He wanted to hurt God for hurting him.
“Wot’s a matter, guv’nor? Ain’t you never been an elbow-crooker before?”
He slammed the tankard back to the bar, paid the lady, and fled from the suffocating building. He marched through the fog with a knot growing in his chest. Everything blurred until he reached the wharf, where his vision centered on the dim silhouette of the ship.
God, why?
He stepped to the edge of the wharf, where black water lapped up to wet his boots. He dragged his coat sleeve across his eyes, ashamed of the tears.Why did You take everything from me?
Mrs. Shaw came back to him, as she always did. He saw her feverish eyes and heard the croaking voice,“Just have to forgive dem. Even if you got to do it over and over again … just got to forgive dem.”
He had not allowed the words to go unbidden. He had learned from them. Indeed, he had forgiven his aunt for her deceitful cruelty, and he had forgiven Lord Gresham for his rejection. But in the name of heaven, when was it enough? How many times was he expected to accept whatever was done to him and forgive?
I cannot.He lifted his face to the sky. Endless stars blinked down at him.God, I cannot forgive anyone else again. I have not the strength.
He was weary in every place imaginable. He teetered on the brink of destruction and madness and rage and confusion and …
He wiped his eyes a second time. He despised the tears but could not stop them.If only You had let me keep Isabella, I could have endured the rest.Had he not tried to keep his chin lifted and his head held high? Did God see nothing of his efforts? Did God not know that since the first blow, William had done his best to continue doing right?
A shudder ripped through him and he contemplated leaping into the black water and swirling to the bottom. But even there, he knew the words would follow him.
They always did.
“Just have to forgive … even if you got to do it over and over again …”A soundless sob shook him. He shut his eyes.God, I cannot.
Yet he could. He must. He knew that.
Indeed, hewantedthat.
For many hours, he remained standing on the edge of the creaking wharf, staring out across the dark waters to the outline of the ship. The words did not come with ease. He had to coax them from the deepest, broken places of his soul.
Not until the sky began to lighten in the horizon, not until the heavy fog of morning lifted into the air, did the prayer finally break:God, I forgive You.
With one last glance at the ship, he turned and walked back down the wharf, the pressure finally diminishing from his chest.I forgive You, and I will serve You.
Even in America.
Even without everything he loved.
William pressed against the gunwale of the ship, ropes and cables rattling in the wind as the white mast filled with air. He breathed in salt and seaweed.
The Ogden Wells port had shrunk in the distance, and all the sailing vessels and rowboats were but specks.God be with thee, my country.From Nash’s accounts, America would be beautiful with her rugged plains and snowcapped mountains. Perhaps she was.
But William would always remember the quiet English countryside, where the grass was so green it was bewitching. He would remember the seashore. The limestone archway and the—
He shook his head and squeezed the cool gunwale with tight knuckles. He had promised himself he would not think of her.
She belonged to England. She belonged to the genteel society, the luster of shining things, the protection and assurance of a secure life. He tried not to remember how fulfilling it had felt to clasp her against him. To run his fingers through her hair, to breathe of her air, to watch her eyes fill with tears and know they were a voiceless token of her love for him. Had they ever spoken the words?
Perhaps it was better they had not. Perhaps that would make it easier to forget.
“Eh, fellow. Smoke?”
A scrubby-faced sailor leaned his back to the gunwale and proffered a cheroot cigar.
“No thank you.” William forced a smile. “I was just going belowdecks.” He navigated his way to the lattice hatch, pulled it open, and descended the rope ladder. He found Nash Abram pulling himself into a green canvas hammock—but he slid back out and landed on the gritty floorboards with a thud.
William bit back a laugh. “I daresay, these shall take a bit of getting used to, will they not?” He helped the man back to his feet.
