Sydnam had a sudden, sickening memory of an almost-identical moment in his own life. His parents had given him paints for Christmas when he was nine or ten, and he had wanted desperately to use them. But there was a houseful of relatives staying at Alvesley, and parties and other activities, all planned for the amusement of the children, had filled every moment of every day. He had been told to put away the paints until after everyone had left and their tutor had returned from his vacation. It had been the longest, dreariest Christmas of his childhood.
“Please, sir?” David said again. “It has been two whole days. And it is going to be forever until we get to Wales and my teacher.”
Sydnam licked dry lips.
It was ridiculous really. Ridiculous! He had dabbled in painting during his growing years and had enjoyed it. He had even had some skill at it. He had since lost his right arm and could no longer paint. It was no big thing. There were plenty of other things hecoulddo. He could be a father to his stepson for one. But—
“David,” he said, “I was right-handed. I can no longer paint. I—”
“But you can tell me how,” the boy said. “You do not have todoit for me. Justtellme.”
But that was not the point at all. It was simply not the point.
“David,” Anne said firmly. “Can you not see—”
“I suppose I can do that,” Sydnam heard himself say as if his voice were coming from far away. “I can tell you how. You are good enough to pick up the skills without my having to hold your hand.”
“Sydnam—”
“Youwill,sir?” David leaned across the bed, all eager excitement. “Tomorrow? We will get out all my new things and I willpaint?”
“Tomorrow morning after breakfast.” Sydnam smiled at him and got to his feet. “Lie down and go to sleep now or we will both incur the wrath of your mother.”
David plopped himself back on the pillow, both his cheeks suddenly flushed.
“Tomorrow,” he said, “is going to be thebestday. I can hardly wait!”
Sydnam slipped out of the room ahead of Anne.
Kit had already disappeared.
It would not hurt him to give his stepson some pointers. This aversion he felt to painting—even to other people painting—was something he just had to get over. It was amounting to something like a sickness. He had felt actual nausea when he had smelled Morgan’s paints back at Glandwr—and when he had been buying David’s in Bath.
Anyway, he had committed himself now. He was going to do something with his stepson—because his marriage and his commitment to the boy were more important than his own particular sickness.
But for a moment he had to pause on the stairs. He felt dizzy.
________
Anne was sitting on a low chair in a large, light-filled, almost completely unfurnished room on the nursery floor that she guessed was the schoolroom whenever there were children in the house old enough to need one.
In the middle of the room David’s very new easel was set up. A small canvas rested on it, and David stood before it, his new palette in his left hand, a new brush in his right. On a table beside him was propped an oil painting of the sea, which Sydnam was using for instruction—he was standing behind David’s right shoulder.
The air was heavy with the strong smell of the oils.
Anne watched Sydnam more than she did David or his painting. He was abnormally pale. Last night he had been uncommunicative. He had not touched her after they went to bed, but had turned onto his side away from her and pretended to fall asleep fast. But he had not slept for a long time, just as she had not, though she had pretended just as diligently as he.
Did he believe what she had told him the night before—though he had not asked for and she had not offered details? Or did he still think himself ugly and untouchable?
She guessed that he had felt a failure during the afternoon because it was Kit who had given David his first riding lesson. And she knew that he had agreed to the painting lesson in order to redeem himself and be the father he was determined to be. She knew too that painting was something he did not even like to think about, let alone involve himself in.
But this was a challenge he had chosen to face—for the sake ofherson. She fell a little deeper in love with him as she watched. How many men, even if they had married her, would have been prepared to do more than tolerate her illegitimate son?
“No, no,” she heard him say now. “You are still gliding the brush as if you were using watercolors. Try using your wrist more to produce the texture of those waves.Flickthe brush.”
“I just cannotdoit,” David said in exasperation after trying again. “Show me.”
Something happened then—or did not happen—that made Anne turn cold. How she knew she never afterward understood—but shedidknow that Sydnam had lifted his right hand to take the brush, only to discover that it was no longer there.
