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Edatched her carefully He’d thought to intervene on her behalf, but she seeood control of the situation Or if not the situation, at least of herself

"What I ht to have frightened Major Wilkins, "was that Thomas was here in New York In hospital And then he wasn’t It’s not as if he was on a battlefield or off scouting behind ene behind enemy lines Edward frowned as the words rolled around between his ears Was that what he’d been doing in Connecticut? It seemed thedone so before

"Well, that’s just the thing," Major Wilkins said "I can find no record of your brother having been in hospital"

"What?" Cecilia’s head jerked as she looked to Edward and then back again at the etically "I had h the records The naht to hospital is recorded in a ledger We make note of the date of arrival and the date of, ehrm, departure"

"Departure?" Cecilia echoed

"Or death" Wilkins had the grace to look at least a little uncoardless, we could not find record of your brother"

"But he was injured," Cecilia protested "We received notice" She turned back to Edward, visibly agitated "My father received a letter from General Garth He wrote that Thomas had been injured, but that it wasn’t ain hospital Is there another hospital?"

Edward looked to Major Wilkins

"Not on this part of the island"

"Not on this part?" Cecilia said, leaping onto his choice of words

"There is so of an infirh that said he wished he hadn’t brought it up "I wouldn’t call it a hospital" He glanced over at Edith a ful look in his eye "Wouldn’t want to stay there myself, if you knohat I mean"

Cecilia blanched

"For God’s sake," Edward snapped, "you’re talking about the lady’s brother"

The ies,by the convulsive s in her throat

"The infirmary in Haarlem is rudimentary at best," Major Wilkins said to Cecilia "Your brother is an officer He would not have been brought to such a place"

"But if it was the closest facility"

"His wound was not life-threatening He would have beenforced to convalesce in subpar conditions merely on account of their rank, but there were only so many beds in the hospital here at the southern end of Manhattan Island "He’s right," he said to Cecilia The army would always move the officers first

"Perhaps Thoested "If he ith his ht not have wished to leave the that he had to pierce her hopes this way "Even if he had stayed to be with his men, surely he would have moved down here by now"

"Oh, of a certain," Major Wilkins said matter-of-factly "There’s simply no way he’d be up in Haarlem"

"You can hardly even call it a town," Edward said to Cecilia "There’s the Morris Mansion, but beyond that, it’s more of a collection of abandoned colonial camps"

"But don’t we haveback into enemy hands," Major Wilkins said "Good farot some crops almost ready for harvest"

"We?" Edward could not help but inquire

"The Haarle," the major said firmly

Edasn’t so sure about that, but this hardly sees

"We went through six ing the conversation back to its purpose He reached out to fix hi when the cheddar crumbled on the knife "We could not find any mention of your brother Honestly, it’s as if he never existed"