A Lady's Dream Come True - Grace Burrowes Page 0,19

than the lower floor had been. “Dirk felt strongly about it. People were forever asking him to do a little sketch or render a quick impression, as if his art were a parlor trick. His charm was useful then. He’d gently point out that even as a boy doing tavern caricatures, he’d expected to be paid for his work.”

“I am not much of one for charm.”

“Yes, you are.” She stopped before the door to his apartment. “You charmed Catherine. She needs to know that not all men are as flippant and glib as Jeremy. He’s quite bright in some ways, but a complete dunderhead at times.”

Oak opened the door. “Aren’t we all a bit foolish, at times?” He was, in fact, feeling a trifle dunderheaded himself where his hostess was concerned. He liked being able to nudge aside her sheer physical beauty to see the devoted step-mother and loyal widow, the pragmatic head of Merlin Hall’s household.

And Forester was a bit of a dunderhead. Miss Diggory seemed to be of the same opinion, if her faint smiles and patient silences were any indication.

“What did you make of Dirk’s gallery pieces?” Mrs. Channing set the lamp down on the desk and poked some air into the fire burning low in the hearth. The task was both entirely mundane and—when she did it—the epitome of domestic grace.

“Dirk Channing was well known for painting in series,” Oak replied, using the flame from the lantern to light a branch of three candles. “I cannot for the life of me organize what’s in that gallery into groups of series or even a coherent collection. It’s an interesting conundrum.” He set the candelabra on the mantel and turned to find Mrs. Channing regarding him.

“Interesting, as in why would a successful artist collect such trash?”

“Not trash, but not great works either. I spent most of today simply cataloging the gallery’s contents, trying to find common threads or themes—and seeing none. Your late husband’s tastes were varied and broad.”

Oak had closed the door out of habit. Conserving heat was a priority in most households, and Mrs. Channing was a widow, not a sheltered young lady whose reputation determined her fate. Then too, she had mentioned wages, and that discussion ought to be conducted privately.

“Most of Dirk’s friends considered me an example of his eclectic tastes in action,” Mrs. Channing said, rearranging the decanters on the sideboard in order of how full they were. “I was neither a highly regarded courtesan, as Catherine’s mother was, nor an heiress, nor connected to a titled or artistic family. I had little understanding of art, in fact, though Dirk addressed that lack. I don’t know what he saw in me, and his friends were surely puzzled as well.”

She spoke not as a woman who desperately missed her husband, but as somebody frustrated with a puzzle that should have a simple solution.

“On all sides,” Oak said, “Dirk Channing was treated as the great artist, the visionary who shed light on the struggles that inspired the Irish Rebellion. He was the brilliant mind that held the Americans up as standing for John Bull’s values more effectively than we English have ourselves. He did this amid controversy, of course, amid both criticism and acclaim. To have the honest regard of a woman who wasn’t distracted by all that noise was likely a precious boon.” A relief, even.

“He married me because I was a pretty girl and easily overawed.” Mrs. Channing spoke with more asperity than Oak had heard from her previously. “More than one of his acquaintances made sure I knew that.”

Oak crossed the sitting room to face her directly. “You are wrong, Mrs. Channing, and his friends were jealous of you. I promise you that Dirk Channing had the company of as many pretty women as he chose. Some of those ladies had the means to pay him to paint their portraits. Others were happy to remove all of their clothing for his artistic pleasure—or so the tale usually begins. Successful painters are besieged with the female form in all its glory and fascination. Dirk needn’t have married beauty to have it on hand every waking and sleeping hour.”

Had she never considered how much time the average artist spent in the company of models and actresses? Never wondered why most studios were equipped with at least a chaise?

“Has your artistic education exposed you to the female form in all its glory and fascination, Mr. Dorning?”

“My own masculine curiosity did that, but yes, I’ve spent