Alec Mackenzie's Art of Seduction (Mackenzies & McBrides #9)(3)
To Lady Flora’s exasperated sigh, Celia fell to her knees, her striped skirts billowing, to collect the drawings. She heard Lady Flora sigh again, and the two footmen appeared next to Celia, collecting the pages with deft, gloved hands.
The footmen restored the drawings neatly and efficiently to the portfolio and laid the large thing at the end of the table. A maid appeared out of nowhere for the sole purpose of helping Celia to her feet, then vanished.
“You’re late,” Lady Flora repeated.
The gilded clock on the mantelpiece gently announced it was quarter past eight. “Mother was in a bit of a state this morning,” Celia said quickly as she brushed off her skirts. “There’s an important debate today, you see, and Papa was wavering on what he wanted to say …” Her mother’s opinion on his vacillation had rung through the house.
Celia trailed off under Lady Flora’s glare. Lady Flora obviously had no interest in the Duchess of Crenshaw’s machinations regarding Parliamentary debates, at least not at the moment.
“The drawing master I’ve engaged is celebrated the length and breadth of France,” Lady Flora said coolly. “He is instructing you as a favor to me, and to your mama.”
Celia knew good and well how obligated she was to her mother and Lady Flora. She’d been told so at least seventy-two times a day for the past several weeks, ever since the Disaster. Drawing lessons with a professional artist was only one idea about what to do with the problem of Celia.
Celia was still astonished that her mother had consented to let her have the lessons at all, but her father had for once squared his shoulders and taken Celia’s side against his wife. Then again, when Lady Flora explained that Celia could learn to paint portraits of the great and good of the Whig party, contributing to the cause of making Britain a world power, the duchess had capitulated.
Lady Flora’s glare strengthened as Celia stood mutely. The woman was quite beautiful, in a brittle sort of way, which made her more daunting. Celia knew she ought to pity Lady Flora, who’d been devastated when her grown daughter had died a few years ago, but any grief had long since frosted over.
“Well, go on up,” Lady Flora said impatiently. “A gaping mouth only lets in flies, so pray, keep it closed.”
Celia popped her mouth shut, made a polite curtsy, and said, “Yes, Lady Flora.”
As Celia turned to take up her portfolio, Lady Flora said witheringly, “No, no. A servant will carry it upstairs.”
Celia snatched her hands back from the portfolio and hastened to the door, eager to remove herself from Lady Flora’s presence. Before she could leave, however, she had to turn back.
“Um, where is the studio?”
Another heavy sigh. “Fourth floor, in the front, near the staircase. The footman will show you.”
Lady Flora waved a hand in dismissal—like the empress of a proud Oriental country, Celia reflected as she hurried away. She bit back a laugh picturing Lady Flora in flowing Chinese garments, flicking her fingers while hundreds of lackeys bowed to her on their knees.
Celia lost her smile quickly. The image was far too close to the mark.
She followed the footman in satin breeches and powdered wig out of the room and up three more flights of stairs. Celia was gasping by the time they reached the top, but the footman breathed as calmly as he would after a lazy stroll in a garden.
He opened a door and indicated, with an elegant gloved hand, that she should go inside. Celia scurried past him, and the footman bowed and withdrew, closing the door behind him, the latch catching with a faint click.
Celia found herself in a quiet room flooded with sunshine. The chamber held a few chairs and a recamier draped with red cloth, an easel, a table filled with jars and brushes, and another table strewn with square frames of wood, folds of canvas, and a sheaf of drawing paper.
A fire crackled in the hearth, but except for Celia, the room was empty. No artist’s assistant bustled about preparing canvases or mixing paints, no artist looked up to comment on her tardiness.
Celia had met portrait painters, including the celebrated Mr. Hogarth, when they’d come to paint her mother, father, brother, and herself, and she knew what artists looked like. Her instructor would either be thin and nervous with a wife and five children to feed, or elderly, fussy, and set in his ways, with a habit of making inelegant noises.
Lady Flora had said the artist was celebrated in France, so Celia pictured a small, dark-haired man with a turned-up nose and a thick accent, who’d click his tongue against his teeth when he regarded Celia’s meager efforts.
Celia explored the room and the artist’s accoutrements as she waited, hoping to find an example of the drawing master’s work, but she saw none.
After a few moments, another footman discreetly glided in and laid Celia’s portfolio on a table then glided back out again.
Celia hastened after him to ask if he’d fetch the drawing master, but the footman had gone by the time she reached the hall. Lady Flora’s servants were trained to come and go like ghosts.
She hesitated in the stairwell, which was dim after the bright room, the only light coming from a shaded window on the landing.
How long was she to wait? Did the drawing master keep erratic hours, coming and going as he pleased? Was he a famous Frenchman quite annoyed he had to teach the likes of Lady Celia Fotheringhay, an English duke’s spoiled daughter? Had he drowned his frustration in wine and now snored away the morning?