"Spring is too uncertain. One never knows whether he will awaken to frost or rain or sunshine. Rather like a visit with Miss Barron,” he added mischievously.
This was the nature of our conversation as we continued along to the Pantiles. There was a definite whiff of romance in the air. It seemed strange to see the colonnade lit up as brightly as daytime, with some of the shops still open for business, and the streets full of strollers. We continued along to where a band was playing. A crowd of holidayers had gathered around. Ladies-and I do not mean the word satirically-were flirting quite openly with gentlemen.
I noticed Lord Weylin was looking at them and said, “There is something about being in a strange town that encourages loose behavior."
One brow lifted and he replied, “I have not observed our little trip having that effect on you, Miss Barron."
"I daresay if those young ladies were accompanied by their mamas, they would not be working their fans so assiduously."
"Your mama is not with you now,” he said, while his fingers tightened possessively on my arm.
If his lordship had some notion of instituting a flirtation while away from home, he was out in his reading of my character. I did not want a clandestine romance, carried on behind society's back.
"Shall we continue our walk?” I said coolly. “The reason we came out was to get a little exercise. We are not making much headway standing here."
"I noticed the lack of headway,” he murmured, and we continued on toward the church. “How does it come you and I are not better acquainted, Miss Barron, having been neighbors for years?"
"I blame it on the infrequency of elections,” I replied. “The only time I am at Parham is when an election is called."
"But as we are neighbors, surely it does not require a national election to get you to call?"
"You forget, milord, I called on you twice this very week. There is just a little something in a threat to call the constable that makes one think twice before calling again. The road travels both ways. You have never called on me."
"I have apologized about the vase. Can we not forget it?"
"You are the one who asked why I do not call at Parham."
The air of flirtation was noticeably lacking in the remainder of our walk. After a longish pause, Weylin said, in the hearty way of a bored gentleman making conversation, “So you are interested in sketching, Miss Barron."
"Yes, I always enjoyed it, since I was a child. A few years ago I began taking lessons from Borsini. He is an Italian conte,” I added, and wished I had not, for it sounded like vulgar boasting.
Weylin's lips moved unsteadily. “I have heard of him."
"Perhaps you are familiar with his painting of the Prince Regent?"
"Very familiar. He tried selling one to me. He paints Prinney with monotonous regularity, and it is a pity the prince has never accepted any of the likenesses."
"Are you saying Borsini was not commissioned? He just painted the picture for his own amusement?"
"No, for money. He runs a profitable sideline hawking copies of Sir Thomas Lawrence's profile of Prinney, but of course, that was not the one he tried to sell to the prince. I do not mean to disparage the man. One has to make a living, after all, and the copies are good enough in their way. There is such a surfeit of art teachers at the moment that he has trouble getting students."
I felt quite deflated, and very vexed with Count Borsini. He had certainly given me the idea he was commissioned to do that painting of the prince. He had also claimed it was a great favor that he condescended to take me on as a student. It was only my unique talent, he said, that convinced him to do it. I had always found it odd that he moved to Aldershot, if he was in such high demand in London.
I twitched my shawl angrily about my shoulders and said, “Shall we go back now? It is becoming rather chilly."
"I thought we might stop for a glass of wine at those tables they have set up around the bandstand."
"Two bottles of champagne were sufficient for me, thank you.” I set a brisk pace back toward the other end of the Pantiles.
"Is there some particular reason why we are running?” Weylin asked.
"It is chilly,” I repeated.
He made no reply, but he took his handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his brow, to show me his idea of the chilly weather.
We went directly back to the hotel. I kept thinking all the way of how Borsini had duped me. Even now I was having the tower room made into a studio. Vanity, all vanity. Borsini had half convinced me I was a genius, and I had gone along with it, paying him a fortune for his lessons.
As we entered, Lord Weylin said, “I am sorry if I have offended you in some manner, Miss Barron. If some of my remarks were slightly out of line, can you not blame it on our being tourists, and forgive me?"
"I am not offended by you, Lord Weylin."
"Then I should dislike to see you when you were offended! If you are not, then join me for a nightcap. I have a favor I want to ask of you. I have reserved the parlor for my use while I am here. We need not have wine. I am not trying to get you inebriated, after all. A posset, or cocoa… There can be no mischief in that."
Since I was curious to hear what favor he wanted, I agreed. My ire was not directed at him, but at Borsini. He ordered tea, and while waiting for it, I asked what he wanted of me.
He placed the miniature of his aunt on the table and said, “Would it be possible for you to do a sketch of my aunt as she looked before she died? Perhaps with this to assist your memory, you might fill out the cheeks, add a few chins, change the hairstyle, and so on. Then we would have a recognizable likeness of her to show around-ask at the various hotels if anyone had seen her. If she used an alias, just checking the registers will be of no help."
I examined the little ivory. “The jowls had sagged, and the eyelids had drooped somewhat when I knew her,” I said, really talking to myself. “The nose tends to become more prominent with age. Yes, I think I could do it quite easily.” Comparing my mental picture of Lady Margaret with the pretty girl in the miniature, I said, “It is sad, is it not, to think how short a time beauty lasts?"
"It has long been one of the poets’ main themes."
Our tea arrived. I poured. “Just a little milk, no sugar,” Weylin said. I had not planned to fix his tea for him; it seemed intimate somehow, but it seemed foolish to object, so I did it.
"Herrick wrote in that vein,” I said. “'Gather ye rosebuds while ye may'-is that what his poem was called?"
"The title was ‘To the Virgins to Make Much of Time,’ I believe. Shakespeare covered the same ground in his sonnets. It is a poetic thought."
"Yes, and it is a pity the poets usually debase it by making it a pretext for urging dalliance on the ladies."
Weylin did not come to the rescue of his sex, but just smiled at the little picture of his aunt. “I suppose we can rule out any romantic doings between your uncle and my aunt? They were several years past it, I should think."
"Barry had a reputation for being a dasher in his youth, but I fear the fires were well banked by the time he returned to England. Mrs. Delancey tried to entice him, but he paid her no heed, and she was attractive, too. Do you think Lady Margaret…"
He shook his head. “I shouldn't think so. She was not a romantical sort of lady. She made a marriage of convenience-and that was in her youth, when the blood should have been at the boil if it was ever going to be."
"If it were not for my uncle having the copy of the necklace, I would think it impossible the two had a single thing to do with each other. They did not move in the same circles."
"The copy, and Steptoe's leering looks,” Weylin agreed. “It seems to me this mystery is about money, not romance. Had they met twenty-five or thirty years ago…"
"But your aunt was in England, and my uncle was in Ireland."
Weylin sat, frowning at the little ivory. “Did your mama not say she recognized this likeness of Margaret, when I showed it to her? I am sure she did. Yet she came to England after my aunt had left. She could not have seen Margaret at this age."