Robert bowed his head to stare mournfully into the dark amber within the tumbler. Her words wounded him all the more for even though he no longer loved her, Diana's words fair broke his heart to where he wished he still did. "I had been quite the storyteller, hadn't I?" he mumbled quietly. And he had been, once. There were times when he was the life of the party, regaling friends and guests with daring tales of adventure during his Grand Tour! The fights upon French docks, attempting to scale Notre Dame, running from the gendarmes, meeting with famed composers in Vienna, duels with upstart nobles in Saxony, dancing with gypsies in Spain and drinking with pirates in Portugal... It was all true, every word of it. Only Robert had spun it such that it seemed to conjure the images of his past before his audience, enthralling him as though they were there themselves. It was at a such a party, he recalled, where Diana had first caught his eye and he her ear. The memory was bittersweet now, as were all of them.

"Would you like to hear a story, my dear?" he asked softly with no trace of mockery. "I do have new ones, you know, ones from the colonies that I haven't told anyone yet. Only they aren't like my old stories. I do not think they would make anyone laugh, and if they did I should question that person's sanity." Robert took a careful sip to wet his lips before continuing. "There's a rather 'amusing' little anecdote about how we had three water boys in our unit, all named Jack, if you would credit it. A... livelier bunch of lads I've never met, not a one of them over fourteen and the best of friends. I'd always thought if we were to have a son..." Robert let that thought peter out and die where it was, a road he was not willing to travel this night. "They were the very epitome of mischief. Harmless pranks, japes minor enough to never offend or inconvenience but crafted well enough to bring a laugh. I shan't... I shan't forget the look on the Sergeant Major's face when he realized his mustache wax had been exchanged for beef tallow. The sad part was that it actually smelled better than his usual pomade. The three of them had this intense rivalry with the drummer boys of one of the other regiments, finding no end to the delight of sneaking to their camp in the middle of the night and filling their drums with water. Each of them adored us. They were our mascots, our good luck charms! And their prayers each night were always the same: Let us be dragoons!"

Robert faltered suddenly. A tear started to well in the corner of his one eye. "They... all died on the same day. Stray round from the enemy's cannon sailed past the lines and into the baggage train." A heavy silence filled the air, the war suddenly brought into the cozy parlor far from the Americas. When Robert was able to continue, his voice was hoarse and strained. "They had been playing at cards. Funnily enough... each of them had a jack in his hand."

Setting the tumbler down, he coughed and composed himself before his wife. The glass was still half full. Robert's face was sincere and honest, and the shining tears that refused to fall conveyed that whatever despair he may have felt when it came to dealing with his wife was no cause of hers, but rather a self recrimination that he was nothing as he should be to her. Robert knew that the core of his resistance to his wife's advances stemmed not truly from dislike; it was born of the knowledge that he did not deserve her. "The more I've seen of this world, Diana... the harder it becomes to find my way back to the old one. I can find nothing... splendid... in any of my stories now... The old ones seem such a lie compared to the new ones, and those are a heavier burden than I wish to carry. As things are now, a retreat is better, even if I must 'lick my wounds' as you say. However else shall I deal with mob? Strut about as though nothing has happened and endure their scorn? Unburden my mind to them in the hopes they might understand? There lie my choices, mockery or pity, and I... I can not say which of them is the worse to endure."

"Best to bed now, I think," he concluded in hushed tones. Robert had revealed more to Diana this night than he had any other since he had returned, fearing and hoping at once how she might react to the realization of just how altered to his nature he had become. "Tomorrow I will get you your gardener, Diana. Invite who you will."