Page 60 of Empire of Shadows

Ellie hesitated before she replied, thinking of how she had come across Bates in his chair on the veranda that first night at the hotel, looking out over the golden sprawl to the west. The memory tugged at her chest in an unexpected way.

“That all seems entirely sensible to me,” she finally concluded.

“Does it, now?” he replied.

His words had a harder edge, and Ellie wondered if this was a topic he was accustomed to battling over.

She raised her head to meet his eyes.

“I know a thing or two about having dreams the rest of the world thinks are madness,” she quietly declared.

The tenor of Bates’s gaze shifted as he looked back at her.

“Maybe you do,” he conceded thoughtfully.

The night air seemed to grow a little thicker. Ellie shook off the sensation as she sat down on the bench in the stern.

“Why British Honduras?” she prompted neatly, pulling off her borrowed hat and tossing it onto the deck.

“I don’t know that I really cared that much where I ended up, as long as it was far away from San Francisco,” Bates replied. “I heard there was an opening here when I was leaving Cambridge, and I wrote to the Colonial Office to apply.”

Ellie straightened a bit.

“I’m sorry, did you say Cambridge?” she asked. “As in Cambridge University, in England?”

“Hinc lucem et pocula sacra.” Bates recited the familiar tones of the university’s motto automatically. “Et pocula profana—plenty of profane draughts as well. I even strapped an oversized bird to one of the spires of the King’s College Chapel with a few of my friends, per tradition.”

The husk of a long-neglected memory sparked to life in Ellie’s mind.

She had been fourteen, crouched on the stairwell of the house in Canonbury, listening with secret delight as her stepmother’s shrill tones had echoed up from the parlor.

And now this! A letter from the dean reprimanding you for behavior unbecoming of a Cambridge scholar!

It was just a harmless bit of fun! It’s the sort of thing one does at university.

A written reprimand, Neil Acton Fairfax! A written reprimand over some monstrous stunt with an—

“Emu,” Ellie blurted softly.

“Huh?” Bates returned. “How’d you know it was an emu?”

Ellie vividly recalled her quick, whispered exchange with her stepbrother as he had passed her by, pausing briefly to ruffle her hair in that way he knew irritated her.

Eavesdropping—eh, Peanut?

You’ve really done it this time.

It was the cowboy’s idea!

The cowboy.

Neil had occasionally mentioned his university friends during his visits home. Ellie knew there had been a little cohort of them, thick as thieves with each other. Neil had mentioned Lord Scardsale, as well as a charming, well-off Cornishman, Trevelyan Perry. Ellie had heard that Perry had gone to Hong Kong with the diplomatic service.

And then there was the American—the one Neil had habitually referred to as ‘the cowboy.’

Neil had spoken of that particular friend with easy affection. He had sounded like a source of both fun and regular trouble.

Of course, Ellie never had an opportunity to meet him or any of Neil’s other university friends. She had been too wrapped up at the time with her urgent efforts to excel at her studies and qualify for university.

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