Page 61 of The Ambiguous Enigma of the Hunted Lady
“As a consultant you see, yes,” Kenneth appeared to pick up confidence. “I found you invaluable when examining the claim and I, well, I suppose I thought you would find some joy in it.”
“I wasn't aware a woman was allowed in that office.” Leah said, baffled by Kenneth's proposal. “Something about it being a man's job?” It was the last thing she had expected him to say. Although, she did not know what it was she thought he would say in the first place.
“Well, not in the office, to my shame.” Kenneth shook his head. “It would not be the most regular of positions, more of a consulting role.”
“A consulting role?” While Kenneth's news astounded Leah, she could still poke plenty fun at him while he bumbled about on his botched delivery.
“Yes, what I mean is that when a case arises in which my services are required, I would be able to call upon you to contribute your opinion on the matter, for a fee of course.”
“I know what a consultant does.” she scolded. “I am poor, not ill minded.”
“I did not mean–” Kenneth stammered.
“Oh, come now I am only playing.” Leah dismissed his minor panic.
“I can never tell.” Kenneth breathed a sigh of relief.
“That's the way I like it.” Leah chided.
“That's rather cruel.” Kenneth protested.
“Is it?” Leah accepted the challenge.
“I would say.” Kenneth refuted. The lines had been drawn. “It is only proper and polite for one to behave in an honest manner.”
“Is it proper and polite to perpetuate the dramatic inequality of wealth and quality of life?”
“I don't follow that line of argument at all.” Kenneth scoffed. “And I am sympathetic to the plight of the poor.”
“Just so.” Leah announced. “Therein lays the issue at its root. Look around you, at all this.” She gestured to the overflowing fountains and the buzzing bees about the tops of bushes. “You have everything a person could want. There are many others just like you. There are more, however, others that do not possess near this amount.”
“No, but–”
“It is not your fault, so don't become embarrassed or cross.” Leah stopped him. “And it is only proper and polite to allow someone to finish speaking before taking your turn.”
“So, it is.” Kenneth conceded to hear her out with a peaceable smile.
“What I mean to arrive at…” Leah paused for a moment to catch her breath, “is that a system has been built in which you and your friends with all this,” she gestured again. “have the say over all the rest. Let me put it this way, have you ever been robbed, Kenneth?”
“Robbed?” He looked startled by the suggestion. “No, never.”
“Well, when one is being robbed,” Leah sighed as she further deviated to get to the root of her argument. “there is a feeling one gets of being completely powerless. That nothing you can do or say will affect the outcome, and that really, you're not worth anything at all. Have you ever had that feeling?”
Kenneth was silent, his eyes becoming a murky pool of reflection.
“Well that is the same feeling a dirt-poor person such as myself gets when they have a run in with the likes of you. You who can do anything against us who are worth nothing. So, when I get smart with my mouth and hurt your feelings, it's because it's all I got to feel like a person around all of this.” she gestured a final time as her voice trailed off.
“When we formed squares at Waterloo, I knew that feeling.” Kenneth said, ever softly.
“You were at Waterloo?” Leah was surprised. Everyone in the country, rich, poor, and anywhere in between, had heard of Waterloo, yet he didn't carry himself like a stoic war hero. She knew he had been in the army, but not the details of his experiences.
“And half a dozen other places.” Kenneth replied. “Endless hooves came crashing down on us, hammering the earth like thunder spit out of their legs. I've never heard anything like it. We all formed up and they came at us like a wall, a moving wall, and we all fired...” Kenneth himself let his words fall away.
Leah knew that there was real trauma behind that half-sorted reveal of Kenneth's history. She had seen plenty of boys come back from the war, more than he had most likely. Down in the ditches of London, the soldiers told the true war stories; they spoke of the violence and the senseless sadness that had broken their minds, only fixed but for a moment with a pint of blue ruin.
In that moment of Kenneth's reflection, Leah realized fully her feelings for this gentle, unique man. He was like no one else she had ever met, and his undying affection towards her was horribly touching.Why does he persist so? What is it that drives him?
He had created a position for her, not because she could do what someone else couldn't, but because he would have an assurance of seeing her again once she was well. Leah had no doubt that it was the most anyone had ever cared for her.
