Chapter Twenty-Seven

Twenty-Seven

London, England

May 1863

Stella stood still as a marble statue in Teddy’s studio in the house in Maiden Lane, her face turned to stare at an invisible point on the chipped wall to her right.

A large canvas was placed across the room, atop an easel. Teddy worked tirelessly behind it, absent his coat and waistcoat, his sleeves rolled up, and his sensual mouth set in a permanent frown of concentration.

He didn’t talk or tease with her when he was working. Not like he had when he’d sketched her in Hampshire. To be sure, he rarely spoke at all, except to order her to “stop fidgeting,” or to “be still.”

Over the past month Stella had become adept at standing still. She’d spent all of April posing for Teddy, long stretches of motionlessness punctuated by rest periods seated on the new damask-covered settee, watching Teddy with interest as he mixed his colors, adjusted his shading, and—on some occasions—removed a portion of the work he’d just done and started over completely.

Julia and Captain Blunt had returned to Yorkshire last month. Since then, Stella had been staying with Ahmad and Evie at their farmhouse near Hampstead Heath. There was ample room there in the barn for Locket, and for Turvey’s horse, Crab. And the heath provided plenty of space for Locket’s twice-daily gallops.

Evie was a warm hostess, and Ahmad was a kind and welcoming host. They dined each night together at home, and breakfasted together in the mornings. The remainder of Stella’s days were her own. She could do as she liked and go where she chose, and no one required her to have a maid or a chaperone any longer.

“Outside of fashionable society, things are done rather differently,” Evie had confided. “We working people value our independence.”

Stella had quickly come to relish hers. When she wasn’t riding or helping Evie with various tasks related to the household or the dress shop, she was traveling to Covent Garden—either on horseback or by hired hack. There, she posed for Teddy for hours at a time, and then spent an additional hour seated with him as he instructed her in her sketching.

Thus far, he’d helped her perfect her perspective and composition, and had taught her new methods of capturing the changing effect of the light. Under his gentle guidance, she’d learned that art was less about exact replication and more about movement, color, and atmosphere.

Her portfolio had grown significantly. She was particularly proud of a portrait she’d drawn of Locket—a depiction of the mare galloping through the Fostonbury woods, hooves ablur and mane and tail flying. Teddy had guided Stella’s hand for a portion of the sky—shading the clouds in gentle strokes—his callused fingers strong but gentle over hers, making her blood quicken and heat.

Yes, Teddy was a forgiving and patient drawing master.

He was markedly less so as a painter.

“Your riding habit is in the way,” he remarked crossly from behind his canvas.

It was one of his regular complaints on the days that Stella rode Locket to Maiden Lane. She’d begun doing so often. Not only riding, but being conspicuous about it.

She no longer made any effort at concealment—not of her tresses and not of her destination. She boldly rode through fashionable traffic, Turvey trailing behind, past the theatres, the flower market, and the fruit stalls, until she reached Maiden Lane. The coach house at the back had been made habitable. Locket happily munched on fresh hay, along with Samuel and Crab, while Teddy and Stella toiled inside the house.

“There’s no help for that, I’m afraid,” she said.

Teddy emerged from behind his canvas. His hair was wildly disheveled, making him appear as unhinged as he was handsome. “You could take it off. Ahmad’s sent over some fabric drapes we might try.”

“No,” she said. “Not until we’re married.”

“And we can’t be married until the house is fit to live in,” Teddy muttered, returning to his work. “The latest estimate is July.”

July?

Stella’s spirits sank. It didn’t seem fair. Not when one considered that Teddy had already moved into the house a fortnight ago. He was working all hours on his painting now, with Jennings in residence to look after his personal needs, and Mrs. Mukherjee traveling in each day to do the cooking and cleaning.

Meanwhile, Stella was still waiting for her life to begin. A life where she wasn’t an awkward third party on the fringes of some other couple’s happily-ever-after, but one where she had a happily-ever-after of her own. She’d already been waiting so long.

And for what? Not love itself, but a chance at love. A chance to fall in love with him, and to make him love her in return.

Granted, the former required little effort. Her attraction to Teddy hadn’t faded during the last month. Rather the reverse. It had only grown as a result of their frequent proximity. It made her notice his dwindling interest in her all the more.

Despite the long hours spent in each other’s company, he gave no indication that he was pining for her, or longing for a repeat of the kisses they’d shared when he’d proposed. He was solely focused on his work.

She was his model, not his sweetheart.

But they were still engaged, she reminded herself. And a July wedding was surely better than no wedding at all.

“July isn’t so far away,” she said.

“It is for this piece. It’s already too late to submit it to the Royal Academy for the Annual Exhibition. Had we not suffered these delays, I might have already done so.” Teddy’s brush slashed over the canvas. “Not that they would have accepted it. They rejected Whistler’s piece readily enough. That’s why he had to resort to a private showing.”

And to a spate of poor reviews, Teddy might have added.

Stella was well aware that the new style he espoused wasn’t yet widely accepted. It was a risk, posing for him. She might, in the end, be made notorious.

Or not.

She could scarcely tell. Just as when he’d sketched her in Hampshire, Teddy wouldn’t permit her to see his unfinished work. He covered the canvas with a cloth drape when he wasn’t working on it.

“Perhaps you could ask Mr. Whistler to render his opinion on your progress?” she suggested. She knew Teddy had written to the man before, and that he’d received a cordial reply. But the two hadn’t yet met, not as far as she was aware. “You admire his work so. His thoughts might be of value.”

“I don’t show my work to anyone until I’m finished. Not even other artists, if I can help it.” Teddy picked up more paint from his palette with the flat of his brush. “In any event, Whistler isn’t in London. He’s been in Amsterdam since April.”

“You wrote to him again?”

“I did. There’s to be an exhibition of works that have been rejected by the Paris Salon. I encouraged Whistler to submit The White Girl .”

Stella’s brows lifted. “Whistler’s piece was rejected from the Salon as well?” This was the first she had heard of it.

The Royal Academy and the Salon des Beaux Arts represented the two most significant art societies in existence. The fact that Whistler’s painting had been rejected from both surely didn’t bode well for the prospects of other newer artists who were painting in unconventional styles.

“It was,” Teddy said. “Along with most of the other paintings submitted. The salon jury has lost all sense of proportion. There was such an uproar from the artists, that the emperor ordered the rejected works be exhibited alongside the accepted ones. They’re calling it the Salon des Refusés.” He translated for her. “The Exhibition of Rejects.”

She gave an exaggerated wince at the name.

“It’s better than the paintings getting no exposure at all,” Teddy said. “And so I told him.”

“Would you ever consider showing your own work at such an exhibition?”

“Would you not?”

“I don’t aspire to display my work for the public’s approbation.”

“You should,” he said. “It deserves recognition.”

She felt a flush of pride. “Perhaps someday. Until then, it’s your work that must be in a museum or a gallery somewhere.”

“I’d prefer the Royal Academy,” he replied frankly. “But I’d consider any showing, public or private—even an exhibition of rejects, if it came to it. Providing I can finish this piece before the month is out.”

Stella refrained from pointing out that there was little hope for that. Not given their current circumstances. Unless…

“We could always do as Tom suggested,” she remarked, feeling Teddy’s frustration emanating from across the room.

“What’s that?”

“We could marry while the renovations are being done.”

“They’ve just ripped out half the walls in the upstairs bedrooms because of rot. Where do you propose to sleep?”

“I could stay downstairs,” she said.

Teddy’s brushstrokes went quiet on the canvas. There was a weighted silence.

Stella fidgeted where she stood, suddenly uncomfortable. One would think she’d just proposed they do something obscene.

“Downstairs,” he repeated.

“Would that be so objectionable?”

“It isn’t the arrangement we agreed to.”

“I thought you offered that arrangement for my benefit,” she said, breaking her pose. “You don’t mean to tell me that it was for yours? That you’d prefer I stay away from you except when you’re painting me?”

“It was for both our benefits.” He resumed painting, his brush working on his canvas with unusual force. “You don’t want to witness all the indignities I must put up with on account of being in this chair. And unless I roomed with Jennings and gave you Jennings’s chamber in exchange, you’d be present for all of them.”

“Don’t be absurd. Of course I’m not going to stay in Mr. Jennings’s room.”

“I thought not,” he said grimly.

“I’ll sleep in your room with you.”

Again, his brushstrokes stopped.

She exhaled an impatient breath. “You forget that I’ve spent most of my life in visiting the sick with my brother. There’s little left that can shock me.”

Her words were met with silence.

“That isn’t to say that I equate you with the village sick,” she added, in case he’d taken offense. “I only mean that I’m not apt to swoon at the sight of an injured limb.”

“Two injured limbs,” he said peevishly. “And no ability to move them.”

“I’m well aware.”

“Jennings must come and go at all hours to assist me. I won’t have him barging in when you’re in dishabille. I’d have to sack him for impertinence. And, much as I’d like to be rid of him, I rather rely on the insufferable fellow.”

“You won’t require Mr. Jennings to help you when I’m in the room with you. I’ll help you myself, obviously. That’s what married people do.”

“I don’t need a nurse, Stella.”

“You’re not getting a nurse. You’re getting a wife.” She felt the silence as well as heard it this time—an oppressive, throbbing thing. It was too much. She blurted out: “Unless you’ve changed your mind.”

He stuck his head out from behind his canvas again to scowl at her. “Is that what you think?”

“I don’t know.” She was no longer teasing. “You have what you wanted—me as your model. Why bother with the rest of it?”

“I hope you’re jesting.”

“I’m not. From the beginning, you only ever wanted to paint me. It was I who wanted something more. Not you. Never you.”

Teddy threw down his paintbrush. Before she realized what he was about, he’d wheeled his chair across the room. There was paint on his hands and on his shirt, and a smudge of French ultramarine across his brow. He reached for her arm.

Stella made no move to evade him.

He pulled her to him. All the way to him. Tripping over her skirts, she tumbled straight into his lap with a disgruntled laugh. “Teddy! This isn’t funny.” She moved to stand. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

He held her firmly against him. “Hurt me? Rubbish. I can’t feel anything.” His voice deepened. “Not in my legs, anyway.”

She set her hands on his shoulders, her cheeks heating. “You’re being ridiculous.”

“ You’re being ridiculous,” he retorted. And then, dipping her back in his arms, he captured her laughing mouth in a kiss.

She clung to his neck. Her laugh turned into a sigh. Her heart was racing. “Oh,” she murmured.

“Quite,” he growled. And he kissed her again.

Her lips softened and parted, yielding eagerly to his. She curved her fingers around the column of his neck. His skin was hot as a furnace. She was beginning to feel the same heat, simmering within her, a blazing fire roaring into flame.

They’d never been this close. They had kissed, yes. And held hands. But he’d never held her . Not like this. It was more thrilling than she could have imagined.

“Is this meant to reassure me?” she asked against his mouth.

“I’m not sure what it was meant to do when I began,” he said, voice gone husky. “The moment you came into my arms, my brain turned to porridge.”

“That’s not very flattering.”

“Do you want to be flattered?”

“What if I did?”

“I would tell you that I can’t sleep for thinking of you. That I go mad waiting for you to arrive each day. That if you’re a minute late—”

“Seriously,” she objected.

“Seriously,” he returned. “I do want to marry you. I never stopped. I just…”

“What?”

His lips quirked in a wry smile. “I don’t want to repulse you before I’ve had a chance to enjoy you awhile. Rather selfishly, I’d prefer to have this—” another kiss, “and this—” and another, “before you must see me as an invalid in need of your nursing.”

Her fingers twined in the hair at his nape. She gave a sharp tug.

“Ouch!” He winced, laughing. “What the devil was that for?”

“I am not your nurse,” she said. “I shall never be your nurse.” She gave another sharp tug of his hair, scolding him. “I want you to trust me. To trust that I won’t think less of you for any reason.”

“Not until you witness me—”

“Never,” she swore to him. “Not so long as you continue to treat me kindly.”

“Kindly?”

“Yes. It’s that which I value. Your kindness.”

“Hmm.” He glowered at her. She suspected it was only partially in jest.

She stroked his hair to soothe his offended dignity. “I never knew I could sit on your lap.”

“You never asked.”

“As if it would occur to me!”

Again, he bent his head to hers. “As always, Miss Hobhouse, you exhibit a startling lack of imagination.”

She smiled up at him, in imminent expectation of another kiss. He was a heartbeat away from claiming one when there was a harsh rap at the front door.

The two of them froze. They exchanged a startled look.

A giggle escaped from Stella. She slapped a hand over her mouth.

Teddy’s cheeks dimpled in a boyish grin. “There’s no one to answer it,” he said. “Mrs. Mukherjee has gone to the market, and I sent Jennings out to purchase more tubes of paint.”

Stella moved to stand. Teddy reluctantly released her. He tugged her skirt back into order for her as she slid out of his lap.

She batted his hands away. “You’re not helping.”

“You have a wrinkle, just here.”

“It’s a pleat, you ninny.”

He caught her hand and kissed it, waiting until the last moment to release her, as she retreated to the hall. They were both grinning now like two naughty schoolchildren.

Stella gave her habit skirts another shake before opening the door.

A balding man in an ill-fitting suit stood on the threshold. He had an enormous wooden crate at his side. In the street behind him, a horse and cart were waiting, with two large men seated on the driver’s bench. Whatever was in the crate, it appeared they’d had a hand in delivering it.

“Can I help you, sir?” Stella asked.

“Is this the residence of Mr. Edward Hayes?” the man inquired. He had a distinct cockney accent.

“It is.” Stella surveyed the crate. It must have something to do with the renovations, but she couldn’t think what. “Do you have an appointment?”

“No appointment, madam, but Mr. Hayes will be expecting me.” He withdrew his card, handing it to Stella with a flourish.

She read it with interest.

Mr. Franklin Abbott, Gentleman Inventor

Her brows lifted. “May I ask what invention this might be in regard to, Mr. Abbott?”

“My patented pneumatic invalid’s chair,” the man announced proudly. “My chief investor, an esteemed gentleman who prefers to remain anonymous, did assure me that Mr. Hayes was eager to possess a prototype.”

A pneumatic invalid’s chair?

Stella stepped back. “I think you’d better come inside.”

?Teddy stared in wonder at the wheeled chair that emerged from the wooden crate. It was made of gleaming polished mahogany, finished with brass, and fitted with the exact rubber-covered wheels that Mr. Hartford had described to him in the library at Sutton Park.

Stella stood beside Teddy, both of them looking over the chair as Mr. Abbott extolled the many virtues of his invention.

“It’s equipped with every comfort and convenience,” Mr. Abbott boasted. “You’ll never feel the lumps and bumps of the road. The ride is that smooth once the air is in the tires. The seat is covered in the finest leather, and the back and arms are adjustable, like so.” He demonstrated, fiddling with a series of pins and hinges. “But this is a highlight, sir. This magic lever here. The invalid can press it himself, if he has the necessary strength. Observe.” Mr. Abbott depressed the lever. Two matching brass brackets immediately descended to the wheels, locking them into place.

Teddy rolled forward in his own chair to examine the apparatus. “A hand brake,” he said in amazement. “Is that what it is?”

“Exactly, sir.”

“Is that important?” Stella asked, frowning.

“Why, it’s essential, ma’am,” Mr. Abbott said. “As Mr. Hayes can no doubt tell you. The invalid generally relies on an attendant to place him into his chair. With my invention, the invalid, with adequate strength, can now get in and out of the chair himself.”

Teddy’s pulse leapt at the possibilities. If it was true, it would mean no more Jennings in Teddy’s bedroom, helping him in and out of his bed. No more Jennings lifting Teddy onto the settee or into a parlor chair. If the wheel brakes worked—if they were truly up to the task of holding the chair steady—Teddy could hoist himself in and out using only his upper body strength.

It would mean far greater independence, not to mention privacy.

“Would you like to try it, sir?” Mr. Abbott asked.

“My manservant is away on an errand,” Teddy replied. “I shall have to wait until he returns.”

“You don’t need Mr. Jennings,” Stella said. “I can help you.”

Teddy inwardly recoiled at the offer. Only moments ago, he’d been holding her in his arms and kissing her. Laughing with her like any young man might do with his sweetheart. He’d felt giddy. Alive.

He wasn’t going to ruin that by allowing her to help him out of one dratted chair and into another. An invalid’s chair , by God! It was bad enough that she must be here to witness his enthusiasm over such a device.

“That won’t be necessary,” he said tersely. “Jennings will be back soon.”

“Shall I assist you, sir?” Mr. Abbott offered. “It’s best you become acquainted with the chair while I’m here. I can explain all its little ways to you.”

Teddy’s jaw hardened. “If you wouldn’t mind waiting—”

Stella’s hand came to rest on his shoulder. She gave it a wordless squeeze.

What it was meant to convey, Teddy didn’t know. He glanced up at her. There was a streak of French ultramarine oil paint across her cheek. It was a stark reminder of the glorious embrace they had just shared.

The anxiety in his chest slowly began to ease, replaced with a growing weight of warmth.

He was still embarrassed. Still resentful in his vulnerability—afraid that she would view him as something less than a man. But he wasn’t going to shut her out. Not anymore.

If she wanted to be part of his life, she could bloody well be part of it. And if it resulted in driving her away—

Well.

At least he wouldn’t have driven her away first with his own surliness and bad temper.

“Very well,” he said. “If you must.”

Stella beamed. “What shall I do?”

“Will you hold my chair steady? As still as you can?”

She went behind him to grip the backrest. Teddy felt her there, as immovable as a pillar of steel. He had the vague thought that riding a difficult mare for so many years had given her an unseen reservoir of power. Luminous as she appeared, she was no will-o’-the-wisp. She was formidable. Strong.

“Mr. Abbott—” Teddy refocused his attention on the task at hand. “Would you bring the prototype right up next to me? Just there. Close enough for me to reach the seat. And if you could, please, lift the arm up on its hinges?”

Mr. Abbott did as he was told, at once appearing to understand what Teddy intended. “I’ll set the brake, sir.”

“Good man.” One at a time, Teddy removed his booted feet from the footrests. He glanced back at Stella, feeling another flash of anxiety. “Don’t let this chair move.”

She gave him a bracing look. “No fear of that.”

Inhaling a deep breath, Teddy placed his hands on the arms of his chair. Using all of his strength, he lifted his lower body up from the seat. It was nothing he hadn’t done before when training his muscles. But this time, he didn’t limit the movement to a straight up-and-down motion. He swung himself forward, bringing his hips right up to the edge of the seat.

Once there, he lowered himself again. His biceps were trembling, the muscles of his abdomen clenching with effort. Leaning forward, he placed a hand on the seat of the prototype. He gave it an experimental push. The prototype didn’t budge.

“Are you going to—” Stella started to ask.

“Yes,” Teddy said. “If I should fall in the process—”

“You won’t,” she told him. “Don’t even imagine it.”

He understood what she meant. Envisioning failure was as good as willing it into existence. One couldn’t think that way. Not when one was risking their body. Their pride.

“Here goes,” he said.

Using all his strength, he again lifted himself up from his seat, this time with one hand on the seat of his old chair and one on the seat of the new one. It was only a short distance. An angled swing of his hips, a split second of sheer panic, and then he landed with a thump onto the seat of the protoype.

His breath gusted out of him.

Stella was at once at his side. He felt her hands at his back, and then at his waist, attempting to assist him as he edged back into position. A lock of hair had fallen over his forehead. She brushed it back from his face.

“Good heavens!” she said. “That was perilous. Are you all right?”

“I did it,” he said, a trifle stunned.

“Of course you did.” She helped him lower the arm of his new chair. “That was never in question.”

He met her eyes as she leaned over him. For the second time that day, the two of them grinned at each other like children.

And he realized that he wasn’t just in love with Stella Hobhouse—his model, his muse, his shining star.

He loved her.