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Effie waited a long time for Julianna, but he didn’t mind at all. In some ways, he had been waiting his entire life for Julianna, so what was a few more minutes?

The most surprising thing about all of this was that her hair smelled of roses. When he’d picked her up and twirled her around, there had been no mistaking the delicate floral scent. Effie hadn’t expected that.

If anything, he’d have thought her hair would smell of ink. But then, he hadn’t expected her . Least of all here, in Brighton, but also in general. He had never expected to be confronted with Julianna in the flesh. He had never dared even to wish for such a thing. You can’t miss what you don’t let yourself want.

But then she was there. Julianna, whose hair smelled of roses and whose skin was pale like the linen paper she used for her letters.

Another unexpected detail: her laugh, as he’d twirled her. She had a high, girlish, lilting laugh that had been utterly shocking—a great deal more shocking than roses. The Julianna of his imaginings had a low, knowing laugh that was seldom heard because her standards for bemusement were uncommonly high.

She had smelled of roses and laughed easily and indeed had looked very little like his painted version of her, yet he had recognized her immediately. There wasn’t a reason in the world he should have, but when his eyes saw a woman alone, gazing at the Pavilion, something inside him had been inspired to undertake further study. All the descriptive bits added up: the dark hair, the height, even the worn brown half boots—she’d written to him a few months ago about needing a new pair.

The descriptive bits had been necessary to achieve a positive identification, but alone, insufficient. So he’d taken a step closer, and examined the nature of her examination. There was something about the quality of her attention as she gazed at the Pavilion with a mixture of wonderment and skepticism, something about her , something ineffable but simultaneously so very Julianna-esque, that had him calling out to her before he could think better of it.

And now he was here, on a bench waiting for her.

As before, he saw her before she saw him. She looked the same as she had when they parted ways, with her gray dress and her gray-ribboned bonnet. But beneath that bonnet, her hair must be wet, no? She must have coiled it or braided it and pinned it up while still damp. Julianna had always complained that she didn’t like the way her hair curled when it was down. He could only imagine that tonight, with an assist from sea salt, and from having been pinned up wet, her curls would be extra chaotic. Wild.

He reached into his pocket to see if he had his fan with him. He often carried it in situations in which he wanted to make a fashion statement. It was a prop.

Now, though, he required it for function. He was very warm. He feared his face had turned as pink as the setting sun.

Once again, he wondered: Is this desire?

If so, desire was quite discomfiting.

She caught sight of him, and she smiled. Her smile was so at odds with her dreary attire that he almost laughed. Not at her, but at the contrast. And at the very idea that she had a secret smile. He wanted to flatter himself that the secret smile was reserved exclusively for him, but he could not reasonably do that. He would have to be satisfied that this smile, here and now, was for him.

He rose as she approached. “How did you find it?”

“I was transported.”

He was so very, very glad. “Perhaps you can go in again. How long are you staying?” He should have asked that already. The answer to that question was everything.

“I’m not sure.” She paused. “A few more days at least.”

This was . . . all wrong. They sounded like they were making idle conversation at a party.

He’d gotten ahead of himself. Or fallen behind. Or something. He cleared his throat. “Did your fictional marital status hold up?”

“It did.” She held up the finger with the dull ring. “I don’t know that I needed it, though, or that the dipper who attended me even noticed. Nothing was said about it.”

“What did you talk about?” He wasn’t sure why he was asking, except that he wanted to be the one who’d been there, witnessing her first foray into the sea.

“Nothing beyond the necessary logistics. I should have preferred to be alone, though I appreciate that I don’t know how to swim.”

Before he could think better of it, he said, “I could teach you.”

“You know how to swim? You must, as you previously referenced floating for long stretches of time.”

“Yes, I adore swimming. I used to go quite a lot at my family’s estate in Cornwall.”

“Your family has an estate in Cornwall.”

Something about her posture changed, stiffened ever so slightly.

He knew what was wrong. His immersion in the sea had allowed him to marshal his thoughts on the extraordinary events of the day. It had stung, when she’d suggested, earlier, that perhaps he hadn’t been the true author of the poems he’d sent her. But he understood why her trust had faltered. “Julianna, I must apologize. Again. Properly.” He hadn’t been able to before, when they’d first encountered each other at the Pavilion, or later at tea, with the boys hovering like overzealous chaperones. And his attempt earlier, before they settled on sea-bathing, had been insufficient.

He leaned toward her, acting on an instinct to take her hand, but of course they couldn’t do that here.

God damn all these bloody rules everywhere.

He took a fortifying breath. “I should never have deceived you.”

“Indeed you should not have,” she said tartly.

“I should like to say in my defense that I never lied to you about anything that was in my heart. About anything to do with sentiment, or poetry, or anything important.”

“You don’t think who you are is important?”

“Oh, Jules,” he said, his heart nearly breaking. “You know who I am.”

“Do I?”

“Yes!” he cried. But again, he could hardly fault her for doubting. “Let me explain.” He told her the same thing he’d told the boys last night, about how thrilled he’d been when she accepted that first poem, and when she offered such excellent editorial suggestions. “I won’t lie—anymore. Initially, I was miffed that you’d suggested changes. But I read your letter, and I knew you were right. I’ve gone on to trust your editorial judgment absolutely. There has been a time or two when I wondered if the printed poem ought to contain the names of two authors.”

“Of course it shouldn’t have. I was merely doing my job.” She was trying and failing to suppress a smile. He thought she was flattered by his words, though he meant them not to flatter but to explain.

He went on to tell the rest: how the more poems she printed, the higher the stakes felt. How once their correspondence became personal, the stakes became too high for him to tell the truth.

“I was afraid of losing you,” he finished solemnly. “I know lying is bad, but losing you would have been worse.”

Did he imagine it, or did it appear for a moment that her eyes were welling with tears?

No, he had imagined it, for she smiled and turned her face toward the setting sun. The pinkness of the sky had deepened. It made her skin glow.

Her posture was less stiff than it had been before, and he felt it as a small victory.

“Did you look at the sky while you were sea-bathing?” he asked, though what he really meant was Do you forgive me?

“Yes,” she said, still gazing at the sun, and he somehow knew she was answering both questions.

* * *

“Where the hell have you been?”

Effie felt dazed as he walked in late to dinner that night. His mind was at once slow and fast, racing back over every bit of his time with Julianna even as some part of him was still languorously floating under the blue Brighton sky.

“You made it back all right.” That was from Archie, ever the worrier.

Effie answered the first question, which had been from the more direct Simon, as he seated himself. “I went sea-bathing.” He turned to Archie. “I’m sorry I wasn’t at our appointed meeting place.”

“We waited an hour,” Simon said, though the pique had gone out of his tone.

“I . . . didn’t think.” He had told Julianna he would wait for her on that bench, yet he hadn’t spared a thought for his friends waiting for him. “It was ill-done of me.”

“We were concerned about you.” Archie served Effie some glazed beetroot and gestured to Simon to pass a platter of roast pork.

“No, we weren’t,” Simon said archly, though he did pass the plate. “You found Miss Evans, didn’t you?”

“Tell me you did not go sea-bathing with Miss Evans!” Archie exclaimed.

“Where are the servants? Have you already had pudding?” There was a baked custard on the table, half demolished.

“We decided we rather liked the informal style of dining that circumstances forced us into last year—everything served at once, servants absent,” Simon said.

Indeed, the remoteness of last year’s holiday, and the lack of servants, meant the usual mode of dining in a series of removes had been abandoned. Effie murmured his approval through a mouthful of the custard. One of the other delights associated with this method was that one could eat the pudding first if one so desired.

“Tell me you did not go sea-bathing with Miss Evans,” Archie said again, though this time he sounded less exercised and more resigned.

“I’m not sure why you’re so scandalized,” Effie said through a mouthful of pork. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was.

“God’s teeth, he did go sea-bathing with her.” Archie turned to Simon, and they shared a look Effie could not parse.

“I didn’t go with her. She went on the ladies’ side and I went on the gentlemen’s, and afterward we had a brief discussion about our respective experiences.”

“Where?” Archie asked.

“What do you mean ‘where’? Our experiences in the sea.”

“No. Where did you have this discussion?”

“On a bench. Why are you so agitated?” Hold up. “Are you about to say because it wasn’t proper?” Effie shot his friend a withering glance that froze him in the middle of lifting a glass of brandy to his lips.

Archie did not deny it.

“In fact,” Effie said, purely to agitate the apparently easily scandalized Archie, “I invited her back to dine with us this evening, but she declined.”

“Of course she did,” Simon said. “Miss Evans seems a sensible sort.”

Effie, confused and offended in equal measure, said, “It would have been much less scandalous than last year when Clementine and Olive joined our holiday—the whole holiday, not merely one meal.”

“Yes,” Simon said, “but last year we were in remote Cumbria and the house was staffed by an ancient woman and a girl who’d had a child out of wedlock.”

Effie started to object, but Simon talked over him.

“I’m not saying it’s right; I’m merely saying that circumstances this year are more delicate. You will recall that we were trying to cut a low profile—and that was before you took to sea-bathing with Miss Evans.”

“What do I care if it gets out that I was seen associating with a common woman?” Effie said, offense winning out over confusion. “I can hardly fall further in my father’s estimation.”

“You don’t care, but she might.”

Ah. Indeed. Effie slumped against the back of his chair, ashamed that he hadn’t thought about things from Julianna’s perspective. It was akin to the letters. It had taken him far too long to understand that posting letters was, for many people, an unjustifiable expense.

Had he pressed her too hard, about the sea-bathing? He couldn’t remember precisely what he’d said, only that he was so very intent that she agree. That . . . was not ideal.

“She wasn’t wrong, before,” Archie said, “when she was speculating about the restrictions faced by unmarried women.”

“Wasn’t that an excellent speech?” Effie’s chest warmed thinking back on it. He was gratified that Julianna’s wit was as pointed in person as it had always been in print. Perhaps you ought to introduce yourself, too , she’d said after he’d presented Archie and Simon to her. Oh, the delicious sharpness of the barb, the delight he took in being so lanced, even as he had been properly chagrined.

Realizing he was grinning like an idiot, he schooled his face. “I do take your point.” He paused. “Perhaps that is why she declined my invitation.” He resumed trying to see his recent interactions with Julianna from her perspective. “She insisted that she was only going to be in town a little longer, that she and I had met, which was her aim, and that I ought to spend the rest of my time with you lot.” He curled his lip, and the boys laughed. “But was that an excuse? Was she worried that the servants would talk?”

Would they have?

Regardless . . . “How can I be here, and she be mere miles away? It isn’t right. I know you think me ridiculous, and perhaps you’re correct. But I love her.”

“Did you tell her that?” Simon asked.

“Good heavens, no. I can’t do that.”

“Mm,” Archie agreed.

“I’m sorry if we are acting like scandalized old biddies,” Simon said seriously. “You know we only want you to be happy. We just . . . don’t want you to ruin Miss Evans in the pursuit of said happiness. You have said how much you admire her work, and her desire to become a woman of independent means. I think you ought to take care not to jeopardize that.”

Right. Simon was right.

“Still, you should see her again before she leaves,” Archie said firmly. “We will think of something.”

Effie told himself to be satisfied with that answer. He would have to be. It wasn’t as if he could gallop off to the Old Ship under cover of night to demand an audience.

With a sigh, he served himself some creamed potatoes.

The rest of the evening was not unenjoyable. They ate, they retired to the drawing room they’d occupied last night, they drank and chatted. When Simon started making noises about retiring, Effie yawned and said, “I think I shall do the same.”

“Pardon?” Archie asked. “Why?”

“Leander has been alone all day. And I am tired.”

“Really?” That was from Simon, who looked as bewildered as Archie. “You are tired at”—he pulled out his timepiece—“half eleven?”

“Yes, really.” Effie was tired, though he knew he would not sleep. Still, this day had worn out its welcome. He wanted to go to bed and stare at the ceiling and think about how to describe the way roses smelled. “Is that so unusual?”

“Yes,” the boys said in unison.

He supposed that was fair. Generally, on these trips, he and Archie stayed up late. He gathered that Archie got up early and breakfasted with Simon. Goodness knew when Archie ever slept, but that was Archie. Who needed sleep when one had friends in want of company?

So, yes, it was unusual for Effie to be tired this early. Perhaps he should tell them. This was an Earls Trip, after all. The time of the year when secrets came out. And this year was apparently his turn.

“I am tired because I haven’t been sleeping,” he said carefully, trying to think how to broach a matter he didn’t fully understand himself.

“What do you mean?” Archie asked. “You haven’t been sleeping at all?”

“Not much. I sometimes attain a few hours toward dawn.”

“You were always a night owl,” Archie said.

“Indeed, but he also always lay abed until noon or later,” Simon said. “Are you lying in as you usually do?”

“No. If I can manage a few hours of sleep, I consider myself lucky. But then I’m wide awake again. I’ve taken to stalking the city before the sun comes up, like some kind of madman.”

“What do you think has changed to prompt these difficulties?” Archie asked.

“I am plagued by nightmares,” Effie said. “I think some part of me resists sleep for that reason.”

“You have often had stretches where you’ve battled nightmares, have you not?” Simon asked.

“Yes, but these are different.”

“How so?”

“I have begun to . . . remember things.” Was he really going to tell them about this?

“What things?”

Yes. Yes, he was. It was a holiday of confessions.

He took a breath to focus his thoughts. “I awaken from a nightmare and . . . Are you familiar with the sensation of trying to remember a dream even as its tendrils loosen their hold on you and begin to withdraw?”

The boys murmured their assent.

“This is the opposite of that. I wake up sweating, often shouting, and the dream is right there , a monkey on my chest.”

“Ah. That is why you took down that painting that used to hang in your bedchamber,” Simon said.

“Yes. I used to find comfort in that painting. It depicted the feeling of having a nightmare. The idea of a creature sitting on one’s chest seemed a fitting metaphor, and one takes pleasure in fitting metaphors, doesn’t one, even if they describe unpleasant experiences? But then this other type of nightmare started, and I no longer found the metaphor gratifying. Or that metaphorical, really. When I awaken from these episodes, I cannot breathe for a few moments.”

“Are we talking about dreams or memories?” Archie asked. “You said just now that you have begun to remember things.”

“That’s the rub. I think the answer is both. In the dream, I find myself in a scene that later, once I awaken, I realize is a memory. I realize it happened .”

Silence fell, and Effie knew they were struggling to understand. “You remember the two Christmases we all spent at school?” He thought back to those holidays with his friends, in an almost-empty school with a handful of other boys, a cook, and a supervising teacher, as some of the happiest times of his life.

“Your parents were traveling,” Archie said.

“Only the first time. The second time, I wrote to them that I had taken ill so I could stay with you lot. I didn’t want to go home.”

“I don’t blame you. Your parents are, not to put too fine a point on it, terrible.”

“Yes, but I think they were perhaps more terrible than you knew.” Effie paused. “Than I knew. My father, anyway.”

The silence returned, and Effie was suffused with good feeling for his friends. They would wait as long as it took for him to speak.

“You both know that I am a perpetual disappointment to my father,” he started, and the boys murmured their agreement—and their disapproval. “I used to try to please him.”

“I do remember that month you voluntarily spent every evening summing vast columns of numbers.”

“Indeed. And I used to follow him and Mr. Rodgers—Mr. Rodgers was the steward at Highworth before Mr. Nancarrow—around, trying to learn the art of estate management.” He paused. “While I can’t say I ever relished the idea of inheriting—I was too interested in other pursuits for that—I was resigned to it. I suppose I still am, but there was a time during which I was keen on preparing for it.”

He shook his head. He was getting off topic here. Why was this so hard to speak of? He hadn’t even told Julianna, though she knew he had nightmares in a general sense.

“There were times, when I was very young, where I would say that Father expressed his disappointment in me with more than just words.”

Archie, ever the protector, sat forward in his chair.

“I can give you examples. Once, when I was about seven, he locked me in my mother’s wardrobe overnight.”

“No!” Simon cried.

“Yes. They caught me trying on one of her hats.”

“Oh, Effie,” Archie said.

“And he killed my kitten once. I’d found a stray in the garden, a wee thing I nursed back to health. He’d been away, and when he came home and found me singing to it, he flew into a rage.” He closed his eyes briefly, remembering. “It wasn’t enough that he took her away, he had to march me to the sea and make me watch as he drowned her.”

“Good God,” Archie said, “that’s—”

“He always hated my eyes.” Effie hated to interrupt, but he wanted to get the rest of the story out now that he’d started. “Said they were the mark of the devil. He told me then that he ought to drown me, after the cat, to see if I’d float.”

Simon blew out a breath. “I’m sorry I ever sought his support for—”

“And then . . .” He hated to keep interrupting his friends, but if he stopped talking, he would never have the nerve to finish. “There was a time a year or two later, between the first Christmas we all spent at school and the second, when he broke my arm.”

“This was when you came back from term break with your arm in a sling.”

“Yes. In that case, he found me playing naughts and crosses with the son of one of the tenants. We were using sticks to scratch the game into a patch of dirt. We were quite engaged in our pursuit and were bent with our heads together, and when I won in an upset, the boy threw an arm around me in congratulations.” He paused. “I did not know my father was watching.” Another pause. “I believe he thought I preferred the company of other gentlemen. Other boys. He sent the boy away and turned on me.” He huffed a bitter laugh. “If only he knew how things have transpired.”

“He would not approve of Miss Evans, either,” Simon said gently.

“Indeed, he would not. But perhaps it would raise my estimation in his eyes all the same, for at least she is a member of the fairer sex. Not that I shall be breathing a word about her.” No. He would not allow the poison that was his father to infect anything to do with Julianna.

“What about your mother?” Archie asked. “Where was she in all this?”

“She was there,” Effie said. “Not at the naughts and crosses incident, but in general. She knew what was happening. When she was present, at the wardrobe incident, and when Father found me with the kitten, she would protest, but ultimately . . .” He shrugged. Ultimately, Mother would never defy Father. No one would. Not even Effie, could he have helped it. That was the problem, though: he couldn’t. He defied simply by being.

“And you forgot about these episodes until recently?” Simon asked.

“Well, obviously I knew that I broke my arm, but I seem to have remembered it more as an accident. And as for the other incidents, yes, I’d plain forgotten them.”

“And now they have returned as nightmares,” Simon said. “How do you know they are memories and not mere nightmares? I am not doubting you, only seeking to understand.”

Because he could smell the cedar of the wardrobe, feel the terror of being left alone. Because he could feel the particular mixture of indignation and shame—and searing pain—that resulted from the bone in his arm breaking. Now that these sense memories had been reawakened, they were with him all the time.

He didn’t want to talk about that, though, at least not now, so he said, “I just do.”

The boys nodded. They believed him. Of course they did.

“I have heard of this,” Archie said. “Chiefly among soldiers returned from war. They somehow block out what has happened to them.”

“You wrote a poem rather recently,” Simon said, “that seemed to be about confinement. I’d thought it metaphorical, but perhaps it was literal.”

“It was both,” Effie said quietly. “I wrote that after the wardrobe episode . . . resurfaced.”

“Do you think there are more episodes waiting to be unearthed?” Simon asked.

“I dread the thought.”

“This is why you cannot sleep,” Simon said. “You are avoiding additional unearthing.”

Effie nodded.

“Do you remember last year, with the dressing gowns?” Archie asked, and they all laughed. Effie was glad for the levity. “You had yours made in pink, and we were surprised it wasn’t black. You used to wear black all the time.”

“I did. I felt black reflected my essential outlook on the world.”

“But on our trip last year, you said something about being drawn to color. About being happier.”

“Yes. I think that was the influence of Julianna. Miss Evans,” he corrected, though he did not know why he was bothering with the boys.

“And that influence must have continued, because every time I see you these days, you are wearing a rather outrageous waistcoat.”

“I suppose I contradict myself. I tell you on the one hand that these awful memories have come back, that they are keeping me from slumber. Yet on the other hand, it is true: I am happier than I have ever been.” He quirked a smile. “I know not what to say other than that I do indeed contradict myself.” He grew serious. “In truth, I think it’s all down to Julianna—the happiness and the memories. I think I started remembering because she began asking me about my childhood. She’s the one who commissioned that poem ‘A Summer’s Day.’ Do you remember that one?”

The boys, bless them, nodded.

“That was an interesting one,” Simon said. “Given the title, one expected it to be a light bit of verse. And it was, to start, but then the mood took a turn.”

Yes. “Do you remember the line ‘broken bones, turned to stone’?”

“Oh, dear God,” Archie said, “that was your arm!”

Effie shrugged. “It was and it wasn’t. I think the memories, and the poems I’ve written about them, reinforce each other. One comes from the other and vice versa. When I try to think how to express something in verse, my mind . . . Oh, it is very hard to explain. It’s as if my mind goes into a different place. As if a curtain is drawn back. Not always. Not often, actually. But the best poems come from when this curtain is drawn, allowing a glimpse into a different realm.” He paused. “I am aware how ridiculous I sound.”

“I don’t think you sound ridiculous,” Archie said.

“Nor do I,” Simon said. “You know I haven’t an artistic bone in my body, but I am not at all surprised that the process of creating poems is rather mystical.”

“Sometimes, lately, it seems the curtain is drawn such that I can see into the past. No, I can . . . feel into the past.”

“Is that a blessing or a curse?” Simon asked.

“I honestly don’t know. On the one hand, I would rather not have these memories. It would be much more convenient if they’d stayed locked away. On the other hand, part of me dislikes the notion that my memory is hiding things from me. It’s as if I don’t know my own soul.”

Effie felt better for having unburdened himself. He always did. He wondered, for the second time in as many days, why he’d ever thought to keep secrets from the boys.

He was tired; he hadn’t been lying about that. But when he got back to his room, he found himself possessed of a newfound energy. He let Leander out of his cage to stretch his wings and pulled out his stack of letters.

Dear Sartorially Sullied,

Stop giving your son castor oil. It’s vile. As a happy consequence, you shan’t have to do battle with castor oil stains ever again.

Sincerely, Mrs. Landers

Much later that night, Effie was staring at the ceiling in his bedchamber, when his door creaked open. He could just make out the shape of Archie, who was carrying a candle, suspended in his doorway.

“What’s wrong?” Effie whispered.

Archie slipped into the room. “Nothing. I awakened and thought to check on you.” He set his taper on the nightstand. “Sleep eludes you, I gather?”

“Sleep eludes me,” Effie confirmed. “What time is it?”

“Nearly four.”

“I thought it must be. I usually try to avoid looking at my timepiece when I am battling my sleep demon, but—what are you doing?”

“Keeping you company.”

Archie had pushed back the covers and was getting into bed with Effie.

“Keeping me company!” Effie, echoed, amazed.

“Well, trying to.” Archie shoved Effie’s shoulder. “Move over.”

Oh, Archie. Was there a better man on this earth? Effie, a little overcome, moved over. If only one could bank kindness. Save it up when one encountered an excess of it, and pull it out later when it was in short supply. If that were possible, Effie would never run out.

“Speaking of preferring the company of gentlemen,” Effie asked, “what will the servants think if they find us in bed together, or if they saw you sneaking in here?”

“Oh, who cares? Being an earl ought to be good for something. Besides, they are unlikely to find out. I told them you tend to lie abed in the mornings—that was before I knew that wasn’t the case anymore.”

“So we’ll have a lie-in and, what? You’ll climb out the window?”

“Do you know that I climbed in Clementine’s window once last year, at Quintrell Castle?”

“You did?”

“Yes, and that was much higher off the ground, so your scenario does not daunt me.”

“You always were rather a Corinthian.”

Archie rolled his eyes and blew out his candle.

Effie turned onto his side, facing away from Archie. He thought he might be able to sleep now.

“You never fancied me, then?” Archie asked. “Or Simon?”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake!” Effie turned back over, propped his head on his hand. It was too dark to make out Archie’s expression.

“I merely wondered,” Archie said mildly into the darkness. “If your tastes encompass men, and if you can only develop ardent feelings for those to whom you have an existing sentimental bond . . .”

Effie snorted. “Don’t flatter yourself.”

Archie chuckled. After a stretch of silence, he said, “I hope I have not offended. I am merely trying to understand.”

That was Archie. Always trying to understand. To stretch the bounds of what he knew, and believed, in support of those he loved.

“I might have harbored a passing, exceedingly passing admiration for you that day you beat Nigel Nettlefell in that archery competition. You targeted him—no pun intended—because he’d been so beastly to me.”

“I remember. He was beastly to everyone.”

“But it dissipated,” Effie rushed to add. “I promise you, it was gone the next day. You are my brother.”

“Yes,” Archie agreed mildly. “And you are mine.”

Effie turned back over, and this time, he took the coverlet with him, yanking it from Archie’s clutches. “Stop hogging the covers.”