“Why do you suppose a woman did this?” The duchess sounded indignant.
Eamon quickly shook his head. “I don’t—I am only speculating. In any case, whoever did paint these, man or woman, might be long deceased. Some of these pigments are no longer obtainable, or not easily so. And it has taken a while for so much grime to build up. But it might have been a woman who painted it. Talent is the same whether one is male or female, in my experience. Look at Madame Vigée Le Brun.”
The duchesses’ stare told him she wasn’t interested in discussing art history.
“What you mean is, these paintings are worthless,” she stated.
Eamon tried to soften the blow. “To the right collector, they are not. They will never fetch the price of genuine Rembrandts, but someone interested in forgers might pay a few guineas for them.”
“A few guineas.”
The duchess abruptly turned and strode away from him down the gallery, her slippers whispering on the bare wooden floor. Eamon wondered if she’d shout for her butler to show Eamon the door, but she turned at the far end of the gallery and headed back.
Her pace slowed as she neared the paintings, her fingers splayed across her mouth.
Eamon watched the duchess try to calm herself, to make herself not care that someone had cheated her family out of tens of thousands of pounds.
“If not these, then perhaps other paintings might be valuable,” she said. “The previous dukes amassed quite a collection.”
And why, Eamon wondered, was she so desperate to sell? Though a noble title did not preclude a peer from being insolvent, dukes seemed less susceptible to the whims of economic change. Dukes were lofty beings, raised high above the other titled nobles, often with blood ties or very close friendships with the monarch—not that monarchs were very good at keeping accounts themselves.
Eamon had noted no fire in the reception room, though he’d assumed that was to encourage unwanted guests to leave. There hadn’t been one in the drawing room he’d been taken to, and its closeness indicated it hadn’t been used in a long while.
Instead of a dozen footmen scurrying about to light the mistress’ way up and down the stairs, there was only the spindly butler who might blow over in the next strong gust.
Cheswell had said, Go charm the Duchess of Aylesworth out of a few paintings we can turn a profit on, without giving him much information on the Aylesworth family itself.
The duchess’s lavender gown was several years out of date and covered her from neck to ankles. She’d come out of full mourning, but Eamon was acquainted with ladies who spent their mourning year planning their future wardrobe down to the last button, donning it the moment the requisite time of grief was officially finished.
Either this woman had respected and loved her husband too deeply to leave off dull half-mourning for frivolous gowns, or she had no other choice of garments.
All signs indicated that the once-wealthy Aylesworth dukes were now skint.
Eamon’s wisest course would be to apologize to the duchess and claim he couldn’t help her. Cheswell’s gallery did not have time or resources to waste scouring a collection of forgeries to try to assist a bankrupt. He’d put it in more polite terms, of course.
Eamon opened his mouth and found himself saying something quite different.
“You are likely right, Duchess. This gallery might hold many treasures, and the rest of the house as well. I can go through it all for you, catalog and value it. Who knows what we will discover?”
Eamon liked the way her eyes lit with hope, though the hope quickly vanished.
“That is kind,” the duchess said. “But I am afraid I will not be able to engage your services.”
She couldn’t afford the fee, she meant. Her attempt to hide this fact behind a chilly, aristocratic dismissal increased Eamon’s admiration for her.
“Duchess, do you still have my card?”
She blinked then reached into a slit in her gown and pulled out a rectangle that had been curled in her warm pocket. Eamon tried not to envy the card.
“Will you read what it says to me?” Eamon asked as she held it up.
“Eamon Stone, Esq. Assessor, art collections. Paintings, sculpture, objets d’art,” the duchess said in a clear voice. “And so forth. I did glance at it when Singleton announced you,” she finished with impatience.
“The last line, if you please. There.” Eamon stepped closer and touched the bottom edge of the card.
The duchess drew a breath, her fetching bosom rising. “No fee for consultation.”
“Precisely.” Eamon made himself increase the space between them, though it was cold anywhere not close to her. “I am happy to rummage through your home and see what I can turn up. I only take a commission on the sale.”
