He walked over to where Van Alstyne was stooping down to lift one end of a log. “Grab that and pull it over here,” he said.
The two men grunted and heaved the log up and on top of the stack of tree trunks, wedged between saplings so they wouldn’t roll.
“Surprised to find you up here,” Van Alstyne said, wiping mud on his haunches, mindless of his expensive riding kit. “With all your family has on its hands right now.”
Ambrose kicked the logs to make sure they were secure.
“Ethan’s the one heading to DC, then?”
Ambrose assumed the hearings must be in the papers already. There was something about the fire, the investigation, and the affected families nearly every day now. He knew Ethan had taken to hiding the papers from May, but she just demanded them from the maids.
“I’m back here to man the ship. Really, they’re going to need a lot of counsel from home.”
“I’m sure,” Van Alstyne said, rather too heartily. In a change of topic he said, “But your brother’s becoming quite the land baron, isn’t he? Vivian says he’s crazy about land.” Somehow Van Alstyne had become the type of man who attributed his thoughts to his wife. Whether he was in perpetual surety of her agreement, or afraid to express his views as his own, Ambrose suspected the verbal tic was the former. The Van Alstynes had always been enviously well suited. Ambrose wanted to ask him about it, wanted to ask how it was maintained, and if it was as easy and blissful as it looked from the outside. He didn’t know if he’d be relieved or disappointed if their union required compromise and hard labor. Ambrose hoped there was at least one easy love story in the world, but he couldn’t pry into the unknowable privacy of someone else’s marriage.
“I don’t know about crazy,” Ambrose said.
“Made me an offer on that duck pond at the far end of my property. Pretty little thing, but I wasn’t thinking of parting with it. He named quite a generous sum.”
Ambrose’s ears burned. Was Ethan trying to best him again, make him want something, and then get it first? Or did he intend to gift it to Ambrose, as an act of charity? Either way, it was enraging. Why had he suggested it to Ambrose this morning? His brother’s actions were never clear to him. Was this an act of keeping his brother close, or an enemy closer?
“Frankly, I was surprised,” Van Alstyne was saying. “Ethan’s never really been the sportsman, has he? And now, well . . .” He trailed off, embarrassed by even this tangential mention of Ethan’s handicap that made it impossible for him to shoot. “Makes Vivian think he’s out to buy up half the county. Maybe he’d let you shoot over there. I’m sure you’re quite the marksman after your travels.”
They continued, with Van Alstyne asking many detailed questions about Ambrose’s itinerary after Mandalay and Ambrose asking many detailed questions about the construction of the Van Alstyne manse next door.
“Now, you tell Ethan to call me when he gets back. Tell him to come see me about that duck pond,” Van Alstyne said, clicking the chestnut racehorse into a walk down the opposite path.
Ambrose continued toward the top of the little mountain, a strange hill that made him feel like he’d ridden back in time. As he rode along the north side of the rise, the views spread all the way to Lake Erie and then across to Canada. The vast horizon made him feel that if he kept riding he would meet water and then perhaps a boat to take him off into all that blue.
He thought of that night on the riverfront in Mandalay with the Van Alstynes, when they should have been at the ball but instead sat getting tipsy and telling stories. The blithe ease that radiated from the couple and enfolded all in their close company focused Ambrose’s mind, and something that had been just in his peripheral vision came into full view.
He could take May. They could leave.
He hadn’t let himself think of it, hadn’t let his mind even consider it. Van Alstyne’s comments had also left a panicky tightness in Ambrose’s chest at the thought of living next to Ethan and May for the rest of his life. But the breeze and the trees began to clear this, began to make him feel expansive, as if anything were possible.
Ethan knew as well as anyone that Ambrose wasn’t going to be content in the middle of the country playing at baron. His brother wanted to keep him close, that much was clear. He probably feared that if Ambrose left, May would go with him. And really, what did Ethan expect? He’d married her under the most precarious circumstances. Ethan was nervous about Ambrose’s return home, that much was clear. Didn’t that nervousness prove there was something wrong with the match?
He heard hooves turning up the trail behind him and, assuming it was Van Alstyne again, he continued toward the ridge.
But it was May who came up beside him on her petite Arabian gray, Blueskin, who daintily sidestepped young trees, keeping tight to the deer path. May was astride. She only rode sidesaddle for show now. Dressed in Ethan’s worn riding clothes, she breathed hard from riding to catch up. The necklace sparkled on her skin.
“Lucky that thing’s sturdy,” he said, pointing with a gloved hand.
“She’s sturdy enough to get me up here at a full canter, though it’s probably not good for her,” May said, purposefully misunderstanding, but Ambrose let it go.
When she was abreast of him, she said, “I love it up here. It’s where we come.” She leaned down and patted her horse’s neck. “Don’t we?”
“You were following me.”
“I was already out. But I did see Calvin. He told me you were here.”
Ambrose leaned over to grab Blueskin’s bridle near the bit, feeling the Ragman sway and prance as Ambrose reined the horses neck and neck. He leaned over then to whisper something in May’s ear, something about them going away, about the expanses before them, the day and the energy of the ride having gone to his head. But she turned toward him at the last minute, and he caught her lips instead and kissed her.
For only a moment he thought of his brother. But thought was replaced by sensation coupled with the deep knowing that life was short. Then the smell of her perfume and a lingering scent of violets overwhelmed him until every thought left his head except for rightness and the opening of memory. When they parted he knew she was his. She belonged with him.
He scrabbled with the reins and the bridle, awkwardly trying to get an arm around her, to bring her closer when her little horse stepped away.
“Why’d you have to do that?” she asked, turning to look at the view ahead, avoiding his eyes.
“You know why.” He pulled her horse in again, but Blueskin stepped back. Ambrose loosened the reins, never wanting to force, but watching May’s face closely.
She looked down, defeated.
He swung off the saddle, coming next to her. “Come down,” he said, patting her horse.
She didn’t move from her position.
“I can’t talk to you if you’re up there.”
She slid off the saddle, ignoring his arms waiting to help her.
“I’m down,” she said.