Page 41 of The Muse of Maiden Lane

“I didn’t come for a book,” Teddy said. “I’m looking for my sister.”

“Here I am.” Laura’s voice rang out, a trifle breathlessly. She hurried to join them from across the library, carrying a thick leather book in her hand. The full skirts of her wool day dress floated behind her as she approached. “I was in the gallery. I saw you both come in.”

Mr. Hartford bowed to her. “Mrs. Archer. Mr. Hayes. If you’ll excuse me.”

Teddy and Laura bid him good morning.

“Nothing’s wrong, is it?” Laura asked the instant she and Teddy were alone.

“Nothing at all,” Teddy said. “I went to your room to check on you, and Alex told me you’d gone to fetch a book. I thought you’d be in bed.”

“I’ve been in bed too long already this morning,” she said. “Was Alex still at his letters?”

“He was.” Teddy’s brother-in-law had been toiling over perfumery correspondence when Teddy had left him. He’d seemed more distracted than usual, with a restless air in the scratch of his pen and a deep groove of disquiet set in his brow. “How are you feeling?”

“Better.” Laura smoothed a stray lock from her temple, tucking it back beneath her lacy matron’s cap. “It’s strange. I was quite nauseated when I woke, but now I’m wholly myself again. It must have been something I ate.”

Teddy’s mouth dipped in a thoughtful frown. “Yes, I suppose it could have been.”

She smiled at his seriousness. “Is that why you’re here? Checking up on me? You needn’t have worried, you know. Alex has been as attentive as any nurse.”

“Of course I worry. But that isn’t why I was looking for you.” Teddy wheeled his chair beside his sister as the two of them departed the library, with Jennings following behind.

As ever, Teddy was loath to ask his family for help. He didn’t like them being involved in his private business. They were too involved already. But in this case, there was no other alternative. Unless he was mistaken, Laura possessed exactly what he needed.

“I wondered,” Teddy asked his sister, “if you might be inclined to do me a particular favor?”

Eleven

Teddy peered over the top of his sketch pad as Stella entered the room. She was wearing another of her fashionable dresses. The same lush-textured, tight-bodiced variety of garment that had, during their last session, done inexplicable things to his pulse. The dangerous effect of it was tempered somewhat by her appalling black crepe matron’s cap. Just as yesterday, it covered all of her hair, its dull black ribbons trailing about the slender column of her neck.

“Good afternoon,” she said. “I hope you haven’t been waiting for me?”

All my life, he was tempted to say.

It was true, wasn’t it? He’d dreamed of being inspired in this way. And here she was, for but one night longer. Tomorrow she would be gone. Back to Derbyshire and out of his world forever.

He cleared his throat. “No, indeed. I’m early, as usual.” He motioned to the shield-back chair. “If you would?”

“May I see it yet?” she asked, coming closer. It was the same question she’d asked yesterday.

Teddy gave her his same answer. “It isn’t finished.”

“I know that,” she said. “I’d still like to see it. I could offer my opinions on your progress.”

“This isn’t a collaborative process.”

“Naturally, it is. What is posing if not collaborating?”

“You sit in that chair, and you stare at that clock. That’s where your part of the collaboration ends.” He again motioned for her to take a seat. “If you wouldn’t mind?”

“Very well,” Stella said with a disgruntled scrunch of her nose. “If you will insist on being a stickler.”

She crossed the room, the fabric of her skirts rustling softly about her legs. She smelled of lilacs, just as she had on every occasion they’d met. It was a sweet, ephemeral fragrance, too subtle to be perfume. Her soap, very likely, or the scented oil from her bath water.

Whatever it was, it was doing Teddy’s powers of concentration no favors.

She sank down on the chair, fluffing her velvet-ribbon trimmed skirts about her legs.