Chapter 7 #2
Florrie blinked, realising she’d crouched to examine the roots. She opened the bag and tilted the painting upward. “Do either of your ballads mention a custom of carving these trees? I suspect both Fairies and Folk must have taken part.”
“Why, would you look at that!” Vern marvelled. “I couldn’t see any carvings on my last journey. It’s very kind of you to give me a glimpse.”
“It’s no trouble,” said Florrie hastily. “At any rate, I can recall only three historical artworks that feature work by Fairies and Folk in tandem – and two of those were done as forfeits after the artists lost wagers, if I’m not mistaken.”
Her eyes followed one portrait subject’s etched hair as it twisted around a root.
Florrie knew she ought to say more – to follow up with some grand statement about how the tree could function as a metaphor for compromise between Fairy and Folk artistic sensibilities, or how it represented a kind of informal, unplanned artmaking that she found far more intriguing than the finest of posed portraits.
What she wanted to do, more than anything, was to keep looking at the art in silence, which seemed impolite, or, alternatively, to show Vern every carving and learn his opinions of them, which might be far more ill-mannered.
Chary would certainly dismiss the latter as nonsense – as she did when Florrie once asked her cousin to examine a fountain-relief with her while they waited for a bird-drawn carriage to arrive.
As her silence stretched on, Florrie wondered if Vern might say something himself. In his years of studying conversation, he must have learned how to proceed if a dull partner stopped mid-discussion to stare at a carved tree.
He did not. He was quite silent. Florrie assumed he must be thoroughly bored. Perhaps he’d even fallen asleep.
She could bear it no longer. Florrie turned her head slightly, subtly, so one might assume she was simply looking out at the landscape.
Vern was decidedly not asleep. He hovered in the top corner of the painting with his head angled upwards. She didn’t need her bonnet to see how rapidly his eyes as he took in every detail of the elaborate artwork before them.
He was rapt, just like her. He had been looking at it, too – though he was now looking at Florrie.
“I should have known you’d show me something wonderful,” Vern said. “Art that’s old and intricate and needs to be seen. That’s what you do best, isn’t it?”
Florrie tried to tell her heart it simply could not beat so quickly every time Vern said something vaguely complimentary.
“Still, I ought to let you carry on with your evening,” he continued. “You must be keen to rejoin your fellow travellers.”
After a few moments of consideration, Florrie eventually arrived at the conclusion that he simply must be joking this time.
Perhaps Vern saw, through the transparent window in the bag, how she shied away from the other Folk on the road – or, even worse, had overheard her unfortunate conversation with Chary after all.
“I do apologise for that business with the bag earlier,” she said, with a slight and sorry curtsey. “I hope you weren’t jostled overmuch.”
“Oh, it was quite unexpected! You’re always so careful, and I knew you weren’t the one attacking those poor handles. Who was it?”
“My cousin, I’m afraid,” she confessed, hating to admit a familial association with the bag-grabber. “I ensured you weren’t in any danger.”
“Were you?” he asked.
“In danger? No. It was simply a rather spirited conversation.”
“About the prince, I assume?”
“About the prince?” she repeated.
“Well, yes!” Vern laughed. “I didn’t mean to overhear – I wanted to give you some privacy, and the bag muffles sounds somewhat – but there’s only so many times that a practised eavesdropper can hear the word beau without feeling intrigued. Was she referring to the prince, or—”
“The prince, yes, certainly,” Florrie said, hurriedly.
“Of course. Does she disapprove of your marriage?”
“She could never disapprove of my marriage.” Florrie sighed. “Our discussion was merely a bit of nonsense.”
As she did not wish to elaborate on said nonsense, Florrie realised she had once again reached the point of conversational floundering. She should beg off with the excuse of retiring for the evening. If there was one social skill at which Florrie excelled, it was ending conversations expediently.
The prospect of ending this one, however, saddened her.
In every previous interaction with Vern (excepting their first meeting), Florrie had come with an agenda – and an approximate time limitation, as she could not stray from her work for too long.
Out here, no such limitations existed. One could not ask for a finer opportunity to become more acquainted with the subject of one’s silly fancy.
But how would she commence a casual conversation with someone who lived in a painting?
None of the prompts Chary had shared with Florrie over the years seemed relevant.
Considering the fragmented nature of his knowledge from eavesdropping, she couldn’t ask for his thoughts about the more trivial goings-on in artistic society and culture.
Was there anything she could say without making Vern feel offended or excluded from the conversation?
After all, she only needed to get him started.
“Won’t you please tell me more of your thoughts about the tree, Florrie?”
Florrie leaned against the tree in question to steady herself. Vern was watching her – well, perhaps scrutinising her – once more, his head tilted slightly to the side.
“Whatever do you mean?”
“You’ve not stopped admiring it. I thought you might have formed some interesting opinions.”
“It is a museum like no other,” Florrie said in a rush.
“Anyone who travels here can view the many works of art it contains. One needn’t fear the disapproval of a gallery guard nor the judgement of one’s fellow museum-goers.
I daren’t admit this to any self-respecting conservator, but there’s something utterly splendid about it. ”
“I certainly agree. Why would your colleagues think otherwise?”
“Oh, it’s also terribly unprotected. At any moment, some tempest could fell the tree, or it could split and shatter from age.
All that art and history would be lost. Its glorious accessibility is also its greatest weakness.
In my line of work, we contend constantly with competing interests – protecting the artwork versus letting it live, so to speak. ”
It was only after this spirited monologue that Florrie realised she was the victim of her own conversational strategy. Somehow, he’d got her started.
“You didn’t need to hear all that,” she said, quietly. “It was kind of you to ask.”
“Come now, Florrie,” said Vern with a grin. “As an artwork who very much wants to live, as you say, it’s my pleasure to ask. You know, I’ve listened to lots of conversations, but no one besides you has ever told me anything.”
“And what do you think of the experience?”
“Why, it’s thrilling!” Vern exclaimed. “I ask something, you answer. Beautifully simple. And I’m ever so curious about everything, Florrie. I practically showed you my entire world yesterday, and yet I know almost nothing of yours.”
Florrie stared at the painting, feeling quite baffled.
“You’d like to learn about my life?”
“Is that not expected in a conversation? Each of us becoming more familiar with the other?”
“I’m afraid you’ll find there’s nothing worth learning about me,” she warned.
“How would I know otherwise? I’ve never met anyone else.”
“I suppose that’s true,” Florrie admitted. “Well, I am most fond of art, as you know. I live – that is to say, I previously lived – with my mother and stepmother. I spend far too much of my time fixing paintings and sculptures and whatever decorative objects a collector hands my way.”
She ought to have kept talking about the tree. With these boring biographical details laid before her, Florrie could not believe how shapeless her life seemed.
Fortunately, Vern was far too considerate to say otherwise. He was, in fact, smiling.
“And what pastimes do you enjoy in the rare moments when you’re not fixing paintings?”
The truth was that nothing brought Florrie as much pleasure as conservation.
She could remind him that she vaguely enjoyed cooking stew, which was true, but only because it kept her from going hungry.
She might also claim she was fond of painting and sketching – and that was probably the sort of answer he sought – but Florrie hadn’t mentioned that to anyone in years and didn’t intend to start now.
Accordingly, she decided the best course of action was to murmur, in a tepid way, “I rather enjoy… flowers.”
“What a coincidence!” Vern exclaimed. “So do I!”
“It’s a remarkably common trait among both Fairies and Folk, I’m sure.”
“I haven’t the slightest idea what’s common or uncommon. Why do you enjoy them so?”
“They’ve fascinated me, artistically speaking, since I was very young.
Did you know that the greatest still-life artists only ever depicted cut flowers?
They’re always vased or arranged on a shelf with a crystal and a seed-loaf and a skull, or something of the sort.
When I was a student, I wondered what it would be like to paint a ‘living-life’ – not a scene of still objects, but a true portrait of flowers, with the textures of the petals and pollen appearing as gloriously wild as they do in nature itself.
How could I not enjoy flowers?” She paused to catch her breath.
“I suppose there’s also the fact that they are quite pretty. ”
“Very pretty indeed!” Vern concurred. “But let me make sure I understand. What you envision is like… like my painting, except instead of Lord Mauve, there’s a flower posing just as regally?”