A-Splendid-Ruin(36)

He took his time over the pages, studying them intently, no doubt finding every flaw. I would almost have preferred that he look through it quickly and decisively, putting a quick end to my nerves.

Finally he glanced up. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m very nervous.”

“Why should you be? These are very good. You’ve a fine eye. I like this one especially.” He flipped to the library that Goldie had said needed statues. “And this.” A dark-paneled dining room with a contrasting wooden floor laid in a radiating pattern. It had been a chromo of a winter scene that had given me the idea. I didn’t remember the rest of the picture that had so captured me, only the ice-covered pond glowing against a stormy winter sky. “Really there are too many to choose from.”

It didn’t seem possible that he might think it. I waited for the but. But there should be more statues. But the wall color is wrong. But, but, but . . .

He said, “Where did you learn this?”

“I didn’t. Well, I had a book of watercolors, so I suppose it was that.”

“No book taught you how to do this. You never had a lesson in design?”

“I read the Wharton book, and a few others.”

“Ah.” He looked back at the page. “But mostly you’ve paid attention.” He seemed surprised, and impressed, and my nerves melted into dizzyingly warm pride. “This is beautiful. They’re all beautiful.”

“Thank you. I’m flattered.” An understatement.

“It’s a pity that you’re a woman.” He closed the book. Before I could react to that—the truth of it, the unexpected disappointment of it—he tapped the cover and asked, “Have you more of these?”

“Dozens. I’ve been drawing them forever. It was a way to—” I stopped, surprised that I’d almost said the truth about my mother and what these drawings had meant, about the future I’d been promised, my loneliness and need.

He did not let it go, as I’d hoped. “A way to what?”

“Nothing. Nothing.” I’d wanted to put a stop to his inquiries, but then I was disappointed when he only nodded.

He handed back the sketchbook. “Well, you’ve done what I thought was impossible, Miss Kimble. You’ve won my attention. Ask your uncle to call me.”

“Thank you, Mr. Farge.” I nearly dropped the sketchbook in the flurry of my gratitude. “I can’t tell you how much I appreciate it.”

He considered me again, this time quizzically. “You care very deeply for your family, don’t you, Miss Kimble?”

“They’re everything to me,” I said simply. “They saved me, you see.”

On the way home, I expected to be basking in glory. I wasn’t. I’d won what my uncle had wanted, but I was not satisfied, and Farge’s admiration for my work, his office, the unfamiliar tools on his desk, had spurred a surprising little ache that was not quite an ache, an excitement shivering with both hope and fear, as if the world had briefly opened to show me something I had never before allowed myself to glimpse. Possibility. Opportunity. And then disappointment. “A pity that you’re a woman.” I was uncertain what I’d wanted from him, but I knew I wanted something—and that I longed for it still.





As brilliantly as the Sullivan mansion shone in the sunshine, it looked cold and austere, the windows blank and still and blind. In spite of the fact that I had good news to tell my uncle, I was unsettled now by Ellis Farge, and a yearning I could not quite put a name to, and the house only exacerbated my discomfort.

There was no one about; the place was again eerily silent. Not even the footsteps of a maid, and Au did not appear out of nowhere to take my coat and hat. Goldie must be in her room. I went upstairs, meaning to ask her why she hadn’t told me about my picture in the Bulletin, but before I could go to my cousin, the door to my aunt’s bedroom opened, and Shin motioned for me to come.

I shook my head. “Dr. Browne said I wasn’t to see her without permission.”

“Please, miss. She is good today. She wishes to see you.”

“I cannot.”

“Mr. Sullivan is gone.”

I knew she meant to reassure me; it only made this more illicit. “The doctor warned me—”

“Please.” How ardent she was, almost pleading.

Shin was so adamant, and she knew better than anyone the effect I had on Aunt Florence. There must be a reason for her insistence.

It was not a good idea, but I followed Shin inside. The maid was so obviously relieved that I was glad I had. My aunt reclined listlessly on the chaise. Her hand swayed to some music only she could hear. Like my mother swaying to music, humming to a waltz. The same expression. Mama’s smell—a ghost of talc and wool stored in cedar—here and gone, startling and disconcerting.

I worked to right myself again, to focus on the corporeal and not the memory: a softly burning lamp, a book of Browning’s poetry splayed open beside it, and beside that, a copy of the Bulletin, folded to the page of my poolside humiliation.

I went to sit on the edge of the chaise. “Hello, Aunt Florence.”

My aunt’s gaze came slowly to rest upon me, faded blue, not so vibrant as my mother’s, not so beautiful. “May. Where have you been?”

“In town.”