Fair Cyprians of London Boxset: Books 1-5: Five passionate Victorian Romances

by Beverley Oakley

  Lord Delmore had been absent at his Scottish estate the last time Crispin had inhabited the cottage, and he was glad of the company now.

  “I read a snippet in more than one newspaper that your painting was lauded a grand success. You’re sure you won’t mind if I wander over and see you at work in the morning? I shan’t frighten the girl?”

  “She’s less of a shrinking violet than she looks. I think she was very tired tonight. Her conversation is usually more diverting.” Crispin found himself defending Miss Montague even when he knew there was no need.

  “She doesn’t need to be capable of diverting conversation. She’s an angel merely to feast one’s eyes upon. Where did you find her? And how did you entice her up here when there’s so much going on in London?”

  Crispin shifted in his chair as he drained his glass. “Poor thing is penniless and jumped at the opportunity for a bit of publicity, to use the modern American jargon.”

  “Husband hunting. Naturally.” Lord Delmore smiled. “She’ll be snapped up before two months, I don’t doubt. That’s if you can resist her.” He looked thoughtful. “Though I’d imagine you’d prefer your company a little livelier.”

  “Oh, she’s sharp when she’s well rested. Sadly, she’s not in my scope. It’ll be at least two years before I’m in the market for a wife. If I’m to be swept away by any romantic inclinations earlier than that, the young lady will need to bring a good deal more to the transaction than Miss Montague, I’m sorry to say.” And he truly was sorry. Fortunately, matters had not yet got out of hand.

  “Ah, the dictates of the pocketbook. Perhaps your father has someone in mind? An exacting man. Well, my advice would be to follow your own path, not the one laid out by your father if it’s not what you want to do.” He pursed his lips as if contemplating something unpleasant. “It can lead to a lifetime of unhappiness—for both of you.”

  Crispin was surprised by his candour.

  At Crispin’s look of enquiry, he went on, “Yes, I speak from experience because I was pressured into a path not of my choosing. Oh, it’s not that I had great objections, but perhaps it was my passivity as a young man that caused a lifetime of regret. I agreed to my father’s proposal when, had I been older and wiser and in control of my future path, I’d have steered well clear of it.”

  “You were pushed into a profession you disliked?” Crispin felt somewhat doltish saying the words, but the long silence unnerved him. Surely, Lord Delmore wasn’t speaking of more intimate matters.

  “My marriage, dear boy. No, I had no profession to speak of. Not a good state of affairs, either.” Lord Delmore smiled ruefully. “I was pushed into a corner so that I had no choice but to make a declaration and then an offer that required me to follow through. It made neither of us happy. Poor Elsie has been gone many years, but it is to my eternal regret that I had not the strength of character to resist my father’s pressure that I make her an offer when I was so inadequately equipped to make her happy. Neither of us brought the other happiness. And what sort of a marriage is that?”

  “But you have two sons who have done you credit, and a daughter.” Crispin spoke weakly.

  “Indeed. A blessing and the greatest gift. Elsie said the same on her deathbed as she sought for something worthwhile to come out of being bound to someone so patently incompatible for nearly two decades. And two decades could be five in your case. Do not pledge your troth unless your heart is truly engaged. Don’t let your father be the one to dictate what will or won’t make you happy.”

  “Pleasing my father is satisfaction enough.” Crispin was unable to meet Lord Delmore’s eye. His father had always dominated him; he knew it. But now Crispin was leaving the country. In Germany, he could be his own man. He’d find fulfilment in his work and rise in the world through his own endeavours.

  “Perhaps for now.” Lord Delmore rose. “But your father won’t be around forever and then who will you have to please? A wife whom you don’t understand? Whom you don’t love?” He touched his breast. “Painting is your passion; I know that. I’m glad you have a week to indulge it. I hope it’ll be a reminder of how much else there is to indulge, and that indulgence is not a sin.”

  Chapter 14

  Faith rose the next morning with a sense of excitement and expectation. It was so unusual to feel something that wasn’t dull resignation, that she leapt out of bed and was smiling as she wrapped herself in her peignoir and threw open the casement window.

  The fresh morning air was a welcome and exhilarating slap in the face. Today was the start of a new chapter in her life. Today, Mr Westaway would begin the painting that would be the catalyst for so much. It could make him famous. He would be venerated; his ambition cemented, and Faith could slip away into her new life with the funds to exist in the modest, quiet fashion she desired.

  She went to her wardrobe and began to dress, pulling on the modest, swathed skirt that was fashionable but only just, due to the paucity of trimmings.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Lady Vernon stood in the doorway, her gaze critical and her nostrils twitching.

  “What does it look like?” Faith hadn’t meant to sound impertinent, but honestly!

  “The morning is fresh, and you want to pick some flowers in your nightdress. Put your peignoir back on and go outside. Mr Westaway will be watching from the casement; I assure you.”

  Faith rolled her eyes, but Lady Vernon was quick to snap. “You seem not to have the faintest idea as to how to wrap a gentleman around your little finger, girl! Do you want to succeed, or not?”

  Sighing, Faith did as she was bid. As she tied the loose, flimsy garment about her, she muttered, “I can’t imagine why you think you are better equipped to know how to entice a man. Have you ever received a letter purporting to a gentleman’s passionately beating heart or, better still, a marriage proposal? That is what Mrs Gedge requires, and it’s what I am always thinking of.”

  “I have received both, my girl, so I know very well how it is to be achieved. You have already thrown away your first opportunity, but you have been granted a reprieve. You have seven days. Seven days to achieve that letter or that marriage proposal. Otherwise, you are going back to Madame Chambon’s and to many gentlemen far less tolerant and thoughtful than Lord Harkom if you’re to continue to have a roof over your head. Where is your sense of urgency?”

  Faith ignored her, of course.

  A short while later, gathering a bunch of wildflowers that grew by the lake—in full view of Mr Westaway’s bedchamber window—Faith reflected on her chaperone’s chilling words. Seven days to achieve so much? Had she allowed herself to be carried away by confidence, again? Or was it fear, during the first week when she’d achieved precisely nothing?

  She’d sensed she couldn’t go too fast with Mr Westaway, but Mrs Gedge had always appeared so obliging during their afternoon tea sessions at Claridges, and Faith had been lulled into thinking she had all the time in the world to achieve what she had to. Not a paltry few days.

  Lord Harkom had disabused her of that notion.

  She rose slowly, enjoying the feel of the dew underfoot and the light breeze on her skin. As she turned back towards the house, a butterfly fluttered up from a nearby rose bush. She put her hand out and the delicate blue-winged insect hovered above it, finally landing on the flowers she held.

  Suddenly, she was five years old again, enjoying a bank holiday with her parents in the days when her father still smiled and there were not so many mouths to feed. She and her two sisters had their parents’ full attention as they picnicked with many other families enjoying a rare day off. The grass was soft and green; the sandwiches had never tasted so good, and nature was butterflies and blooming flowers—not vermin in the kitchen and mud underfoot picking stunted vegetables in the soggy garden.

  She closed her eyes against the pain of memories unbidden. She didn’t want to dredge up thoughts of her past. She had no past to call her own anymore. Her parents would have forgotten her long sin
ce. Perhaps the sisters closest in age, older and younger, would wonder what had happened to her, but it was best they never knew the truth—that Faith was a thief, according to her employer, who lived in a house of ill repute.

  Her sadness was momentary. She was stronger than that. She had to be if she were to crawl out of the mire and be something more. Something more than what others would paint her—a thief and a prostitute.

  But she had never been a thief, and she never would be a prostitute.

  Forcing her thoughts to the painting she headed towards the house, glancing briefly at the casement windows and wondering how Lady Vernon could claim to know so much about the way gentlemen’s minds worked.

  Crispin stared out through the casement window towards the small lake at the bottom of the field. A light mist rose above it, and wildflowers littered the soft green grass. The scene was enticing and even more so when a movement caught his eye.

  His breath caught. Miss Montague was gathering flowers still wearing her nightclothes. At least, only a light peignoir covered her nightdress, a thought which made him unexpectedly aroused.

  He quashed his feelings quickly. Inconvenient and impossible to act upon.

  Yet that didn’t mean he wouldn’t enjoy her company in the spirit of accommodation they’d tacitly agreed upon.

  In seven days, he would create a masterpiece, and he’d need her compliance. Nothing more than that. A pleasurable whiling away of the time could be anticipated. He knew already she was good company. Easy on the eye, as Lord Delmore had pointed out, but that didn’t imply Crispin would be unable to rein in the rampant impulses of a young man who hadn’t had a woman in his life for a very long time.

  His future was in Germany, and while his artistic temperament might suggest a romantic and spontaneous nature, he intended to be exacting when it came to choosing the right woman to spend the rest of his life with. He’d need to spend a great deal of time with her to ensure their minds were of one accord.

  He’d not act with reckless abandon and allow infatuation to have any bearing on his decision.

  Indeed, as his father counselled, it was far better to consolidate his career. In another year, perhaps, he might be better placed to put the necessary search for a wife near the top of his agenda. Not that Miss Montague was a contender, as he’d made clear to both the young lady and to Lord Delmore.

  So why did he have to keep reiterating it? He hesitated before he dragged his eyes away from the scene by the lake. She’d stopped as if a thought, compelling, but not pleasant judging by her stance, made her hesitate.

  He quashed the desire to quiz her when she returned. It was unwise to invite confidences. The less they delved into anything of a personal nature the better.

  But he must think like a painter, and a good painter had a sense of the essence of his subject matter.

  No point in wondering how he would paint her. The delivery of the props in an hour or so would determine that. For a moment, he cast his mind over to the brief. An eccentric American was behind the competition. Rockefeller? Rosenstein?

  Imagine painting a canvas that would hang upon one of the walls of their homes. The idea sent a thrill of excitement through him.

  Just as the sight of Miss Montague turning her lovely face up to the sun, smiling for a moment, sent a spear of foreboding through him.

  Her fate lay in his hands. He could craft a future for her that was more than being a wife to a no doubt appreciative, but almost assuredly impecunious, young clerk, or as an unpaid servant to aged parents or small children.

  He was roused by the sounds of gasps and oohs and aahs downstairs. So, the delivery was early. Not that he minded being put out of his anticipation. His mind couldn’t settle until he knew how he would stage the young woman.

  He hurried into the drawing room where a canvas bag lay upon the table. Around it stood Miss Montague, Lady Vernon, and the parlourmaid; all three of whom looked expectantly at him as he entered the room.

  So much for being the aloof master of this temporary household. But then, there had never been any secret that this moment was the beginning of everything.

  “I suppose there’s only one thing for me to do,” he said with a resigned grin at the company before he began to undo the ties.

  A piece of paper with neatly written instructions lay upon a set of paintbrushes he unwrapped from its canvas covering, and a bag of something whose contents he couldn’t quite identify.

  “Completely unnecessary. I have my own,” he muttered, but Lady Vernon was holding up one of the sable brushes and saying, “Perhaps this mystery person is signifying their knowledge of what is considered good quality in the art world. Or is that not true, Mr Westaway?”

  Crispin had to concede that the materials were of the finest quality and now that the entire set was laid out, his earlier scepticism had been replaced by a definite itching of the fingers to get started. As he bent to pick up a brush, he intercepted Miss Montague’s smile. She looked as excited as he felt. Yes, as if she relished what lay ahead as much as he wished she would if it were to be good.

  The painting. It was about the painting, of course, and she’d shown interest in art and culture, so they were on level ground in this instance.

  “Roses?” He picked up a handful of crimson petals that must have been picked within the last twenty-four hours, then looked at Miss Montague. “You’re more a wildflower girl, with your delicate colouring, I’d have said, but perhaps I’m mistaken and the richness of these deep-hued petals will bring out something I’d overlooked.” He was considering her as the inanimate subject of his talent, not the vibrant flesh and blood creature who fed his inspiration, but Crispin needed some distance.

  “And the title? What is the title of this painting?” Lady Vernon asked, picking up the paper with its instructions. The Lady of the Lake?” She looked from Faith to Mr Westaway. “I suppose you can interpret that any way you like, is that correct, Mr Westaway? Yet I am sure I’ve heard the title used before. However, you must use the props supplied, the instructions say. Water and red rose petals. It could be charming provided it doesn’t resemble a scene of carnage.”

  “What do you mean?” Miss Montague frowned at her chaperone who gave a theatrical shiver, replying in a whisper, “Blood!”

  Revulsion swept over Crispin, and he gripped the table edge to steady himself. These were not memories he could entertain if he were to do justice to the brief.

  Miss Montague raised her brows before remarking, “I’m sure I’ve heard about a painting called The Lady and the Lake. Do you know it, Mr Westaway?”

  The oil painting that featured a naked woman reclining on a rock had garnered a great deal of critical acclaim, and now Crispin found it was impossible not to look at Miss Montague and imagine what she looked like with no clothes on, reclining on a rock or, in this case, floating in a lake. He swallowed and stepped behind the table, saying, “Perhaps you’re mistaking it for John Waterhouse’s The Lady of Shalott.” Before she could contradict this with some incisive remark that she was sure she was not thinking about that painting, because Miss Montague’s mind was as sharp as a needle, he found himself taking her by the wrist and pulling her into the light by the window saying, in a contemplative, artist’s manner, “So many possibilities, but what would be best in this instance? A lake? I hadn’t thought there might be logistical difficulties.”

  Lady Vernon’s nose crinkled as she stared through the window at the body of water in the distance. “Not especially appropriate with the reeds and ducks and mud and approaching storm clouds. I hope you don’t mean to drown poor Miss Montague for the sake of your art. Can she even swim?”

  “I can’t swim.” Miss Montague shook her head. “But I can lie in a bath, and you could paint in a background afterwards.”

  Faith had been told by Lady Vernon that this is what she must suggest. She supposed Lady Vernon thought that having Faith wearing diaphanous wet clothing might somehow entice Mr Westaway more thoroughly than otherw
ise. An outside body of water would have done just as well, but it was true that the weather was deteriorating while a bath would be heated. Not that Lady Vernon would have been thinking of Faith’s comfort.

  Regardless of the motive, Faith was now experiencing her first pangs of self-doubt. Mr Westaway still didn’t look at her as if he couldn’t live without her. His scrutiny was decidedly painterly in an objective, distanced way. He had enough self-control that he’d buried his initial admiration beneath a veneer, possibly something much thicker than that even, of objectivity.

  But he was a diplomat, after all. He needed to hide his emotions, so perhaps his real feelings were very different.

  She continued to study him as he looked into her face, while she tried to read behind the mild interest in his expression. His interest seemed to be motivated by nothing more than where she should be posed and in what clothes.

  “I daresay that would work,” he said as the first raindrops hit the windows. He smiled. “No, this weather is hardly conducive to outdoors painting, after all.”

  “A bath,” announced Lady Vernon. “A heated bath for we don’t want Miss Montague to catch her death of cold.” Faith could read very clearly the gleam in Lady Vernon’s eye. No, her concern was far from Faith’s comfort. She wanted to control the situation as best she could. She had something planned; Faith was sure of it. Especially when the old woman said, “I have an idea, if you’ll permit me, Mr Westaway. May I be so bold as to prepare my young charge in what surely must be the only fashion that can be suggested by the props provided?”

  What could Mr Westaway do? Faith smiled at the pained look that crossed his face. As she turned to follow in her chaperone’s wake, she quirked her mouth in a rueful smile, whispering as she passed him, “See what I have to put up with every day, Mr Westaway! If you let her have her way today, you can paint me however you choose later.”

  When he winked at her, Faith felt a ridiculous jolt of pleasure. For a brief moment they were in collusion, and Lady Vernon was the common enemy.