12

Paris

September 2, 1821

"A rabella Denton! " Grace's voice rose to a squeal as she swept Arabella into her arms, then pushed her away to peer closely at her friend. "Lord mercy, look at you!"

Arabella thought her friend must mean the frock—far simpler than anything she'd ever ordered when they visited the modiste together in years past. She'd removed her painting smock to come to the door—another shock to Grace, no doubt, that Arabella's servants counted precisely none.

"You look so . . . sophisticated ." Grace shook her head in delighted wonder.

Arabella stepped aside, inviting her friend into the building. Grace waved to the footman in her carriage—Arabella could see the pile of smartly wrapped packages stuffed inside from a fruitful morning's hunt among the shops.

Grace followed Arabella up the narrow stairs, wide-eyed, stifling a giggle of shock as Arabella unlocked the door to her room and gestured for Grace to step inside.

The room, above a lively street of businesses and caf é s, was entirely Arabella's own. It was no manor, certainly—it spoke very clearly to her station, a thousand miles below the ton. But it was, she knew, lovely. The ceilings were high, and the light by the window tipped past good and into enchanting. She kept it fairly bare, so that it would feel, more than anything else, like a painting studio. A pitcher of flowers by the narrow bed and a pile of cushions and books by the fireplace were enough to make it her home.

"Oh, Arie," Grace breathed, turning in a circle to take it all in. "You've made it very charming." She went to a collection of in-progress canvases, leaned against the wall. "May I?"

"Of course."

Grace peered closely at Arabella's work. A smattering of still lifes, but most of the work was portraits. She stopped at a particular one. The subject was a noblewoman, though you'd never know from the pose, on the floor, leaning her back against an overstuffed and sagging shelf of dusty books, her feet crossed in front of her, a thick medical anatomy textbook in her lap. She gazed at the viewer with a sharply intelligent, not-unfriendly directness.

When Grace looked to Arabella, there were tears in her eyes. "My word. This is ... you've gotten so remarkable . I mean to say—you've always been brilliant. But when one hears about you ..."

"Talk of the scandalous lady painte r leads the discussion," Arabella finished, dryly. "You know, here, they don't view me as particularly risqué. Oddly interesting for an Englishwoman, perhaps. But there is so much very bold work on display all the time, I'm rather middle of the pack."

That was true, and not true. Arabella certainly wasn't among the most famous painters in Paris—not even among the most famous females. But she'd done well for herself in a comparatively short time. She'd never had to utilize her fake letter of reference. And she'd never visited the duke's solicitor.

She had kept Blackflint's letter tucked in a sketchbook. When she'd found it again a few months ago, she'd studied it, taking in the clean, curt penmanship for a long moment. Then decided it was time to throw it in the fire.

Monsieur Allard had insisted she stay in a room above his studio, rent-free, in exchange for tidying the place. As cleaning work went, it was rather adventurous, considering the types of disarray she found after a late-night class. She attended his lessons, also for free. "A condition of your employment," he'd said.

Gratitude drove her to find more to do, and soon she was managing his unopened stack of mail, double-checking sums in his ledgers, helping to plan his upcoming exhibition.

An exhibition in which, only two days before the opening, he offered her a small space on the wall, in a back corner, not well-lit, not large enough for any of the canvases she'd been slaving over.

She stayed up all night with her oil pastels, working feverishly, then discarding a dozen fretful starts. She began to worry she could not make a worthy piece in time. Under the pressure, she felt utterly blocked.

Dawn was breaking when she looked out the window. And noticed it was beginning to rain.

She felt weightless, slightly between worlds, as she hurried down the stairs in her bare feet. The street was deserted. The air smelled like wet soot giving way to clean sky. It was cold, but she'd certainly survived much colder.

She stood for ten minutes, allowing the rain to drench her. Feeling it soak her clothing until it stuck to her skin. No one walked by. It was as if the city had arranged this, just for her.

Then she returned to her room, dripping, shivering. She angled her easel in front of her mirror, and drew what she saw.

It earned her three sentences near the bottom of a review by the city's foremost art critic. It is a portrait like a peek through a keyhole into a secret chamber, though it is in no way vulgar. The subject is fully clothed, her eyes searching for something beyond the viewer. And yet one feels, even without further context, that one has trespassed upon a very private intimacy.

After that, the commissions began, and soon Arabella was making more than enough money to pay for classes, to let this room. She became known for her raw, unadorned style, her avoidance of the clich é s of portraiture. It had become quite fashionable among the well-to-do to acquire an "unflattering" image of themselves.

Grace had finished looking at the paintings, and now sat dramatically at Arabella's little table.

"Well," she said. "It is obvious that you simply must paint me."

She posed Grace at the table, a shawl over one shoulder, chin resting in her hand. Arabella's goal was to capture her curious, eager-to-be-scandalized side, while also intimating that the young woman was deeply loyal and capable of keeping any secret. It was true—even after the scandal of Arabella's departure had exploded, Grace had not breathed a word about Arabella slipping away to Allard's classes. "She'd never shown herself the least bit capable of such subterfuge," was the refrain on every gossip-monger's lips, and Grace never once corrected them.

They settled into an easy rhythm of chatter as Arabella worked. Grace was considering several suitors, weighing their attributes, but slipping every third or fourth sentence into the romantic idealism she couldn't quite shake.

"Grace," Arabella said. "If you want love, marry for love." She saw the protest brewing in her friend's eyes. "However modest their yearly might be, rest assured you'll never find yourself in a room as bare as this one unless you visit me again."

Grace took that in, sobered. "You're right."

"Well, you are right to worry about the future, it's only—"

"You were never happy. And now you are, completely. That is the entire lesson, isn't it?"

It wasn't quite so simple, of course. It had been well over a year—a year and a half, next week—and Arabella still thought of him each night as she doused the lamp. Or when she passed someone on the street, tall, broad-shouldered, all in black. A truly ridiculous abundance of such men in Paris lately—it seemed, as he had said, that God had a sense of humor.

She thought of him when she painted subjects with guarded eyes. Or silver at their temples.

She thought of him when it rained.

Grace saw something in Arabella's expression. "Arie," she said, cautiously. "I wonder ... The night you left. I know you and the duke conversed, and came to an understanding, and he arranged your departure."

"Yes."

" When ? You disappeared right after dinner. I think I was the only one to notice, until he did. Where did the conversation even happen?"

Arabella weighed her answer. She felt no shame when she thought of that night. But she also didn't know what good it would do, to bring it all up again. "What are you asking, Grace?"

"Did he ..." her voice lowered to an embarrassed whisper. " Do something to you? Something untoward, or—not what you'd have wished, or—"

"Not at all." He did everything to me, but only because I asked. "I did run. He found me on the outskirts of his property. And when he understood my reasons, he let me go at once. I know rumors chase him everywhere, but he is not what we thought he was. I came away from the encounter quite convinced he would never harm me, or any woman."

Grace looked at her for a long moment. "Good."

It seemed the subject was at an end, mercifully. Arabella returned to her paints.

"Because I am given to understand he is newly betrothed. She and I are not acquainted. But, at any rate ... I worried."

Oh.

It wasn't sharp, the pain in her chest. There was something soft about the way it brushed over her heart. Like a thumb wiping something away.

Arabella kept her eyes on her work. "Well. No reason for concern. I am certain he will treat her with the utmost respect."

"Yes," Grace agreed. "But she's not who I was worried for."

The portrait didn't nearly capture Grace's insightfulness, Arabella realized at that moment.

She smiled, though she had no doubt Grace was unconvinced by it. "You have no cause to worry, I promise."

Grace nodded, understanding in her eyes. And then, because she'd always been a very good friend, she did change the subject.

The burgeoning popularity of Arabella's work earned her half the real estate on one wall of Allard's next exhibition. Still the back wall, but Arabella recognized the progress. She chose the portrait of Grace, one of Allard, and one of her landlady, a birdlike woman of eighty years who still moved with the grace of a ballerina, and who, when the wine flowed, enjoyed telling bawdy stories of her youth among Eastern European aristocrats.

There was room for one more canvas, and she had one in mind. She considered it her best work.

But the idea that it might cause the wrong kind of talk kept her awake the night before the opening. Finally, she got out of bed, went to her easel, and decided to make another self-portrait. The paint was still wet when she finally delivered it to the gallery.

In the painting, she sat at her easel in profile, regarding a blank canvas. Back straight. Patient. The hand at her knee held a paintbrush dipped in dark paint. Her other hand rested upon the back of the chair. In a nod to the painting she would never publicly display, dangling from her thumb and forefinger was a length of black silk ribbon.

Thanks to Monsieur Allard's scandalous newest series of nudes in positions that straddled the line between art and indecency, the opening of the exhibit was an exhausting whirl of patrons, artists, people speaking French too quickly, too many glasses of wine pressed into Arabella's hands.

Finally, she retreated to the back of the space. Thankfully, her quiet portraits couldn't compete with the carnality of Allard's.

She regarded her self-portrait, and realized it hung crooked. She adjusted it, then stepped back to make sure it was straight, nearly running into the man who stood behind her, admiring the work.

"I like this one," he said in a thoughtful tone.

It could not be his voice. But it was his voice.

She turned.

He was dressed as usual. His hair had a bit more silver. Same black silk eyepatch. Same shoulders. Same impossible level of calm, while her pulse drummed riotously. The idea of speaking words back to him— him , standing, somehow, impossibly, right there —was so daunting as to seem ridiculous.

"May I ask if the artist mentioned the significance of the items in her subject's hands?" he asked, deep green gaze moving over her features, observing, to her dismay, every shift, every hitch, every second she flailed for a response that didn't drown her in mortification.

"She does not believe in explaining art," Arabella heard herself say from a great distance away.

"Ah." He turned to the portrait.

"It was a last-minute replacement," she mumbled. "By my understanding, the artist had another piece in mind, but worried it might be too revealing."

" More revealing than this one?"

"This is only a portrait of the artist at her easel. Part of a long tradition. Not one known for deep revelation."

He threw her a dry look. "I am told the artist enjoys subverting tradition."

When had he stepped closer? She caught the faintest whiff of his scent, the clean wool of his coat, citrus soap, leather. Him.

She took a step back. Met his eye, and saw that he knew exactly what had just happened.

A couple walked by, arm in arm. She was suddenly aware of the people all around them. She cleared her throat. "It is kind of you to visit the gallery, Your Grace. I was not aware you were a connoisseur of art."

"I'm not." There it was. The sardonic tone. But it was gone again when he continued. "I confess, I only happened to hear of the exhibition because I was in Paris with my fiancée, acquiring her wedding dress."

Say something. Wish him well. Send him to the Devil. Say anything.

The best Arabella could do was smile, unconvincingly, stupidly.

He was doing what he did: watching her. It seemed cruel, considering. "Felicitations," she finally managed. "I shall bid you good evening, and—"

"Called the wedding off, but I am confident she'll look splendid in the gown, wherever she does decide to wear it. Is there somewhere more private we can speak, Bella?"