A Lady's Dream Come True - Grace Burrowes Page 0,33
older sister explained this to me, because I was mystified as to why Papa always traveled in high summer when Dorning Hall was at its most beautiful. He’d often take one of us children and disappear to the Lakes or go poking along the Devon coast. He pretended these were botanical excursions, and they were, but he was also dodging sad memories.”
A sense approaching vertigo assailed Vera, though she was on a comfy cushion in her own sunny parlor. “Dirk died in midsummer. He wasn’t ill for long, and like your father’s first wife, he declined rapidly. Would a boy who lost his father at the age of three even grasp what time of year the death occurred?”
“Of course, though the child might not be able to tell you why he’s in a brown study at that same time of year. Get him a dog,” Oak said, holding up his plate for more biscuits. “A pup will take him out of the house and possibly get him out of the doldrums.”
This time, Vera didn’t let her fingers touch his. “A dog, not a pony?”
“A pony would necessitate more instruction, and I gather Alexander is getting a bellyful of that just now. Will Mr. Forester take a holiday at any point?”
“Not until Yuletide, when he calls upon his uncle in London.”
Oak stole a biscuit off Vera’s plate, though she’d served him two more on his own plate. “My riding horse should arrive when my supplies do, tomorrow or the next day. I’ll take Alexander up before me a time or two, and you’ll know if he has an aptitude for the saddle. Most children seem to, given a decent mount.”
“That is kind of you.” Vera regarded her empty plate, then regarded the man who’d purloined her biscuit. “Why did you steal my sweet?”
He took a bite of that biscuit, and watching him devour it stirred an odd feeling in Vera’s belly.
“Because, Vera Channing, you’ve ignored my every touch and smile. I’d descend to winking and ribald innuendo, except that you’re worried for your son, and I am not a randy youth.”
“You’re not?”
“I’m a randy adult male.” He finished the biscuit and dusted his hands over his plate. “At least, I seem to be prone to randy-ness around you.”
And now Vera was fascinated with his hands, which would never do. She took one of his biscuits and broke it in half, then brushed at her bodice as if to dust the crumbs away.
“Randy-ness can be a sore affliction,” she said, smiling blandly. “Tell me what you think of the paintings to be restored.”
A pause followed, a bit goggling on his part, pleased on Vera’s. Alexander’s situation was troubling, but Oak Dorning had provided a reasonable explanation for that.
“Come with me to the gallery,” he said, rising. “I’ll show you what I’ve found.”
“Did you find treasures, Mr. Dorning?”
“Possibly, or a clue to where the treasures might be hiding.”
Artists, for all they might live a life ruled by creativity, had to develop a sense of composition if they were to paint successfully. Within any one frame, colors, shapes, intensities of light, themes, and symbols all had to balance, to come together in a pleasing, well-thought-out impression. The whole had to work as an image, as a message.
Oak had fallen asleep struggling to solve the riddle of the composition that was Dirk Channing’s personal gallery. Whatever Dirk’s message had been, Oak could not divine it. The paintings made no sense as a grouping, and many of them made little sense as individual renderings.
Channing had been noted for always creating his works in series, but his gallery was a hodgepodge, no two paintings belonging together.
“I went back to our young mother,” he said, coming to a halt before the frame. “I asked myself why Dirk Channing, who was an exceptionally sophisticated producer and consumer of art, would have a painting like this in his collection. The image is historically inaccurate, the subjects are mundane, the brushwork pedestrian. Nothing about this work impresses, except as a painting that in every way falls short.”
Vera stood beside him, frowning at the lady and her two children. “You’re saying an amateur could have done this?”
“Exactly. Why would Dirk not only keep a work this unimpressive, but also display it?”
“Because they look happy?”
Well, hell and damnation. Vera sounded so wistful as she posed that suggestion.
“I’ll paint you all the happy parlor pieces you want, madam, but I suspect Dirk hung this work because it is such a clearly inferior effort. I’ve