Page 77 of The Reckless Love of an Heir
Sarah wrote to us this morning. They are shutting up their town house and returning home immediately. William is to be buried in Yorkshire. So of course out of respect Papa has said we shall leave town and come home too. We should be with you in three perhaps four days. Mama said, you must tell the household to expect us.
I cannot write more, we are all in shock.
Your beloved sister,
Alethea
William had died…
Susan stared at the letter, her lips parted in shock.
He was just a boy.
Her heart drained of all emotions, all the pain of the last few days falling silent. An acute sense of loneliness struck at her. She wished for someone to hold, and to hold her. Henry… Poor Henry. Poor Uncle Robert and Aunt Jane… How must they feel?
Yesterday she had sulked and moped about the ruins pitying herself and what she had lost. While Henry must have been at William’s bedside watching his brother die. She had not once thought about Alethea’s letter saying that Henry had gone to his brother. She should have spent the hours praying for William, not lamenting over her selfish longing.
William had no more life to live… The words sliced her in two. All the pain now filling her heart and soul was for Uncle Robert, Aunt Jane, Henry, Sarah, Christine and the others.
Nausea twisted through Henry’s stomach as he watched William. But it was not William, it was William’s lifeless body. The laughing, energetic boy whom Henry had spent half his life impatient with was no longer here. Pain threatened to overwhelm him.
His father arrived too late to say goodbye. He had looked tortured when Henry told him the news. He had walked into the room, dropped to his knees beside the bed and held William’s body, kissed his cheek and pressed his forehead against William’s. It had been minutes before he let go, even though Henry’s mother had come about the bed and held his father as he held William.
Henry had watched, with his hands clasped behind his back,and said nothing, because no words would bring William back, and nothing would take away the pain.
When his father rose from his knees, Henry’s mother had wrapped her arms about his waist, and his arms had settled on her shoulders as she’d sobbed against his lapel. His father had not arrived in time to say his goodbye to William, but he had, at least, arrived in time to comfort Henry’s mother.
His father had not cried, though, his eyes had been dry, but full of torture, of an agony Henry probably only felt one tenth of.
Henry had left the room, then.
Now he focused on William’s face. He was glad he had stayed – glad he was the only one who had seen this. As soon as his parents had left he had dressed William in his school uniform, while William’s colour darkened and his muscles stiffened. He had become a green-grey.
A desire to clasp William firmly, shot through Henry. He did not want to let him go.
His mother had not wanted to leave, but when Henry had offered to stay with William to allow his parents to return to London and tell his sisters, his father had urged his mother to go. It was not William who needed his parents now, it was the others. Henry was glad his mother would not have this memory of William’s cold, lifeless body.
His parents had taken his other brothers, Stephen and Gerard, out of school and taken them home with them. They had been in shock, caught off guard by the speed of this. Christine and Sarah had been waiting for news in the town house.
In William’s last hour, Stephen and Gerard had been sent for and come to the room, and stood by William’s bed to say their farewell. They had tried to hold back their tears, but failed. Stephen told Henry only two days ago he was playing cricketwith William. Gerard had turned and wrapped his arms around Henry’s waist, seeking comfort that none of Henry’s siblings had sought from him before. Henry had held him in a tight embrace.
The boys had wanted his father, but his father had not been there and so they’d looked to their elder brother. To turn to their mother would have felt weak.
And besides, their mother had been crying quietly, she would have been unable to comfort them. In the last few hours, Henry had discovered a strength he had not known was within him, and now he was clinging to it, his fists holding tight. He was being strong for his brothers, for his mother, and stronger than his father because his father needed to focus on the others – and grieve.
‘The coffin is outside, it is ready, my lord. I am sorry, the stairway is too narrow to bring it up.’
Henry looked at the man who stood in the door. The school staff had left him alone in the attic room, out of respect probably. He hoped not out of lack of care. Yet he felt as though the world should be wailing with sadness – not enough fuss was being made. This was his youngest brother – and he had become nothing but cold flesh and bone.
‘Shall I wrap the body in the sheet, sir?’
The body…William! My brother!‘No. I will carry him down.’
Henry walked to the side of the bed, as the man held the door open. Henry’s heart pumped hard, pulsing blood into veins which felt dry.
William had grown much taller in the last year. He had grown from a boy to a youth.
He would not grow any more now.
