Another man dying before her eyes, the life extinguished like a candle too soon snuffed out. Leaving what? Vapors. Tendrils of smoke. Worse, the shifting shadows of smoke, the kind that one could only see in one’s periphery, that fled when one tried to focus upon it.
Was life any more than that? Did what one accomplished before death matter at all, or would it all be blown away like smoke?
She squeezed her eyes shut, blocking out the image of her hollow face. Papa’s life mattered. He did great things, fought battles, won wars for his country. Stood, always, as a shining example for those around him. Mama had brought grace and faith wherever went. But Gwyneth? No one would miss her if she were to fade away like a whisper. London would have forgotten her. Her friends would have turned against her when she failed to keep in touch. Sir Arthur would have found another young lady to woo, one more to the taste of his uncle.
And the Lanes—she was naught but a burden to them.
A light tug on the tendrils, and the familiar sound of hair being wrapped around the curling tongs filled her ears. “There now, it will only take a moment.”
She mustered a close-lipped smile and clasped her fingers together, digging nails into palms. She must focus. Must shake off melancholy as well as bile. Must determine what she was to do with herself.
She could not impose on the Lanes forever. As soon as word reached them of her father’s death, she must leave and find some safe place. Somewhere to hide away. Someplace she could…could… A sob tried to rise, but she minimized it to a gasp.
“Heavens, child, whatever is the matter?” Mrs. Wesley patted her cheek and loosed the now-perfect curl. “Perhaps you ought to nap rather than go out.”
“No.” She swallowed against the rising tide and reached up to her hair. She selected the next curl to tighten and extended it toward Mrs. Wesley. “I want to see some of the city.” She had already missed church, being too exhausted after a sleepless night following Mr. Whittier’s demise to join the rest of them. She would not miss out on this opportunity. Who knew when Thad would have the time for such leisure again?
Though she couldn’t determine what kept him so busy. He was out at all hours, usually her wakeful ones, and home at odd times. If Rosie or Mrs. Lane inquired as to his whereabouts, he would inevitably name some public house—yet he never carried even the slightest whiff of alcohol.
But if he were not there to drink, why would he be?
While Mrs. Wesley finished up on her left side and moved around to her right, Gwyneth reached for the pencil and paper on the vanity. The scene under her fingers would be better in oil on canvas so she could properly capture the glint of sun on water, the green cast that would edge the clouds on the horizon, but she dared not take this particular picture out of her room. Not when the master of the house was the subject, his feet braced on the pitching deck of the ship and spyglass in hand.
She set her pencil upon his face. He would have straight brows, eyes slightly narrowed to show concentration, yet sparkling with…not quite amusement. More…fascination with the world around him.
Mrs. Wesley hummed an old hymn as she twirled another lock of hair around the tongs, leaning over to watch Gwyneth shape his eyes. Her hymn turned to a hum of approval. “Never does your skill cease amazing me, love.” She chuckled. “Had I even half your ability, I would be a rich woman indeed from selling my work in London.”
Gwyneth’s pencil moved quickly. The line of his nose, leading to the peculiar quirk of his lips, one side raised and the other steady. Not quite laughing in the face of the encroaching storm, but showing clearly that his respect for it gave no way to fear.
Her hand stilled. No, this one could not leave her chamber. Not when every time she left a work in some other part of the house, she found Thad studying it later. Who knew what he would think if he saw this. “I have never considered selling them.”
“Of course not. You have no need of that.”
Gwyneth frowned and gripped the pencil harder. What if she did have need? She had no idea how much sterling Papa had sent with her. No idea how she would ever access what had been in the banks at home. Everything must be hers now, the London house, the small country cottage Mama had so loved—unless Uncle Gates’s treachery had somehow stolen that from her—but what good did any of it do her? When could she ever return?
Nay. She was trapped here in America, trapped not by the war but by her own family. And what if she hadn’t funds enough to support herself for long? Perhaps she could sell her art. Did the Americans spend money on such frivolities? She had heard scathing whispers about them in the drawing rooms when hostilities were renewed, about how uncultured and barbaric they all were, prideful but with nothing deserving of pride. Far from what she had seen thus far.
Though she also had not seen any artwork on Thad’s walls.