Chapter Twenty
After that, people forgot about sketches of their animals and besieged Andrew Fielding for portraits in oil.
All the wives of the gentlemen invited to the unveiling declared they would die of shame if they did not have their likeness taken.
After all, they said, if a nobody like Mrs. Witherill had had hers done, why should not they?
When their husbands protested that the blunt could be more profitably spent on a new heifer or stud fees, they said if a cow or a horse was more important than they, someone would be hearing about it.
However, the artist wouldn’t take a commission that didn’t interest him.
The animal sketches took in enough money for his simple needs.
He didn’t exactly say no, but was always mysteriously from home if they came by.
But since each lady thought she was special, and the artist only had to lay eyes on her to want to paint her, the number of them that just “popped by” to see how dear Miss Rowley, and, of course, her lodger, were getting on became first an embarrassment, and then an annoyance.
Cynthia couldn’t avoid inviting them in, but Mr. Fielding was never anywhere in sight.
No, Miss Rowley had no idea where he might be.
He had lots of commissions, and came and went as he liked.
Yes, she would tell him they had called.
When she didn’t offer them so much as a cup of tea, they were forced to go away, bitterly disappointed, while their quarry sat peacefully in the kitchen with Teacup on his knee.
“You’re going to have to agree to paint someone else, you know,” Cynthia told him. “If only to stop Harriet becoming insufferable. She has heard you are refusing all others and has taken to wearing that gown all the time. She receives visitors sitting on her throne.”
“The only person I want to paint is you,” he replied, “but I haven’t yet fixed you clearly in my mind. You are too complex.”
Cynthia laughed out loud. “I, too complex?” she said. “I am the simplest of souls. I feed the chickens, dust the furniture and do the mending. That is all.”
“It is not all. You were not reared to keep hens, yet you do it with good humor. You were not brought up to dust the furniture, but you do it with a smile on your lips. You were not raised to engage in endless mending. You prefer to do exquisite embroidery. But you do it with a smile, and talk to me intelligently as you sew. You have mysterious depths, Miss Rowley. You are profound.”
Cynthia didn’t know what to say to this, and only shook her head.
He was a mystery, too. He was obviously a real artist, not just a sketcher of pretty little pictures of cats and dogs.
He could surely work in London, even be artist to the King.
Why did he stay around there, in the depth of the country?
But these thoughts were chased from her mind a few weeks later by a visit from Harriet, who was bursting with news.
She was to be married! It was all because of the portrait.
One of the Councilmen who had come to the unveiling, a Mr. Oswald Throgmorton, was a well-to-do widower.
He had been impressed by the portrait, and, seeing her in her amber silk gown ensconced in the throne-like chair, even more impressed by the woman herself.
He had begged the privilege of calling on her in the days following the party, and realizing that the gentleman was impressed by her regal appearance, she had received him in the same way.
Mr. Throgmorton’s first wife had been a quiet, modest woman who had found it hard to keep up with her husband’s rise up the social ladder.
Not so Mrs. Witherill, who thought no rung too high for her.
The wooing had been rapid, the acceptance immediate.
“We are neither of us in our first youth, and we’ve both been married before,” explained Harriet.
“There are no children to be considered, and no impediment. We decided we shall be married by special license, to save the bother of reading the banns week after week. Oswald is visiting the Bishop today to obtain it. I wish you to be my maid of honor, Cynthia.”
“I?” cried Cynthia. “Maid of honor?”
“Well, you are a maid, and you are my best friend, who better?”
This was true, but it was also true that Harriet knew Cynthia would not compete with her as they walked down the aisle.
“I am to have a gold gown,” she said. “Oswald insists. We are going to Winchester tomorrow to buy the material. I’ve already spoken to Mrs. Mayhew in the strictest confidence, and she says she will work night and day to make it up. Money is no object, of course.”
“I am honored, Harriet, but you know I only have that pale blue gown,” said Cynthia. “It will not look good against the gold, besides being altogether too summery.”
“Oh, it doesn’t matter,” said Harriet sunnily. “Just wear the best of what you’ve got. No one will be looking at you anyway.”
“That’s true,” said her friend humbly. “But I will see if I can come up with something else. A little darker, perhaps, against the gold.”
“Whatever you like,” said Harriet. It was all the same to her.
When Cynthia told Mr. Fielding about Harriet’s marriage, he laughed.
“I pity the man, whoever he is,” he said. “He won’t have a moment’s peace.”
“Apparently, he is overwhelmed by her beauty, so perhaps he won’t mind the lack of peace,” said Cynthia.
“I would,” said the artist. “A peaceful woman is worth a king’s ransom.” He smiled at her.