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Patrick had spent two weeks in the mountains. He’d drunk more tea in that fortnight than he had in his entire life, it seemed. But in doing so, he’d found a way to face the pull of a master he no longer wished to serve.
And he’d found his brother again.
“Do you have a plan yet?” Ian asked, driving the wagon in the direction of town. They weren’t near enough yet to see even a glimpse of the Hope Springs valley, but it oughtn’t be long now.
“A plan for what?”
Ian tossed him a look of doubt in his intelligence. “Winning your lass’s heart, you dunderhead.”
“All I have,” Patrick said, “is some advice I once got—long before this sobering-up trip—from a fellow who was more or less reliable.”
“I gave you advice during this sobering-up trip,” Ian said. “Do I not lean toward more reliable instead of less?”
Patrick pushed a needle through several layers of thick canvas. He was nearly done with a project he’d begun at the start of their two weeks away. He’d had to pause his efforts a few days in, when the need for whiskey had set his hands trembling and his head pounding fiercely. The worst seemed to have passed. “You’re reliable enough, but this fellow . . . he was wise.”
“What did this scholar tell you, then?”
“He, in his very wise way, said that when a colleen captured my heart, I needed to say what needed saying, take risks, and do what needed doing. He also said something about not being a coward, but since I was so very brave at the time, I didn’t worry too much about that bit.”
Ian tossed him a dry look. “I told you that, before we left New York.”
“Couldn’t be.” Patrick twisted his face into an expression of confused disbelief. “This fellow was much, much younger than you are.”
“You were much, much younger then, too.”
“Aye, but I was and always will be younger than you.”
“There was a time, Patrick, when I missed having you around.” Ian adjusted his hat on his head. “That was back when you were nice to me.”
“You’re happy I’m back. Admit it.”
“I’m happy you’re back, not the shell of you that stumbled into town months ago.” Ian kept his gaze on the road. “He was infuriating.”
Patrick laughed, keeping at his sewing project. “Eliza liked him.”
“And now Eliza’s not speaking with him.”
With a sigh, Patrick said, “If only that wise young fellow from all those years ago were nearby with some advice.”
“That wise young—”
Patrick cleared his throat.
“—youngish fellow has been giving you advice for two weeks now.”
“And tea,” Patrick added. “He’s been giving me far too much tea.”
“It’s helped, though, hasn’t it?”
“It—and you—have likely saved m’life, Ian. And you did it even though I didn’t deserve a bit of your help. You’d every reason to tell me again to keep the devil away from you.”
They kept rolling down the road. “You weren’t so far gone as all that, Patrick. Though whiskey had a greater pull on you than you’d like—and I’m not denyin’ it’s caused you no end of trouble—I’ve seen men shackled to it. Destroyed entirely. They couldn’t’ve gone hours without it, and you’ve just gone two weeks. I don’t think you were as near to destruction as you feared. And I suspect that means you’re going to be able to keep winning your battle with it.”
“Provided I don’t run out of tea.”
Ian guided the horses over a small rise. “If you ever run low, come to my place. And if we don’t have any, we’ll go beg a bit of Ma. And if she’s out, Mary. And if not Mary, Ciara. And if we get desperate enough, we might even talk to Tavish.”
“I don’t know if I’ll ever be that desperate.”
Ian laughed. That was a sound Patrick would never grow tired of hearing. “Do you know the worst part about your being halfway across the country these past thirteen years? I’ve had to be friendly with Tavish. Pure torture, that’s been.”
“Well, I’m here now, brother. We can ignore him together.”
Their plot proved doomed to failure. Not thirty minutes later, Tavish, Cecily, and their nearly one-year-old boy, Matthew, turned onto the very road they were driving on in their own wagon. They waved and pulled their wagons to a stop alongside each other.
“How’d your sales do?” Ian asked.
“Grand. And I had better company than in years past, I’ll tell you that.”
Ian leaned a little closer to Patrick. “I have gone with him in years past.”
“Ah.”
“Where’ve the two of you been?” Tavish asked.
“Up in the mountains,” Patrick said. “Ian’s been torturing me.”
His brothers exchanged looks: eyes a little widened, brows twitching upward, mouth twists that seemed to say, “Isn’t this intriguing?” Silent conversations were the specialty of brothers who were particularly close. Patrick and Ian used to have such conversations all the time. He had hope they would again.
“Our brother, here, has made a mull of things with the lass who’s claimed his heart,” Ian said. “Any words of advice for him, Cecily?”
From behind her green-tinted spectacles her brows pulled low. “Is Eliza upset with you?”
Ian and Tavish laughed. Even Patrick found he could smile. Obviously he hadn’t kept his preference for Eliza a secret.
“She’s decidedly upset,” Patrick said. “I don’t know how to fix it.”
“Bribery?” Tavish suggested. “How much money do you have?”
“Stop it,” Cecily said, amusement filling her tone.
“Poor as a church mouse, this one,” Ian said. “And he’s every bit as ugly as you are, so we can’t depend on him wooing her over with his handsome gob.”
“And he’s not very funny,” Tavish said, “so we can’t count on charm.”
Patrick managed to sneak into the back-and-forth. “I sure have missed the two of you,” he said dryly.
“You also won’t win her over with a show of brotherly devotion,” Tavish said. “She’ll sort out that deception straight off.”
“The only person here I’m likely to get any actual help from is Cecily, but the two of you won’t stop flapping your gums long enough for me to discuss this with her.”
“I think I’m offended,” Ian said. “Are you offended, Tavish?”
“Deeply.”
Cecily shook her head. “The two of you are utterly impossible. Patrick, switch places with Tavish. We’ll let these ridiculous brothers of yours drive ahead, and we can follow behind.”
’Twas the most intelligence anyone had displayed since the two wagons stopped.
“Brilliant,” Patrick said, and climbed down.
“We’re really doing this?” Tavish clearly hadn’t expected that.
“Outta the wagon, old man.” Patrick ushered him out. “Go sit with that other antiquity over there. Cecily and I are going to solve a problem.”
“And is Matthew coming with me?” Tavish asked.
“Of course not.” Patrick gave him a look of exasperation. “He’s too bright to ride in the dullard wagon.”
Tavish held a hand up in a show of surrender. “I’ll ride with Ian if only to shut your gob.”
“Odd, the reason I’m riding with Cecily is so that you’ll shut yours.”
Patrick was in Tavish’s seat, his horses’ leads in hand a moment later. “Is now the right time to tell you that I don’t actually know the way home?” he said under his breath to Cecily.
She didn’t look concerned. “Just follow the boys. They’ve made this trek many times.”
Patrick did precisely that.
Cecily wasted no time addressing the topic at hand. “How difficult are things between you and Eliza?”
“Horrible. Honestly, horrible.”
She patted her baby’s back as they rode along. “What reason did she give you for this rift?”
“I kept something from her I shouldn’t have,” he said. “Now she’s worried I’m not trustworthy.”
“Are you?”
“I try to be. I’m determined to be.”
She looked in his direction as they spoke, though Patrick knew she was entirely blind. Did she do so out of habit or a sense of expectation?
“If keeping secrets is what caused her concern, then being forthright is most likely to counter that,” Cecily said. “Are there other things about yourself you haven’t told her?”
“We’ve known each other only a few months. There’s a lifetime of things I could share with her.” He would enjoy doing so, in fact. And hoped she would tell him about herself in return. “But I don’t know if I have things to share that are . . . ‘important’ enough to overcome this chasm between us.”
“You must have kept something quite significant from her.” Cecily, bless her, sounded more empathetic than judgmental.
“Aye.” He’d made a right mull of it all. “And it affected her daughter.”
“Mercy, Patrick. That will make regaining her trust very, very difficult.”
“What should I do? I have to at least try.”
Cecily didn’t say anything as they rolled down the road. Patrick kept his gaze on the wagon ahead, trying to convince himself that his heart wasn’t dropping to his boots. What if he couldn’t fix things with Eliza? What if he’d ruined everything?
“Secrecy put you in this fix,” Cecily said. “Vulnerability seems your only chance of overcoming it.”
“You have my attention.”
“It’ll likely be very uncomfortable, and there’s no guarantee it will prove effective,” she warned him.
“Eliza is the most extraordinary person I know. She saw value in me when I didn’t see it in myself. She loved me when no one else did. No amount of discomfort will convince me not to do anything and everything I can to try to prove myself worthy of her regard.”
Cecily nodded in apparent approval. “Then let’s make good use of the remainder of our drive and sort this out.”
* * *
Patrick’s arrival at the céilí that night did not go unnoticed. He’d worried a little about his family’s reception, considering he’d dragged Ian away, giving them all extra work to do without explaining his reason for being gone. Far from rejection, he was hugged and welcomed every bit as much as Ian, Tavish, Cecily, and Matthew were. It was comforting and reassuring, especially in light of the plan he and his golden-haired sister-in-law had concocted as they’d driven toward Hope Springs. Their plot might go terribly wrong, but at least something had gone right.
He found Cecily. “Have you heard anything encouraging?”
She nodded. “Tavish tells me Eliza is sitting with Maura near the musicians. A rather perfect position.”
“What do I do if this doesn’t work?”
“You’ll be no worse off than you are now,” she said. “But if Eliza is at all receptive to the possibility of second chances, then it will have been worth the risk, don’t you think?”
“She’s worth any risk,” he said.
“Then go take it.”
Cecily was often quiet, but she had shown herself time and again to be fearless. Patrick liked her more every time he was with her. And, heavens, he hoped she was right about this.
Patrick moved toward the musicians. Eliza was right where Cecily had said she would be. Maura welcomed him warmly, but she watched Eliza, no doubt wanting to make certain her friend approved of him joining them.
“You’ve been gone for a while,” Eliza said.
“I took your advice.”
Her gaze narrowed on him, not in disapproval but in confusion.
He answered the question he was certain hovered in her mind. “I told Ian what I told you, and what you sorted about me.”
“Oh.” She watched him, hope in her eyes. “And did he denounce you as you assumed he would?”
“No. He helped me.”
A tender and joyful smile touched her face. No matter that she was put out with him, she was compassionate enough to be happy for him.
Maura looked from one of them to the other a couple of times, brow creased in confusion.
“I’m an awful lying liar, Maura,” he said. “I think you probably ought to know that. Everyone likely should.”
Laughter filled Maura’s eyes. How easy it would be to play this off as a grand joke. But he owed Eliza vulnerability and honesty. He owed those things to all of them.
“I didn’t tell the family I was still alive. I didn’t tell them I was in Canada. I didn’t tell you I had Grady’s haversack. And I didn’t tell you the real reason I left the Widows’ Tower.”
Maura set her hand on Patrick’s arm. “I have always wondered about that. We tried to make a happy home for you there.”
“You did. And after years of warfare, it was a godsend.”
Quietly, Maura asked, “What drove you away, then?”
“Aidan asked so many questions about his da’s time in the war. He wanted to hear heroic things, and I wanted to be able to tell him heroic things, because Grady really was brave and unwavering and noble. But war is nothing short of a walk through the corridors of hell, Maura, and I was still so close to it. I was afraid I’d say something that would dim Aidan’s precious little light, and I couldn’t risk that.”
“He missed you when you left,” Maura said.
“I missed him. I missed you. All of you.”
She leaned closer and pressed a very sisterly kiss to his whiskered cheek. “We’ve missed you too, Patrick. It seems you’re finally coming back to us.”
She rose to her feet, the movement made a little more difficult by her quickly expanding middle. Patrick helped her. She smiled once more before moving in the direction of both her mothers-in-law.
“I’d wager that’s the most honest you’ve been with her about your flight from New York,” Eliza said.
“I’m working to be more trustworthy.”
She watched him but didn’t reach out, didn’t touch his hand as she’d sometimes done. “Are you meaning to be more honest with me, as well?”
“Aye. Starting with something I’ve not told even m’family.” Saints above, he could hardly believe what he was about to do. “During the thirteen years I was away from them, I learned to play the fiddle. I played it around the campfire during the war, then on m’own while working in Canada. I’ve not played it in front of anyone since Grady died. It’s always felt too personal, too vulnerable.”
“I can appreciate that.” She was still guarded, but she wasn’t sending him away.
“You told me you needed me to be more open about m’self and who I am. So, I’m no longer hiding the parts of me I think might earn me dismissal or laughter. And I’m starting now.” He rose.
“You’re going to play? In front of everyone?”
“I’ll have to borrow an instrument—I sold mine to buy whiskey.” He tossed her a chagrined look. “It’s feeling good to be a little less under that spell. I’m hopeful that’ll get better and better.”
She pressed her open palm to her heart, watching him with wide eyes. Now was the moment of truth.
He approached the musicians just as they were finishing a tune. A dozen pairs of eyes turned to him. Seamus Kelly, who always served as the voice of these evenings, moved to stand next to him.
“What’s your policy on guest musicians?” Patrick asked.
“We encourage ’em, provided they can keep a tune.”
“I’m a bit out of practice,” he admitted, “but I’d like a chance to try.”
Seamus nodded, eying him. “I don’t spot an instrument.”
“I’d be needing to borrow one.” He looked back at the musicians. “A fiddle.”
Mary’s husband, Thomas, was among them, he being quite the penny whistler. “You didn’t used to fiddle.”
“I picked it up during the years I’ve been away.”
“Your da and ma haven’t mentioned it.”
Patrick’s nerves were growing more raw by the moment, but he wouldn’t back out now. He needed Eliza to see that he was sincere. “Da and Ma are about to be surprised, I’ll tell you that.”
“A debut performance, is it?” Seamus sounded excited at the prospect.
“Something of.”
That seemed to satisfy them all. Rowan O’Donaghue stepped to him from among the others and held out his fiddle.
“I’ll be careful of it,” Patrick promised.
The lender didn’t seem overly worried.
Seamus called the gathering to attention. “We’ve a new musician among us. Let’s give him a listen, shall we?”
And with that, Patrick prepared to share with a town of near strangers, and a family he was barely coming to know again, a bit of his carefully hidden self. He did a quick check of the strings, making certain the instrument wasn’t in need of tuning. Satisfied, he took a breath, then pulled the bow and began a tune he knew all too well.
The strains of “Irish Washerwoman” echoed around him. He knew he wasn’t the most expert player, but he felt he did the song justice. Ma drew nearer, delight on her face. Da popped his arm around her and listened at her side. All the family were there, except Finbarr, who never attended the weekly parties. And they all appeared pleased.
He hadn’t looked at Eliza. Not yet.
Only when he’d finished, and the crowd applauded, did he hazard a glance in her direction. He couldn’t entirely make out her expression.
He returned the fiddle to Rowan with a word of gratitude. The musicians offered myriad invitations to join them again at future céilís. He didn’t know if he’d take them up on the offer. That hadn’t been the purpose of the song.
Patrick accepted compliments as he determinedly made his way back to Eliza. It took a little doing to get there. By the time he arrived at the seats where she’d been sitting, she was gone.
He sat, deflated and discouraged.
Maura passed behind him. She leaned close and whispered. “Don’t lose hope. She saw and she listened. You’re making more progress than you think.”
If there was any mercy to be found, his sisters-in-law—both of them—would be proven as wise and correct as he hoped they were. As he needed them to be.