lesson in manners. “If the flirtation is competently done, the lady can be sure that humorous banter has taken on harmlessly amorous undertones. If the flirtation is of the bumbling variety, the lady is left feeling uncertain, insulted, or angry. Did Tom Treeble try out his flirtations on you, Catherine?”
She set aside Forester’s portrait and opened her sketchbook to a clean page. “Something like that. The whole business strikes me as silly. Papa was a flirt, and you flirted with the Davies sisters after services. Everybody knows you don’t mean anything by it, so why flirt at all?”
The questions one half-grown female could ask… “I was merely passing the time with new acquaintances.” Oak considered what Catherine had not told him, considered the sketch, and considered the slight awkwardness between Catherine and her step-mother. “If a fellow’s attempts to flirt are unwelcome, Catherine, you simply tell him so.”
“Tell him he’s a bumbler? Are you much acquainted with young men, Mr. Dorning? They do not cope well with unflattering truths.”
I am a young man. Except in Catherine’s eyes, Oak was apparently among the doddering ancients.
“You say something along the lines of, ‘Mr. Treeble, I hope you aren’t attempting to flirt with me. I have no patience with that sort of foolishness, and I have always admired your great good sense.’” Oak had raised the pitch of his voice to a clipped falsetto, though, really, why should a young woman have to offer false flattery to get a fellow to desist with his melting glances and bad puns?
Catherine peered at him over the top of her sketch. “That is very good. I will practice saying that in the mirror. What if I want him to flirt?”
When had an art lesson become something else entirely? “Catherine, might you have this conversation with your mother?”
Her pencil moved more quickly over the page. “That’s twice you’ve referred to Step-mama as my mother. She’s not my mother, and while I love her and am grateful to her, I am not her daughter.”
“Is that what Miss Diggory tells you?”
“Yes. Aunt says the same thing. My mama was Papa’s muse, while I am his by-blow. Merlin Hall is not my home. I am here at Step-mama’s sufferance, and should she send me off into service as a governess,”—Catherine’s expression conveyed endless dread—“I will have nothing to say to it.”
Oak took the sketch of Forester and added some lines about the mouth and nose. “Catherine, Merlin Hall is most assuredly your home. Do you know why your step-mother is selling some of the older works?”
“Because they are cluttering up the attic.”
“Because she wants you to have a considerable dower portion. Because she wants to be able to afford finishing school for you.”
Catherine looked up, gaze narrowed. “Step-mama told you that?”
“She did. She has no use for the money herself, having a life estate here at Merlin Hall. The funds will go to assure your security.” And why the hell would Tamsin Diggory imply that Catherine was destined for a governess’s life?
“By-blows don’t go to finishing schools, Mr. Dorning.” Spoken in faintly amused, condescending tones.
“My beloved niece is a by-blow, and her mother was a tavern maid. Tabitha will start her second year at school in the autumn, and she’s having a grand time. We miss her very much at Dorning Hall.” Oak missed her very much. Casriel’s pining for his daughter went beyond mere missing. “You and she would get on famously.”
Though, of course, they’d never meet.
A beat of silence went by while Catherine’s pencil made short, sharp strokes on the paper. “Why do you want to go to London so badly?” she asked.
Oak had expected more questions about flirtation, or perhaps—this was an art lesson, at least in theory—a query about the differences between oils and watercolors.
“You wield your verbal arrows with the skill of an Amazon, Catherine Channing.” Oak put the last touches on Forester’s eyes. “I am bound for London because the Royal Academy is there, impressive commissions are more likely to be found there, and all the best exhibitions are held there.”
Financial independence lay in London, professional recognition, a commercial and aesthetic demand that Oak could supply. It wasn’t a stretch to say that Oak’s self-respect dwelled in the capital. Among his siblings, he was an oddity, an affectionately tolerated eccentric. Among fellow artists, he could maunder on about brushwork and light and balance, and they would maunder right back at him.
Catherine passed over the drawing she’d been working on, and it was not of