Chapter Three #2
“This was exactly my thought. In disbelief, I hunted down the clerk who had been so helpful to me during the war years. I know he remembered me. I know it. But he gave me that same blank stare as everyone else in the War Office had done. He apologized profusely but repeated those same lies, that there had never been an officer by the name of Andrew Clement serving in the army.”
Milbury’s mouth was agape. Obviously, this was not what he’d expected to hear.
“What did you do next?” he asked.
“I called upon his family.”
“That was sensible,” he muttered, giving a nod of approval.
“They put me off, too. In fact, they avoided me like the plague. It felt as though no one in his family cared that Andrew had gone missing. Finally, his father agreed to see me. It was like meeting a stranger. He rebuffed me coldly. I begged him to just tell me what had happened to Andrew, and assured him that if Andrew wished to call off our betrothal, I would give no objection.”
“So, it was broken off?”
“No,” she said with a vehement shake of her head. “His family never got in touch with me again. They denied my requests to call upon them. All I wanted was a word from Andrew.”
Milbury rubbed a hand across the back of his neck. “And you never got it?”
“Nothing, in all these years. The mystery of his disappearance has never been resolved. My search did not stop at the War Office or with his family. I looked everywhere. He was not listed among the dead, for which I was greatly relieved. Nor was he listed among the injured returning to England from the Continent. So I checked the manifests of all the able-bodied soldiers shipped back home. He was not listed among them, either.”
As she took a deep breath, she realized Milbury had taken hold of her hands to offer comfort.
He was good like that. She had noticed his protective instincts toward his sons and was glad they extended to her, too. Retelling this nightmare was taking a toll on her.
Over the course of the years, she had managed to continue with life on her own terms. But there were moments like these, when the world seemed to collapse around her, that she appreciated a pair of strong arms around her.
His were quite nice. His were the first that had ever held her since Andrew.
“Months and months went by. I continued checking the manifests. I stopped by the War Office repeatedly, even spoke to his regimental commanders. Oh, some had vague recollections. But they offered nothing helpful. Then one day, no one remembered and no one had any records on him at all. He was lost. Completely stricken from all lists. Vanished into thin air.”
“How is this possible?”
“I don’t know. I was left with a betrothed who was not dead, nor returned to England. Not in any hospital. But he is alive,” she said with certainty. “I would have felt something, a ripple in my heart, had he been killed.”
“Oh, Gwen. Not necessarily. My own wife passed before my very eyes and…” He let out a ragged breath.
“And that was it. She was gone. My heart ached. I wanted more. A sign. A touch. Anything that I could hold on to. As much as I would have wished it, her spirit did not slip through my body or leave some parting memory.”
“But I have heard of people feeling such things,” she insisted, for this was the only shred of hope she had left to believe that Andrew was still alive and might someday return to her.
“Wishful thinking on their part, their mind playing tricks on them because they desperately want to keep a connection to their loved one.”
“Well, I believe it,” she said with an upward tilt of her chin.
“Forgive me if I cannot be as logical as you. But let’s not quibble about this when the hard facts cannot be disputed.
How are Andrew’s missing files to be explained?
Or his family’s vague responses? How can I ignore our betrothal and move on while so many questions remain unanswered? ”
Milbury stared at her, concern filling his eyes. “I doubt he expected you to wait for him all these years.”
“Perhaps, but it is my decision to make. Is it not?”
“This does not feel right, Gwen,” he said, his lips pinched as he pondered all she had told him.
“I agree. Something is terribly wrong. Have I not been saying this very thing? Nothing about his disappearance makes sense. And before you call me daft and start spouting plausible explanations, let me tell you that I have heard them all and do not believe any of them.”
“I do not mean to be cruel, but if he is alive…”
“He is.”
“Set aside the loss of his military records, for this is just paperwork and there were tens of thousands of men serving during the war. Any harried clerk could have lost his enlistment records. But if he is alive, as you insist, then why has he made no attempt to contact you? What if he made a conscious decision to walk away from you?”
“From me? From his family? From the life he had built up until his enlistment in the army?” She gritted her teeth. “He wouldn’t.”
“I am not suggesting he is a bounder. Quite the opposite—he might have done it for purely heroic reasons. If he was as capable and honorable as you say, the Crown might have asked something more of him.”
“What are you saying?”
“The records of an earl’s son do not simply vanish.
Even if he was just a second son, he was a man of significant importance as a male heir in the earl’s bloodline.
More important, and I say this as a father, I would turn over every stone to find my son if he had gone missing.
I cannot believe his father would remain quiet and not conduct his own search.
In fact, he would look high and low, offer a reward printed in every London newspaper, turn Parliament upside down and demand inquiries. ”
“But the Earl of Hornsby hasn’t done any of this. Do you think he knows what happened to Andrew?”
Milbury nodded. “Yes.”
“Then why would he not tell me? Why would no one tell me? Am I not considered family? I was to be Andrew’s wife.”
“The Earl of Hornsby may be under orders to keep silent from the Crown itself.”
“Could he not have given me a hint? Anything to allay my concerns?”
“Not if he were under royal command.”
She frowned. “Is this something usually done? Surely others have served as agents for the Crown and not been required to cut all ties with their loved ones. Nor would their existence be purposely removed from military files.”
“I don’t have the answers, Gwen. Perhaps he is an elite agent taking on the most dangerous assignments for the Crown.”
She cast him a doubtful look. “Assignments that continued six years beyond the end of the war?”