The Girl with the Make-Believe Husband

It was a lovely future. It just wasn’t hers.

“Cecilia?”

“We’re all done,” she said, a little too loudly.

“Already?” His brow furrowed into a quizzical vee as he touched his right cheek. “You did this side much faster than the other.”

She shrugged. “Easier as I went along, I suppose.” She hadn’t done quite as careful a job on the right side, but it wasn’t noticeable unless one got right up next to him. And at any rate, he’d said he was going to do it again tomorrow.

“I should let you rest. You’re tired, and we have that meeting later.”

“You don’t have to leave.”

She did. For her own sake. “I’ll bother you,” she said.

“Not if I’m sleeping.” He yawned again, then smiled, and Cecilia was nearly thrown back by the force of his beauty.

“What?” he asked. He touched his face. “Did you miss a spot?”

“You look different clean-shaven,” she said. Or did she whisper it?

He gave her a loopy smile. “More handsome, I trust.”

Much more. She wouldn’t have thought that possible.

“I should go. We’ll need someone to take care of the water and—”

“Stay,” he said simply. “I like having you here.”

And as Cecilia gingerly sat on the far side of the bed, it seemed impossible that he could not hear the sound of her heart breaking.

Chapter 7

Oh for heaven’s sake, I know I don’t have a freakishly large nose. I was merely making a point. You cannot expect honesty from Mr. Rokesby when the subject of conversation is your sister. He must be complimentary. I think it is an unwritten dictum among men, is it not?

What does Lieutenant Rokesby look like?

—from Cecilia Harcourt to her brother Thomas

When they went downstairs at half five that evening, Major Wilkins was already waiting for them in the dining room, seated near the wall with a mug of ale and a plate of bread and cheese. Edward gave him a crisp shoulder bow when he stood to greet them. He’d not served alongside Wilkins, but their paths had crossed often enough. The major served as a sort of administrator for the British garrison in New York and was certainly the correct place to begin in any search for a missing soldier.

Edward had always found him somewhat pompous, but with that came a rigid adherence to rules and order, which he supposed was a necessary trait in a military administrator. And truth be told, he wouldn’t have wanted the man’s job.

Cecilia wasted no time once they were seated. “Have you any news of my brother?”

Major Wilkins gave her what even Edward could recognize as a condescending look, then said, “It is a large theater of war, my dear. We cannot expect to find one man so quickly.” He motioned to the plate at the center of the table. “Cheese?”

Cecilia was momentarily flummoxed by the change of subject, but she seemed to regain her purpose quickly. “This is the army,” she protested. “The British Army. Are we not the most advanced, the most well-organized force in the world?”

“Of course, but—”

“How could we lose a man?”

Edward laid a gentle hand on her arm. “The chaos of war can test even the most well-run of militaries. I myself went missing for months.”

“But he wasn’t missing when he went missing!” she cried.

Wilkins chortled with amusement at her malapropism, and Edward nearly groaned at his insensitivity.

“Oh, now that’s a good one,” the major said, cutting off a thick slice of cheddar. “Wasn’t missing when he went missing. Heh heh. The colonel will love that one.”

“I misspoke,” Cecilia said tightly.

Edward watched her carefully. He’d thought to intervene on her behalf, but she seemed to be in good control of the situation. Or if not the situation, at least of herself.

“What I meant,” she continued, her eyes icing over in a way that ought to have frightened Major Wilkins, “was that Thomas was here in New York. In hospital. And then he wasn’t. It’s not as if he was on a battlefield or off scouting behind enemy lines.”

Scouting behind enemy lines. Edward frowned as the words rolled around between his ears. Was that what he’d been doing in Connecticut? It seemed the most likely scenario. But why? He didn’t recall ever having done so before.

“Well, that’s just the thing,” Major Wilkins said. “I can find no record of your brother having been in hospital.”

“What?” Cecilia’s head jerked as she looked to Edward and then back again at the major. “That’s impossible.”

Wilkins shrugged unapologetically. “I had my man go through the records. The name and rank of every soldier who is brought to hospital is recorded in a ledger. We make note of the date of arrival and the date of, ehrm, departure.”

“Departure?” Cecilia echoed.

“Or death.” Wilkins had the grace to look at least a little uncomfortable upon raising this possibility. “Regardless, we could not find record of your brother.”

“But he was injured,” Cecilia protested. “We received notice.” She turned back to Edward, visibly agitated. “My father received a letter from General Garth. He wrote that Thomas had been injured, but that it wasn’t a mortal wound and he was recovering in hospital. Is there another hospital?”

Edward looked to Major Wilkins.

“Not on this part of the island.”

“Not on this part?” Cecilia said, leaping onto his choice of words.

“There is something of an infirmary up in Haarlem,” Wilkins answered with the sort of sigh that said he wished he hadn’t brought it up. “I wouldn’t call it a hospital.” He glanced over at Edward with a meaningful look in his eye. “Wouldn’t want to stay there myself, if you know what I mean.”

Cecilia blanched.

“For God’s sake,” Edward snapped, “you’re talking about the lady’s brother.”

The major turned to Cecilia with a contrite expression. “My apologies, ma’am.”

She nodded, a tense little motion made heartbreaking by the convulsive swallow in her throat.

“The infirmary in Haarlem is rudimentary at best,” Major Wilkins said to Cecilia. “Your brother is an officer. He would not have been brought to such a place.”

“But if it was the closest facility . . .”

“His wound was not life-threatening. He would have been moved.”

Edward did not like the idea of enlisted men being forced to convalesce in subpar conditions merely on account of their rank, but there were only so many beds in the hospital here at the southern end of Manhattan Island. “He’s right,” he said to Cecilia. The army would always move the officers first.

“Perhaps Thomas would have had reason to refuse a transfer,” Cecilia suggested. “If he was with his men he might not have wished to leave them.”

“This would have been months ago,” Edward said, hating that he had to pierce her hopes this way. “Even if he had stayed to be with his men, surely he would have moved down here by now.”

“Oh, of a certain,” Major Wilkins said matter-of-factly. “There’s simply no way he’d be up in Haarlem.”

“You can hardly even call it a town,” Edward said to Cecilia. “There’s the Morris Mansion, but beyond that, it’s more of a collection of abandoned colonial camps.”

“But don’t we have men there?”

“Merely to keep it from falling back into enemy hands,” Major Wilkins said. “Good farmland up there too. We’ve got some crops almost ready for harvest.”

“We?” Edward could not help but inquire.

“The Haarlem farmers are loyal to the king,” the major said firmly.

Edward wasn’t so sure about that, but this hardly seemed the time for a discussion on the local political leanings.

“We went through six months of records at the hospital,” Major Wilkins said, bringing the conversation back to its purpose. He reached out to fix himself another piece of bread and cheese, scowling when the cheddar crumbled on the knife. “We could not find any mention of your brother. Honestly, it’s as if he never existed.”