Page 119

Alex gazed at her as if these words pained him. Then, in a whisper, he said, "We have always been a family, Mother, you and I. And Father. And we always will be, regardless of where any of us are in the world. Regardless of where any of us hope to be."

"Yes, I suppose so," Edith whispered. "And be assured, I do miss your father from time to time. Even melancholy has its charms now and then."

"Alex," Julie said, "do you care to join me for a walk?"

He nodded, but he continued to stare at his mother.

Edith's mind seemed elsewhere. Perhaps that was why she didn't notice the glint of tears in her son's eyes. When he bent down quickly, almost furtively, to kiss her on the forehead, she reached up and patted him gently on the cheek. But her expression suggested she'd returned to some silent deliberation over the strange events of the past few days.

*

They walked together through the tree-lined square just outside. They were surrounded by a mix of stone walls and shop fronts, and neither one of them seemed able to speak. She expected Alex to burst forth with some great outpouring of emotion. That's what the Alex of several days before would have done. But now he had been changed once more, it seemed. And so she was at a loss for how to determine his mental state without revealing details she didn't want him to know.

"What do you believe, Alex?" she finally asked him.

"What do you wish me to believe, Julie?"

"I don't understand." But she did. She did understand. He had suspicions, suspicions of her.

"Most people don't change, do they?" He'd stopped suddenly, his hands in his pockets, staring at a motorcar as it chugged past. "No matter what happens to them. No matter what they go through. They do everything they can to preserve their prejudices. Or their ambitions, even if those ambitions were cast when they were quite young and foolish. This is the business of living, as I once described it, isn't it? To explain away new experiences with old beliefs."

"The business of living," she said, "as you described it, as I understood you to describe it, was ignoring the pain in your heart and seeking to distract yourself with routine."

"Yes. Indeed."

"You have been changed by what you have seen, Alex?"

"Perhaps. But that's not exactly what I mean to say."

"What is it you mean to say?"

"I mean to say it's a reasonable expectation of most people. That they won't change. That they will reject the implications of new experiences." He met her gaze. "New information--"

"Alex--"

"And so it's understandable, I guess. And perhaps the basis for forgiveness when you learn that so much has been kept from you, even by those to whom you've bared your heart."

When she reached for his hand, he withdrew it. When she reached for his face, he took a step back.

"But this is new, Julie. This forgiveness. So I ask you not to test it just yet."

"What else do you ask of me?"

"I ask that it be my turn. For the time being, at least."

"Your turn? I don't understand."

"My father is never coming home. I know this now. I know it because he will make no promise, no mat

ter how he's pressed by me and my mother. And I know as well that my mother is greatly relieved. She's quite happy to return to her duties as the Countess of Rutherford now with the new wealth supplied by my father, and to have full charge of the estates she struggled to maintain so miserably for so long. She says to me confidentially that it is her turn to rule the little kingdom of Rutherford, and she does not care if she ever sees my father again."

"I see," said Julie.

"And that is all well and good," said Alex. "But I would like it to be my turn too in a different way."

"I still don't understand what you mean, Alex."

"My father is enjoying his endless travels. You and Ramses have enjoyed yours. And you will again. I would now like to enjoy my own."