas.
The train ride from Manchester to Whaley had been soothing, allowing him to watch the land gradually become more and more like home as it passed by his window. The Yorkshire countryside he now walked through was familiar, to be sure, but it was also more taxing than he had anticipated. The effects of war on the body were no match, it seemed, for even Captain Zachary Hanson, the twenty-two year old son of The Earl of Beasley.
Altogether, The Great War hadn’t left many scars on Zac’s body—at least not on the outside—but there were two noticeable changes. The first was the slight limp with which he walked, caused by what was really more a drinking wound than a war wound. Not that he would tell his mother, Lady Beasley, that particular version of the story. The second was the long, unfashionable hairstyle he sported. He had commanded a former barber, and so most of his unit were kept in decent shape, but after realizing the effect his unruly hair had on the ladies, Zac had decided to leave it be. He had, however, thought to brush it into a neat ponytail before setting off on his trek. Still, he wondered if they would recognize him, even though he wore his military uniform and had sent a letter informing everyone that he was finally coming home.
Home…
Home lie just down the road and across the bridge. Even from where Zac stood, on the other side of the Ribble River, he could see Beasley Hall rising up to greet him. The architecture was a bit of a mishmash, largely Tudor with additions and remodels at various times in its five hundred year history, but it was nevertheless imposing.
And for Zac, it was the most comforting sight in the world.
The cobblestone path leading up to the main entrance was as he remembered it, tall trees shading the walk so that once you were underneath it seemed late evening rather than mid-afternoon. The large doorknocker still gave the foreboding sound that seemed to echo through your very soul, a sound that had frightened Zac as a young child. To top it all off, the door was still opened by Dawson, who Zac was convinced had been butler since the day Beasley Hall was built. These days, Zac felt just as old as the stone-faced butler looked.
“Mr. Zachary,” Dawson said, his face betraying no emotion. “I’m afraid we didn’t know when to expect you. Shall I send someone for your cases?”
“I sent for Shanks; he’s picking them up at the train station. Thank you, Dawson.”
Dawson gave a curt nod. “Very good, Sir. Your parents are in the library, if you’d like to go—”
Before he could finish his sentence, small footsteps echoed through the great hall, and soon the source of them appeared. Zac hardly recognized his youngest sister Zoe, her blonde curls bouncing as she bounded across the room and lept into Zac’s arms. He let out a groan as he struggled to hold her up, his bad knee threatening to give out.
“Now, who’s this?” He asked. “This tall, it must be Lady Jessica.”
Zoe giggled. “It’s me, Zac. Zoe. I begged and begged the governess to end my lessons early so I could wait for you, but she wouldn’t.”
“Well, you have to do what your governess says now, don’t you?” Zac asked, groaning again as he lowered Zoe back to the floor. “Learn how to be a proper young lady. You’ll be coming out before you know it.”
“I’m not going to come out. Jessica didn’t have to.”
Zac ruffled her hair. “We’ll see about that in a few years now, won’t we? Where are Jessica and Avery?”
“Avery’s finishing her embroidery lesson, and Jessica’s still at the hospital. She’s there all the time.”
Zac let Zoe take his hand and lead him into the library, all the while chattering about how gross Jessica’s job tending to the wounded soldiers was. Zac had to laugh; he was sure he had seen far worse on the battlefield, but if any of his sisters came close to having the constitution necessary to handle British soldiers in all their glory, he hadn’t been so sure Jessica would have been it.
Dawson hovered protectively over them, opening the heavy library doors and standing aside to let them enter. Tea had been set adjacent to the two large couches by the fireplace. Lord and Lady Beasley sat across from each other, murmuring quietly, and Lady Avery sat at the end of one couch, giving her embroidery a positively murderous look. At least that much hadn’t changed, Zac thought to himself. He couldn’t recall another time when Beasley Hall had been so quiet; his parents were unusual in that they hadn’t seen fit to stop at the typical heir and a spare. Between the seven siblings, the house’s staff and constant guests coming and going before the war, Beasley Hall had seemed akin to Oxford Circus at times. Now, it seemed like a museum—or worse, a mausoleum.
The butler cleared his throat. “Captain Hanson has arrived, my Lord.”
There was a moment of silence, as though the statement was so outlandish that no one could quite process it. Avery eyed him suspiciously, and Zac couldn’t blame her for not being so certain he was in fact the brother who had left just a few short years ago. His father stood first, but rather than address Zac, he turned to Dawson.
“Have cook send up another platter of those scones, will you?” With Dawson dismissed, he turned to Zac. “You must be hungry. I’m afraid we hadn’t planned a large dinner; we weren’t sure exactly when to expect you.”
“I was hoping to surprise everyone,” Zac replied.
“And you did,” Lady Beasley replied, reaching a tentative hand out to him. “I’m sure we can arrange for a dinner in your honor later this week.”
Zac took her hand and led her back to the couch. “You needn’t make such a fuss.”
“It isn’t every day the prodigal son returns home,” Lord Beasley remarked.
“That brings me to my next question,” Zac began. With a nod toward Zoe, who was playing with Avery’s extra thread, he said, “I’ve seen these two lovely ladies, but where is everyone else? This place is like a tomb.”
His parents shared a look, and Zac realized he had asked the wrong question. So many years in the military, forced by necessity to communicate quickly and openly with men of all classes, had taught him to be too direct, he supposed. He would need to tame that if he were going to reintegrate into country manor life.
“Darling,” Diana addressed Zoe. “Why don’t you help Avery put her sewing away. I think that’s quite enough for today.”
Once the two of them were out of earshot, Zac edged forward in his seat, hoping to finally get some real answers.
“Mackenzie is at school of course,” Walker finally replied.
Zac nodded, recalling a letter the previous autumn explaining how his youngest brother had followed family tradition and begun his public education at Eton. He bit his lip to resist the urge to ask about his older brothers.
His mother cleared her throat. “And I believe Taylor is at his office. It’s near the church; I’m sure he would love if you visited him there. You should have enough time to walk down before dinner.”
Zac stared pointedly at the two of them. They were clearly avoiding the topic of Isaac, and Zac hadn’t the foggiest idea why. He supposed their letters hadn’t mentioned Isaac much, but there couldn’t be much to say about endless pleasure trips and dates with this heiress or that. Zac didn’t mind being the third son; being the heir didn’t just sound like too much pressure, it sounded positively boring.
Diana seemed about to say something, but the door opened and a footman Zac didn’t even recognize carried in a tray of scones and placed it on the table next to the tea. An awkward silence fell upon the room, even after the footman had left. Zac could only stare at his parents, hoping they would see fit to clear up his confusion.
Once the footman had gone, Diana cleared her throat. “Well, you know, dear; your brother is always traveling, working on those books of his. His letters are often delayed or don’t arrive at all. We really can’t keep up with where he is.”
“Sometimes Isaac arrives home before the letters do,” Walker added with a short, curt laugh that Zac didn’t find funny at all.
“Where was he traveling this time?” Zac asked. “I thought he had gone to America, chasing after some investment prospect or another.”
“Oh no, nothing came of that,” his mother replied. “He went to India several months ago. Something about studying the influence our military presence has had on their native lives. I’m sure he’ll turn up eventually. You know how he is.”
“Yes,” Zac replied. “I suppose I do. If you’ll excuse me.”
“You’ll be here for dinner, of course,” his mother said, standing to excuse him.
“I will,” Zac said, standing and walking to the table. “But I think I’ll skip out on tea and go for a walk. You said Taylor was at his office?”
“He stays there until it’s time to change for dinner,” Diana replied. “If you could, stop in at the hospital and see that Jessica comes home at least early enough for Mrs. Berry to fix her a plate of leftovers.”
Zac nodded. He took one last glance at the tea table and nabbed a scone, stuffing it into the pocket of his pants. He might be upset with his parents’ cavalier attitude toward Isaac’s absence, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t appreciate his first home cooked treat in ages. In any case, it might help him survive the walk down to the village where his brother kept a small law office.
No one stopped Zac on his way out of the hall, and a part of him wished they had. By the time he reached the bridge again, he was in such pain that he decided he might never walk again. He was noble enough to get away with it, he decided. He could hire a chauffeur to drive him any distance further than from his bedroom to the dining room.
Finally, he reached his destination. The office was small, tucked into a building that dated back centuries and had been the carriage house of another, older and since demolished manor owned by some distant relation or another. Zac couldn’t keep all the details straight; Taylor was the one with the mind for facts and logic, hence the reason he had been the son to study law and Zac the one to choose a military career.
He rapped on the heavy door, then gave it a good shove open before waiting for any sort of reply. It held only three tiny rooms, Taylor’s being the farthest toward the back. At the sound of the door Taylor had come rushing out, stopping short in the hallway to stare at Zac as though he were looking at a ghost.
“One brother returned from the dead,” Zac said grimly.
“We never thought—” Taylor began, then nodded. That was as much of an acknowledgement as Zac needed.
“I’ve been home already,” Zac replied. “It’s all very English over there—carry on, nothing wrong, nothing to see here. Surely I can count on my lawyer brother to cut through to the truth for me.”
Taylor sank into a nearby chair. “The truth is we don’t know. That’s honestly all I can say with any certainty. We’ve all heard of those plots, those conspiracies. All failed, of course, but they made a splash. Isaac’s letters were more concerned with the local politics, clashes between the castes and so on. I don’t pretend to understand all the politics, but it seems like the climate there is becoming rather volatile.”
Zac shook his head. “They’re on our side, Taylor. At least, they fought with us. The Indian regiments I met were full of fine chaps.”
“Then I don’t know what to tell you,” Taylor replied. “You know as much as I do now, and it’s precious little.”
“So it is.” Zac gave a nod. “I’m supposed to pop in and check in on Jessica, but the longer it is before I see another uniform, the better. I’ll be in your debt if you’ll round her up before dinner and cover for me if I’ve not returned to the manor by then.”
“Need I ask where you’ll be?” The slight smirk on Taylor’s lips said that he already knew. The Green Dragon in Beasley had been far too familiar to him before his military tenure, and he only hoped they recognized him now.
Zac returned Taylor’s expression. “As usual, it’s likely best that you don’t.”
The two brothers stood to part company, Zac unsure whether to hug or salute Taylor, both of which went against his training both as a soldier and a member of a great family. In the end, they settled for a series of nods, smiles and promises to catch up in more detail later.
It was only a short walk to the pub, and for that Zac was grateful. What he needed most right then was a stiff drink and a comfortable chair to ease his stiff leg. That wasn’t entirely true, though. What he really needed most was for his eldest brother to materialize out of thin air, like a spectre in those strange novels he liked to write. He needed some assurance that the war hadn’t turned everything in his world upside down. After everything, he needed Beasley Hall to be the same place it had always been, but he was beginning to suspect those wishes were in vain.
When the door closed behind Zac, Taylor sank farther down into his chair. Had he been right to answer Zac’s questions? His brother had always been pointed and direct, a trait that got him into trouble constantly in society. Military training had clearly done nothing to improve that; if anything, it seemed to have made him worse. Not only that, it had given him an air of confidence and superiority that left Taylor feeling like he had no choice but to obey.
Wonderful, Taylor thought to himself. As if there weren’t already enough rumors and mutterings about his manhood. Now he didn’t even have the backbone to stand up to his younger brother.
It was no secret that Taylor had received special permission to be exempted from military service, even when everyone above and below him in social standing was up for the draft. It wasn’t unusual, of course, for members of the upper class to seek medical discharge, and Taylor had spent that one year convalescing by the seaside. The fact that he was at university counted for him too. Still, he had heard the snide comments about the real reason why he had been deemed unfit for military service.
None of that was really worth devoting much thought to, though. It didn’t get Taylor any closer to finding his missing brother or learning how to relate to the one who had just returned home. He picked himself up and walked back to his office, which was littered with papers from all the work he had tried and failed to accomplish that day. Ever since the letters had stopped coming from Isaac, so too had Taylor’s productivity tanked. The later he stayed at the office, though, the more his family thought he was working. At least it kept him from making note of all the ways Isaac was absent from their lives, all the little moments that made it glaringly obvious that Beasley Hall was not the same as it once had been.
He had spent most of that day doing nothing but re-reading Isaac’s old letters, hoping to find some hint in them that he had missed before. Taylor had a mind for the law, even politics to an extent, but the finer details of war were beyond him. He knew there was talk of another Afghan War, which would necessarily involve Indian forces, but beyond that, he couldn’t even pretend to understand the Hindu-German plots. And no matter how many times he read the letters, the words remained the same. He closed the folder and replaced it in the top drawer of his desk.
He supposed there was nothing left to do but check in on Jessica at the hospital. A part of him wished Zac had had the heart to do it himself; Taylor was sure Jessica would have preferred to see Zac for the first time in her element and not stuffed into her dinner gown. But Zac would be Zac, and Taylor would always be left to clean up his messes, it seemed.
After a short and pathetic attempt at cleaning his office, Taylor called it quits for the day. The other two lawyers with whom he shared the office had already gone home for the day, and so he locked the door on his way out. It was only a short walk to Jessica’s place of employment. Beasley Village Hospital was a modestly sized building, typically serving only the small village population’s minor ailments. When local soldiers had begun to return home in large proportions and with complicated injuries, Taylor’s family had given a hefty donation to turn the adjacent former abbey into an extra wing. Jessica had wasted no time volunteering and had likely learned more on the job than if she’d taken a nursing course.
Taylor stepped past the abbey’s gates and through the heavy doors that lead into what served as their triage unit. The smell of antiseptic nearly covered the smell of blood, but Taylor felt himself going weak in the knees anyway. Perhaps those who said he was unfit for military service were truly onto something.
“I’ll let Lady Jessica know you’re here, Mr. Taylor,” said a passing nurse whose name Taylor didn’t remember.
Taylor could do little more than nod, for fear that if he opened his mouth, he would do something truly unacceptable. At least, he reasoned, being sick in a hospital was fairly convenient, if embarrassing.
Thankfully, Jessica appeared quickly, her blue and white uniform rumpled but surprisingly clean. Taylor was equal measures impressed and jealous that his sister was, like Zac, so obviously more competent than him. She brushed back a strand of hair that had fallen loose from her nurse’s cap and gave Taylor a tired smile.
“Done for the day, then?” Taylor asked.
“Not hardly,” Jessica replied. “It’s never done here. But I’ve been informed that I do need to rest and eat at some point. If I don’t leave now, I think they’ll find an empty bed and confine me to it.”
“Well, come on then,” Taylor said, holding out his arm to her. “We better go while you’ve still got the energy to help me roll our brother home from the pub.”
“Zac’s home, then?” Jessica asked after a moment’s pause.
Taylor nodded. “He is. And somehow I think the adventure has only begun for the rest of us.”
Jessica laughed, but Taylor was afraid it wasn’t a joke at all.