Lucy’s throat went dry. She’d half forgotten herself; how had Catherine guessed? But it was true—the embroidery had initially been hung by her fond father in the front parlor. But then Stephen had brought an artist friend home that winter, and they’d whiled away an entire rainy afternoon storm by critiquing every last error and flaw in her work. “They said I lacked inspiration,” she murmured, “and that it is inspiration which breathes life into true art. That’s the root of the word, they said, trotting out all their newly acquired Latin.”
Catherine stroked a hand down Lucy’s arm, soothing and safe. “So you chose science instead of art?”
“I thought I had to choose between them. I knew I loved astronomy, even then—so I thought my terrible embroidery was another sign of my scientific abilities.” Lucy shook her head, a flood of rare regret briefly swamping her. “I shouldn’t have argued with you before, when you said the value of art lies in how other people view it.”
Catherine sat up, eyes flashing. “You know what I think? I think we should stop taking your brother’s self-indulgent ranting as the ultimate authority.”
Lucy shook her head, but her dismay began to shade into amusement. “He’s a professional painter; I’m not sure we can discount him entirely.”
Catherine’s gaze turned stern, her blue eyes fixing Lucy where she lay sprawled. It was an oddly schoolteacherish look, an impression which was only strengthened when the countess demanded, “How did Isaac Newton discover the principle of gravitation?”
Lucy was not yet so far removed from her school days: her reply was swift. “He saw an apple fall to the earth.”
“And was he the first person to ever have seen this? Was he a discoverer of apples falling?”
Lucy let out a breathy laugh, mirth bubbling up in her. “Of course not.”
“Right, because that would be absurd. So Newton looked at a perfectly ordinary apple, doing something that apples do every autumn in every orchard in the world—and not only apples, but other fruits, too, every plum and peach and orange and mango—and he came up with one of the most brilliant discoveries about the physical world, something no other living being on earth had ever realized before.” Catherine folded her arms. “Now tell me that science doesn’t sometimes involve inspiration, as much as hard work and a search for truth.”
Lucy considered this, staring up again at the terrible evidence of her youthful feminine failures. “That’s all well and good for Mr. Newton, but all I have done so far is to bring other people’s thoughts into greater clarity—first with my father, and then with Oléron. I can claim no inspiration of my own.”
“None?” Catherine’s eyes narrowed. “What was it you said made you decide not to do a plain translation?”
Lucy sucked in a deep breath. “You,” she said, sitting up again.
She picked up the end of the blanket Catherine held, pulling on it. Catherine didn’t let go, but allowed herself to be pulled closer.
Lucy looked down into her lover’s flushing face. “I wanted to write something to convince you that you could pursue science, if you chose. I wanted to help set you free.”
Once, Catherine might have dropped her eyes, and trembled. Now she only dropped the blanket, baring her breasts and reaching out to pull Lucy into her arms.
It was Lucy who shook as the countess’s hands skated over the tenderest parts of her, warm against the cool air, flickering like candlelight over her skin. “I might have taken up science once, for you,” Catherine whispered. There was a sad shadow at the corner of her mouth that Lucy desperately wanted to kiss away. “But I know better now than to try and remake myself for someone else’s comfort. I’m not drawn to natural philosophy, not like you are, though it’s very much a part of my world. I’ve chosen a different path—parallel, perhaps, but not the same as yours. I want to try thinking of myself as an artist for a while, because I think it might suit me.” Her hands on Lucy’s shoulders clutched tighter. “But I never would have had the thought before I met you. So you see, you did set me free after all.”
“I’m glad,” Lucy whispered.
Chapter Twelve
All interludes must come to an end, however, and it was at last time to return to London. They stopped one night with Aunt Kelmarsh, whose garden was doing poorly in the wet, chilly summer but who still had plenty of poisonous blossoms to offer to avenge what Stephen had done.
“It doesn’t have to be fatal,” she explained to Catherine as Lucy went off in peals of laughter. “A single daffodil petal mixed into a salad won’t kill him, but it will make him at least as uncomfortable as he deserves.”
Catherine smiled and sipped her ale—summer for Aunt Kelmarsh wasn’t summer without a good broad English ale to hand, no matter what the weather—as the older woman listed a few otherhighlyfrightening ideas. Yes, she’d done well to imagine Aunt Kelmarsh in a witch’s gown. She might see about having one made up as a gift, in time for Christmas...
It was lucky Catherine was thinking about her art—she even stuttered over the words in the quiet of her own mind, though it was getting easier—because they returned to London to find Lucy’s new wardrobe was finished and needed only the last quick fittings to be properly tailored. Suddenly Lucy looked fashionable, not at all the young country lady who’d turned up on Catherine’s doorstep all those months ago.
Society began to take more notice.
Some of those noble scions who’d approved Lucy’s book had not minded to learn it was the work of a woman, and had issued invitations to tea or to certain interesting lectures around the city—so Lucy was growing a small social circle of her own in town, quite separate from the gentleman naturalists, eccentrics, and dilettantes who made up the bulk of the Society’s ranks.
Not that the academics were absent, of course—Mr. Edwards had come by for dinner several times with his novelist wife, and Mr. Frampton had written to ask if Lucy had sent her translation to Oléron yet. Lucy had demurred, less than eager to expose herself to more potential scorn from male bastions of astronomy.
And then there arrived a letter from Stephen, asking if he could come to Lady Moth’s and apologize to Lucy in person.
Catherine thought Lucy ought to use the blue parlor, as the most formal and frigid room in the house, but Lucy chose instead to wait for her brother in the small back garden. He would be more at ease there, she was sure—and she could escape indoors if necessary and cut the interview short.
She paced for ten full minutes before a cough from behind her made her spin round.
Oh, it made her heart ache to see that even now, when he was calling at the home of a countess, he still had paint stains on his sleeve.
