Chapter Five
A sea of mud, a cold wind, and the desperate cries of his friend. “Help me! I’m sinking.”
Hugh scanned the muddy earth. Where is he? “Alfie,” he shouted.
“Hurry,” Alfie cried. “I’m drowning.”
Desperation clawed at Hugh’s throat. He couldn’t see anything. “Alfie!” he cried again.
Suddenly, a hand shot up through the mud, “I’m here. Come, please.” The voice seemed to be coming from above. But how? Alfie was under. How could he cry out so?
“Come, Hugh. I’m waiting,” the voice beckoned as Alfie’s deathly pale hand clawed at the air.
Hugh ran forward but found he could not move.
The mud has taken hold of me! He started to sink.
Mud filled his throat, and he could no longer breathe.
Darkness enveloped him as another cry sounded in his ears, “Where are you? I’m dying.
I’m dead.” The voice sounded again, and that was when Hugh realized he was the one screaming.
Hugh awoke with a start, gasping for breath.
When his breathing slowed, he pushed back his covers, stepped out of bed, and went to pour himself a brandy, which he swallowed in one gulp.
He always kept brandy on hand to calm himself after one of these dreams. They’d been happening on and off for the past seven years, and he never got used to them.
And why should he? He deserved to suffer.
Evie certainly still was, and that hurt him more than anything.
He’d tried to prepare himself for seeing Evie again.
He had readied himself to face her contempt, her wrath, and her hatred.
For despise him, she must. Part of him had looked forward to it.
He deserved her scorn. He deserved her anger.
He wished she’d lashed out at him, cursed him in front of everyone. He’d been ready for that.
But she’d done nothing of the sort. And he hadn’t been ready to see the hurt in her eyes.
He hadn’t been prepared for the feelings she’d conjured up in him.
Evie…sweet, kind Evie…as beautiful today as the last time he’d seen her.
His heart ached at the notion that his presence in Stanbury was hurting her.
If he’d thought she still cared for him…
He poured himself another drink. No. That was too much to hope for.
She hated him. He was certain of it. She’d simply been shocked to see him this afternoon; that was all.
Once she had time to recover, she’d certainly serve him the contempt he deserved.
The best thing he could do for Evie now was to leave Yorkshire.
This was her home, not his. He’d lost the right to Evie and to the moors he loved.
There had to be a price for him too, and this was it.
*
Unable to sleep, Evie contemplated taking some of her mama’s laudanum but feared that if she allowed herself such a luxury, even once, she’d grow dependent upon it too. They couldn’t afford that. Her mama needed it more than she did.
Try as she may, her mind would not rest. It kept returning to Hugh and that fatal night seven years prior.
Seeing Hugh again ignited a rage within her.
How dare he keep Alfie’s death a secret from her?
She had a right to know. Why would he deliberately hurt her so?
How could he go on with his life so happily while she suffered?
It still made no sense to her. The Hugh she’d known was a kind and decent man.
She thought about confronting him again, but that was impossible.
He’d brought his betrothed home. They’d be celebrating.
No one wanted her dredging up old wounds.
People might even say she was going mad.
She might be locked away. Her family had had the sympathy of the town after Alfie died, but people eventually became less forgiving of their inability to heal.
The gossip and speculation about Alfie’s untimely death had also fallen away with the years.
They were young men, roughhousing and behaving foolishly.
It had led to a terrible accident. That’s what people concluded.
And now, Hugh’s return would bring with it excitement and celebrations.
A London gentleman, as he now was, betrothed to a beautiful and very likely rich lady.
What would Alfie’s life have been like had he lived? What would hers have been?
It was no use; sleep totally eluded her.
She rose from her bed, lit her lamp, and exited her room, intending to make some tea.
But as she headed for the stairs, she noticed a flicker of light coming from down the hallway.
Evie stopped. A cold shiver ran up her spine.
It looked to be coming from Alfie’s room. But how could that be?
Her heart drummed as she crept toward the light. As she neared, she saw that the flame was indeed coming from her brother’s room, the door to which was cracked open.
“Hello,” she called softly, her voice shaking. When she received no answer, she gently pushed open the door, terrified of what she would find inside.
*
Evie gasped when she saw her mother curled up, fast asleep, on Alfie’s four-poster bed. Her lamp, the source of the light Evie had seen, sat on the floor next to a pile of Alfie’s sketches, for he used to love to draw. The rest of Alfie’s room was undisturbed.
She entered the chamber, her heart racing.
It was like stepping back in time. If only that could be true.
She gazed at her mama, who clasped Alfie’s pillow to her chest as she slept, and Evie’s heart broke for her.
Why had Mama come in here? The laudanum usually kept her sleeping until the afternoon…
The thought stilled her. She slept all day sometimes.
Mama wasn’t taking her laudanum at night.
That was the only explanation. Mama had been taking her laudanum during the day and then coming into his room while Evie slept.
She’d always wondered why Mama had insisted on keeping Alfie’s chamber locked, guarding it with the fierceness of Cerberus.
Now she understood. It was all she had left of her son.
Her mama had likely been coming in here for years.
Evie’s gaze fell on the drawings beside the bed, and she sank to the floor. Putting her lantern down, she picked up the pile of artwork. Alfie had been genuinely talented.
The first few drawings were of the moors.
They were all beautiful. The next was a portrait of her, and it struck Evie hard.
How fresh and innocent she looked with her blue eyes and shiny locks.
Then came a self-portrait that brought Evie to tears.
It was one she’d never seen before, and Alfie must have drawn it the same year he died.
How handsome he’d been with his thick blond hair, bright-blue eyes, and perfectly sculpted face.
How alike they’d been. Evie bit her lip.
The pain was almost unbearable. How I miss him.
When she regained her composure, she continued looking through the art, and what she saw next made her heart still in her chest. A drawing of Hugh, shirtless, standing on the heath, the wind whipping back his thick dark hair.
There was something strange about the drawing.
She reflected on her time with Hugh, recalling their secret meetings on the moor.
She recalled seeing his unclothed body for the first time.
The delicious shock of it. The intimacy of it.
This picture was intimate, and it struck her as odd.
She riffled through the remaining sketches. All of them were of Hugh. Portraits of Hugh’s profile, him smiling, him contemplative, and so many more. Had he posed for all these pictures? Or had Alfie done them from memory? And why?
The last drawing was a shaded, charcoal profile portrait of Hugh, and alongside his face, Alfie had transcribed, in his beautiful and neat script, the first stanza of Shakespeare’s sonnet number 18.
“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, and summer’s lease hath all too short a date,” Evie read.
But, she had to wonder, what does this mean?
All these sketches of Hugh, and this last one alongside Shakespeare’s most famous love sonnet.
A hand on her shoulder made her jump, and she turned to see that her mother, who still lay on the bed behind her, had reached out and touched her.
“Our Alfred wasn’t like other men,” Mama said.
“What are you saying?” Evie asked, her voice trembling.
“He loved deeply,” Mama said. “But he was different. The way he looked at Hugh. I knew he’d never marry.”
Evie blinked. Alfie had been in love with Hugh? She’d never guessed. Such an idea would not have entered her mind. “Papa…did he know…is that why he turned on Hugh?”
“No. He was oblivious. He turned on Hugh because he was heartbroken and needed someone to blame. But I knew my son. A mother always knows.”
Evie turned back to the drawing, shaking in her now-trembling hand.
It all became clear to her. That fatal night, when Hugh had told Alfie of his plans to marry her, it must have hit her brother hard.
Did he confess his love for Hugh, or did he simply object to him marrying me?
The fight suggested a confession. If that was true, then that begged the question—had Hugh been protecting Alfie’s reputation all these years by keeping the reason for their quarrel a secret?
Or had Alfie become angered by Hugh’s confession—so angered that they’d engaged in a shoving match, which then led to a larger altercation on the moor?
The thought of the latter terrified her. She had to find out the truth. Hugh wasn’t going to leave Yorkshire with his secret intact this time.