Page 14 of Portrait of a Lady
“Are you saying that it lacks emotion?” he prodded.
“That is exactly what I am saying. Looking at this, I get no sense of your connection to the scene or the people in it. This woman for example—”
He pointed toward the lady Hugh had placed at the center of the piece. Dancing in the arms of a lord with her rouged lips stretched into a smile, she wore the resplendent white dress reminiscent of a Greek goddess with a silver demi-mask cloaking the upper half of her face. Her eyes shone through the slits, glazed as if she were drunk off the revelry, hypnotized by the glamor of the masquerade while heedless to the goblin lurking in the shadows with its sights trained upon her.
“She is beautiful, the quintessential debutante,” Crosby went on. “But your point of view puts her out of my reach. I cannot sympathize with her, because I do not know her. I cannot love or hate her, because you’ve told me nothing about her beneath the facade of her beauty. And perhaps the vanity of her is purposeful, but the depiction of every face in this painting gives me nothing more than a surface-level view.”
Hugh bit his lip, seeing for himself that Crosby was right. His distance from thetonnow made him nothing more than a spectator and this scene proved that.
“Bloody hell,” he groaned, running a hand over his weary face.
Crosby chuckled and squeezed his shoulder. “Try not to take it too hard. If I did not think highly of you, I would not be so honest.”
“I know, and I thank you for it.”
“I am not saying that it isn’t a worthy piece, or that it isn’t good enough to be selected for the Exhibition. Truly, it is some of your best work. However, I have noticed a lack of poignancy in your pieces, and it is the one thing you need to stand head and shoulders above the others. If you are to become a portraitist, you must learn to capture the truth of a person on the canvas, you must paint not only their face and form, but their soul as well.”
Hugh wanted to assure Crosby he could do that, especially with a live subject to work with. But that would mean nothing when it came to this painting or the Exhibition. It meant nothing if he could not even manage to inject life into this particular piece.
“All is not lost,” Crosby assured him. “You’ve months until the Exhibition, time enough to ponder what you might do to give this painting what it needs to be more than good, more than technically perfect. Find something personal in it...find the thing that speaks to you and put it on this canvas for all the world to see.”
Determination gripped Hugh as his gaze wandered across his studio, to the pots of pigment and linseed oil, the freshly washed brushes just waiting to be used. He wanted to get back to this painting right away, work at it until he got it right. He would not go another year as an unrecognized student of art, unseen and unworthy. If it killed him, he would paint the perfect piece and it would change the course of his life forever.
But Crosby’s words required a time of reflection, so he would not touchVirtue and Viceagain until he figured out what it was missing. Until then, he would work on other paintings and sketches.
And draw another fifty sets of hands that looked as though a bloody child of three executed them,he added to himself.
Thus far, the people inVirtue and Viceresembled Biblical thieves, all their forearms ending in bald stumps. Those accursed hands were the last detail to add. Perhaps that was something he could work on while thinking over how to proceed.
“Thank you so much for coming and for your honesty.”
Crosby patted his round belly and smiled. “Dinner was delightful. Haven’t eaten a thing since morning, you know. When art and teaching begin to consume me, I can think of little else.”
It was the same for Hugh, who itched to paint even after he’d just told himself he must take the time to think. For now, he would find some other way to distract himself. Tomorrow night, he would enjoy the diversion of Evelyn and hope he would come to like her enough that being her courtesan would be more of a pleasure than a trial. If she were going to be his last, he’d want the experience to be enjoyable for them both.
Because, once his painting was displayed in the Exhibition, he’d have no reason to take another keeper, no reason to go on acting as a high-paid whore draped in satins and silks.
Chapter 3
“Tonight’s fancy dress masquerade at Vauxhall Gardens promises to be quite the diversion. I suspect this writer will witness enough salacious happenings to fill the pages of this paper for weeks to come!”
-The London Gossip,11 March 1819
Evelyn held Patience’s arm as they neared the entrance to Vauxhall Gardens through the proprietor’s house. She clung to her companion, trembling and fighting not to turn and flee—running as fast as her legs could carry her back to the bank of the Thames, where she would leap onto the first boat she encountered and beg to be taken back across. Hell, she might simply dive into the putrid waters and swim, not giving up until she trudged home, wet, panting, and sobbing like a lunatic.
But, if she turned around, she would find her way impeded by Joseph, who acted as their escort for the evening. Patience hadn’t offered much protest when Evelyn had insisted that it was not safe for them to attend the masquerade alone—no matter how easily propriety might fall to the wayside once they entered the gardens. She had heard horrid stories of murder, robbery, and all manner of crime taking place during these parties in the pleasure garden, but she felt comfort with the presence of Joseph as well as the pistol he concealed beneath his domino.
Though, once she had met Hugh, Evelyn supposed the two servants would wander off to enjoy the ball, leaving her alone with the man who would shortly become her lover. Based on the loaded glances being exchanged between Joseph and Patience, she’d wager they would disappear down the darkened paths at some point during the night. The two had tried to hide their blossoming romance from her, but Evelyn wasn’t blind. The staring, Joseph’s smiles and Patience’s giggles...they all pointed at what might become a full-fledged affair by the end of the night. The two made an adorable pair, with Joseph standing several inches taller than Patience, his dark hair a contrast to her fair locks.
Joseph seemed to take particular interest in Patience’s costume, which exposed her slender ankles as well as a good bit of bosom. They’d managed to find the only habit-warehouse in London whose supply of fancy dress and masks had not run completely dry. However, the pickings had been slim, forcing both women to settle for the best to be found amongst the leavings. The footman’s attire had been simple enough, as the typical uniform of hooded domino and mask proved enough to make him satisfactory. He looked quite dashing in it, the darkness of his hood and mask making his blue eyes stand out bright and clear.
Patience had been outfitted as a Dresden shepherdess, her waist tightly cinched into a corset beneath a stiff, burgundy brocade bodice, and her hips given added volume by the panniers she wore under a voluminous overskirt. The pink satin underskirt fell shorter than would be proper on any other night, with the ruffles of a white petticoat showing at the hem. Evelyn had helped her use curling tongs to create fat, sausage-like curls at her temples, which peeked out from behind the farcically large bonnet sitting atop her head, tied at her ear with a saucy pink ribbon. She held a staff with a crook at its end, adorned with more of the pink ribbon and a cluster of small flowers. A demi mask concealed the upper half of her face, with Patience’s rouged lips appeared fuller and more prominent beneath it.
She looked darling, and had giggled for several minutes upon looking at her reflection in the looking glass. They hadn’t even arrived at Vauxhall before Patience was declaring that this was, by far, the most fun she’d ever had in her life.
Evelyn scowled as she pulled her shawl tighter around her body, wishing she had been able to successfully talk Patience into lettingherattend as the shepherdess. The two women proved similar in size and height, and there had only been two costumes left which would fit that were not utterly ridiculous. There had been the shepherdess, and a wholly scandalous Grecian goddess getup that had made Evelyn blush just looking at it.
Patience would hear nothing of allowing Evelyn to meet Hugh dressed as a shepherdess.
