Sargent lowered himself into the armchair, stretching his long legs out in front of him, while Emily, in her usual compulsion to be helpful, ignored her hostess’s command and began preparing the tea that Sally had brought in.
“I’m afraid you just missed Henry and William,” explained Alice, once the tea had been served. She added casually, “William’s here to help investigate the Ripper murders for Scotland Yard.”
Emily clapped her hands in delight, and even Sargent, constitutionally phlegmatic, opened his eyes in surprise.
“You must keep this entirely confidential,” warned Alice. She knew she could depend on Sargent to say nothing, but Emily, rather like Henry, was an excitable person, likely to blurt things out inadvertently.
“We’ll be quiet as a tomb,” Emily assured her.
The door opened a crack, and Archie peeked in. The boy had reported to the house that morning and seemed to have taken to his new responsibilities with alacrity. He entered the room boldly; he was holding two blankets in his hands. “Sally says as how Madame James might be needin’ a blanket as it’s a bit chill in here today,” said the boy, looking at the group with the unselfconscious gaze possible only in a total innocent. “She tol’ me to bring this wool’un here, but I says as it’s too rough for her ladyship, and the mohair’s the one I’d like.”
“Quite right,” said Alice, casting an amused glance at the Sargents. “Her ladyship prefers the mohair.”
“I knows it!” exclaimed Archie triumphantly, bringing the blanket to Alice and, though Emily seemed eager to take it, insisting on draping it over the bed himself.
“Archie is a new addition to the household,” explained Alice to her guests. “William engaged him to help Sally out.”
“Really?” said Emily. She knew that Sally did not need help.
“These are two friends of mine.” Alice addressed the boy: “Miss Sargent and Mr. John Singer Sargent. Mr. Sargent is a painter.”
“A painter?” said the boy. “I likes pictures!”
“Very good.” Sargent nodded. “Liking pictures is good.”
“What pictures is it the gentleman paints?” asked Archie. “I likes them pictures they paste on the walls to tell o’ what’s playin’ at the music halls. But I don’t know as gentlemen does those.”
“You’d be surprised what gentlemen do,” said Sargent. “Posters are the least of it. But I’m in a different line myself. I paint pictures of real people.”
“Real people?” queried the boy. “Like me?”
“Most certainly like you. You would make an excellent subject.”
“People pay Mr. Sargent a great deal of money to paint their portraits,” clarified Alice.
“I coulden do that,” said the boy.
“Nor would I expect it,” said Sargent. “I don’t paint only for money; I also paint for pleasure—subjects that interest me.”
“Like that,” said Emily helpfully, pointing to a small painting over the table that Sargent had given Alice for her birthday. It was of a young woman in a red cloak standing in the portal of a building.
“Tha’s beautiful!” breathed the boy, gazing at the painting intently. The woman had a dark, delicately pretty face. He moved closer and studied the figure a moment. “She looks like me mum,” he finally said.
“Archie’s mother passed away recently,” explained Alice.
“Poor child!” murmured Emily.
John had risen from his chair and stood beside the boy, looking at the picture. It was one of his gifts to be able to relay sympathy and understanding without saying a word. In the present instance, he focused his attention on the painting, but in such a way as to include Archie in the act of assessment. They might have been two casual connoisseurs touring a gallery together. “The lady was a very interesting subject,” he noted, then squinted a bit. “Don’t you think it looks dull?”
“I woulden know,” said the boy. “It looks beautiful to me.”
“And to me,” seconded Emily.
“I’ll brighten it up with a coat of varnish,” said Sargent, ignoring these opinions, as he would more expert ones, and taking the painting off the wall. He turned to the boy. “A little dressing up always helps.”
“I sees as that’s so,” said Archie, looking down at his own new clothes, which had been bought with Sally at a haberdasher that morning.
“It doesn’t really change what’s there,” continued Sargent sagely, “but most people don’t know that. I’ve made many a mediocre work appear better with a coat of varnish.”
“Nothing you do is mediocre, John,” insisted Emily, turning to Alice proudly. “He just had his portrait of Mrs. Marquand sent over for submission to the Royal Academy show. It’s said to be a masterpiece.”
John waved his hand dismissively. “It’s a flattering likeness, which, to the subject at least, qualifies it as a masterpiece.”
“Oh no,” protested Emily. “You paint your subjects exactly as they are.”
“Yes.” Sargent nodded. “Only six inches taller and with good teeth.”
Alice laughed. “You have, in my opinion, come up with the perfect formula for success as a portraitist. If your subjects are impossibly old and ugly, you make them look like dowager empresses, and if they’re young and vacuous, like blushing roses. How, I wonder, would you paint me? Would you make me wise or beautiful?”
“I would not need to make you either.” Sargent laughed. “You are already both!” He had returned to his chair, although not before producing a farthing and a piece of candy, which he slipped to Archie before he left the room.
“I won’t argue with your flattering assessment of me,” said Alice, “especially since you might have leverage with my brothers. They tend to be skeptical of my wisdom, if not my beauty.”
“Oh, they’ll come around,” said Sargent, stretching out his legs and closing his eyes. “You’ll see to that. Now if you’ll excuse me, ladies, being in the presence of so much wisdom and beauty has tired me out. And since I’m sure you have a great deal you want to gossip about, I think I’ll take a nap.”
Chapter 14
When Henry and William returned to Alice’s apartments that evening, Archie was on hand to take their coats. “If you’ll step this way, I’ll show you to the apartment of Madame James,” said the boy with an exaggerated bow.
William seemed nonplussed by this childish formality, but Henry, with a greater understanding of how custom and ritual served to uphold the social structure, responded with a grave nod. “We’re much obliged to you, young man.”
“Archie, get back here and stir the pot!” shouted Sally from the kitchen.
“If you’ll excuse me, sirs, I’m called to duty elsewhere,” explained the boy. “Milady’s chambers is through that door, if you’d be so good as to find your own way.” Having apparently suffered the ire of Sally already and not wanting to repeat the experience, he ducked out of sight.
Henry laughed after the boy left. “It’s a great thing to lift the lower classes.”
“I suppose,” said William doubtfully, “though I suspect it only teaches a more elaborate form of servitude. The whole system offends my ideal of democracy.”
“Your ideal of democracy would not work in this country. Your cutlery would be stolen and your daughter carried off before you had a chance to launch one of your progressive schools.”
“A rather cynical way of looking at things.”
“Not cynical; realistic. You speak continually about the importance of context. Well, context works in social settings as well. One doesn’t apply democratic ideals without an understanding of the history and customs of a people. Here, change happens incrementally, and giving the boy a uniform and a chance to stir the pot in Mayfair is a great leap forward from pilfering and worse in the East End.”
William did not argue.
When they entered Alice’s bedroom, their sister was sitting in her bed, munching on a piece of celery. “It’s supposed to be good for the digestion, only I hate it,” she grumbled, at which she threw the celery across the room, where Katherine, who had been sitting reading a newspaper, calmly picked it up.