by Lynn Messina
Now that he wasn’t prattling nonsensically about clothes or blatantly mocking her, Agatha could appreciate his aesthetic qualities—the broad swath of his shoulders, the straight line of his nose, the deep rose of his generous lips. He wore his blond hair calculatingly disheveled in a perfect approximation of the windswept style.
He was not handsome—at least, not in the classical way of Mr. Sutherland, whose physical perfection made her want to place him in a variety of tableaux. If the gentleman had been willing and society permissive, she would have leaned him against a fireplace, stood him before a ruin and sat him upon a horse in full regalia.
But the aspects of appearance that fascinated her as an artist did not necessarily interest her as a woman, for as she looked at the viscount now she thought there was something very appealing about his uneven features and open demeanor. She wondered about the attraction as she switched her attention from Miss Redburne’s chin to her ears, marveling at how beguilingly jaunty they were.
Lady Bolingbroke’s fingers twitched with the nearly overwhelming desire to snatch the glasses from her daughter’s hands, but she managed to contain herself and merely begged for an opportunity to admire the beguiling jauntiness herself.
“Yes, of course, Mama,” Agatha said agreeably, tightening her grip. She simply was not ready to relinquish her view of Viscount Addleson just yet. She was far too intrigued by the way his eyes crinkled when he laughed.
The Merchant of Venice started a few minutes later, and unable to justify looking across the way when the action was on the stage, Agatha returned the glasses to her mother. Lady Bolingbroke required no justification for the brazen observation of her fellow theatergoers, and she kept her eyes trained on the boxes opposite for the whole of the performance.
Agatha could not imitate her mother’s unabashed curiosity and limited herself to darted glances at Addleson. Despite the activity around him—Mr. Abingdon was deep in conversation with the gentleman to his right, who seemed to be trying to teach himself how to juggle apples—he was engrossed in the play. Agatha wanted to be engrossed in the play, too, and was genuinely annoyed at herself for being unable to concentrate. She resolved to focus on only the stage, which she managed to do, but the effort required was almost as distracting as the viscount and she missed most of the dialogue.
Conceding it was hopeless, Agatha abandoned all attempts to follow The Merchant of Venice and decided to think of something else—the British Matrimonial Society. While Shylock raged at the Venetian judicial system, Agatha laid out the scene in her head: Miss Harlow would stand in the middle of the lecture hall’s famous rotunda, looking bemused by all the attention, a pretty blush on her cheeks. Her suitors, also known as the esteemed members of the British Horticultural Society, would be gathered around her, their hands held high like schoolboys craving attention. Two or three would be lying on the floor, having tripped over themselves in their rush to court Miss Harlow. A large orchestra would be arrayed along the back wall, opposite the speaker’s podium, and next to it would be a table with a bowl of the notoriously weak lemonade served at Almack’s.
Yes, she thought with silent satisfaction, that would do very well.
The play ended with a standing ovation, which her mother enthusiastically joined despite not having watched a single moment of the performance, and it was universally agreed that they would not stay for the afterpiece. The duchess cited her own fatigue, but it was her sister who in fact looked exhausted.
“Well, that was a treat,” said Lady Bolingbroke as soon as she and Agatha were in their carriage. “I cannot recall the last time I’ve enjoyed myself so much. The duchess and her sister are charming, and the acting was sublime. I do believe I shed a tear at the end.”
Given that The Merchant of Venice was a comedy, Agatha could only suppose her mother had cried because she had to leave off watching her neighbors.
Lady Bolingbroke recounted the delights of the evening during the drive home, which was mercifully short. Once inside the Portland Place residence, she requested a light repast to be served in the drawing room, but Agatha excused herself to work on her illustration. She did not say that to her mother, of course, claiming instead to be too tired to eat anything. Her mother would be horrified if she knew the truth and would most likely disown her. She was impatient enough with Agatha’s stubborn insistence on painting with oils, rather than making tasteful watercolor daubs like other accomplished young ladies of marriageable age. That her daughter had a genuine talent for painting was a source of embarrassment for her and seemed of a piece with her inability to appropriately calibrate her laughter. Both indicated a deplorable lack of moderation.
Agatha abided by her mother’s wishes that she not put her portraits on public display and hung them in the privacy of their own home, mostly in her bedroom, with a few in her father’s study. The majority of her work was piled in stacks along the walls of the small downstairs room given over to her studio. She was also under strict orders not to inconvenience the staff in her never-ending hunt for subject matter. She complied with this request as well by seeking out the servants in their natural environment and drawing quick studies that she filled in later at her easel. Only her maid Ellen was able to sit for her and that was because her mother thought it took hours to make Agatha’s coarse hair presentable. In truth, it took mere minutes; the rest of the time was given over to posing and painting.
Having made these concessions to her parent, Agatha had to have some outlet for her passion. It wasn’t enough to paint in obscurity and display her portraits in secret. She craved—nay, hungered—for her work to be seen and admired and discussed. If drawing caricatures for Mrs. Biddle’s shop in St. James’s Street was the best she could do, so be it.
Lady Agony had been thwarted enough in her twenty-two years to be grateful for anything she could get.
With this melancholy thought in mind, she donned a smock, lit several candelabras, retrieved a fresh piece of paper and got down to work.
Miss Fellingham’s Would she be the dupe of
a handsome lord?
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1“An imaginative and witty retelling of
universally acknowledged truths.”
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