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The ancient oaken door groaned open, ushering in a surge of soot-laden air and the pervasive northern chill. Harrison entered the taproom carrying a shrouded object that instantly recalled the specter of the funeral plaque from James's vision. A tremor passed through him, which he sought to conceal by tightening his grip upon the bar as he fixed his gaze upon his brother.

Wending his way to the bar, Harrison signaled for an ale and set the item on the wood.

“I do not know why you wished me to bring this. I can’t stand to look at the damned thing.”

James glanced at the covered piece, which he guessed to be the painting of Bedford Grange that had hung in the breakfast room at Bailey Hall. He wondered if that was why Harrison had covered the thing but did not ask.

“All in good time, Captain Reed.”

Harrison paused mid-drink. James could not recall if he had called his brother by his rank and title before. It was a first step but it was not enough.

“I owe you an apology,” James began, then stopped. As much as he wished to turn over a new leaf, why did making amends need to be so deuced awkward?

“If it is for the incident at the assembly hall, you owe Mariah the apology.”

James held back his grimace at his brother’s use of his wife’s Christian name. He did not have any right to object to their friendship. Not when he knew what it meant to both of them.

“I owe her more than an apology,” James admitted, unable to look directly at his brother.

Harrison set down his ale and stared at him for a long moment. “At least we can agree on that.”

“You were right. Seeing you at Portsmouth…knowing what you experienced in the war. What you continued to experience. It was a reminder that we aren’t owed anything.”

Harrison turned away and stared forward, inhaling deeply after James’s words. A slight tick at his eye patch was the only indication that he had registered what his brother had said.

At his brother’s continued silence, James went on. “I’m sorry I abandoned you when you returned. For that is exactly what I did. I pretended my brother was still that man in the painting.”

James could have sworn he saw moisture behind the eye patch, yet his mind rejected the sight as an impossibility. Nevertheless, a phantom tear seemed to track a path down his brother’s scarred cheek.

“I think,” Harrison went on, “That a gentleman went to war. That one in the painting. He read Tennyson and thought war was glorious. But that gentleman is dead. He died in a hole outside of Sevastopol.”

James had nothing to say to that, so he nodded and took a small sip of ale.

Harrison shook his head as if to clear it and swallowed. “Our parents were not monsters, but they taught us we were entitled to the world bending to our will. Our needs. That we mattered more than everyone else around us because we were Reeds. Because some long-dead relative had fought with William the Conqueror or had done a favor for Henry VII. But when the Honorable Harrison Reed went to war and died, he learned his life was no more important than anyone else’s on the Crimean Peninsula.”

At last, Harrison looked at him with his one good eye, which was bloodshot but not wet. “You never had to learn that lesson.”

James’s hand spasmed of its own volition, as if it wished to reach out and grasp his brother’s. He did not reach out, but the sentiment wrapped around him.

“I might be learning that lesson now.”

Harrison watched him, unblinking. “You are staying here at the Crown and the Loom?”

James nodded. “Mariah asked me not to return to Bailey Hall, and I aim to respect her wishes.”

Harrison did not move, his eye still upon James. “Why?”

“Why what?”

Harrison pounded the table. “Why are you in the north? Are you trying to get Monahan to lower his wages again?”

“No!” James roared, his outburst momentarily drawing the collective attention of the taproom before the patrons resumed their libations and quiet murmurs. “No. I cannot…quite explain, but I want to live differently. To be better.”

Harrison huffed, then added. “Mariah said you apologized.”

“Did she say anything else?” James could not hide the strain of hope in his voice but Harrison dashed it as he shook his head.

“She seemed a bit stunned in all honesty. You realize she has no reason to trust you?”