Thad flipped open the book. He had found it in a hidden drawer of Mother’s secretaire when he was thirteen and had set about memorizing it so that he and Arnaud could pass messages between them in school. It had earned him a knuckle rapping from Mr. Taylor, but still the memory made him grin. When his parents realized what he’d done, they had been far too impressed with him to dole out any extra punishment.
And a ruler across his hands was not so great a penalty, not when one considered that his mother had risked her life every time she wrote a message. Had she been caught, she would have been hung. Thad had no such danger facing him. Though the British would no doubt be happy to see him dead, they were hardly within reach.
He and Tallmadge had political enemies aplenty, though.
As Mother would say, better to spend an hour encoding and decoding than a lifetime wishing one had.
He dipped his quill into the vial of stain. Careful not to let the straw-colored ink cross over the iron gall and leave telltale smudges, he penned the pertinent information into the blank space between the visible lines. Even as he wrote, the pale stain faded and dried, disappearing entirely.
Magic. Two centuries earlier, Father would have been called a sorcerer for creating such a potion and likely burned at the stake. Praise the Lord they lived in a more enlightened age.
Once the message was dry, Thad folded the sheet, let a few drops of melted wax fall onto the edge, and pressed to seal it. He slid the code book and vials back into their drawer, cleaned and mended his quill to be ready for its next use, and then pushed away from his desk. Arnaud had said he would be over to collect Jack before dinner, which meant anytime.
As if summoned by his thoughts, Jack came flying into his study, leaping upon his legs and trying to climb him like a ratline. Thad laughed and hauled him up into his arms.
But the boy stuck out his lip. “Not funny.”
No? Odd, he had heard him laughing like a loon not five minutes earlier. “What is not funny?”
“Papa said it is time to go home, but I don’t want to go home. ’Tis no fun there.”
Thad lifted his brows and met the boy’s scowling brown eyes. “Is that not where all your toys are? Your carved horse, your tin soldiers? Your wagon?”
For some reason, that reminder only served to bring the lip out farther. “Papa is mean.”
“Oh?”
“I asked if he would bring them all back here, and he said no. But I bringded them all before.”
“Brought.” Thad tapped Jack’s nose and gave him his best wise-uncle look. “And that was because you were staying with us for a month, my little mate, not for an afternoon.”
“But—”
“Jacques?” Arnaud appeared in the doorway, his smile edged in frustration. “Are you ready?”
The boy squirmed so that Thad had no choice but to put him down lest he fall and then went tearing from the room shouting something to the effect of “No!”
Rather than chase after him, Arnaud fell into one of the leather chairs with a long sigh and rubbed a hand over his face. “I am a monster, you know, for expecting my son to live at his own home with me.”
Thad sat on the edge of his desk. “Hmm. That is because you have no Grandmama Winnie there. Though if you wish to transfer Father’s laboratory to your house and have them stay with you…”
The look Arnaud shot him was far too pained to play along with the jest. “Am I doing wrong by him, Thad?”
Sorrow pulsated from his friend’s hunched shoulders. Thad sent a silent prayer heavenward. “He is still so young, Alain. He hasn’t the reason yet to sort through his conflicting emotions—his love for you and his fear for you.”
Arnaud seemed not to hear him. His gaze remained fastened on a tassel of the rug, his shoulders now slumped. “I still miss her so. I still think, every time I feel at a loss with him, that Marguerite would know exactly what to do.”
Thad sighed and gripped the edge of wood under his hands. “She would be proud of you. Proud of you for taking charge of him when it would have been so easy to entrust him to someone else.”
The way Arnaud winced, eyes closed, made Thad wonder if the pain would ever dull for this friend of his. “If only I had not missed so much of his life, perhaps then it would be better. Perhaps I would not feel so helpless had I been here when he was born, before Marguerite died.”
“’Tisn’t your fault you were not. Those pirates all but killed you—”
“But I ought not have gone.” Arnaud surged to his feet and paced to the window. “Had I but listened to that blasted feeling of yours…”
How different it all would be. So many years of questions and grief that never would have been. So many fewer nightmares. So many shadows that would have no place.
But still, there was light anew. “We must simply thank the Almighty yet again for the miracle of your escape, of your return to Jack, and trust that He is leading you still. Just as He led you out of that infested pit in Istanbul.”