"It was the best ever." It was something he said every year. "I love you, Con," he had said as his brother bent over the candle. "I love you more than anyone else in the whole wide world. I love you forever and ever. Amen." He had giggled at the old joke. "Can we play again tomorrow?" But when his brother had gone into his room the following morning to tease him about sleeping late now that he was sixteen and almost an old man, he had found Jon cold. He had been dead for several hours.

It had been a devastating shock.

But not really a surprise.

Children like Jon, the physician had warned their father soon after his birth, did not usually live much beyond their twelfth year. The child had had a large head and features that were flat and looked strangely mongoloid. He had been plump and ungainly. He had been slow to learn all the basic skills most children absorbed easily in early infancy. He had been slow-minded, though not by any means stupid.

He had, of course, always been called an idiot by almost everyone who encountered him - including his father.

There was perhaps only one thing at which he had excelled, and in that he had excelled utterly. He had loved. Always and unconditionally.

Forever and ever.

Amen.

Now he was dead.

And Con was going to be able to leave home - at last. He had left numerous times before, of course, though never for very long. There had always been the irresistible pull to return, especially as no one else at Warren Hall could be trusted to give Jon the time and the patience needed to keep him happy, though it had been an absurdly easy thing to do. Besides, Jon had always grieved and fretted if he was absent too long and had driven everyone to distraction with his incessant questions about the expected date of his return.

Now spring was coming and there was nothing to keep him here.

This time he would leave for good.