A Lady's Dream Come True

by Grace Burrowes

  “And you are still avoiding Dirk’s friends. Is this why you’ve tucked yourself away in the countryside, because you dread the company you might encounter in London?”

  Another bird joined the first, a robin perhaps, given the more pedestrian nature of its song.

  “I’ve been to London, Oak. The stench alone should drive people away. Beggars everywhere, maimed soldiers among them. Prostitutes exhibit their wares right outside the theaters. Children go hungry while fine coaches nearly run them down in the street. Even if Dirk’s London friends hadn’t propositioned me and tried to make free with their hands, I would dislike London.”

  Some change came over Oak. Vera could not see it, but she sensed it.

  “They touched you?”

  “They touched me, some of them with blatant impropriety that I was to regard as a friendly compliment. One of them lay in wait for me in the attic, and that was a very near thing. I wasn’t to mind being groped and patted when it was all in good fun.” Vera forgot who’d used that term. Some fawning acolyte of Dirk’s who’d been genuinely surprised when she’d slapped him. “Others asked me to model for them, and they meant model in the nude. They intimated that Dirk wouldn’t mind, that Anna had happily dropped her clothing for anybody with a notion to sketch her thus.”

  Oak was listening. Of that much, Vera was certain.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I am profoundly sorry, and I apologize on behalf of every man who so egregiously mistreated you.”

  The apology was sincere, and yet, it did not help with the anger these memories engendered—anger at the presuming louts, at Dirk and Anna, and at Vera herself.

  “I gather Dirk’s relationship with Anna was far more mutually permissive than anything I could have imagined when I married him. I didn’t like that he would treat any woman that way. Didn’t like the idea that Anna was property that could be shared around. Anna apparently thrived under Dirk’s roof. She was a free spirit; I am a squire’s daughter. I wanted domesticity, peace, and calm, and I concluded Dirk wanted that of me too. When he married me, he was no longer a young man gleefully shocking the world with his talent and his radical notions.”

  Vera faced the approaching day, angry at the dawn itself. That tears should well now surprised her. This was old business, long since grieved and put aside.

  Oak sat up, his back against the headboard. “Vera, for the love of God, Dirk had a daughter to think of. What was Catherine to conclude about men who importuned her mother, about a father who regarded such behavior as harmless diversion?”

  “Catherine was doubtless kept in the nursery, away from all the late-night mischief. Mrs. Tansbury was devoted to her.”

  Oak climbed off the far side of the bed. “The girl was seven when her mother died. Seven-year-olds overhear servants, they peer out of windows, they lurk in conservatories and trees and follies. If Catherine is reluctant to trust you, perhaps that’s because her own mother wasn’t much of a mother to her, nor Dirk much of a father.”

  He came around to Vera’s side of the bed and crouched so he was at her eye level. “Why are summer nights so short?” he asked, smoothing back her hair. “When I’m with you, there are never enough hours. This is a topic that wants more discussion, and yet, I must away to my own room.”

  If he saw her tears, he was politely ignoring them.

  “We will talk more later. I believe I’ll start my day with a soaking bath.”

  He brushed his fingers over her brow, tucking a loose lock of hair behind her ear. “I’ve made you sore. Bad of me. I do apologize.”

  Vera was a trifle sore in intimate locations. That wasn’t why she wanted an excuse to linger in her bed rather than impersonate a cheerful woman at breakfast.

  “You’ll be leaving for London soon, won’t you?”

  Oak rose and appropriated Vera’s dressing gown, though it barely reached his calves. “I’ve done what I can with the older paintings, and they will earn you some coin. The nudes… I recognize the blond model, Vera. Hannah Stoltzfus still takes an occasional sitting and runs a political salon on Tuesday evenings. My brother Sycamore is among her acquaintances.”

  Vera sat up. “Is that a euphemism for something more intimate?”

  Oak brought her nightgown to her. “With Sycamore, one is better off not asking. He will reply with more honesty than any brother deserves, and he’ll do it in public. My point is, Miss Stoltzfus is semi-respectable. She could display at least two of the nudes without any negative reflection upon you, Dirk, or Catherine. She could sell them for you.”

  Vera rose and regarded the messy bed. After Oak left, she’d inspect the sheets and pillows for dark hairs and open more windows to air the room. She’d wash out the handkerchief crumpled on the bedside table and otherwise erase any evidence of Oak’s presence.

  Perhaps Dirk and Anna hadn’t been entirely wrong to rail against society’s conventions.

  “I’ll think about it,” she said. “The potential for coin is tempting, but if Dirk painted two nudes, people will speculate that he painted others, particularly given his relationship with Anna.” The total number of nudes came to eleven, and for some reason, that number bothered Vera.

  Oak took off the dressing gown and wrapped it around her shoulders. His warmth and scent enveloped her, a pleasant bit of consideration she doubted any other man in the whole of England showed his lover.

  “People speculate no matter how careful we are,” he replied, tugging the lapels together. “You might as well have the money, Vera, and it will be a goodly sum. Those are exquisite works of art.”

  Oak was an exquisite work of art, utterly unselfconscious of his nudity. Vera watched him dress, handing him this or that article of clothing, passing him sleeve buttons when he was once again in a country gentleman’s finery.

  “You did not answer my question,” she said. “When are you planning to leave?”

  He borrowed her hairbrush, but she took it from him and did the honors.

  “Are you eager to be rid of me?” he asked, smiling slightly.

  “No.” She set the brush on her vanity. To a casual observer crossing paths with Oak in the corridor, he was simply up and about early, dressed and ready for the day.

  He took her hands in his and drew her into his embrace. “I am not eager to go, truth be told. Alexander loved our ride yesterday. Catherine is taking to oils like a foal to spring grass. And the time I spend with you…”

  He kissed her brow and snuggled her close. Vera waited, waited for him to offer to stay through the winter, to paint away the months in his airy studio, to let London wait just a bit longer.

  She waited in vain. “Be off with you,” she said, stepping back and trying for a smile. “The sun will be up all too soon.” Though benighted London had sat on the banks of the Thames since Julius Caesar had been in nappies, and would likely blight the same location for centuries to come.

  “I’ve asked my brother to send along the traveling coach,” Oak said, “in order that I may safely transport your paintings. When the coach arrives, I’ll need a day or two to pack up, and then I’ll be on my way.”

  “I will miss you.”

  “And I will miss you. You must decide what to do with the nudes that remain here at Merlin Hall. I can return them to their hiding places, if you like.”

  “A sound course.”

  Awkwardness arose, a new and painful addition to Vera’s vocabulary of emotions where Oak was concerned. She had sense enough to know the awkwardness would get worse as the time for his departure drew nearer, so she busied herself belting her dressing gown.

  “I’ll likely miss breakfast,” she said. “And please do have a word with Alexander. He seems to trust you.”

  Oak’s expression said he knew he was being dismissed. He did not know that Vera was likely to climb back into bed and cry at length when he’d gone.

  “I’ll see you at luncheon.” He kissed her cheek and withdrew, closing the bedroom door softly.

  Vera did
dodge breakfast, and if the vicar and his wife hadn’t been on hand, she would have dodged luncheon too.

  Where was a meddling brother or two when a fellow needed sorting out? That Oak could miss Hawthorne’s fists, Valerian’s scathing common sense, Cam’s irreverence, or Casriel’s lordly oversimplifications was a rude shock.

  That he’d also miss Ash’s brooding questions and even Willow’s canine analogies suggested matters were beyond dire. Fortunately, the hour had come to instruct young Alexander, and for Oak, time out of doors was usually an effective tonic for low spirits.

  Though why should Oak’s spirits be low?

  “I would rather not ride today,” Alexander said when he emerged onto the back terrace. “If you don’t mind, sir, that is.”

  “Saddle-sore?” Oak asked, pushing away from the balustrade. The pain of new acquaintance with the saddle was often worst not the day after a ride, but the day following that.

  “Yes. That’s it. I am saddle-sore. Might we sketch Charles this afternoon?”

  Alexander never wanted to work in the house. Even on rainy days, the boy would rather sketch in the stable or sit bundled in a blanket beneath a porch overhang while discussing how light was affected by a cloud cover.

  “Let’s have a ramble,” Oak said. “Lunch with the vicar and his wife has left me needing to move about. We can finish up in the stables.” He had enjoyed the luncheon with the vicar, a jovial old fellow married to an equally cheerful wife. Oak also liked the time spent with Vera’s son, liked listening to how Alexander’s busy little mind made sense of the world.

  “I won’t be late again returning to the nursery, will I? A gentleman is punctual, sir.”

  Oak did not enjoy Alexander’s tendency to chronic fretfulness. “Is that more of Mr. Forester’s tripe?”

  Alexander’s gaze across the garden was oddly adult. “I am not to insult my elders.”

  Oak ruffled his hair. “I believe you just did, and rather deftly. Let’s see how the stream is getting on, shall we?”

  Alexander no longer trudged at Oak’s side, huffing and puffing, and in the usual course the boy no longer remained silent either. Today, he was both trudging and silent.

  “Alexander, if you were a small boy’s tutor, how would you go about the job?”

  “I wouldn’t. Tutoring is the worst post in the world. Mr. Forester says he must have committed some great sin against the universe to deserve the fate of teaching me.”

  From some window or other, Vera was doubtless watching Oak cross the back garden with her son. Oak wanted to turn and wave, to see her caught by the afternoon sunlight, to point her out to Alexander.

  He kept on walking. “But if you had to teach a young boy, a good little fellow, though without much education, how would you go about it?”

  Alexander tromped along in silence until they reached the gate at the foot of the garden. “I’d ask him what he likes to learn about and start there. If he likes horses, we’d learn about horses. If he likes books, we’d read books. If he’s fond of butterflies, then we’d study butterflies.”

  “What about Latin?”

  “Butterflies have Latin names, according to Miss Digg, and so a little boy who loves butterflies already has a reason to study his declensions, doesn’t he?”

  Alexander was very much his mother’s son. He was smarter and more sensible than he appeared, and also less confident than he should be.

  “Do you like butterflies, Alexander?”

  “Yes. They are ever so pretty, and they can fly anywhere they want to. Nobody traps a butterfly in a schoolroom. Nobody flogs a butterfly for being stupid.”

  What the hell? Oak took his time latching the gate closed. “Which one is your favorite?”

  “The green hairstreak can hide among the leaves. Nobody can see him unless he wants to be seen.”

  Worse and worse. “What about the Adonis blue or purple emperor?”

  “They are bright, and that makes them easy to catch. Some people stick pins in butterflies and collect the carcasses. I wouldn’t do that.”

  Oak wouldn’t do that either. “How do you study the butterfly well enough to draw him if you don’t collect a specimen to sketch?”

  They’d reached the gate by the stream. Alexander clambered over, waiting for Oak on the other side. Oak unlatched the gate and stepped through, then refastened the gate. On a different day, he would have vaulted the obstacle, but the morning’s discussion with Vera had stolen such ebullience.

  “If I wanted to draw a butterfly,” Alexander said, “I’d catch him in a glass jar and make sure he had leaves and whatnot to keep him comfortable. I’d sketch him as best I could, then I would thank him for his patience and let him go. Mr. Forester says talking to animals is a sign of a weak mind.”

  Mr. Forester is an idiot. “Well, then, my mind is complete mush, for I confide all of my troubles in Charles, and he has never given me bad advice. I’ve suggested to your mother that you should have a dog.”

  Alexander came to a halt. “A dog? For me? My own dog?”

  “I’ve written to my brother Willow, who raises dogs, in hopes of securing a canine companion for you. Willow not only speaks to dogs, he can hear their replies.”

  They had reached the stream, which in high summer was more of a soggy, meandering burn than a watercourse.

  “Nobody can hear a dog talk,” Alexander said, picking up a stick and pitching it into the slow-moving current. “That’s silly.”

  How many times had Oak’s brothers told him that drawing flowers was silly? “Do you know when Catherine is sad?”

  “Yes. She looks out of windows a lot and twiddles the ends of her hair. When Miss Digg scolds her for that, Catherine doesn’t care. If she pouts and makes faces when she’s scolded, she’s not sad, she’s in a taking.”

  The ground was too damp to sit on this close to the bog, so Oak perched on the log where he and Catherine had become acquainted.

  “You know when Catherine’s sad because you watch how she behaves. She doesn’t need to say, ‘I am sad,’ but you know. It’s like that with dogs and horses and all manner of things. Watch closely, and you can see what they aren’t saying.”

  He hoisted Alexander to sit beside him, though the boy jumped right back down. “Is that what you do, sir? You watch and study and see who people are?”

  “Something like that.” Oak pushed away from his makeshift bench, unwilling to deny Alexander more activity when the boy had so little time out of doors. “Let’s have a look at the bog, shall we?”

  “Do I have time, sir? We haven’t sketched Charles, and I must not be late.”

  I will find this boy a pocket watch when I’m in London and send it to him for a Christmas token. Though Christmas tokens were usually exchanged only between family and friends, and when Oak left Merlin Hall, his departure would be permanent.

  “We have time. What color would you use to paint the water, Alexander?”

  The child took to the question with his characteristic earnest enthusiasm. The peaty quality of the stream, the low summer volume, and the afternoon sunlight created hues of amber, burgundy, bronze, sable, and gold, and Oak was able to use those observations to point out that black in a painting was seldom truly black, just as white was usually not quite white.

  “And this stream flows under the bog?” Alexander asked, stopping on the edge of the path.

  “That’s hard to say. Sometimes, a quaking bog forms as a pond recedes or spreads; sometimes, we don’t know what created it or whether it’s more extensive in summer, spring, or fall.”

  “Or winter,” Alexander replied. “Bogs don’t always freeze just because you see ice. Mrs. Tansbury says bogs are never safe.”

  “Mrs. Tansbury is right. We’d best be getting back if we’re to say hello to Charlie.”

  Oak, much like his pupil, did not want to return to the house, did not want to explain to Catherine how to mix a carmine hue rather than scarlet or mulberry or strawberry. He wanted to find Vera and�
��

  And what?

  “Charlie’s coat has the same color brown as the peat water does when it’s in shade,” Alexander said as they approached the geldings’ paddock. “The sun gives him golden highlights too.”

  “Because we groomed him so thoroughly the other day, and he hasn’t yet found any mud to roll in.”

  Charles went on cropping the lush summer grass, indifferent to his observers. Oak was struck by the recollection that Charles did not like Town. If he wasn’t galloped—hard—every morning, he developed vices and became unruly. He was a country horse, but because he was the only horse Oak owned, into Town he would go.

  “If Charles rolls in the mud,” Alexander asked, climbing the fence rails, “do you beat him?”

  What in seven schoolroom purgatories could prompt such a question? “Of course not. Horses roll to itch their backs, to put dirt between them and the flies, and because it’s fun. Try it sometime. Get down and roll in the grass or roll down a hill, then get up and shake all over.”

  Alexander, perched on the top rail, was nearly eye to eye with Oak. “You are jesting. Mr. Forester says you frequently jest.”

  Oak wanted to grab this solemn little boy and show him how to roll down a hillside. Wanted to find him a few good climbing trees where he could have solitude when his little world needed pondering…

  Wanted to tickle him and hug him and toss him into the air… As Oak had been tickled, and hugged, and tossed.

  “I am not jesting when I say that I believe you should have a dog. Mr. Forester’s opinion on that subject doesn’t signify, so you need not air it with him. Come along.” He lifted Alexander off the fence rail and set him on his feet.

  “I am not to tell Mr. Forester that you might talk Mama into getting me a dog?”

  “You are not.”

  “Am I late, sir?”

  “No. Why?”

  “Because you are walking almost as fast as Mr. Forester walks.”

  Oak tossed Alexander into the air, then carried the boy piggyback to the garden.

  “If you were a dog,” Alexander said as Oak passed through the gate, “you would be telling me you were unhappy without speaking human words. Why are you unhappy, Mr. Dorning?”