“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,exceedinglypassing 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.”
* * *
Effie did sleep in the next morning. When he awakened—to an empty bed—and checked his timepiece, it was just after ten. He felt more refreshed than he had in months.
He took the sheet off Leander’s cage, opened the door, and offered his arm. Leander, like Sally, was quite happy to perch on Effie’s hand, but unlike Sally, he wasn’t affectionate. Whereas Sally used to nuzzle Effie’s cheek and take apparent delight in playing games with him, Leander merely regarded him with his blank eyes.
“Is there anything in here?” Effie asked, rubbing Leander’s head feathers. “I fear not.”
“Go!” Leander chirped.
“Oh, so we’ve reverted to ‘Go!’ have we? All right, then.”
It was just as well Leander had forgotten his recent foray into speaking in complete sentences; Effie didn’t need the blasted bird announcing the contents of his heart like some kind of feathered newspaper boy. He arranged the sheets of linen Mrs. Mitchell had furnished and let Leander roam while he performed his morning ablutions.
Later, Effie found the boys lingering in the breakfast room, and as he helped himself to tea, he shot Archie a questioning look.Hadhe climbed out the window early this morning?
Archie merely winked.
“We were just about to walk to the village,” Simon said. “Stretch our legs a bit. We thought we’d walk there, then visit the beach. We can discuss what to do about your Miss Evans.”
She’s notmyMiss Evans, Effie wanted to say, but he also wanted what Simon said to be true, so he remained silent, and after he’d had eaten some kippers and toast, they set off.
The house they were borrowing was newish, its acreage carved out of farmland on the outskirts of the old village and situated on land that sloped down to the sea. It belonged to a friend of Simon’s from Lords whose wife had taken a shine to the area. The family summered here but left the house empty most of the rest of the year.
“Have you been to the beach yet?” Effie asked. “Here by the house, I mean.”
“We went after you stood us up yesterday,” Simon said archly. “It’s very quiet. Rather the opposite of the bustling seaside in Brighton. A shingle beach, with quite large stones. Mrs. Mitchell reports that the water is shallow.”
The walk to the village was short, and as the September sun warmed Effie, that sense of lightness returned, of being able to relax in the steadfast company of his friends.
When he tripped over a loose cobblestone, he realized he had forgotten to put on his boots. He’d come down to breakfast in a pair of court shoes he’d packed and had unthinkingly left the house in them. He’d gone through a phase of wearing the flamboyant footwear last year, and this pair, which he’d had made based on a portrait of Charles II, was perhaps his pièce de résistance. He was mostly over the phase, but he did enjoy antagonizing the boys. And, really, these shoes, with their high red heels and riotous bows of silver lace and ribbon, were so much more pleasant to look at than plain leather boots.
“All right?” Archie said, reaching out a hand to steady Effie.
Simon, for his part, merely let his gaze fall to Effie’s shoes and then lifted it to the sky as if applying for divine patience.
“What if I were to call at the Old Ship?” Effie said, returning to the topic of how he might see Julianna.
