Ophelia's Muse

by Rita Cameron

  Lizzie drew herself up and turned from her father. “Then I’ll go,” she said, her voice breaking. “I have no other choice. I can’t be parted from him.”

  Her mother reached out a hand to hold her back, but Lizzie brushed past her. If she lingered a moment more, she would lose her courage, and she could not be separated from Rossetti, not now.

  She ran through the streets, hardly seeing where she was going. Her thoughts circled around each other: She loved him, she must go to him; he loved her, he would do right by her. She’d given up everything—her position at the shop, her good reputation, even her family—but she had his proposal, and his promise. Still, the fear that she would be no more welcome at his studio than she was at her father’s house plagued her all the way to Chatham Place. She stopped to take a steadying draught of her laudanum, but its effect was not as strong as it had been at first, and by the time she arrived at Rossetti’s door her hands shook with nerves.

  But she was wrong to worry, for he greeted her tenderly. He was moved by her distress, and blamed himself for being the cause of her trouble. Faced with the trembling girl before him, it was easy to assure her that the studio was as much her home as his. “Don’t worry,” he said. “You will stay here as my pupil. Until, of course, we can have the great happiness of announcing our engagement.”

  “You’ve made the forearms too long,” Rossetti said, looking over Lizzie’s shoulder at a half-finished oil painting. He made a few quick marks, correcting her proportions. “But the head looks better, and the draping of the clothing is excellent.”

  The picture was giving her trouble. Drawing in pencil was one thing, but painting in oil was quite another. It was easy to get lost in the problems of color, and forget something else, like proper perspective. Still, even she could see that her work had made a marked improvement since Rossetti began to teach her in earnest.

  He watched as she reworked the figure. “Much better. You’ll be submitting to the exhibitions before long if you keep it up.”

  Lizzie shook her head dismissively. His enthusiasm was out of proportion to the slow progress that she made on the canvas. It was so frustrating—she had so much to express, but her hands lacked the skill to bring her thoughts to life. It would take years of training to accomplish anything of merit. And she had wasted so much time sewing bonnets while Rossetti and the rest were hard at work learning their craft.

  Rossetti sensed her agitation. “Are you tired? Perhaps you’re working too hard. Why don’t we get some fresh air? I need to go round to the shop for new brushes. Come with me.”

  “You’re sweet to worry, but I’d rather keep working.” Lizzie tried not to look at Rossetti’s nearly blank canvas on the easel by the window. He was sensitive enough about it to see even a curious glance as a reproach. In the months since she had come to live with him, he hadn’t finished a single picture in oil, and now that spring was nearly upon them again, he would have to rush if he wanted to submit to the exhibitions. He had been particularly touchy about his lack of progress since Holman Hunt had started shipping home stacks of finished paintings from Jerusalem.

  “I won’t be long. When I get back, we’ll have tea.”

  Rossetti was gone for only a few moments when Lizzie heard someone on the landing. She thought that he must have forgotten something, and she went to the door to see what he needed.

  But instead of Rossetti, she was greeted by a tall man lounging against the bannister. “Mr. Ruskin!” Lizzie said, recognizing Rossetti’s patron. “I didn’t know that Dante was expecting you! I’m afraid that he’s just gone out, but I expect him back very soon. Won’t you come in?”

  “Thank you,” Ruskin said, following her into the studio. He looked at her with the eye of a practiced appraiser of beauty. “It’s been too long since we last met. And I always see you in a crowd, surrounded by admirers. I’m glad to find you here alone.”

  “I’m afraid that I am rarely in a crowd these days. My health keeps me from going out very much, and my work keeps me here, toiling away over my poor sketches.”

  “I was sorry to hear of your ill health. But surely you have Dante for company? I should hate to think of someone so lovely being lonely.”

  “Yes, of course, I have Dante.” She colored slightly. “Though he cannot be expected to always be at my side.” Then, feeling that there was a plaintive quality to her voice that she didn’t like, she added, “He has, however, been very attentive to my painting lessons.”

  “He told me you were making progress. I believe that the word genius may have been bandied about.” Ruskin smiled as he said this, and Lizzie couldn’t tell whether he was serious or joking. He picked up a pile of her sketches that lay on the table. “May I?”

  “Oh, no. I’m afraid that Dante was kidding with you. I’m hardly a genius, though I do believe that I study under one.”

  “Dante is a genius, I’m certain of it,” Ruskin agreed. “Now, if only I could convince the British public of what you and I see so clearly. But they are coming around, bit by bit. I’m no longer the only critic standing behind this Brotherhood of his. I really must be careful, or I’ll no longer be able to get his paintings at such a good price!”

  “Dante is not a man who would forget his friends,” Lizzie said quickly. She didn’t want Ruskin to know that he still had little competition for Rossetti’s works, or at least those that were not commissioned. Though his paintings had lately had more interest, Ruskin was still by far the wealthiest and most enthusiastic patron that Rossetti had found.

  “But enough about Dante.” Ruskin turned to Lizzie’s easel. “He’s spoken to me about you at length, and I’m afraid that I won’t be put off of seeing your work.”

  Lizzie hesitated only briefly. She was intimidated, but Ruskin’s kindness put her at ease. There was something about him that was so sad and serious; she instantly felt that she could trust him.

  Ruskin studied the oil painting on the easel, and then began to page through her sketches, idly at first, and then with more interest. He was fully absorbed in looking at them when Rossetti banged into the studio. He swept Lizzie up into a kiss before he realized that Ruskin was in the room. Lizzie pulled back, embarrassed, but Rossetti only laughed.

  “John!” he said, walking over to shake hands. “I’m glad you came. I’ve got a few new watercolors that I think you’ll like. Has my Lizzie kept you entertained?”

  “Indeed she has. It was a lovely surprise to find her here, and to finally see her drawings. You weren’t wrong—they show real talent. Technically, they are sufficient. But the genius is in the style of them. They’re so emotional, almost primitive. A talented paintress is a rare bird, Dante. You were lucky to catch her.”

  Rossetti slipped his arm around her waist and beamed. “She’s beginning to work in both watercolors and oils. I have a little plan for her to do some illustrations for my sister Christina’s new poems.”

  This was the first that Lizzie had heard of this plan, and she was thrilled. If he hoped that she might work with his sister, he must at last be thinking of introducing her to his family.

  “Is that right?” Ruskin asked, looking more intently at Lizzie’s drawings.

  “Lizzie,” Rossetti said. “Be a dear and fetch us some tea, will you? I want to show John the new watercolors.”

  Ruskin looked up from the drawings, amused. “You would send the Princess Ida for the tea tray?”

  “The Princess Ida?”

  “Is your Miss Siddal not the very image of Tennyson’s Ida? ‘Such eyes were in her head, and so much grace and power, breathing down, from over her arched brows.’ ”

  “By God, she is. But I’ve never come across a lady of poetry who was not the image of my dear Lizzie.”

  “You flatter me too much,” Lizzie said, laughing. “I’ll go for the tea tray before there’s a duel on my account.”

  When she returned with the tea things Rossetti and Ruskin were deep in conversation over his watercolors. Rossetti looked content a
nd she thought that Ruskin must have agreed to take them at a good price. She brewed the tea and they sat down as best they could in the irregular surroundings of the studio, drawing up chairs to one of the worktables and pushing the painting tools aside to make room for cups and saucers.

  The three talked as if they were old friends, and Ruskin was particularly solicitous of Lizzie’s opinions. But he made no more mention of her drawings, and she began to think that he had complimented them only out of kindness. He could hardly have said otherwise, after all, with her standing right there. She felt foolish for thinking that a great critic such as John Ruskin could be interested in her own poor work. She was surely nothing more to him than Rossetti’s lover, to be petted and treated kindly out of deference to his friend.

  She consoled herself, however, with the news that she would soon meet Rossetti’s sister. Even if his plans for her illustrations should come to nothing, it would at least give her a chance to be introduced to his family, as she should have been long ago. No understanding between them, no matter how many times it was sworn to in private, could be depended upon until she had been welcomed by his family.

  Rossetti was as good as his word. The first week of May they swept the studio clean of its dust, bought fancy tea and biscuits, and displayed Lizzie’s sketches on the walls to their best advantage. Lizzie donned a demure blue dress, tied her hair back, and waited nervously for the arrival of Christina Rossetti.

  Lizzie was determined to make a good impression. She was anxious to move forward with their marriage, but whenever she pressed Rossetti to set a date, he always had some excuse as to why the time was not quite right. Soon, he said, soon. But she was tired of waiting, and she hoped that a successful introduction to his sister would reassure Rossetti that she would be welcomed by his family. He would never say it aloud to her, but she knew that he worried that she wasn’t refined enough for his mother. Lizzie hoped that if Christina liked her, Rossetti would take her to meet his mother next.

  Christina entered the studio on Rossetti’s arm, her back as straight as an arrow and her dark eyes inscrutable. Her face was already familiar to Lizzie—Christina’s high cheekbones and strong brow peered out from many of Rossetti’s early paintings. She had modeled for his painting of the Virgin Mary, and Lizzie thought that Christina carried herself with an air of calm superiority that would have befitted that sainted lady herself.

  Lizzie stepped forward and embraced Christina with affection. “Welcome, Miss Rossetti. I am so glad to meet you at last. I hope that we will be great friends. I admire your poetry very much.”

  Christina leaned into Lizzie’s embrace stiffly and made a small smile that did not extend to her eyes. “I’m pleased to meet you, as well,” she said, not sounding at all pleased. “Dante has told us so much about you, and about your interesting history.”

  Lizzie colored, thinking that Christina was not at all what she had expected of a poetess. She seemed instead like a very cross abbess, with none of the flairs of dress or manners that Lizzie associated with artists. She swallowed hard and kept her smile pasted on her face. She was determined to win Christina’s approval, and she would not be put off by a few icy words. “Will you have some tea? I’ve prepared everything myself.”

  Rossetti joined them at the table and they sat down to eat. Lizzie poured out the cups of tea and passed around the cakes, very conscious that she was being watched, and judged.

  “You manage everything so well,” Christina said. “Considering that you have so little to work with.”

  Both women were now staring at each other with frozen smiles, that feminine armor for the battlefield of the tea table. Lizzie could see that Christina was not prepared to give her an inch. She turned to Rossetti for help, but he was oblivious to the silence that had settled over the table.

  Lizzie groped around for a neutral topic. “You’re engaged, I believe, to the painter James Collinson? I know that Dante admires his work very much.”

  Christina blushed and Rossetti cleared his throat. “I’m afraid that the engagement has been broken off. Terrible of course, but probably for the best.”

  Lizzie was mortified. She couldn’t believe that Rossetti hadn’t shared this news with her. She felt keenly how cut off she was from his family, how little she really knew about them.

  When Lizzie said nothing, Christina took pity on her. “My work has been a great consolation to me, of course.”

  “Of course,” Lizzie murmured, thinking that her own work had lately been a consolation as well—something to keep her mind from dwelling constantly on what Rossetti was really thinking, or whether his attentions were engaged elsewhere.

  Christina seemed to follow Lizzie’s thoughts, and for a moment the hard lines of her face softened. She looked around the studio, at the many sketches of Lizzie that lined the walls, and then down at Lizzie’s hands, and her bare finger. She let just the hint of a sympathetic smile pull at the corner of her lips.

  Lizzie smiled back, but as soon as it had begun, the moment was over. The sympathy passed from Christina’s face, and coldness once again dropped over her features like a mask. They sat in silence for another moment before Rossetti finally noticed that the conversation was lagging.

  “Christina, why don’t I show you some of Lizzie’s work? She’s a very apt student, and she’s done some excellent illustrations from Wordsworth and Tennyson. You’ll see, I think, that she has a real gift for capturing the nature of a poem on the canvas. As I mentioned in my note, I think she might be just the person to illustrate your new poems. And I know that Lizzie would devote herself to the project—her dedication can be much greater than my own, I’m afraid.”

  “Dante, we do so hate to see you waste so much of your time with trifles when you should be painting.” She glanced over at Lizzie, who remained at the table, silently fuming.

  Rossetti didn’t seem to notice the slight. He was used to being worried over by his sister and mother, and he hardly heard their admonishments anymore. He gave Christina his arm as he showed her around the studio.

  Christina glanced over at the wall where Rossetti’s sketches were pinned up. A hundred drawings of Lizzie stared back. She raised her eyebrows and sighed, then moved on to look over Lizzie’s drawings. Lizzie heard her turn to her brother and say, “She has real talent, but the style is crude,” as if Lizzie weren’t standing right there. But Lizzie seized on it as an opening.

  “It would be an honor to illustrate for you. Would it be possible for me to see your new poems, to get a feel for the work?”

  Christina turned to Lizzie as if she had, in fact, forgotten that Lizzie was present. “They aren’t yet ready to be seen.” Then she looked back at Rossetti, and her tone warmed as she addressed her brother. “I’ve been doing a little painting of my own, you know. I have a mind to do the illustrations myself. Miss Siddal is not the only woman, after all, who can be taught to paint.”

  “Is that so?” Rossetti asked. “Well, that’s grand, but you must be careful not to rival dear Lizzie, but to keep within respectful limits! No, Christina, I think that you’d better stick to poetry, and awe us with your words alone.” He laughed, thinking it a joke, but both women were now looking stonily at their feet.

  “Perhaps you should come home for a visit, and you can judge my work for yourself. And of course Mother would love to see you. She longs for your company.” Christina gathered her shawl up and wrapped it around her shoulders. “As for myself, I must be on my way.” She turned to Lizzie. “It was so lovely to meet you.” She did not, Lizzie noticed, extend the invitation to visit to Lizzie, and Lizzie thought longingly of her own sister, Lydia, whom she hadn’t seen in months. She wondered how her mother was managing, and whether Lydia had ever been able to repair things with Robert Crane after Lizzie’s scandalous departure. The thought filled her eyes with tears, but she held them back, not wanting Christina to think that it was her coldness that had upset Lizzie.

  “How does Tuesday sound?” Rossetti was sayin
g to Christina. “You can expect me for lunch,” Rossetti promised, kissing his sister on the cheek and showing her to the door. He made no mention of Lizzie joining them, either.

  When Christina had gone, he turned to Lizzie and said, “Well, I think that went well.”

  Lizzie paused and turned to look at him, to assure herself that he did not jest. “Did you?” Lizzie knew that there was nothing to be gained in picking a fight with Rossetti, but she couldn’t hide her disappointment. “Dante, your sister barely said a civil word to me! It’s obvious that she thinks you’re wasting your time, and that I’m a detriment to your work. And how could you have failed to tell me that her engagement was broken off? It was humiliating.”

  Rossetti laughed uncomfortably. “I’m sorry you felt that way. But you shouldn’t be so sensitive. Christina is no different from the other artists we know—she’s very serious, and not given to pleasantries and small talk. I’m sure that she meant nothing by it.”

  “And why,” Lizzie asked, finally posing the question that really bothered her, “didn’t you introduce me to her as your betrothed? Why must there be this secrecy about our engagement? It’s been almost a year since you asked me, Dante, and we haven’t told a soul.”

  “Lizzie,” Rossetti sighed, exasperated. “I’ve told you, the time just isn’t right. I couldn’t very well tell my sister without telling my mother. And once we announce our intentions to our families, they will want us wed as soon as possible. You know how mothers are.”

  “And what’s wrong with that? Why shouldn’t we marry as soon as possible?”

  “I just need more time, Lizzie. I have so much more that I want to accomplish with my painting before I settle down into married life. Why should we spoil this idyll? We have everything we need right here—a place to work, each other, a few willing buyers to keep us in canvases and paint. We can do what we like and go where we please. And you are just beginning your own career. Why should you wish to take on the duties and obligations of a household when you can instead paint and create and be free? Let’s not leave this Eden just yet, Lizzie. There is time for all that later.”