IV
His father!
Separated by the width of the show case whose edges both gripped suddenly. Nathan and Johnathan gazed into each other’s suddenly ashen faces.
“You!” cried Johnathan. “You! My—son!”
Johnathan had grown stouter but he had aged twenty years. Remorse, loneliness, self-pity and the ever-present realization that he was an exile had eaten into his features like acid. Both temples were white but it was a weak, rusted, moth-eaten whiteness. His eyes were more watery than ever and his mouth as loose, excepting for the petulant knots of muscles in each corner.
“Father!” the boy gasped huskily.
Madelaine frowned, then looked on wide-eyed. From his son’s bronzed, muscular face, Johnathan’s gaze leaped to Madelaine’s, then back again. Ivory carvings were forgotten.
“What—are you—doing—out here?”
“I’m on my way back home from Russia,” Nathan answered mechanically. His mind was still stunned with the drama of it.
“You have—been—to—Russia?”