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“His lordship is a busy man!” Nurse admonishes, chasing Gregory down a long hallway.
Gregory isn’t moving too fast due to how awful he feels, but he's managed to dart away from her skirts and toward Anthony’s study. He veers right, his destination within his sightline. He nearly has a hand on the doorknob before Nurse pulls him away.
“Let us go back to the nursery,” she says, her voice pinched, frantic.
“I want to see Anthony,” he repeats, trying to cross his arms, but he’s only got one arm available, so the effect is somewhat lost.
“You cannot see him now, you are supposed to be—“ Gregory knows she’s going to say in the nursery before she says it, but just then the heavy oak door swings open and he’s staring at a pair of legs in black woollen trousers. If he looks way up, he sees his eldest brother wearing an undone necktie and rolled up shirtsleeves. His hair is all mussed and there’s an ink stain on his chin. He looks untidy—even a bit silly, which is the best way for him to look.
Gregory grins. “Anthony!” He didn’t even need to knock on the door because Anthony had heard him!
Nurse’s grip on his hand tightens and she sucks in a big breath like she’s got to do something frightening. “I apologise, my lord—”
“What is the meaning of this?” Anthony says mildly, tiredly, and Gregory hopes this means he’s done working. Anthony can’t work if he’s too tired. That’s what Gregory thinks, having yawned through his lessons this morning.
“I— I was telling Master Gregory that we ought to return to the nursery, but he insisted—”
Anthony holds up a hand, and Nurse goes quiet. “Gregory?” His brother says, arching a brow. “What has happened?”
Oh, good. Someone’s listening. Gregory takes a deep breath. “I did not feel very well, and Nurse says I must go to bed now, but I don’t want to.”
Anthony crosses his arms, and Gregory deflates. Arms crossed is never a good sign. “You are unwell?”
“It is but a headcold, my lord. I’ve had Mrs Taylor prepare a tonic.”
Gregory wrinkles his nose. The tonics are only all right with sugared biscuits, and he doubts Nurse will let him have one now that he’s caused a fuss.
“I do not want another tonic,” he grumbles.
“Now Gregory, you know we must sometimes do unpleasant tasks to get well,” says Anthony, and Gregory frowns because he knows that, but he’s had rather enough of unpleasant tasks today.
“Will you read me a story?” He says instead, hoping his brother might take pity on him now that he’s confirmed to be unwell, but before Anthony can even answer, their conversation is interrupted by a tickle in Gregory’s throat that makes him cough. It’s not a very painful cough, though, and his throat is only thirsty. He does feel quite tired, but he’s not about to say so. Nurse will only insist he go back to the nursery.
It’s sometimes easier to get what he wants when he’s ill, depending upon what he wants, but it is best if he’s not really very ill or anything, so he can enjoy himself. A few good sneezes got him out of his arithmetic lesson this afternoon. He sniffles, for good measure.
Then the trouser legs look very wrinkled as Anthony crouches down, and his forehead looks very wrinkled as well. A large, warm hand covers Gregory’s forehead, testing his temperature with a palm and then the back of the hand. “Are you certain it’s only a headcold?”
“Yes, my lord, though I’ve asked for Miss Hyacinth to sleep in a guest room so that she won’t fall ill as well.”
Anthony nods, and Gregory watches his eyes rove around like he’s searching for something before they are seeing eye-to-eye.
“Nurse Ridley can read to you,” Anthony says and starts to stand up.
No—he—wait.
He shakes his head, whip-quick, and it leaves him feeling a little bit dizzy. “No! I mean, she can, but will you do it?”
Anthony sighs. “Greg…”
He knows that tone. It means no.
This certainly isn’t working out like he thought it would, and on top of that, he does feel a bit more poorly than he had this morning. His nose has been running all day, and Nurse has been rough with the handkerchief when she thinks Gregory hasn’t tidied himself all that well, but it’s just that it hurts his nose, and now he could really use a story. Anthony always reads stories the best—or he did, but that hasn’t happened for a very long time, which is why Gregory wants this now. He didn’t realise how much he missed it until this very day.
And so he does what he swore he wouldn’t do the minute he reached his sixth year. He pouts. Like a baby.
Colin had been right: Gregory will always be the baby brother, and now he’s requesting his eldest brother treat him like a baby and read him a bedtime story, and Anthony will be cross at him for not acting his age, and suddenly his eyes sting, and he tries to stop pouting, he does, but—
“If I read you a story, you must go to sleep just after.” Anthony’s voice is very quiet—soft. It takes the sting away by degrees.
He nods, relieved, even if it means he must retire to an early bed. It only makes sense, seeing as he’s asked for a bedtime story.
“My lord, I really must insist. I can read Master Gregory a story, your lordship need not bother yourself.”
“And I really must insist that you tend to Hyacinth. I will take care of the story.”
A large hand is on his shoulder, and Gregory lets it guide him down the hall, leaving Nurse behind. Once they reach the grand staircase, the hand holds him back before he can reach for the railing, and he looks up. Anthony’s looking wrinkled again, but different. His eyes have gone rounder, softer somehow.
“Might I carry you to bed?”
The question comes as a surprise, and Gregory finds that he doesn’t care so much about Colin’s opinion on the matter now. He just nods. Because so long as Anthony thinks it’s all right that he be carried to bed, then it’s all right.
He’s scooped up into strong arms, and tucks his face into Anthony’s neck as if he really is a baby. “I’m not too heavy?” he mumbles, turning his face when Anthony’s collar pokes him in the eyebrow.
“Not for me.”
“Because you’re strong?”
“Because I’m strong,” Anthony agrees, and Gregory can hear him grinning.
They make their way up the staircase, and Gregory feels like he’s sailing on the Serpentine, lulled by the gentle rocking sensation of his eldest brother ambling through Bridgerton House. He is warm, safe, and so very tired. Anthony’s arms tighten around him, holding him snug against his chest, and Gregory hears a soft whisper of “I’ve got him.” He wonders who Anthony is talking to, but his eyelids feel too heavy to check and see.
He makes his eyes open once they are in the nursery, though. If Anthony thinks he’s asleep, he might not read a story after all. He is laid down and the quilt (made of many shades of blue fractals spiralling from the centre, with a B stitched into one corner) is tucked up to his chin, but he wiggles until it only rises to his chest. He’s got one too many pillows under his head as it is, but Nurse says it is so that he can breathe more easily in his sleep. Even in sleep he must do unpleasant tasks. It is a terrible thing, but tonight he will get a story from Anthony, and that makes all of it worth the trouble.
“Stop wiggling,” says Anthony as he adjusts the quilt.
“I’m not wiggling, I’m moving.”
“You are. You’re wiggling. Like a worm.”
“I am not a worm!” Gregory giggles, and then he moves again so the quilt won’t touch his neck.
He hears a rare sound, a treasured sound: Anthony is laughing , his eyes bright with mirth. Although he hasn’t done much of anything, Gregory has hardly felt more funny, more special, in his whole life. Nobody makes Anthony laugh—well, maybe Hyacinth sometimes, but Gregory does it more often.
“Then you should not wiggle like one.” Anthony tousles his hair, and his voice is warm and happy. “Are you ready for a story?”
Gregory nods, and perhaps he is wiggling, but only because he is excited! One cannot be expected to always hold these things in, even when one is a young gentleman.
Anthony moves from the bed and bends down to the lower reaches of the bookshelves, perusing the selection. “What shall we read…” he mutters, “Ah, here it is.” He plucks up the book, and Gregory sits up to see.
“How about this one?” Anthony asks, holding up one of Gregory’s favourites: Keeper’s Travels in Search of His Master. He wishes he could have a dog like Keeper, but until he gets his wish, a story will do nicely.
Gregory nods vigorously. He almost nods before he even sees the cover, only because he wants Anthony to read something. Well—something from those shelves, he should say. Anthony has been known to read estate reports and newspaper articles to get Gregory to sleep. They are quite boring, and they’ve certainly put him to sleep, but they do not give him sweet dreams the way storybooks do.
When Gregory had suffered a bout of insomnia in his toddlerhood, a treatise on the use of animal dung for field tilling had sounded funny when Anthony had read the title.
The remainder of the document had not been funny at all.
Anthony leans close, holding the book so that they both can see the page and he might read along.
“Do you think I am too old for a story?”
“No one is too old for a story,” Anthony replies easily, and then he begins to read.
As enthusiastic as he is, after a while of listening it is difficult to keep his eyes open. Anthony does the voices for the characters, which is great fun, and Gregory resists the pull of sleep as long as he can, but he feels so blessedly heavy and peaceful in bed. The last thing he feels is a tender kiss pressed to his forehead and the soft quilt tucked up to his shoulders.
They repeat this process for the next few days, but Gregory never has to knock on the study door or ask Anthony for a story. He appears in the nursery doorway each night and picks up the book right where they left off. After a few days, Gregory feels much better, and he’s excited to join the family for dinner, although he’s somewhat crestfallen to find Anthony’s place at the head of the table is empty. They had finished their book the night prior, and Gregory is no longer feeling poorly, but he’d picked out a new book on the chance that they might still read together.
But there is no Anthony that night, or the following morning for breakfast, or dinner the next day.
“Where is he?” Gregory asks one morning, looking out the window of the drawing room, trying to distinguish between the carriages on the street.
“Where is who, dearest?” Mama says, without glancing up from her own reading. He supposes he could ask Mama to read to him, and she’s good but not the same. None of his elder siblings read the same way Anthony does. A paltry story isn’t so bad, if paltry stories are all one has on offer, but he misses his brother.
“Anthony,” he mutters, turning from the window. None of the carriages look right.
“Did you need something?”
Gregory shakes his head. She’d only offer to read to him.
“Your brother is a busy man,” Mama says, trying to placate him, but he already knows Anthony is busy, it’s just that—
“He did not come by for dinner or breakfast or anything. He’s usually here, and he did not say anything about being away.”
Mama purses her lips, her eyes narrowing in thought. “Perhaps we should send a note to him. Would you care to write it?”
Oh! He had not considered that. Sometimes Mama has the best ideas!
Gregory nods. “My letters are very good now. I have been practising.”
Mama leads him to her writing desk and pulls out a bit of paper. It is a little sheet with the family crest in ink in the corner, which makes him feel very grown-up. He perches on the chair and dips his quill into the inkwell the way he’s watched Anthony do countless times, and drags the quill tip very slowly and carefully over the page: Will you please come for dinner?
“There,” Gregory says, feeling quite pleased with himself.
“You must sign it,” Mama reminds him, and Gregory scrawls his name at the bottom before handing the letter off to her. He imagines it travelling by carriage all the way across Grosvenor Square to his brother’s home. Sometimes he wishes Anthony lived at Bridgerton House with all of them, but he is here so often that sometimes Gregory forgets that he doesn’t.
He holds out hope all day, stealing glances out the window and practically nipping the heels of Humboldt when he arrives with a note a few hours later, and then deflating when that note is an invitation for his mother to some stupid party. He does not ordinarily think parties are stupid, but today they are.
With Hyacinth gone at Aunt Winnie’s, Colin away at Eton, and Benedict at Cambridge, he’s dreadfully bored. He’s spent some time with his other sisters too, but they are sometimes not very good at including him in their games and conversations, which do not always appeal to him anyway. As the afternoon stretches into evening, he finds himself drawn to the window again, waiting for one sibling in particular.
When dinner is nearly ready, Mama calls him away from the window, and while the sky is darkening, there is still plenty of light to see all the carriages pass. Surely one of them holds his brother.
Just then, he sees it!
“Mama!” he shouts. “He’s here!” He nearly beats Humboldt to the door, but somehow Humboldt is always quicker.
Gregory is nearly bursting with excitement, a feeling that is almost immediately quashed when his brother comes into full view.
Anthony looks awful. He’s unusually pale, yet his eyes and nose are tinged pink. New lines have taken root beneath his eyes, and he looks more tired than Gregory has seen him, which Gregory would have thought impossible. “Good evening,” he says, and his voice sounds scratchy and hoarse. He coughs into his handkerchief, and then stuffs it into his pocket.
“Dearest, you could have said you were unwell,” says Mama.
“It is only a headcold. I can leave, though, if you’d prefer it. I have a few things to collect in the study, and then I will be off.”
“No!” Gregory cuts in, and then he realises something that makes his stomach upset. “Did I make you ill?”
“It is all right, Greg,” says Anthony, and he knows that means yes.
It seems he’s doing a poor job of not pouting these days, but he hadn’t meant to hurt Anthony! Having stayed in the nursery, he hadn’t gotten anybody else ill, not even Mama, and he is quite plainly convinced Nurse cannot fall ill. Gregory realises he’s never seen Anthony ill before, either, and he finds he doesn’t like it one bit.
Then Anthony is crouching before him on the floor. “It is all right,” he says again. “You are no longer ill, are you?”
Gregory shakes his head. No, he feels much better now.
“Then in a few days, I shall be like you. I even have had a tonic, to help me heal faster.” He pulls a face. “I should not think soil belongs in medicine, but what do I know?”
Gregory giggles, imagining Anthony holding his nose and knocking back a vial of dirt to clear his sinuses. He’s right, of course. After all, Anthony is even stronger than he is. He will be well in no time. He’s just got to do the same things Gregory has done, like take tonics and rest in bed. Anthony often helps him make sense of things and set the world to rights. Speaking of—
In a stroke of brilliance, Gregory grabs Anthony’s hand and pulls, causing him to teeter until Anthony scrambles to stand upright without falling over.
“What is it?”
“I have an idea,” he says, pulling him toward the staircase.
“Gregory, it is almost time for dinner!” calls Mama, but he continues marching, crafting his plan as he goes. This is important.
Eventually they are in the nursery, where he leads Anthony over to his bed. “Sit here.”
Anthony obliges, perching on the bed as Gregory retrieves the Pretty Little Pocket-Book from the shelves. “You want me to read another story? Perhaps I should do so at bedtime, rather than before dinner.”
Gregory turns around, ready to commence his plan, but it isn’t the same as before. It isn’t quite right, the way Anthony is perching on the edge of the bed, still wearing his shoes and jacket. He should be lying against the pillows, tucked under the quilt the way Gregory was. Suddenly, he feels shy, knowing he won’t make as good of a storyteller as his brother. Perhaps this idea is a mistake.
“I want to read to you,” he mumbles, his eyes on the book in his hands.
“You do?”
Gregory nods, and he braves a glance up when he hears a shuffling sound. Anthony is removing his shoes and jacket, rearranging the pillows against the headboard. He sniffs and rubs his nose with the handkerchief before beckoning Gregory over. Gregory snuggles up to him, settles the little book against his knees, and follows the words with his finger as he reads. Anthony helps him sometimes, guiding him as he makes the letters into sounds until they are words again. By the time they’ve finished the letter from Jack the Giant-Killer to Tommy, Mama is standing in the doorway. She’s smiling.
“My dear boys, I am sorry to interrupt, but it is time for dinner. You may return to reading afterward.”
“Could we have trays up here?” he hopes.
“I’ve asked for Anthony’s plate to be set aside, but yours is already on the table.”
“But Mama, why is it that Anthony can have his on a tray, and I have taken all my meals upstairs, but now I must eat at the table?” It hardly seems fair. Lately he’s delighted in the occasions when he may take his evening meal at the table, now that he’s old enough to do so (Hyacinth, barely in her fifth year, only ever eats dinner here in the nursery) but today it feels strangely like a punishment.
“Go on, do as she says,” Anthony says, gently taking the book from his hands. “I will wait.”
Gregory sighs and trudges over to where Mama awaits, her hand outstretched to hold his, but when Anthony starts to get up too, Gregory frowns. “You said you would wait.”
Anthony lifts a brow. “I did not mean I should wait here, on your bed.”
Mama chuckles. “Perhaps I shall send up your tray here, then.”
Gregory nods, firmly. “I will come back very soon.”
“You will not take your meal too quickly, I hope,” says Mama as she leads him out the door. “You will not want to upset your stomach when you are feeling so much better.”
At Mama’s request Gregory does his best not to shovel food into his mouth. He’s been learning the manners of a gentleman, but he cannot contain his excitement and ends up with more food on his clothes than usual. It is by the grace of God that he manages to not spill his milk.
“May I be excused?” he asks, once he’s eaten the requisite number of carrots to appease Mama. He’s counted them out to be sure.
“Where are you going?” asks Eloise.
“I promised Anthony I would read a story.”
His sisters all turn to him, confused, but as soon as Mama says he can be excused, he’s up and out the door as fast as his legs will carry him.
“Do not run,” Mama calls after him, but it’s a little late for that.
When he finally reaches the nursery, he’s very nearly out of breath as he skids to a stop. As he’d hoped, Anthony is still here, but he’s shocked to see his eldest brother tucked into the bed, the big quilt covering him up. He’s asleep.
He tiptoes closer. Anthony looks little and big at the same time, like he’s as young as Gregory and as old as Mama.
Suddenly, Anthony’s eyes flutter open. He hums softly and sighs. “My apologies, I grew tired as I was waiting.” He blinks. “What is on your face? And your clothes?”
When Gregory wipes his face, his hand comes away sticky. He tastes it.
Anthony cringes and pushes himself upright.
“Marmalade,” he declares, and then he remembers that he’s not supposed to have food on his face or his clothes.
Anthony shakes his head. “Perhaps you ought to have a bath before bed.” He pulls out his fob watch and checks it, frowning at the time. “You’ve finished your dinner already?”
“I wanted to read the story,” he defends, shifting from foot to foot in his eager impatience.
“I thought—” Anthony pauses to catch a startlingly loud sneeze in his shirtsleeve “—Mother told you not to rush. No wonder you’re covered in marmalade and pork pie.” Anthony unfolds the napkin from his dinner tray and dips it into his water before cleaning Gregory’s face.
Gregory does his best to stay still, but he cannot help the way his nose scrunches up in displeasure. “I can do it myself,” he mutters, though this is still not as bad as Nurse wiping his sore nose.
“Then you would have done it already. “Anthony cleans Gregory’s sticky hand for good measure and drops the napkin on the tray. “Now, you wanted to read, yes?”
“Yes!” Finally, Gregory crawls into bed, this time with the quilt over their laps. They make it through a goodly bit of the alphabetical stories before he starts to feel strangely sleepy.
Perhaps it is from leaning on Anthony’s chest, which makes the best pillow. Perhaps it is from the rhymes lilting from the pages like a song. Perhaps it is from the relief of his brother’s company after he’d spent the better part of two days hoping for a bedtime story.
Perhaps it is simply from the pork pie.
With his belly and heart full, he closes his eyes, the book slipping from his grasp and Anthony’s because he, too, is fast asleep.