Page 76 of The Forgotten Boy

“I think that dark stone might be a garnet,” she said. “It’s obviously real gold. And there’s an inscription.”

Noah squinted, turning the ring to try and catch the light at the right angle. “Daniel’s going to need a magnifying glass for this.”

When Juliet said nothing, he shot her a sharp glance. “Unless … do you know what it says?”

She did know. Despite the faintness of the engraving and the unfamiliar spelling, Juliet was certain she knew. Because, as she’d attempted to decipher each individual letter last night, words had floated into her mind and imprinted themselves with surety.

“It reads, My Loyalty Is Fixed.” Juliet said, pointing to the tiny letters on the inside of the gold band. “And there’s a name. A name from more than five hundred years ago.”

“Let me guess—Edward the Fourth?”

It was a decent guess, considering everything else they’d learned and especially considering that Edward’s royal livery badge had been found deeper in that same tunnel a hundred years ago. But Juliet shook her head. “The letters are a capital e and a lowercase d, and with another one of those little d’s attached. That abbreviation might mean ‘Edward,’ but it could also mean ‘Edmund.’ And the next word is not a name, it’s a title: Rutland.”

When Noah continued to look at her blankly, Juliet said, “I only know this because of the reading I’ve been doing, following Clarissa Somersby’s interest in the Wars of the Roses. See, before Edward the Fourth was king, he was Edward, the Earl of March. And he had a brother—not George, who Shakespeare killed off in the butt of malmsey, and not poor Richard. A brother who was only one year younger than the future king.” Juliet touched the ring in Noah’s hand and said softly, “Edmund, the Earl of Rutland. He died with his father at the Battle of Wakefield at the age of seventeen, three months before Edward won his crown.”

Yes, the ring would have to be dated, and experts would be called in to examine the engraving, and then historians like her would argue for years over its meaning and why it had been found in an obscure Northumberland tunnel … but Juliet knew she was right—because her ghostly guide had known.

No, be brave, Juliet thought. Give the guide her proper name: Ismay.

It would never be more than conjecture, of course. It was far too long ago, and the written records too few for anything like proof.

Noah returned the ring to her finger for safekeeping. “So what are you going to do now?” he asked casually.

“I still have three months of winter to sit through at Havencross. I’ll get started on my dissertation about the flu and probably annoy your friend Daniel with constant questions about what they’ll do with the bones from the tunnel. Let the police handle Duncan however they want. I’d be fine just to let him go back to the States. He has enough trouble to face there.”

“And when spring arrives and you’re no longer needed at Havencross? I suppose you’ll go straight back to the States and another university job.” He said it without looking at her, as though determined not to influence any possible answer.

“Do you know,” she said, snuggling closer to him, “that I never wanted to teach college students in the first place? I always wanted to teach high school kids, or even middle school. But that wasn’t prestigious enough for Duncan. I suppose even England might need teachers in … what do you call them here? Secondary schools?”

She felt a slight tremor run through his arm. “If you’re teasing, tell me now,” he warned her.

Juliet turned her face up to his, Noah’s lovely hazel eyes wide with appeal. “I’m not teasing,” she said, and kissed him.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

DIANA

MARCH 1919

Spring came early to Northumberland that year. Although Joshua told her not to trust it—“It’s a false spring; there will be snow before Easter”—Diana found the sunshine and temperate breeze a gift after the long winter weeks.

In the end, Havencross School had lost three boys and the gardener to influenza. Watching it sweep across the world, Diana knew it might have been worse. She still woke once or twice a week from nightmares of too many patients and not enough help—but on the other hand, her nightmares about being buried alive had stopped. She knew now how grief would ebb and flow, and ever so slowly the tide would go out as life moved on.

On this Saturday afternoon, Diana sat on the steps with a book in her lap and watched a tumble of boys—some playing cricket, some croquet, and a few of the younger ones engaged in a boisterous game of tag. Austin and Jasper Willis took turns with the camera their mother had given them for Christmas, taking photographs that would be mostly blurry, Diana thought, if their subjects didn’t learn how to stand still.

Joshua was at the far end of the lawn, bowling to the cricket players. He’d had the slowest recovery from the flu, but the pallor of illness had at last faded and he was beginning to gain back the weight he’d lost.

Clarissa sat next to her on the steps, arms folded and resting on her knees. She was dressed, like Diana, in a rather informal skirt and blouse. Ever since that night on the moor, Clarissa had softened and warmed. At first Diana had been certain she would be fired for the things she’d said and the way she’d said them, but only once had the matter been referred to. On the day the last patient left the makeshift infirmary and they began restoring the dining hall to its proper use, Clarissa had approached Diana and said abruptly, “I will never forget what you did for me the night I almost killed Austin. Thank you.”

Although she had softened, Clarissa had not entirely lost her abrupt manner. Sitting next to Diana now, she said bluntly, “I have news for you.”

“Oh, yes?” Diana was only half-listening; most of her attention was on Joshua, whose cricket game had been disrupted by the tag-playing boys. He darted among them with an ease that still surprised her.

“I’m leaving Havencross in June,” Clarissa announced.

Diana jerked her head around. “You are?”

“I’m joining my family in London, and taking up a place at Oxford’s Somerville College in the autumn.”

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