Page 57 of The Secret Identity of the Lord's Aide
Lord Linfield hunted for the proper answer. But how could he say the right thing when everything seemed to swirl with the worst kind of reality?
“They’ll be murdered. Those children, wrapping their arms around you and calling your name? They’ll be taken from this world. Perhaps it won’t happen in the next five years, or even in the next ten. But by that time, they might have had children of their own. And then …”
Lady Elizabeth had worked herself up. Tears streaked down her cheeks. Lord Linfield reached forth and dropped his finger against the softness of her cheek. He hardly noticed that he’d done it. In the back of his mind, he sensed it was inappropriate. But Lady Elizabeth’s eyes closed at his touch. Her lips parted slightly. Around them, the rest of London swirled. Even Peter clunked around the side of a building several feet away, amusing himself with the dogs that ran around the neighbourhood pubs.
After perhaps a half a minute, Lady Elizabeth found ground behind her and stepped away. Her eyes flashed. Neither of them mentioned the big wave of intimacy between them. Perhaps neither of them would ever admit the insane attraction that sizzled in their hearts.
“And what is it you have in common?” Lord Linfield asked. “Why do you hide yourself from Society? If you don’t mind me speaking out of turn, Lady Elizabeth, you have far more to offer the world than most of the debutantes I know, all added together. You have a brain and a passion. You have such life.”
Lady Elizabeth’s eyes met his for a long moment. Lord Linfield found it incredibly difficult to read her expression. How he longed to reach behind her swimming eyes, to read her seemingly-constant string of thoughts. Everything she’d told him, thus far, made his heart ache. He hadn’t known about these children, living alone in the midst of London. He hadn’t given them a single thought. And with this, he hadn’t allowed himself to link the fact of his father’s death—and the fact that he so wanted to give complete and total judgement to the men involved—with the shivering, starving children at the centre of the city.
How complex it all was. Again, he considered the next several years of his life, at Parliament. Each decision he was bound to face would have equally as many sides, equally as many horrific realities. How could anyone deduce the proper thing to do?
“Please,” Lord Linfield said, his voice low. “I know I don’t deserve the truth from you. I know that I’m an imbecile, a fool. I wouldn’t be where I am today, poised to take this seat in Parliament, if it wasn’t for the brilliance of your brain. But I’m asking for just one more thing: understanding. Can you give it to me?”
Lady Elizabeth swirled her little toe across the cobblestones, just outside her skirts. Lord Linfield imagined tugging at the bottom of the dress, allowing himself to see the full foot, even up to the very bottom of her ankle. He imagined the starkness of being alone with her in a bedroom, of being allowed to gaze at her face, perhaps her bare shoulder … all without pause.
But he shoved the thoughts away, choosing instead to focus on her words. They turned back to face the road and began to toil along it. Peter scampered up behind them, still not listening. He whistled to himself, and then muttered French words for practice. He left Lady Elizabeth and Nathaniel in peace, at least for the moment.
“When I was a debutante, I met a man named Conner Graves,” Lady Elizabeth said. The words hung in the air between them. Sometimes, Nathaniel thought that the whole and complete truth had this capacity. That it was somehow three-dimensional, rather than just words exchanged between friends.
“I fell for him immediately. I was rather young, of course, and idiotic and open to love,” she continued. “At the time, you know, it was kind of a contest between debutantes. While it’s true that we were awash with academia, that we each spoke various languages and prided ourselves on being well-read, the true essence of our world was that we each wanted to marry better and quicker than the rest.”
“I’ve always suspected this,” Lord Linfield said.
“And rightly so. For I believe that many of us debutantes wore this fact upon our perfectly painted faces. But I digress,” Lady Elizabeth continued. “When I met Conner, I knew my life would change forever. He was handsome and smart and eager. Several of the girls I knew were incredibly jealous of the match I’d made. Already, I was awash with expectation. I felt he would be the father of my children. That we would grow old together. And my expectation only grew when Conner met my father. For you see, the moment they met one another, it was as if another portal opened up between them. They couldn’t stop speaking. I stood in the background, equally enamoured with both of them, for very different reasons. For, throughout my childhood, my father had taken very little interest in me. But with Conner, I felt suddenly that I had a kind of power with my father. He now regarded me with a sense of purpose.”
They neared Lady Elizabeth’s home. It seemed she was anxious, teetering back and forth on the path. Nathaniel was awash with a sense of something he felt was absolutely true: she felt too anxious to invite him back to her home, as she felt it was perhaps too measly for the likes of a lord.
“May I suggest that we return to yours?” he asked.
Lady Elizabeth’s lips quivered. It was clear she was frigid, hunting for the proper place to return. She nodded, murmuring, “If that’s quite all right with you. I know it’s not much.”
“Please. The place is cosier than ever,” Lord Linfield said.
And, with a motion he hadn’t expected of himself, he brought his elbow out and watched as Lady Elizabeth slotted her arm through his. It occurred to him that no woman, no one he’d ever met in his life, had ever fit alongside him as well as she did, now.
Lady Elizabeth paused the story as they walked back to the house. Peter scampered up the steps in front of them, unlatching the door and rushing to make another fire. He hollered that he would have tea prepared in no time at all, that the pair of them could expect wine and biscuits, as well.
Lady Elizabeth offered to take Nathaniel’s coat. He pulled it from his shoulders, slipping it into her hands. Her eyes found his for a moment before pulling away.
“I’ll be back shortly,” she whispered. “Go. Warm yourself in the kitchen. I can’t imagine what you feel, after wandering around my neighbourhood all afternoon. It’s certainly not what you’re accustomed to. But …” She paused for a moment, hunting for the proper words.
“But what?” Nathaniel asked.
“I really appreciate your coming here,” she offered.
“Lady Elizabeth,” Nathaniel murmured, trying to speak low enough so that Peter didn’t hear them—only ten feet away. “Lady Elizabeth, you’ve been privy to so much of my life. Why shouldn’t I be privy to yours?”
“We’re simply meant to be employee and employer, Lord Linfield,” she said, still clinging to his coat.
“Well, I think we might have accidentally bypassed that line,” Nathaniel offered.
Lady Elizabeth had no answer to this. She spun back towards the staircase and scampered up the landing, where she deposited his coat, and hers. In the silence, Nathaniel returned to the kitchen and perched on the edge of the shoddy wooden chair in which he’d sat earlier. Peter dropped another scone on a platter for him, gesturing with red, chilly hands. “Please, sir. Eat, if you wish. I won’t be said to be a poor host.”
Nathaniel nibbled anxiously at the edges of the scone, waiting for Lady Elizabeth to patter back in. When she did, she’d removed her hat, and curls cascaded down from her back up-do. She looked vaguely tired, and her cheeks were fresh pink from the chill of outside. Nathaniel felt another wave of something rather like love.
Of course, he’d never been in love. How was he supposed to know what that felt like?
