Page 47 of The New Earl’s Convenient Wife

Chapter Fourteen

A few days later, Rafe was able to follow through on his resolve to seek out more excursions to delight his wife. As she reclined in his arms in bed after their early-morning lovemaking, he said, ‘Would you like to visit the Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy? It won’t present an opportunity to sketch, but you could study the landscapes, which will almost certainly include some drawings of animals.’

He was rewarded by her immediate flare of interest. ‘I would love to! Will you obtain tickets?’

‘I already have. We can go today, if you like.’

‘How thoughtful of you! I’ll be ready in a trice! Thank you!’ She gave him a long, lingering kiss that made him question whether she needed to leave the bedchamber just yet.

‘I think we’ll have time to breakfast first,’ he called after her as she rushed to her dressing room, amused at her eagerness. What a clever devil he was, he thought as he rose and threw on his banyan. To spark such an enthusiastic response, most husbands would have to expend a great deal of blunt on fine jewels or a costly gown. All he’d needed was the shilling price of an entry ticket to the Royal Academy.

An hour later, after taking a hackney to Somerset House, they entered the building with a flurry of other early visitors.

Looking through the catalogue, Rafe found the work for which he’d been looking. ‘J. M. W. Turner, the artist of whom your work reminds me, submitted only one painting for this show, Dido and Aeneas. Shall we find that first?’

‘Let’s do. I’m curious to see which artist I remind you of—though I can’t imagine my simple offerings resemble those of a craftsman as renowned as Turner! Aeneas…he’s featured in The Iliad,’ she commented as he guided her to the appropriate gallery.

‘Yes. One of the Trojans, Hercules’s friend, who survived Troy and, legend says, went on to found Rome. On the way, after being shipwrecked in Carthage, he fell in love with its queen, Dido.’

‘If he went on to found Rome, I assume that relationship didn’t end well.’

‘No. Though it’s written that they were very much in love, when he left to fulfill his destiny, she killed herself. But this painting, the catalogue says, represents the early, idyllic days of their association, before duty prompted him to leave and break her heart.’

‘Much better to illustrate happiness than the misery of being broken-hearted,’ she said, such emphasis in her voice that he gave her a searching glance.

Had she been broken-hearted at some point? He knew she hadn’t felt more than fondness for his brother. He’d first suspected her ‘other plans’ for escaping her family were woven around the interest of some astute gentleman, but she’d insisted that becoming a companion to Lady Fallsham had been her only outlet.

If so, how could she have experienced heartbreak? Disappointment and sadness at her ill-treatment by her family, but true heartbreak was reserved for the loss of one’s dearest love. Something, he thought as he suppressed another sharp pang, about which he knew all too much.

Had she met some unknown young man and lost her heart?

Though he couldn’t see how or when that might have happened. But if it had, he felt a wave of compassion for her. He of all people knew how devastating such a loss could be. How long and difficult it was to claw one’s way back to any semblance of enjoying life.

But under the sympathy lurked another less noble emotion…surely not jealousy? That she had cared so much for another man that she would see his loss as heartbreak?

Watching her smiling as she gazed at the works they passed, he told himself he was being ridiculous. Cloistered away at Edgerton Manor, she’d had virtually no chance to meet an eligible gentleman with whom she could fall in love.

Unless it had occurred during her sojourn in London during her sister’s come-out? Had she fallen for one of Aggie’s suitors, and as a younger daughter not yet out, not even had a chance to win his affections?

A fierce sense of possessiveness succeeded his speculation. Despite the odd tone in her voice, with its stark edge of sorrow, it was highly unlikely she’d been speaking from personal experience. For which he was glad and relieved. He wouldn’t wish her to suffer as he had. And he was very glad—ignoble as that feeling might be—that another man had not claimed her before he could.

Shaking his mind free of such useless speculation, he escorted her into the room where the Turner painting was displayed, where a number of visitors clustered to view the work,

The painting was calm, majestic, dominated by a grand sky, with clouds at the top of the canvas looking like a flight of birds. The human figures, the titular focus of the work, were dwarfed by the natural world surrounding them…trees, hills, that enormous sky. To him, they looked…insignificant, despite being grand figures of ancient literature. His eye was drawn instead to the trees on the hills behind them, reaching out over the river as if they wished to embrace each other from their opposite shores—perhaps meant to symbolize the star-crossed lovers?

‘May we linger a moment, so I might study the brush-work and technique?’

‘Take as long as you like.’

She had her sketchbook deployed before he finished speaking. Rafe watched her as she stood, rapt, her gaze darting around the canvas. He could almost feel her brain noting the shades of color, the luminosity of the sky, the hues of the shadowed hills and limpid water.

‘It’s very grand,’ she said eventually. ‘Do you truly think my work resembles this?’

‘Not in grandeur. But in its emphasis on the natural world and its wildness. Like those clouds in the mid-ground, reaching up like fingers trying to grab the clouds above them, which are fleeing like birds at the top of the canvas.’

‘Another hint of the sad end of the love affair, Dido reaching out for departing Aeneas?’

‘Perhaps. Like your sketch of the diving peregrine falcon, its swiftness and speed emphasized by the wild flurry of cloud behind him—all violent, feral motion. Shall we look at some other works?’ Rafe asked.