Page 41 of The Secret Identity of the Lord's Aide
Just outside the doors of The Rising Sun, Bess spotted a once-familiar form, creeping around the edge of the building. Bess took several rapid steps towards him, shuffling so that he spun fast towards her.
“Marvin?” Bess blared. For it was truly the ex-political writer who’d quit several weeks before, when it was clear he was the second-rate political writer (to L.B.) at The Rising Sun. He looked strangely flustered. His hair was ratty, grown out to his shoulders beneath his rounded hat. He looked at her quizzically, and then turned his eyes towards Peter. He gaped.
“Marvin, what on earth are you doing at The Rising Sun?” Bess demanded. “You quit without another word. You left us in a lurch, you know. After all the years we worked together.”
Secretly, of course, Bess hadn’t cared at all that Marvin had quit. The man had been a bumbling fool, ill-equipped with a quill. Certainly, his knowledge of politics had been malformed, perhaps passed down from a father or an uncle or some such thing. The opinions hadn’t come from between his two ears.
“Lady Elizabeth,” Marvin finally said, curling his lips cruelly. “Can’t a man walk through the centre of London without being hounded about why he’s doing such a thing?”
“It’s simply that I haven’t seen your face in weeks,” Bess said, lifting her chin. “Have you come to collect your final pay cheque?”
Marvin reached for his hair, twirling it absentmindedly. “I would have assumed the proper thing would have been to send it to me, rather than keep it. It felt like a sort of game of cat and mouse, forcing me back in here …”
“Come along, Marvin,” Bess said. She slipped towards the door, unlatched it and entered, sensing Peter hot on her heels. As she walked towards her desk, the other writers peered up. Bags beneath their eyes were grey and dark. They blinked first at her, and then at Marvin in the doorway.
“All right, Marvin?” one of them, a writer named Craig asked. They hadn’t been particularly good friends, not before Marvin left. But Craig was always up for a pleasant comment.
Marvin just scowled at him, and then turned his body fully towards Bess. Bess reached her desk and shuffled through several papers, looking for the folder in which she’d stored Marvin’s final pay cheque.
“I don’t suppose any of you are finally going to tell me who this dismal L.B. is,” Marvin huffed, crossing his arms over his chest. “The word around town lately is that the man doesn’t even exist.”
Bess paused, her fingers atop the pay cheque. She turned towards him slowly. Irene exited her office, leaning heavily against the door and watching Marvin with cat-like eyes.
“Marvin. What a pleasure,” she said shortly. “It’s good of you to finally come by.”
Marvin flinched. He didn’t turn to look at Irene and instead kept himself poised towards Bess. Meanwhile, Peter remained in the centre of the room, turning his body this way, then that, watching the interaction with a mix of fear and amusement.
“Bess, you’re in charge of the money. You’re in charge of the pay cheques,” Marvin said, forcing his eyebrows low. “You must know who he is. You must have some idea. And why won’t you tell? What has L.B. given you to keep your mouth shut?”
At this, Irene let out a cackle. Bess shook her head at her, subtly. Marvin seemed to sense the interaction between them and tossed his head back. “Oh, you wretched women,” he said. “You absolutely wretched women. Again, thinking that whatever you do is somehow greater than anything a man could do in your place. My goodness, I can’t imagine what will happen to you on your deathbed. When you look back and realise you’ve given nothing to God’s beautiful earth. No sons. No daughters. Nothing.”
“Marvin, you imbecile,” Irene said, taking a step forward. “If you weren’t such a horrific writer, I wouldn’t have had to find a replacement for you.”
Marvin’s face fell low: his cheeks seeming to cover up his throat.
“That’s right,” Irene said. “Nothing you’ve said is in any way detrimental to us as women, you know. Bess and I. We’re partners in many ways. In fact, I would love to tell you who L.B. is. Right this instance. For I would absolutely love to tell you the person who took over your position. Would love to show you just exactly why.”
Bess tilted against the front of the chair behind her, making it crack against the floor. She sputtered, with shocks going up and down her spine. Irene didn’t have the right to give her away like this. She didn’t have the say. Irene glanced back towards Bess, assuredly seeing the stricken expression upon Bess’s face. Bess shook her head ever so slightly. This wasn’t the time. This wasn’t the person she could reveal that identity to.
She’d cultivated the persona for a reason.
But Marvin wasn’t finished. With vitriol, he stepped forward, speaking only to Bess, now.
“And don’t think I don’t know where you came from, Lady Elizabeth,” he continued.
Bess felt the coming comments like a wave. She tried to support her back, to appear stronger than she was. She felt Peter looking at her still harder, trying to gauge her.
“Don’t you dare, Marvin,” Irene said, her voice lowering.
“I will very much dare. For you walk about here as if the rest of us don’t know where you came from,” Marvin continued. “You walk about like you don’t know Craig over there—Craig’s father lost over a thousand pounds after he took up with your father and your late fiancé’s silly little game. And Alice, my wife’s friend? Her father attempted to invest in your father’s idea—a false one, might I add—and he ended up committing suicide, of all things. Your father and your fiancé ruined countless lives, Lady Elizabeth, and now you stay on here at The Rising Sun as if none of it ever happened. Do you know how much you disgust me? Lady Elizabeth. As if you should still be deemed a lady after all of that.”
Silence fell across the paper office. Bess felt close to crying—could feel the tears burning just behind her eyes. She swallowed hard and waited, praying herself back into her bedroom at home. She imagined herself cosy beneath the sheets, counting the minutes till sleep. For the first year or two after Conner’s death, she hadn’t been allowed sleep until far past midnight. She’d known the rest of the world to be peaceful around her. But she didn’t dare dream.
She hadn’t felt she deserved it.
“I don’t. I—I don’t,” Bess began, stuttering.
Marvin mimicked her. He snorted, and then spread his hands wide in front of him. “Well, you have quite the way with words, don’t you? I suppose that covers one question. You’re certainly not the mysterious L.B., are you?” He laughed to himself, laughed so hard that his eyes became pink and strange, showing his drunkenness. “For surely the famous L.B. would have something much greater to say.”
