“Yes, really, and that is a fact. You inherited my sense of responsibility—which is not a bad thing, although a burden. Legally, you were within your rights to stay in America. Morally, the decision was one of conscience.”
“Whatever it was, I came back, and I’m still here.”
“And I thank you for that. Brace, in the past six years I’ve watched you mature into an intelligent man. When you returned from America, you were angry and bitter, but you overcame that, or at least I thought you had until recently. What happened?”
Brace took a deep breath in order to stop his first rush of words. His father’s question hit him hard, and he’d been unprepared for it. A moment later, he spoke in slow, measured tones.
“What happened is very simple. She came back.”
Charles shook his head sadly. “As we knew she would. Devonairre is Elyse’s home.”
Brace’s anger burst its bonds. “How can you sit there and speak like that? How can you? You, Mother, and I have given our lives to this place, cared for it as if it had been our own. And we’ve done this only to have some stranger who was raised among the spoiled fops of the world come and tell us what to do!”
Charles almost leaned away from the force of his son’s anger, but held himself straight, not a flicker of emotion showing on his face. Instead, he placed his hand on his son’s thigh and gently squeezed the hard muscle. When he spoke, his voice was low, but emotions flowed powerfully through it.
“You must not think that way.”
“Why must I not?” Brace asked, anger making his words stiff. “She left sixteen years ago, and not even when her father died, did she have the courtesy to come home. Did she ever once write to us to find out how Devonairre was doing? What reasons could there be to not make me think the way I do?” Brace paused for just a moment. When he spoke again, his voice was still angry. “When she finally returned, it was as a lordly high lady! No, Father, you have given me no reason not to think this way.”
Charles sighed wearily. “For more reasons than you could ever know, we owe to Harlan Louden everything that makes life worthwhile, and through him, to Elyse, too. What we have now, your mother and I—and you, too—is more than I could ever have hoped. If not for Harlan, I would have nothing, not even you!”
Charles, even as he spoke, knew the truth of his words. Harlan Louden had given him the chance to live a life of self-respect and worth, and for Charles, nothing that came after that meant more.
“Brace,” Charles said, lifting his hand from his son’s leg, “it is because of Harlan Louden that you are what you are today, and have the education and home that you do.”
“Don’t you think I know that?” Brace shouted, his frustration growing out of control. He stood quickly. “Good night, Father.” He turned and walked stiffly toward the east wing.
“Brace,” Charles called from the stone bench, but Brace would not turn at his father’s call, and Charles knew better than to chase after him. Brace was much as he had been as a young man, hotheaded and determined to do himself harm. Yet Charles prayed that somehow his son would see through the irrational curtains that covered his eyes and come to terms with the man he was, and the man he one day would be.
*****
Elyse stood on the balcony, breathing the cooler night air. Her life was settling in to a semblance of normalcy. England was becoming a thing of the past and so were the memories she tried her best to suppress.
She wanted to be happy here, but she was finding it difficult. She loved Devonairre, and loved Jamaica. Yet there was still one thing missing from her life—the ability to give her love to the one person who refused it.
I will survive this, too. The dreams will stop. The aching will leave, she added in her silent dialogue, but found her words hard to believe.
Then she saw Charles Denham step into the courtyard, and was about to call to him when she heard a horse approaching. Intuitively, she knew that it was Brace returning from wherever he had been. Not wanting him to see her, she retreated into the hallway and returned to her room.
She stayed there, pacing restlessly, until she grew angry with herself. Why am I hiding in my own home? With that thought, Elyse left her room and went back onto the small balcony. The courtyard was deserted, and she began to relax.
Ten minutes later, she heard footsteps and saw Brace enter the east wing. She stared at him for several seconds before he was gone from her sight, conscious of the way her heart raced and her mind spun.
Where were you? Why did you go away without saying anything? Elyse shook her head. She had no right to ask those questions of him, for it was in her mind alone, where her love dwelled. Yet, even as she found herself mired in these painful thoughts, a hidden sense rose up to challenge her.
From a far place deep within the core of her mind, a voice spoke to her, telling her that Brace loved her, and for her to see it as the truth. There was no basis for this knowledge, no reason. Yet she accepted the thought and allowed it to grow free.
Why does he treat me so disdainfully? How can he love me and act the way he does? With the insistent inner voice blending into her thoughts, a myriad of newer memories, acquired since she had returned to Jamaica, assaulted her. She remembered Brace’s first, hostile greeting, and remembered, too, the look in his eyes. It was not a look of hatred, but of something else. Desire? Love?
She relived, for the moment, their one heated, passionate kiss, which had shaken her to the very center of her being. Closing her eyes, Elyse realized that so much had happened in so short a time that the relationship between Brace and her wavered like the leaves of a tree in a storm.
Once again, since that afternoon at the aqueduct, their relationship had changed. Brace had turned sullen, speaking only when she asked a direct question, and the next day, the minute the sugar processing had ended, he’d disappeared without a word.
After a sleepless night, which she knew well was because of Brace, she had grown afraid he had left forever. She feared she had triggered the cause of Brace’s hatred, and that he left so that he would not have to be reminded of her again.
She’d spent the night staring out at the phosphorescence of the moonlit waves, praying that Brace was safe, admitting her love for him, even as she accepted the fact that he was gone and might not return.
Elyse shrugged away her thoughts of last night while she watched Charles cross the courtyard and enter his apartment. When Charles and Ann’s window darkened, Elyse felt as though she were alone in the world.
The night sounds grew loud; insects called, an old owl hooted madly, and a sudden, strange chill raced through Elyse’s body. What’s happening to me? I was supposed to be happy when I came home. Why can’t I be? Will I ever be?
All the anger of the past years, at her inability to do with her life what she desired, welled strongly within her. Her escape from imprisonment and her return home had not helped to ease her mind; she was still a prisoner, this time captive to her emotions.
A single tear fell from her eye and rolled down her cheek. She closed her eyes, fighting the sadness trying to claim her and to make her surrender. “No!” she whispered fiercely, drawing on the anger she’d felt earlier. “No, you won’t do this to me!” As she spoke, Brace’s taunting face rose before her, laughing at her, making sport of her love for him. The same face that had shared her dreams each night.
“Do you hate me or do you love me?” she asked the ghostly apparition. The hazy smiling face laughed at her. Is your love in my mind only? “Damn you, I will have the truth!” Suddenly she knew what she had to do. Leaving the balcony, she walked purposefully down the left staircase and out the rear of the house. Her feet moved of their own volition, carrying her toward the east wing.
At Brace’s door, she raised her hand and rapped sharply on the dark mahogany. The scent of night orchids grew strong while she waited. Her breathing was tight and forced. Then the door swung open and she found herself staring into his face.
“Which is it?” She asked the irration
al question in a forced, sharp voice.
Brace stared at her for a moment, drinking in her beauty, breathing in the womanly fragrance that radiated from her, her strange question a puzzle to his mind. “Which is what?”
“Do you hate me or do you love me?” she demanded, knowing with the logical part of her mind that she had no sane reason to ask the question. Now that she had, she couldn’t stop herself from going on. “The other day I asked you why you hated me—I don’t think you do—I think you love me. Answer me, Brace—do you hate me or love me?”
Brace held his breath as her green eyes bored into his very soul. Slowly, forcefully, he strengthened the barriers he had erected and shook his head. “The answer is as pointless as the question.”
“The hell it is!”
“Perhaps that’s the answer—it is hell.”
“Please, Brace,” Elyse whispered, unable to stop herself from staring helplessly at him. “Tell me.”
“There is nothing to tell, Lady Louden,” Brace said in a stiff voice.
“If there were, would you?”
Brace remained silent, gazing at her with distant eyes.
Her legs were trembling from the strain of her tight muscles. Elyse closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she sighed and took a backward step. “I…I’m a fool.” She turned and went back to the house, unable to stop her tears from flowing.
*****
“A wise man knows his heart and heeds its call. A fool hears his heart and argues with it. Do not be the fool, Brace,” Lucea whispered to herself when she emerged from the bushes after Brace had closed his door. She hadn’t meant to eavesdrop on Brace and Elyse; she’d come to speak to Brace of her fears, but had seen Elyse walking toward Brace’s apartment and had hidden herself.
Now that she had heard their talk, she knew she could not go to Brace; he would not believe what she had discovered, and a deep and dark sense of foreboding grew within her.
Last night her spirit had come to her, warning that the trouble she had already foreseen was nearing her island. With it came a terrible danger to one she loved as a son; and she had known it was Brace.
Her spirit had also told her that Brace was in as much danger from himself as he was from others, for he was denying everything that was a part of his heart and soul. He must understand and guard against himself.
Not tonight, Lucea decided wisely. He is aching for what he thinks he cannot have.
As silently as she had hidden herself, Lucea walked away, but only after invoking a charm to help protect Brace.
Chapter Fourteen
Ann Denham stood on the veranda, watching Elyse walk aimlessly on the stone path toward the garden. For the first time since her return, she noticed her face showed no signs of happiness, and her heart went out to the young woman.
From the day of Elyse’s arrival, Ann had been aware of Elyse’s reactions to Brace. She had watched both her son and the daughter of her benefactor, until she was sure about what was happening to them. She knew with certainty how they felt about each other, because Ann had always had a keen sense about others.
Last night, when Charles had finally come to bed, he did so in a disturbed state of mind. As had been her habit over the years, Ann probed Charles with gentle questions until he told her what was troubling him. He related his entire conversation with Brace, confessing his own confusion about his son’s attitude.
It was then, with the lantern turned off and feeling secure within Charles’s arms, that she told him she was certain Brace and Elyse were in love. She voiced her thoughts, and Charles, after a few moments of disbelief and introspection, finally agreed with her.
“Brace is struggling with himself and with his conscience. He wants her, but he does not want to have her hurt.”
“Perhaps it’s time I told him,” Charles said in a low voice.
Ann lifted her head and stared into her husband’s eyes. So close to his face was she, that she was able to see him clearly in the darkness. “No! He must first come to terms with himself. He must understand and accept himself for the person he is. Only then can you tell him. Please, Charles, we’d agreed about this years ago. Your conversation with him has confirmed that. You must wait until the anger dies before you tell him.”
Silence fell between them, but Ann felt his warm breath wash across her cheek. “You are right, as always,” he finally said.
“But I must speak with Elyse,” Ann told him. “She must be told why Brace is acting this way.”
Ann shook away her thoughts of last night, stepped down from the veranda, and walked to where Elyse now stood staring listlessly at a tree.
“Good morning, Elyse.”
Elyse blinked when she heard Ann and slowly turned to look at her. “Is it?”
“Yes, it is.” Ann smiled and waved a hand toward the sun. “The sun is out, it’s not overly hot, a gentle breeze is blowing in from the ocean, and Devonairre is alive and so are we. And you are here with us.”
“My being here, is that really so good?” Elyse gazed fondly at Ann, the love she held for her was a gentle reminder of the happier times of her childhood, a time forever gone.
“Do not blame Brace for what is happening,” Ann said suddenly.
Elyse stared at her, her eyes opening wide with questions she could not voice. “Am I that obvious?”
“When you think no one is watching you, and Brace is near, I see the way you look at him.”
“But he doesn’t look at me in the same way. Moreover, if he did, it would be for nothing. Why, Ann?” With her last question, Elyse turned from Ann and gazed at the royal palm at which she had been looking before.
Ann studied Elyse’s profile, at the inherent strength and fragile beauty that was so much a part of the woman. Her heart went out to her, and emotions built strongly, maternally, within Ann’s breast.
“What do you remember about your early life here? About Brace and yourself?”
“Just little memories—snatches of things,” Elyse admitted.
“You went away when you were very young, and you were never a part of the island’s society, so you didn’t learn its ways. Elyse, Charles, Brace, and I are not an acceptable part of Jamaican society. We are debtors.”
“You were debtors,” Elyse corrected as she turned to face Ann. “You and Charles paid your debts through work, here at Devonairre.”
“That’s only partly true. Yes, our debts are paid, but we arrived in Jamaica as debtors. We will always be debtors in this society.”
“That’s unfair.”
“It is a fact. And,” Ann continued, her voice not betraying the emotions that played upon her mind, “because we are considered of the lower class, we are shunned by most of society. Debtors are thought to be only half a step above slaves.”
“It’s wrong,” Elyse reiterated.
“Your father left all of us—Charles, myself, and Brace, very well off. More so than many of the ‘gentlemen’ planters. That only fueled their resentment. And for Brace, their shunning has been a heavy burden.”
“I still don’t understand what this has to do with the way Brace treats me. Or is he trying to do to me what the others are doing to him?”
“No.” Shaking her head, she reached out and took Elyse’s hand in hers. “I believe you love Brace very much.” Ann squeezed Elyse’s hand as she spoke. “And I know Brace is in love with you.”
This time Ann’s words struck her as a blow; her mind reeled and her legs threatened to crumble. She willed her body to recover, and when it did, she shook her head. “I want to believe you, but...”
“Elyse, what I’ve been trying to tell you is that because of who you are, and who Brace is, he thinks that nothing can come of your love.”
“Nothing? Why?” she demanded angrily. “Do you think I care what others might say?”
“Not you,” Ann whispered softly, still holding Elyse’s hand firmly. “You’re like your father. It’s Brace. Partly because of pride, but mainly because he would not w
ant you ostracized by your peers.”
“Pride, most certainly,” she said, thinking of the many times she and Brace had been alone together and the way he had reacted.
“And concern, although he may not show it or admit it. Elyse, when your father sent you to England, Brace came to your father the night before, demanding that he be sent with you.”
“Sent with me?”
Ann released her hand, smiling at the memory of that night, sixteen years ago. “He barged into your father’s office and drew himself as tall as he could. He wasn’t afraid when he faced him, just brave and concerned. He demanded that your father send him to protect you. Elyse, from the time you could walk, Brace watched over you like a jealous brother.”
“I wish to God he had come with me,” Elyse said suddenly, speaking aloud what she had meant to be only a thought.
Ann stared at her for a long time, trying to understand what she’d heard in the few words Elyse had just spoken. However, until Elyse was ready to explain it, she knew she must not pursue that avenue.
Elyse took a deep breath, and as she exhaled, she smiled. “When he left the other day, it was after we’d had a…disagreement. I thought he’d gone for good.”
“He went to his plantation to check on it. He always does as soon as a harvest is finished on Devonairre, because he must stay here for so long.”
“Plantation? I didn’t know.”
“It’s a small plantation in the mountains.”
“Ann, I don’t care what anyone says or thinks,” Elyse began, her voice strong, her eyes determined.
“But Brace does. He knows what it’s like to grow up being looked down upon. Always being thought of as dirt, as a nobody. He would never allow that to happen to someone he loves.”
This time Ann could not keep the bitterness from her voice. Instead of seeing shock or dismay on Elyse’s face, she saw a strange smile.
“But it has already happened to me, although he does not know it. Oh, Ann, I must do something to make him understand that our love could not hurt me.”
“That,” Ann began with a sardonic smile, “might be the hardest thing you’ve ever tried to do.”
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