Alex relaxed his body. “It’s a wonder he could lift them.”
“With those arms?” Jess said, smiling dreamily in memory. “That man could carry the hindquarters of a whale home. You know, Alex,” she said, sitting up straight, “a couple of times it’s crossed my mind that maybe Ethan is the Raider. They’re built alike, both tall, strong, both very good-looking, and I doubt that Ethan’s afraid of anything. Only last year he—”
Alex was sitting upright on the rock, his back as rigid as a sword blade. “How do you know what the Raider looks like? The last time I saw you, you were saying you hated him.”
“I do, but that doesn’t make me blind. Ethan has the strength to swing on a rope like the Raider did.”
“So do half the sailors on the dock. Maybe any one of them could be this Raider you seem to think so highly of.”
“That I…” She looked at him in the fading light. “Alex, are you jealous?”
“Of the Raider?” he gasped.
“No, of Ethan. A lot of young women in town watch Ethan wherever he goes. You have to understand that when you court a woman, you may be competing with Ethan and, well, Ethan doesn’t…I mean he’s…” She was trying to be tactful but it was difficult. She looked pointedly at Alex’s belly and hair.
For a moment Alex glared at her, then he lowered his eyes. “I want to tell you something, Jessica, something I’ve told no one else in Warbrooke, not even my father…Only my body servant, Nicholas, knows this. You see, after the ship I was on went down off the coast of Italy, I had a fever, a very high fever. I nearly died.”
He looked at her through his lashes. “As a result of my illness, some of the muscles of my body were affected.” He put his hand on his stomach. “You see, because of the fever, I can’t lose weight. I can’t control the muscles, they were too weakened.”
Jess couldn’t speak for a moment. Waves of guilt washed over her as she remembered all the times she’d laughed at him. “And your hair?” she asked.
“My hair? Oh yes, I lost that, too. The wigs cover my bald scalp.”
“Alex,” she whispered, “I’m really sorry. I had no idea. I guess your illness made you weak, too. That’s why you can’t ride or work or even walk very well.”
“Yes,” he said.
“But your clothes,” she said. “Perhaps if you wore—”
“It’s the only thing I have left,” he said. “Take away my silk clothes and all you have is a fat, bald, weak-muscled former sailor.”
“I…I guess so. Alex, I’m so sorry. If only those idiot women knew.”
“Women?”
“The ones you’re trying to get to marry you. If they knew, surely one of them wouldn’t mind being a nurse rather than a wife. Have you tried N
elba Mason?”
“Nelba Mason!” he gasped. “She makes toads look pretty. Does she have a mouth under that nose of hers?”
“Yes, a small one, but no lips. Alex, her father has two hundred acres of good farmland. All right, forget Nelba. Surely one of the girls must like your money.”
“Not compared to Ethan’s arms,” Alex muttered.
“That’s a good point. But surely, there is someone who’ll have you.”
“Here,” Alex said abruptly. “This is for you.”
Jess took the wooden chest from him, then opened it to see a blue cotton dress inside.
“It was my mother’s,” Alex said. “Hardly worn at all.”
“But, Alex, I can’t accept this.”
“My sister married Pitman and gave him power in the town and Pitman’s the reason the Raider appeared and the Raider tore your dress—Eleanor told me—so I owe you a dress.”
“But Alex—”