a marriage of convenience: xi. the escape
xi. the escape
In the morning Tom was pale and drawn, but he told Jon he was feeling quite well enough to travel. Jon had sent for another of his carriages to meet them at the inn, and once they were settled inside Jon said, "I will not speak of it again, but I am glad we had a chance to talk. I hope - I hope it will make things easier for you as well, to know why I have been not myself lately. Or at least not myself as I would hope to be. But I trust I will be much better soon."
Tom looked at him, and to Jon's surprise, said suddenly, "You are a good man." Then he flushed and turned his head to the window, claiming weariness, and kept his eyes shut for the trip back to town.
At home Tom spent the rest of the day in bed, but came down to dinner with his hand newly bandaged. Jon smiled at him and showed him a card for a reception thrown by Ryan Ross's chaperones. "Will you go and show off your war wound?" he asked cheerfully. "I'm sure there are many people who would like to hear the story."
"No," Tom said. "I don't - I am still not feeling quite the thing, I think I will stay home if you don't mind."
"Of course," Jon said. "Are you sure you're all right? Do you need the doctor? I can stay home, of course, if you're not -"
"No, no," Tom said. "You must go, it would be rude not to. I am just tired - please make my excuses."
After he'd dressed for the evening Jon stopped by Tom's room. Tom was standing in front of the window, and he looked up sharply when Jon knocked. "I'm off, "Jon said lightly, "unless you need anything. I have asked the servants to look in on you, too, just in case -"
"I'm fine," Tom said.
"Well, in that case, good night," Jon said, and left him for the party. It was rather a dull affair, he thought, despite the interest everyone showed in the story of his ill-fated race. Wentz was there, but uncharacteristically silent, perhaps because of Tom's injury, Jon thought, and Ryan was almost feverish throughout the evening, talking and laughing loudly, as if for someone else's benefit. It was rather a strange night altogether, Jon thought, and was happy to return to his own house, and to his own bed.
When he awoke the next day, Tom was gone.
To his eternal shame Jon didn't even realize he was gone until late in the afternoon, when his butler dragged Tom's man into Jon's library. The man was in a panic. Tom was gone, along with most of his things and his awful dog, and his man hadn't packed for him and no one had said where he was going.
Jon fell into his chair and said dully, "Is there a note?" but of course none had been left. There was a glass of brandy helpfully in front of him and he gulped it down, then stared blankly for a moment. Eventually his butler coughed and Jon said, "Make sure no one speaks of this," and gathered himself.
He ordered his horse and left the house before he realized he didn't know where he was going. Common sense, not to mention common gossip, would direct him to Wentz's house, but when he thought about it Jon simply did not believe Tom would have gone there. He just did not believe it.
After some frantic thought Jon knew where he should go. There were not that many places where Tom would find refuge, after all, and so he headed for the old business district and Tom's father's house. However, a few moments' awkward conversation convinced him that Tom's father had not seen him, and he left as soon as he could, bearing several light-hearted messages from Tom's father for Tom.
Jon had no idea where to even start looking. It was his own fault, he knew. If he'd known more about Tom, if he had talked to him more, or listened, then he probably would have known exactly where to go. As it was, he couldn't stand to go home and spend the evening jumping up every time he heard the door, so he went to his club, where he proceeded to do his best to drown his sorrows.
Slumped in a corner of the room, he was overlooked by a group of men who entered, quite late, and called for claret. "You've heard the latest, of course?" one of the men said. "It seems Wentz can't be in town for a month without causing a new scandal. You know how he's been hanging around after that common boy poor Walker married? Typical Wentz, he causes all the trouble, disappears to let someone else clean up the mess, then can't leave well enough alone, comes back for a second helping. Well, it'll all come to an end now -- his carriage was seen on the northern road an hour ago, with someone inside. The shades were drawn but everyone knew who was with him --"
When Jon stood up the men actually gasped. The one who'd been doing all the talking said, "Walker, I'm sorry, we didn't see you -" but Jon shoved past him, pushing him so hard that he stumbled back against the table, accompanied by the sound of crashing glass. "Walker!" another of the men called after him, but Jon threw a curse back behind him and buttoned up his jacket on his way out the door. He had no time to stop and chat. He had a carriage to catch.
If Jon had seen anyone else ride the way he rode along the northern road, he would have shaken his head and prophesied the death of the horse. Tonight he didn't care. He also knew that he had told Tom to go about his own life, to take his own happiness, but he found that he didn't care about that either. He knew Tom, and Tom would never be happy if he thought he had hurt Jon, or disgraced him. If Tom had gone to Wentz, it was because Jon had driven him there. A wiser man, or a more worldly one, might have let Tom go, might have let him try to find happiness there, now that he'd left, but Jon found that no matter what fine thoughts he had expressed about letting Tom pursue his own happiness, he had no intention of giving Tom up to Wentz. He didn't care about Tom's happiness, or his own. All he cared about was not letting Tom go.
Jon's reckless riding was rewarded when he overtook the carriage some distance out of town. The carriage was closed, of course; even Wentz would not be so shameless as to flaunt the carriage's occupant until they were much further outside the city. Wentz was driving himself, as well, for secrecy's sake. Jon rode right up to him without even slowing, frightening the horses and almost overturning the carriage. Only the thought that Tom might be hurt made him draw up on his reins.
Wentz was knocked into the road and came up swearing, but Jon met him. "I don't know what you think you're doing," Jon said, although he had a fair idea, "but I won't let you do this. You're a liar and a scoundrel and I won't let you take advantage of him."
Wentz looked at him coldly. "I've called men out for much less," he said.
"Go ahead," Jon said, though inwardly he recalled the rumors that Wentz was a deadly shot.
"I would," Wentz said, turning his back on Jon, "but I have more important matters to take care of this evening. Besides, I don't see how it's any of your business."
There was nothing Wentz could have done or said, Jon thought, short of taking Tom in front of him, that would have made him more livid. "None of my business? It's only my business, and if you think I'll let you take him to your home then you're a bigger fool than you are a liar."
Wentz said with a laugh, "If you keep calling me a liar, I might take offense." Before Jon could strike him, he continued, "Besides, we're not headed to my place. We're going to Gretna Green."
Jon was for a moment lost for words. Wentz wasn't laughing anymore. He looked totally serious, and for a moment Jon wondered if all the world had gone mad. "What is the point of that?" he asked wildly. "He's already married."
For the first time Wentz looked truly exercised. "What do you mean, he's already married?" Wentz said, sounding as wild as Jon. Just then a head popped out of the carriage window.
"I am most certainly not married," Ryan Ross said, and for the first time since he was five years old Jon fell off his horse.
When he sat up Wentz was leaning against the carriage, smoking and looking unbearably smug, and Ryan was bending over Jon. "Are you all right?" he said. When Jon nodded he said, "And you're not going to take me back, are you?"
"Of course not," Jon said. "I don't care what you do."
Ryan sat back on his heels, looking annoyed, and Jon said quickly, "I mean, obviously I care, but I'm sure you know what you're doing. I didn't come after you."
"Who did you come after?" Wentz asked innocently. Jon thought that even if Tom was nowhere near him, it just might be impossible for him and Wentz to get out of this without coming to blows.
"You know," Jon said, and Wentz asked even more innocently,
"And you thought he'd be with me? How odd."
"Yes," Jon said viciously, "especially after you've spent weeks trying to convince me of it."
"Oh, you noticed," Wentz said. "I hadn't thought you noticed much about Tom at all."
"Yes," Ryan piped up. "You've been neglecting him shamefully the past few weeks. You're an awful flirt, for someone who's married," and Jon abandoned thoughts of dueling Wentz for a simple double murder on the road.
"Someone had to teach you a lesson," Wentz said. "Tommy wouldn't, clearly, and I don't like the way you treat him. I don't like it at all," said the man who left Tom to face scandal on his own. Before Jon could say that, Wentz said, "And if you think for a minute he'd run away with me then you don't know him at all."
"I didn't - I knew he wouldn't," Jon cried.
"And yet," Wentz said calmly, "here you are."
Jon looked down and said, shortly, "I thought I had driven him to it."
"I told him myself that you didn't treat him right, and he told me to mind my own business and that I wasn't allowed to talk about you, though I had plenty to say. So he didn't tell me he was leaving, though I would have cheered him on, and he certainly didn't tell me where he was going. But I'll tell you this, though, if you're serious about mending your ways." Wentz actually paused for Jon to nod. "He wouldn't talk to me about you, but he told me - he said there were times when he was happy, and Tom was never a liar. There's been little enough of that in his life, so if I were to look for him, I'd start with somewhere he was happy."
Wentz motioned to Ryan, who ran to his side. "And if you tell me you can't think of where that might be," he said as he helped Ryan inside, "I'd say that you deserve never to find him."
As Wentz mounted the carriage and gathered the reins, Jon stood looking past him, lost in thought. As he drove away, Wentz leaned down to say with a laugh, "Walker, you never wished us happy!"
"You deserve each other," Jon yelled down the road as their carriage drove away.
[xii. the reunion]