A Lady's Dream Come True - Grace Burrowes Page 0,7
the right foot with Jeremy Forester. “Are nice women a rarity here in Hampshire? We have some in Dorset, and my brothers have a knack for marrying nice women.”
Forester pulled a face. “I realized before completing my first year at university that to be a fortune hunter takes some means. One must have lodgings, decent attire, and belong to a club or two. My uncle paid for my education, he wasn’t about to pay for me to idle around Town, dangling after women who could buy and sell my family forty times over. I saw the pretty ladies in their fine carriages every afternoon in Hyde Park, and they had no time for me. The local widowers and swains would dote on Mrs. Channing even were she a shrew, but she’s not.”
She also hadn’t remarried, which struck Oak as curious. “Do you suppose she’d allow me to paint her portrait?”
“Ah, so that’s your interest. Makes sense.” Forester swirled his tea, nodding as sagaciously as if he were some sort of professional tea taster employed by Twinings to perfect their blends. “You’d have to ask her. Catch her in the right mood, and she might allow it. Be charming and winsome, though she’s not much for outright flirtation. Miss Diggory warned me about that. Still, getting Verity Channing to sit for you would be quite a coup, and a man can but try, right?”
Oak left Forester sorting through the remaining cinnamon buns, looking for the largest of the lot no doubt.
A portrait of Verity Channing, done right, could launch Oak’s career. She was stunning, complicated, somewhat familiar to the artistic community as Dirk Channing’s widow, and as far as Oak knew, nobody had done her portrait yet. He could submit the finished painting for inclusion in the Academy’s annual exhibition, and if chosen, paying commissions would be sure to follow.
He was halfway to the front door, hoping to locate Bracken, when it occurred to him that he hadn’t asked Mrs. Channing about last evening’s intruder in his rooms, nor had she mentioned the incident. Did she think Oak had gone larking up the corridor in nothing but a towel for the pleasure of taking the evening air?
Exactly how mercurial had Dirk Channing been, and why hadn’t he ever painted his lovely wife’s portrait?
“But what do we know of this widow?” Grey Dorning, Earl of Casriel, asked. “Who are her people, and why did Oak hare off to restore her paintings when he could have whiled away his summer here, amid the home vistas of Dorsetshire?”
Valerian Dorning poured his oldest brother two fingers of brandy, though afternoon had not yet yielded to evening. Clouds to the north promised rain, which meant Valerian needed to be on his way.
First, his lordly brother required sorting out. “Oak has painted every vista Dorning Hall has to offer,” Valerian said, passing Casriel the half-full glass. “You told the lot of us to go forth and make our way in the world. Oak is an artist. He’s making his way.”
Casriel, mannerly to his bones, waited until Valerian had filled his own glass. “To the health of our ladies.”
Valerian lifted his drink a few inches. “To the health of our ladies.” Emily, his wife, was a blessing recently added to his life, and he looked forward to ending his day in her company. “Oak found this job on his own, and I suggest we leave him to it.”
Casriel prowled over to the library desk, a massive expanse of carved mahogany that could have done service as an altar for pagan sacrifices.
“But why a job restoring paintings?” Casriel asked, taking the wing chair behind the desk. “Oak is an artist. Artists create, particularly if they want the notice of the Royal Academy and the lucrative commissions that follow therefrom. This is good brandy.”
“Sycamore sent me a case as a wedding present,” Valerian said, getting comfortable on a window seat. “I passed along two bottles to the Hall.”
Casriel scowled and held his drink under the lordly beak. “Sycamore is a case in point. He wanted to be a man-about-town, so he acquired a club, and now his days are spent man-about-towning. If Oak is an artist, he ought to be artist-ing. Setting up his easel in Hyde Park, ingratiating himself with wealthy cits, advertising his skills. Not banishing himself to bedamned Hampshire so some crotchety old beldame can begrudge him his wages.”
“We don’t know if she’s a crotchety old beldame or a young merry widow, Casriel. A concerned patriarch might