Chapter Six
“We were on a bit of a roll, you might say.” Mrs. Dawson looks to the newcomer, who strides boldly into the studio space, an overflowing parcel of groceries in each hand, as comfortable as if she owned the place.
“Well, then keep on rolling. I won’t interrupt,” the woman offers in easy reply. “The name’s Rachel.”
“My…roommate,” Mrs. Dawson hastens to explain. “And it’s no interruption. We had just finished for the day.”
Rachel pauses before the kitchen butcher block and begins unloading her overstuffed bags—carrots, apples, bread rolls, a thick square of cheese, eggs.
I realize, again, how hungry I am. Didn’t Mrs. Dawson mention that lunch would be included?
This new woman, Rachel, catches me staring and lifts an eyebrow, saying: “Leah, don’t tell me you forgot to feed the poor thing? ”
Mrs. Dawson looks from me to Rachel as embarrassment spreads across her face. “I, uh, well, I forgot about food entirely. It was…it was a productive session.”
“Well, then I think an omelet is in order,” says Rachel, pulling a red pepper out of her satchel. “Give me just a few minutes.” She reaches into a drawer to retreive a series of bowls and utensils.
“Rachel works for a widow on Spruce Street, keeping house, laundry, cooking. She’s an excellent cook,” Mrs. Dawson says as she picks up her scattered papers from the floor.
Mamma, lowering her knitting and looking between the two women, speaks up for the first time. “You are Leah and Rachel? What a biblical pair of names.”
Rachel lets out a deep laugh, saying: “That’s about where our resemblance to the Good Book ends.”
Mrs. Dawson throws a scowl in Rachel’s direction but quickly busies herself with tidying up her papers and pencils.
In the kitchen, Rachel places a frying pan on the stove.
I see how Mamma’s eyes have widened as she looks once more at each of these two ladies, then toward the brass bed behind the partition.
And then she turns toward me. I give a shrug; I don’t understand what Rachel meant by the remark, but something about Mamma’s expression tells me not to probe.
And soon the scent of melting butter is so distracting that I walk toward the stove.
Mrs. Dawson, meanwhile, looks toward Mamma. “Mrs. Talbot, may I have a word with you?” When Mamma nods, Mrs. Dawson takes a seat, joining her at the table.
Rachel places a knife on the kitchen counter before me. “You like to cook, sweetie?”
I consider her question. Is it called cooking, what I do? Not really, as we don’t ever have proper ingredients, but rather scraps we scrounge for and then toss together. Rachel, perhaps seeing my hesitation, goes on, “You know how to chop peppers?”
“Yes,” I answer. That I can do. I’ve fixed dinner enough times for Kit and myself.
“Then get to work, darling, and make it fast because these eggs aren’t going to wait on you.” Rachel starts whistling a tune, bustling about the kitchen, pulling down four plates, plucking a finger’s pinch of some green herb—parsley?—from a small basket on a shelf.
Soon the smells wafting around us are torturously enticing, and Rachel is telling me how she wants to travel to France someday.
“The best cuisine in the world over there. If I could study there, why, I’d open my own café.
” She stares at a large print of a map that hangs on the wall nearby, labeled “France.” Surveying it, she goes quiet, then exhales.
“Leah and I will save up enough. Someday.”
As I’m chopping, I can’t help but eavesdrop on Mrs. Dawson’s lowered voice nearby: “As you can see, Mrs. Talbot, your daughter has been greatly blessed. But I’m sure you are aware of that.”
“ ’Course I am,” Mamma says, making less of an effort to keep her voice quiet. “Though I don’t know whether I’d call it a blessing or a curse with this child. She’s far too beautiful. Soon enough, she’ll know it.”
Mrs. Dawson sighs; I can hear it over the sputter of the eggs frying on the stovetop.
I’m almost done chopping, but I pretend I’m entirely focused on the peppers as Mamma goes on: “Tarentum may be the ugliest town in America, but she was the prettiest baby in America. My, when she was born, people would come from places far away just to glimpse her face. They’d show up saying they’d heard about this beautiful baby born to the lawyer Winn Talbot.
Sure, her daddy loved it. Completely agreed with all the praise. ”
This is news to me, this story of my earliest days.
The knife has gone still in my hand, which I notice is now quivering as I think about Daddy, boasting with me in his arms as a baby.
Mamma goes on: “Winn worshipped that child from the day she was born. I’d always tell him he had to keep it down, crowing on about what a beautiful little girl he had—such talk would go straight to her head and spoil it.
Well, now he’s gone, so we aren’t hearing from him anymore… .”
Mother’s words taper off, but Mrs. Dawson’s voice is low and warm when she speaks: “I can imagine it’s been difficult.”
“You can’t imagine,” Mamma answers, her tone bald, almost rude, and I wince where I stand.
Rachel wordlessly slides the plate of peppers from me, finishing the last few slices and offering a wink as she scatters them over the nearly cooked eggs.
I’m thankful that she allows me to remain where I am, silent, as Mamma goes on.
“And it wasn’t just him that we lost—it was everything.
Maybe if he’d spent less time gabbing all over town about his pretty little girl and more time practicing law or seeing to his accounts, we wouldn’t have been left in such a bind.
But as it was, we lost the house, the horse and buggy, the furniture, all of it.
And I got another little one at home, too. A son.”
“Well, I’d be ever so willing to hire Evelyn again. And if the earnings help you just a little, then it’s a favorable situation for all.”
“I’ll have to think on it.” I hear Mamma’s exhale. “I’m not sure, well…Is it decent?”
“I’d only do work that is entirely decent, Mrs. Talbot.” Mrs. Dawson’s voice remains even and calm. “There’s so much to explore with her. The colors alone—her skin is the richest hue. She’s not pale like many other girls. Her complexion has a warmth to it.”
“That’s her daddy in her.”
“And her hair, it’s like a waterfall, so thick. The most entrancing shades of chestnut and gold.”
“That’s thanks to me. I may not look like much now, but…well, I was young once, too.”
“Yes, Mrs. Talbot, I don’t doubt it. She’s lucky to be your daughter.
Oh, and her lips. We need to work with color to capture them, like two rose petals.
Listen to me, I sound like a student of Shakespeare suddenly.
But I assure you, my interest as an artist is what drives me.
I’d love to pull out your daughter’s gifts.
Someday soon she may realize the treasure she has, and she won’t have any use for my little studio.
But until then, I’ll paint her any day she’ll give me. ”
Mamma declares once more that she has to think on it, and then Rachel announces that the omelet is ready, and all talk of posing is paused for the day.
As Rachel slices into the eggs and serves up four steaming plates, my mouth begins to water.
And as I sit down at the table, I realize yet again just how hungry I am, but not only for the food—also for the work that Mrs. Dawson has offered.
After that, I go to Mrs. Dawson’s each Sunday morning.
I sit before the windows in their ever-changing puddles of sunshine, “finding my light” as Mrs. Dawson has taught me to do.
I always wear my starched white blouse, and sometimes, if she wants to draw a bit of my neck, I’ll unbutton the top, but that’s it.
Sometimes Mrs. Dawson has me turn around and undo my braid or chignon so that she can devote her entire attention to my loose hair.
Other times she focuses on just my eyes, moving me toward and away from a window for various amounts of light and shadow.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen them looking this big,” she says.
Other times she studies my hands as though they hold some secret treasure that only she can find.
The view outside, originally one of spring trees newly in leaf, thickens and warms as summer approaches and then begins to ripen across the city.
Eventually Mamma stops accompanying me to my Sunday appointments, assured of Mrs. Dawson’s respectability and happy to have her one free day back to herself.
—
After a few months, Mrs. Dawson declares that we are ready to begin incorporating props. “Art isn’t meant to be passive; it’s active,” she explains to me. “And you are the most animated artists’ model I’ve ever worked with. Let’s begin storytelling.”
So the following Sunday, on Rachel’s direction, I tip my nose into a silk rose as though I’m entranced by its perfume.
Next, holding the petals to my cheek, I stare off into the imagined distance.
“As though you are pining for a long-lost love,” Mrs. Dawson says, throwing me a playful wink. “Ever been in love?”
“Of course not,” I answer, feeling my cheeks grow warm with bashfulness.
“Then you get to do a bit of theater, too, Evelyn. I know you’ve got several talents.” Mrs. Dawson pauses, tipping her head sideways as she studies me for a moment. “Have you ever longed for anything?”
That I can answer in the affirmative. Yes, I’ve longed for a good many things.
Daddy. Our old home. The life we lost. “There.” Mrs. Dawson leans toward me.
“That’s it right there. Keep that.” And so I try my best to oblige.
To push the memories aside, wiping my mind blank, even as I hold on to the expression that the sad memories have summoned.