A society lady had even taken her aside and given a well-meant lecture, proclaiming that although Evelyn’s watercolours were adequate, her bright hair, dubious background and passion for oil paint would never be accepted. Better to receive a relative’s aid, she’d imparted, patting her hand.
But there were no relatives. Father had been the last of his male line.
Impoverished gentlewomen existed the length and breadth of the country.
If the lot of marriage proved elusive, then without money, options became scarce, and without references, downright non-existent. They either loitered on the fringes of society, fading away within a relative’s household, or eked out an existence from the little they were permitted to do.
The noble Swift family had disowned Mother for her elopement with the artistic Sir Henry, but in desperation, Evelyn had swallowed her pride and approached them for aid.
A cold back had been their reply, a slammed door theiradieu.
The theatre had been the only place to earn from her own talent.
“We live for the day,” Father would oft proclaim with brush in hand, and they’d all laugh in agreement, him painting, Mother dancing, daughters playing with porcelain dolls one week and rag puppets the next.
Living for the day had left his daughters destitute.
In the corner upon the bare boards, ready for the morrow, sat her last remaining hope.
As an unsigned sketch by a dead artist, it was worth maybe a pound or so. But in crimson oils and with the signature of Sir Henry Pearce, it represented freedom from the choking London fog, the damp bedsheets and Filgrave’s blackmail.
A crash and yell from downstairs rang out but neither she nor Artemisia flinched, well used to the noises of dusk.
Flora was out posing tonight, and so it was solely the two of them for supper, but a gloom had descended upon their lodgings, a quietness that bespoke worry and burden.
Whilst Evelyn had been at the ball, the leering landlord had called upon her sister, demanding more rent for the pitiful place or…
Those lingering threats once more.
The ever-resourceful Flora had been there to persuade the lecher away, but later, her friend’s parting words had held foreboding and rattled nerves. “Filgrave is behind that. He wants you and yer sister, not the blunt.”
Dear heaven, she had to remove Artemisia from this place, had to convince the duke that the painting was whole and real and worth spending that which he probably frittered on candles in one day.
Tomorrow, she would be business-minded and efficient, not some shameless harlot that whimpered at his touch or sighed at his gravelly voice.
Evelyn had thought acting the experienced woman would tease him from his cold demeanour but it was she who had shivered with desire.
Pathetic.
She could not afford weakness or remorse, desire or pleasure.
“What’s the stew?” she asked, attempting to lighten her mood.
“A hodgepodge of potatoes and meat…but without the meat.”
“I don’t know why people dislike potatoes,” Evelyn said cheerily. “There are so many ways to cook them.”
“I have added some bones for flavour.”
She dreaded asking but… “Whose?”
Ashen lips creasing, Artemisia giggled. “From the butcher, silly. I took a page from Flora’s book and flashed my ankle for some beef bones.”
Evelyn laughed as surely Artemisia had meant her to, but inside she was crying with dread and anguish, her heart withering.
For what came next? A touch on the hip for a basket of apples? A caress of breast for a bag of salt? Her innocence for a pound of flour?
A canny Flora knew this ground, this way of life, but Artemisia for all her adaptability was still a tender child with a gentlewoman’s upbringing. The bawds could be wily and callous and indeed, Evelyn herself had fallen so tidily into Filgrave’s ensnaring debt.
