“Ooh, don’t move.” Giroud hurried to his easel. “Remain just like that.”
Eleanor stared at the pillow above Miss Abbott’s head. It was covered in a lovely purple satin with a black lace trim. “Your landlady told me you were taking painting classes. I didn’t realize that you were”—she cleared her throat delicately—“sitting.”
“Or lying, as the case may be.” Miss Abbott rested her hand on her smooth belly, the movement drawing Eleanor’s gaze.
She snapped it back to the pillow. “Yes. Well. I was wondering if you’d heard about Edgar Bannister. That he’d been killed.”
“I had heard that.” Miss Abbott tutted. “What is the world coming to? I am almost glad Susan died first. Her son’s death would have devastated her.”
Eleanor gripped her left elbow with her right hand. Miss Abbott was likely right. Losing a child must be the greatest pain that existed. She’d heard that Lord Richford had gone to his country estate, unable to face society with this second blow. Could a man recover from losing his wife and only child?
“I wanted to ask you about your argument with Bannister.” Perhaps it was the thought of Viscount Richford crying and all alone in the country, perhaps it was the surprise of questioning a nude Miss Abbott, but she didn’t try to ease into the subject. It seemed like the time for artifice was past. “What was it concerning?”
“At the cemetery? I already told that Runner it was of little account.”
Giroud put down his brush and strode to his subject. He repositioned one leg, bending it at the knee slightly, exposing a dark shadow at her vee. His fingers lingered a moment longer than necessary, his eyes dropping to half-mast.
Oh. That explained how Miss Abbott went home with paint on her body.
Eleanor fixed her attention on that pillow again. She wondered where Giroud had bought it. It was quite lovely. “No, the other argument you had. In front of the Queen’s House in St. James. You were seen having a heated disagreement.”
“I was seen?” Miss Abbott dipped her chin. “By whom?”
“By me.” She met Miss Abbott’s narrowed-eyed gaze. “I saw you. As did Mr. Rollins of Bow Street.”
It would be easy to dismiss Eleanor’s account, but adding Frederick’s name gave the accusation more weight. Miss Abbott would have to answer or else face the law. At least Eleanor hoped so.
Fire kindled in Miss Abbott’s eyes and was quickly doused. She turned a bored look toward the easel that Giroud had disappeared behind. Perhaps that was the expression he told herto wear. “Edgar took a perfectly natural conversation and made it acrimonious. I only wanted to offer him direction, as a favor to my friend. He didn’t appreciate my concern.” She frowned. “He was a very conventional young man.”
Concern or interference? “Conventional how?” By her tone, Miss Abbott didn’t consider conventionality an asset.
Giroud called out a direction, and Miss Abbott shifted to comply. “He didn’t approve of his mother’s interest in modernity. Or politics. Or of any interest outside of the home. His body might have been in the nineteenth century, but his head was firmly in the eighteenth. He had very traditional views on society. He and Susan butted heads frequently.”
“Perhaps we should send him a copy of this painting,chère.” The painter leaned around his easel, a grin licking his lips. “Show him just how magnificent an untraditional woman can be.”
“Did you miss the part in the conversation where we discussed that he was dead?” Miss Abbott laughed, but it was ugly, cruel. “Go back to your painting.”
The man’s cheeks flushed, and he ducked back behind his canvas.
Eleanor didn’t like the gnome, but she couldn’t help but feel badly for him. His admiration for Miss Abbott was obvious. She seemed merely to tolerate him.
But Eleanor had only seen the two together for a few minutes, and as one was naked and the other French, they could hardly be considered to be at their best.
“What was Lady Richford like?” She knew all the reasons her mother hated the woman, knew the pettiness and cruelty that had led to giving her mother the cut direct, but there had to be more to the viscountess. “How was she interested in modernity?”
Miss Abbott traced a fold in the counterpane beneath her. “Susan was an ardent believer in the free love movement. She devoured everything written by Shelley. Advocated for female empowerment. She was brilliant.” She blinked rapidly, her throat working on a swallow.
Eleanor’s cheeks heated. She’d read Shelley before and found his poetry needlessly indulgent. His morality formed on the indulgence of childish whims.
After spending time with Frederick, finally experiencing the pleasures Shelley wrote about, Eleanor had to admit that her criticism of the man might be ill-formed, as well. She had come to a conclusion without a full understanding of the subject matter.
She cleared her throat. “Her husband is a Tory. I don’t remember ever hearing gossip that he was married to a radical.”
Bitterness twisted Miss Abbott’s face. “Sue could hardly express her opinions in that house. Her husband held too much power over her, which was one of the reasons she advocated in private for the abolition of marriage.”
“The beautifulrévolutionhas inspired much,non?”
Miss Abbott gave the painter an approving look.
