by Abigail Agar
“As many of my readership know, I wasn’t an enormous fan of Lord Nathaniel Linfield when his political career began, over a month ago. I found him childish and silly, spewing words that he perhaps remembered from conversations at the dinner table with his father. It seemed that he didn’t want to cultivate any sort of proper personality, one that the people of London could latch onto. But beyond that, he was a stuttering fool, apt to make one feel ill halfway through his speech, if only so one could retreat from the environment in which he spoke and find solace and silence.”
At this, Lord Linfield couldn’t help snickering. He turned his eyes to the people surrounding him at the restaurant. One man, perhaps twenty or thirty years older than Lord Linfield, blew down upon his spoonful of stew. His cheeks were heavy and sagged low, towards his chin. The man gave him a dagger-like expression, one that told Nathaniel he better keep his eyes to himself. He returned them to his paper, tearing through the next few paragraphs.
“But something seems to have shifted in the mind and heart of Lord Linfield, for it seems that his words are more articulate, that he addresses the crowd with more certainty, that he, wonderfully, incredibly, actually has a vision that isn’t just a copy of his father’s. I found myself awash with feeling that perhaps with Lord Linfield in Parliament, we might be privy to a beautiful future, one with more promise than previously thought,” the essay continued.
“Hey there, my boy!”
The words bounced off the walls of the restaurant. Lord Linfield turned his face up to find Everett’s above him, grinning in a way that felt far more youthful than his 32 years. He bounced into his chair, clapping Lord Linfield’s back as he did it. “What are you reading there?” he asked. “Don’t tell me. You’re reading analyses of your speeches, aren’t you?” He coughed as he laughed, tossing a napkin over his lap. “We really cannot get enough of ourselves, can we?” he said with a sigh.
“It’s important to know how the world is perceiving me,” Lord Linfield said, feeling strangely flustered. What did it matter if Everett caught him reading the paper? It wasn’t as though Everett knew a single part of his relationship with Lady Elizabeth—not as if that relationship existed in any capacity.
“Of course. Of course. And it’s also convenient when the world is calling your name from every rooftop, my boy. Of course, the old Nathaniel, the one back in school—that Nathaniel shrunk at any sign that the world could even see him. Now, all this attention. It must be getting to your head.”
Lord Linfield rolled his eyes, knowing Everett was teasing him. “You’ll never change, will you?” he muttered.
“And would you want me to?” Everett countered. “The more things change, the more things stay the same. Isn’t that the old refrain?”
The men ordered their meals: potatoes, slathered with gravy, minced meat pies, and more gallons of beer. The surly barmaid smashed their platters atop the table to serve them acting as though they were the worst possible things to happen to her in her career. She grumbled to herself as she hobbled away, something about “rich men should take their business elsewhere.”
“I don’t suppose she knows we have a history here,” Everett said, wagging his eyebrows.
“A history of drunken buffoonery, you mean.” Lord Linfield laughed.
“We were children, yes, but I have to say we were a bit cleverer than most children I come up against these days,” Everett said. “You should have seen these blokes trying to steal my wallet a few days back. One of them decided to sing me a little tune at the corner, near my carriage. Thought I would surely stop and stare, you know. So impressed with a bit of music. But I sensed something was amiss. His eyes glittered with foolishness. I darted around to find that his mate, another little scoundrel, nearly had his hands in my back pocket! Immediately, I grabbed my wallet, lifted it high in the air—too high for him to reach—and shook it around. Saying something like, ‘Oh, is this here what you want? This here? Goodness, me. How foolish of you to think I wasn’t paying attention.’”
Lord Linfield snickered, stabbing his fork into a piece of minced pie. “And what did you do next, Everett? Make them pay for their petty crimes?”
Everett’s smile faltered slightly. “Lord Linfield, I’ve noticed something about that, in fact.”
“What is it?” Nathaniel asked.
“I’ve noticed you’ve been largely avoiding the topic of the Judgement of Death Act in your speeches,” Everett said.
Lord Linfield felt his heart dip somewhere into his stomach. He tapped his fork at the edge of his plate.
“Yes,” he said simply.
“Why is that?” Everett said, leaning forward and drawing his fingers together tightly. “It seems to me that you of all people must have a volatile opinion regarding the Act. After what happened to your father, I can’t imagine that this is a lacklustre issue for you …”
Nathaniel wished he could rewind the conversation back to something a bit easier to swallow. He allowed his shoulders to droop as he considered what to say next. “You’re absolutely correct,” he said, giving Everett a strange, sad smile. “But honestly, Everett, I haven’t decided on either side. Which perhaps sounds strange to you.”
Everett arched his brow. “Perhaps not. You were never fire and brimstone, Nathaniel. But I had heard that after your father’s death you took on a different anger. An anger that darkened you. You wanted the highest possible damnation for those highwaymen, and that’s not to say I blame you for that. It’s a wretched thing that they got away.”
Lord Nathaniel’s brain felt fizzy with drink. He gulped another drink of beer, and then another, conscious that Everett’s eyes were still upon him.
“When I think of those highwaymen,” Nathaniel began, trying to articulate his words carefully. “When I think of them, my heart beats faster than it should. Rage makes my blood boil. I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. It’s an anger that I can’t possibly explain. My father was still youthful. He was fresh with ideas and knew how to change the world. But these men, these horrible men, they robbed the world of this gift, my father. And for a long time, I wanted to watch the world burn. And with that world, these men within it.”
Everett squinted at Lord Linfield. “But something is making you question this opinion?”
“I can’t readily explain it,” Nathaniel offered. “Perhaps I’ll find the words. But I’m still up in the air above it unable to find the proper compassion for such evil men who do such evil deeds.”
Everett and Lord Linfield were quiet for a long moment. Everett gazed down at his food before him, for the first time resembling a much older man. Lord Linfield had a glimpse of what Everett might look like in ten years, in twenty, provided either of them lived that long. Lord Linfield had known several men who’d died before him—of plague, of illness, of accidents. And although it was never spoken of, each knew that his number would come up far faster than he liked.
“Well, this is a perfectly pleasant lunch,” Everett finally said, waggling his eyebrows once more. “Just a bit of talk of death. A bit of talk of destruction. And some of the best minced pies around.” He flashed his thumb back towards the barmaid, looking mischievous. “And I think the barmaid is romantic for me, don’t you? You saw the way she looked at me. The age difference could be tricky, and I’m not sure we’ll have a proper line of children. But the love …”
“Come off it,” Lord Linfield said, chuckling.
They were back at a stasis, a place where they could banter and laugh until their platters were wiped clean. When they finished their meals, they erupted from their chairs and wandered into the drizzle of the late afternoon—both grateful for the company.
But when they reached Lord Linfield’s carriage, Lord Linfield paused, placing his hand atop the door handle. He stared at his friend, allowing his smile to falter.
“What is it, Nathaniel?” Everett said. He asked as if he expected something to erupt from Nathaniel’s lips, as if he’d expected it all along. He leaned closer, a
rching his brow. “You know you can speak to me about whatever it is you please.” His eyes raced across the horizon of downtown London, reflecting the dimming light. “It’s true that when you come to Parliament—a when, for which I’m sure, you’ll sense that you must keep your life under wraps. That you’ll be required to be calm and reticent. But I’ll be right there beside you, old boy. A relic from the past if you will. Know that I will be your secret keeper. Your friend.”
Nathaniel pushed around thoughts of Lady Elizabeth in his mind, marvelling at the weight it had upon his chest. “I never fancied myself to be a romantic, Lord Beauchamp,” he said. “But the story you’ve told me, regarding that girl from your past. I was wondering. What will you do to rectify it?”
A shadow passed over Everett’s face. “And look at you, again switching the conversation to my problems.” He sighed. “You’ll be a perfect member of Parliament. Always looking out for other men, and not yourself.”
“Just answer the question, Lord Beauchamp,” Nathaniel said.
Rain pattered over them, making his hair streak down either side of his head. He readjusted his hat, trying to shield his eyes, but it seemed that the rain was oddly sideways, and he couldn’t hide from it.
Everett sniffed. His lips parted, but then he closed them again as if he couldn’t decide what to say. Nathaniel tilted his head towards his carriage, an idea spinning in his head. “Would you like to show me where she lives now?”
Everett swept into Lord Linfield’s carriage. Elated, Nathaniel sat beside him. Everett informed the carriage boy of the direction to go, and the horses began to clop along the cobblestones, shoving the wheels through the odd puddles of mud.
“I often roll past her house,” Everett said, his voice low in the midst of the quiet. “I don’t often see much. As I told you, she has a daughter, and once I saw her in the window, holding her daughter high and allowing her to view the carriages as they passed by. It’s strange to think of that baby seeing me, seeing her. And Nelle not being the wiser.”
Nathaniel’s nostrils flared as he hunted for a proper response. He knew they were approaching Nelle’s mansion. He drew his arms across his chest and crossed them.
“Of course, I think about contacting her. Writing some kind of letter, perhaps. Anything to let her know that she’s on my mind, eternally, and has been for the previous years. Since I was such a young man. But when I put my pen to paper, nothing comes out. And so I force myself back to the work of Parliament, hoping that somehow, my own ego will stop existing. That someday I’ll allow myself happiness with one woman or another, someone I can’t possibly name. I can’t even envision what she might look like, if she wasn’t Nelle.”
The carriage stumbled to a halt outside the mansion. Nathaniel turned his head, his heart racing. The candles had been lit in the house, at the windows, evoking a sense of warmth within. He felt a strange longing in his stomach, for a home he didn’t yet have.
“There she is,” Everett murmured, his voice hardly a whisper. “There.”
Nathaniel leaned towards the window of the carriage, peering up at the second-floor window. In it was a young woman with curly blonde hair. A distracted finger tangled itself through it, curling and curling away at the strands. It looked as though she was lost in thought, her face tense and strange.
“She’s quite pretty,” Nathaniel murmured. “Incredibly so, in fact.”
“Far better looking than any woman I’ve ever seen at a debutante ball, I can tell you that,” Everett said. He jostled slightly in his seat, wrapping his coat tighter around him. “Not that I’m in it for the beauty, truly. You should have seen the way she captured the people in her portraits. Her fingers were so tender, drawing tight little lines. This little wrinkle would form between her eyebrows as she concentrated. And I …” He paused, sensing, perhaps, that he was going too far. His words were becoming poetic, beyond any realm of reality.
“It’s quite all right, Everett,” Lord Linfield offered. “It truly is.”
“Regardless, there she is.” Everett sighed. “And I can’t do anything else about it, except watch her ageing from the street below. She’ll become older, and I will become older, and we’ll never have one another. Not truly.”
Nathaniel felt awash with a strange sense of rage. He couldn’t comprehend this life: one in which he wasn’t allowed to be with Lady Elizabeth, and Everett wasn’t meant to be with Nelle, because of some sort of strict understanding of what the world was meant to be. Suddenly, he burst to the right, stumbling into the street below. Everett called out his name from the carriage, completely shocked. The carriage driver’s eyes leered at him, seemingly demanding answers.
“What on earth are you doing, Nathaniel?” Everett cried.
But Nathaniel had begun a strict march towards the gates of the mansion, squaring his shoulders as he moved. His brain fizzed with the alcohol from their lunch, and he felt strangely arrogant, unable to halt his rapid gait. Everett stumbled up behind him, reaching for his elbow. At the gates, Everett finally grabbed him, yanking him around. He huffed, gawking at Nathaniel with the angry eyes fit for a much younger man.
“What are you on about?” he demanded.
“You can’t possibly think that your life will become what you want it to be if you cannot act,” Nathaniel blared. “You must call on her. Tell her how you feel about her. Otherwise, you’re a coward.”
Everett’s eyes glittered. He coughed, moving in between Nathaniel and the gate. He crossed his arms over his chest, becoming a wall between the house and Nathaniel. “It’s not your cross to bear, Nathaniel.”
The two men gazed at each other, both burning with anger. Nathaniel couldn’t exactly name where his anger was coming from. He felt youthful and arrogant, willing to burst through Everett’s firm stance and march up the rest of the way to the mansion.
“Who is she, Nathaniel?” Everett finally demanded. “Who has gotten you so riled up, hey? Because it isn’t Nelle. Nelle is my problem. My blissful memory. But it shouldn’t be any reason for you to act this way.” He swallowed, his throat clenching hard.
The rain seemed oddly thicker still than it had been, bursting against Nathaniel’s shoulders. He allowed those shoulders to droop and turned his eyes towards the ground. He recognised that he was acting a fool, that his actions had everything to do with his own raucous, beating heart. If he was ever going to be in Parliament; if he was ever going to align himself with the beliefs of the people of England, he couldn’t be this way.
“Tell me, Nathaniel,” Everett said.
Nathaniel traced his fingers across his forehead. He remembered when he’d been a boy; it had been difficult for him to ever verbalise how he felt. When he was ill, it took him several hours to call to his mother. He felt better about suffering in silence. He didn’t want to cause harm to anyone.
“I have a secret, Everett,” Nathaniel said. “But I simply can’t explain it to you here. Not out in the open.”
When Nathaniel stepped back into the carriage, he turned his eyes back towards Everett, who kept his stance towards the house. He gazed up at Nelle, still in the window. For a moment, Nathaniel felt sure that Nelle spotted Everett, as well. But she turned back, swiping the curtain over the window. Everett turned, his eyebrows high, and stepped into the carriage after Nathaniel. “Sometimes, I think she knows I think about her. I can feel her thinking about me, somehow. I can’t explain it.”
Everett clicked the door closed behind him, placed his hands atop his thighs and called to the carriage boy. “We’ll head to mine, my boy,” he said. “925 W. Randolph Street.” He gave Nathaniel a final, meaningful look, before shrugging. “I hope you have a bit of room in you for some fine whisky. Straight from Scotland herself.”
Nathaniel prepared himself to do something he hadn’t allowed himself to do in many, many years: speak the precise truth, without leaving anything out. He knew it would bring him calm, and perhaps a bit of insight. But still, as the carriage clunked towards Lord Beau
champ’s mansion, he felt stricken with fear. His tongue was thick, plastered to the bottom of his mouth.
Chapter 19