Page 76 of The Muse of Maiden Lane

Jennings helped Teddy into his chair. Mr. Chakrabarty stood back, politely averting his eyes until Teddy was settled. He then enlisted a neighbor boy to stand with Samuel while he and Teddy entered the house. Jennings followed close behind.

“It was built in fifty-nine,” Mr. Chakrabarty said as he escorted Teddy through the lower reception rooms. “A good house, and a good street for an artist. Mr. Rossetti had his studio here for a time, and there are still many others hereabouts who draw and paint.”

Teddy was familiar with the works of Rossetti and the rest of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. There was no question they were talented. Groundbreaking even, for their time. But their lush, vivid paintings, which had found fame in the previous decade, were nothing like the new school of art embraced by the painters Teddy had studied with in Paris. He found no inspiration in the Pre-Raphaelite’s religious themes and medievalism. It was light Teddy was after.

“It won’t do, I’m afraid.” He turned his wheeled chair toward the exit before Mr. Chakrabarty could persuade him to venture upstairs.

Mr. Chakrabarty was crestfallen. “But it is a very good house, Mr. Hayes,” he said, trailing after Teddy. “The best on offer, and only slightly more than the top of your budget.”

“The extra cost would be nothing if the light was right. Not to mention all these stairs.”

“Stairs are unavoidable, sir.”

“Yes, but I’d rather there not be so many of them. The floors above would be all but useless to me.”

“Your servants could make use of some of the rooms,” Mr. Chakrabarty suggested. “The others you might rent out for a fee.”

“To people who would disrupt my work with their incessant comings and goings? No, thank you. I’ve no interest in being a landlord.” Teddy cast one last look about him, frowning. It was a pity the house didn’t suit. It was in a prime location. “I trust you have other properties to show me?”

“One or two in your budget,” Mr. Chakrabarty said. “The neighborhoods, however…They are not so genteel as this.”

Teddy wheeled himself out the door. “Show me.”

Nearly two hours and three houses later, Teddy was beginning to feel discouraged. None of the residences the estate agent had shown him were what he had in mind.

As they exited the final property, Mr. Chakrabarty paused to think. “Is your budget fixed, sir? I have another house coming available soon, but you might find the cost of refurbishing it excessive.”

“I have some flexibility,” Teddy said. He wheeled his chair to the edge of the street where his wagonette was parked. “Where is this property?”

“In Covent Garden,” Mr. Chakrabarty said.

Teddy gave him an alert look. “Where in Covent Garden?”

“In Maiden Lane, sir.”

Teddy’s pulse leapt. Good God. Was it possible? Could there truly be a suitable place on the very street where Turner had his famous beginnings?

“It’s in a poor state of repair,” Mr. Chakrabarty said, “but it has a good deal of potential. If you’re willing to look past its deficiencies—”

“I’d like to see it,” Teddy said abruptly. “Do you have time to show it to me today?”

Mr. Chakrabarty withdrew his pocket watch from his vest to check the time. He nodded slowly. “Yes, yes, if we make haste.”

“To Maiden Lane, then,” Teddy said. “With alacrity.”

Stella joined Evie and Julia in an upstairs bedroom of the Earl of March’s stately town house in Arlington Street to assist Anne out of her wedding dress and into her traveling clothes. Anne and Mr. Hartford would be departing for their honeymoon within the hour. Their destination was so far a secret. It was considered bad luck for the guests to know where the bride and groom were headed. But judging by the steamer trunks the servants had been carrying down earlier, with instructions to convey the luggage to St. Katharine’s Docks, Stella suspected that a honeymoon in Paris was in her friend’s near future.

It would certainly fit with the romantic theme of the day. And it had been a romantic day, from start to finish, from the moment Lord March walked Anne down the aisle to the moment when Anne and Mr. Hartford had bounded, beaming, to the vestry to sign the registrar.

After departing the church, they and their guests had repaired to Arlington Street for a sumptuous champagne breakfast. It, too, was hosted by Lord March. Better him acting as patriarch, Anne had stated before the wedding, than her odious distant cousin Joshua Deveril, the new Earl of Arundell. Anne loathed the man, and neither he nor his equally odious mother had been invited to the ceremony.

“I don’t regret excluding them,” Anne said as her maid helped her to step out of the lace-trimmed, white satin skirts of the exquisitely tailored wedding gown that Mr. Malik had designed for her. “And I don’t give a toss that some of the Deveril relations are saying that Joshua should have given my reception in Grosvenor Square.”

It hadn’t been the only source of gossip at the wedding. The presence of Mr. Hartford’s half-siblings, sitting unashamedly in a pew at the back, had prompted its own share of outraged whispers.

“Ignore the gossips,” Evie said. “Don’t let them ruin your day.”

“And what a beautiful day it’s been!” Julia proclaimed, flouncing the double skirts of her apricot silk bridesmaid dress as she took a seat on the edge of the bed. Her cheeks were flushed as much from the romance of the occasion as from the two glasses of champagne she’d imbibed at the wedding breakfast. “Did anyone else see the rainbow that fell across Anne’s gown inside the church?”