VI.

Marianne wakes with her head resting on the table, fresh rays of sun falling in through the opened window onto her face. 

Upon casting a downward glance at the warm presence sloped against her leg, she is met with the serene face of Luella--still soundly asleep--stripped of all her outer garments, down to a slip falling carelessly off one shoulder; seated on the dusty floorboards there, with her back propped up against the side of Marianne's chair. 

She presents so blissfully in her slumber, and Marianne simply hadn't noticed it before, but when stripped of her bulky furs and bombacity, she actually comes across as pitiably small; the opposite of Marianne herself, who had undergone a tremendous spurt during her adolescence: growing from a small pea into a string bean that was even taller than some boys her age--whereas Luella looks to have not grown an inch since their auspicious first meeting at the fountain.

This revelation only served to bring the prevailing dilemma back to the forefront of Marianne's mind.

Was there truly nothing to be done? She ponders, as she slowly rises from the chair to approach the open window, its silky curtains hanging aflutter. 

While gazing out from her present vantage--the store having been built upon a considerable hill, overlooking much of the town--she could just barely glimpse the harbor in the distance, lively with dock workers attending to the arriving ships.

Presently, Luella stirs, sighing contentedly.

"Last night…feels like a dream--"she stretches and yawns, breaking into laughter midway, then casually glancing around at her environs --"although, I'm quite certain this isn't my room."

Marianne sits beside her, caressing her hair.

"Oh, but surely you must be hungry." She says, her voice falling gradually, until it is but a faint whisper, as she draws her lips closer to Luella's. "And, I should think one can never feel hungry inside of a dream."

Luella smiles, and they share in another kiss; one so natural, it is like breathing.

After which, the two become settled, as a discussion is brought up concerning the topic of breakfast: and, more pressingly, through what means the ladies might be able to venture to the market unmolested--without fear of any prowling Lafferty agents.

"Well, the answer is quite simple." Luella says, her eyes sparkling with mischievous glee. "I need only don a disguise!" And as to that, in so far as disguises go: there was a veritable pick of them to be found, among all the unclaimed articles littering Marianne's room. 

It isn't long before their ploy proves to be misguided, however; when, at one point early on in the venture, Luella is called upon outright--by name--through the mouth of one unsuspecting stall minder; who when pressed, simply explains that his hunch was because Marianne, in all the years he'd observed her, was never once to be seen in the company of anyone else but the good lady Lafferty, and so therefore assumed the same.

Following this startling illumination, the ladies quickly finish with their shopping and retire to the house.

Marianne is doing the cooking.

Luella is at the table, fretting with worry.

"My stepfather is a powerful man, with many connections. If he finds you've secretly been aiding me, and thereby meddling in his affairs, he'll--"

"He'll do what?" Marianne interrupts, casting her a sideways glance. "Order an assassin?"

The fading look she gives says everything. 

Marianne nods. "I see."

Sizzling oil splatters from the pan, directly onto her hand, but she doesn't so much as flinch.

"I haven't properly repayed you, for that day."

Luella scoffs.

"Come now, Marianne. We aren't children anymore, with all their cute little promises!"

"Heaven knows I do not wish to be married to that Chevalier fellow, but it is not my decision to make."

The bacon is smelling up the entire room, being charred to a crisp.

"Call me childish, then," says Marianne, "but I do believe one should have the ultimate final say on whom they should marry, and perhaps spend the remainder of their life with."

"Oh, sweet May." Luella says, shaking her head softly.

"The unsavory truth, is that I haven't had any choice since the day my mother met that man. He controls our finances, which means I am rendered but a prop in his schemes, and mother had no right to complain."

"You've managed to make it this far already, haven't you?"

Luella stares, in silent intrigue.

"I mean to say, you've already managed to slip out of the manor thus far, and you're welcome to stay with me for as long as you please." She continues, then pauses to dispense the blackened bacon and scrambled egg onto a plate: trying to appear nonchalant, but being betrayed by the blood visibly rushing to her cheeks. "Even forever, if you so choose."

Luella gives a confounding smile: one caught between sheepishness and delight. Timid, but emphatically glad.

"Oh, darling, precious Marianne..."

"We need not remain in such a loathsome corner, either!" Marianne continues, raising her tone in excitement. "It would only be for a little while, until we find a new place: somewhere far, far beyond that sodding Lafferty's reach. Somewhere I can finally retire my hands from that damnable machine. Forever."

Marianne pauses in her speech just long enough to walk across the room, carrying the plate of food, and plopping it down on the table.

"In that way, we shall both have our happiest outcomes."

Luella hasn't spoken much in a while.

Her response pours our slowly, meticulously:

"There is...that word, uttered from you, again." She says. "Forever."

"Mm." Marianne brushss the side of her face.

"Is it having its intended effect on you?"

"It is." She answers back sharply; almost frustratedly. "I just...always viewed you as more of a pragmatist."

"Correctly so, in most cases." Marianne curtly replies, leaning back in her chair with a wry grin. "However--as I have come to discover-- it is not, with concern to matters most vitally important to me."

At this assertion, Luella is instantly curious. 

"Oh?" She questions, whilst rising from what is the only chair set at the only table present in the room, so that Marianne can sit down, with the only fork she owns, to eat from the only one plate of food she has served: to a meal of bacon, fried to an extreme char, perfectly in sync with her own tastes.

"I take it that...I am one such specimen, which renders you foolish?"

Wordlessly, she takes a seat in Marianne's lap.

Then, in turn--as if the two are engaged in an unspoken, cryptic act--Marianne wordlessly pierces a tuft of egg with her fork, and brings it up to Luella's mouth to bite from.

"In all truth, Lu:" says Marianne. "I think we are both becoming fools by the second."

**********

And so it is, along this very trajectory, that a new strategy is hatched for the couple's next attempted outing.

It is the likes of which only two fully enamored "fools," such as they, can possibly think up: making it appear, through their refinements, to any casual observer passing by on the street, that a perfectly ordinary--if not noticeably slim--young dandy, with top hat and suit and cane and pants all, is out for a perfectly ordinary stroll with his missus strapped unyieldingly to his arm. Said missus is indistinguishable due to the concealing hood she wears, but for her incessant laughter; seemingly derived from her man's jolly insistence in tipping his aforementioned top hat at each and every passing stranger.

"Never mind my love's chortling!" Marianne says to one curious onlooker, in a voice so objectively lacking in the depth required to pass for a man's. "My darling is a rather simple beast, and daft besides--finding obscene humor in the most irrational of settings!"

It is then, whilst the two are seated at a park bench, Luella can whisper to her some words filled with newfound hope:

"Whether we are meant for each other will ultimately remain up to fate, but I am prepared to endeavor: so long as it be that any difficulties we encounter, we shall face together; one-by-one."

Marianne tips her hat. "Darling, I must declare this is the most sensible you've been all day. Most sensible, indeed."

By evening, when finally they retire to their abode above Dintman's thrift store, the ladies are still girlishly giggling, with mischievous glee, amongst themselves: over a shared feeling as though they'd outsmarted the whole world. It is precisely, due to this inwardly-drawn focus, that they continue to miss the bespectacled pair of eyes that have been secretly watching them, across all their numerous comings and goings from the shop...

Arthur Dintman is left scratching his chin, wondering just what exactly is afoot to inspire his best employee--whom, until now, has mostly kept herself squarely tucked away in the attic--to suddenly spring into such a vibrant social life.

That is why, on the particular evening of the 17th of December, 188X, it is just past the hour of 5'o'clock when he goes for a knock on Marianne's door; whereupon, and despite it being so early, she is predictably near-immediate in her answering: with a breathless, frantic air, and beads of nervous sweat running down her face: her being, in his mind, a fellow lost soul, trapped alongside him in his father's tomb; and yet, he considered her to be so blatantly the inferior, such that her presence never fails to trigger a certain brooding, maniacal malevolence that lay dormant inside him.

"Good evening." He greets her.

"Ah! Mister Dintman." Marianne replies, sweating under his expectant gaze. "It is...quite late."

Thus far, she has remained partly behind the door, holding it like a barricade between them, but he forcefully shoves it aside--"Just Arthur." He snaps with a noticeable snarl of disgust, as though she'd inadvertently committed a horribly offensive slight. 

She wags her head, startled into submission. "R-right! Sorry, Arthur. It is just my habit."

 "Erm...so, what is it that you needed?"

He grins, deriving a cruel delight from watching her squirm. 

"You're possessed of quite the flustered look about you today, lass." Arthur says, craning himself: trying to peer beyond her, into the room--as she awkwardly repositions herself to try and block him, without making it appear obvious. "You've had a friend staying over these past several days, haven't you?"

Marianne gawks. "Wha--I mean...how did you know, sir?"

Arthur scowls, at once transforming into the incarnation of rage:

"What an unfathomably stupid question!" 

Pulling a fist, he knocks her once in the side of the head.

"Idiotic slut!" He bellows at her, at once dispensing with any prevailing illusions of civility. "I watched the both of you clamoring up and down the stairs, carrying on like a couple of schoolgirls!"

Marianne wags her head again, sheepishly nursing it. "Oh. Right. Of course."

"Well, I couldn't care less what goes on in your personal life." Arthur goes on to say, waving his hand dismissively. "Except, I've recently received an order: this one being for one hundred ladies' blouses."

He pauses to grin, adjusting his glasses.

"I hope you'll have those ready for me, by this time tomorrow."

"A hundred by morning!?" She gasps.

"I'll have to work all day and night to even stand a chance, sir!"

He chuckles, patting her once on the head.

"In that case, you'd best get to work--you wouldn't want me to raise this month's rent again, now, would you?"

"No, sir."

"That's a girl!; I knew you wouldn't disappoint."

Thereafter, with his business completed, he departs: leaving Marianne standing there in the doorway, silently devastated, in his wake, as Luella rushes to console her.