Read Online Mad About the Earl by Christina Brooke - Free Book Online Page A

Lady Steyne and the artist himself would know who the model for this work had been. Monsieur François would impose Mama’s raven-black hair and classically beautiful features on the face of this sprite or nymph or whatever she was supposed to be.
    Rosamund could see nothing amiss with her mother’s figure, but gainsaying her parent when that lady had a fixed notion in her head was far more effort than giving way to it. Lady Steyne had sighed and muttered about taut, dewy young skin, an attribute all the marchioness’s cosmetic aids could not entirely preserve or reclaim.
    She ought to pity her mother. To Nerissa Westruther, Lady Steyne, her beauty was her sole personal asset, the one true measure of her worth. While others saw the marchioness as an exquisite woman, Rosamund knew Nerissa felt her former glory slipping through her slender fingers like water. This composite portrait was a desperate—and quite pathetic—attempt to recapture it.
    The drawing room was chilly despite the soft, golden sunlight that streamed through the window beside her. Rosamund shivered, uncomfortably aware that she’d developed goose bumps on her arms and that her nipples had tightened to hard, embarrassing peaks.
    Far from displaying any propensity to leer, the artist himself was all business. With a hint of impatience puckering his fine black brows, he spoke around a paintbrush he held wedged between his teeth. “Hold the urn a leetle higher, mademoiselle. Higher. Yes, that is it. I must work vite, vite, vite, before we lose the light.”
    Rosamund complied, reflecting that her mother’s lovers were becoming increasingly less aristocratic, yet commensurately younger and more attractive as the years went on. The footman at the door had been staggeringly handsome. Did François know he had a rival? Or didn’t he care?
    But then, one might go mad speculating about the intricacies of her mother’s affaires .
    How much longer? The arm she’d raised ached, her nose itched, and the wreath of spring flowers and leaves Lady Steyne had set in her hair possessed malevolent protruding twigs that stuck into her scalp.
    Rosamund had agreed to model today primarily to assuage her stinging conscience. Her mother’s reproaches of neglect had merit; visiting Lady Steyne proved so emotionally draining that Rosamund seldom called in Berkeley Square at all if she could avoid it. Even then, she usually chose the marchioness’s “at home” days to avoid a tête-à-tête.
    Had she made good on her promise to Montford and brought her old governess, Tibby would have found some way of extricating Rosamund from this hideous obligation. But knowing that her bluestocking former governess secretly despised her mama, Rosamund hadn’t brought her after all.
    It was one thing to harbor her own misgivings about her errant parent. Quite another to see those misgivings mirrored in her respected companion’s eyes. Instead, Rosamund’s maid awaited her in the kitchens and knew nothing of what went on upstairs.
    No doubt, Meg was even now enjoying a comfortable gossip with Lady Steyne’s dresser. Rosamund shivered. She’d give her eyes for a hot cup of tea.
    “My dear girl, you look like you’re facing an execution!” drawled her mother. “You’re supposed to be Arethusa, the water sprite. Ethereality, my dear! Lightness! Esprit! ”
    “I’m sorry, Mama.” She forbore to point out that it would not be her expression on the portrait but Lady Steyne’s. Obediently, Rosamund tried again.
    When her mother wasn’t looking, she sent a longing glance toward the clock on the mantel. Fifteen minutes—half an hour at the most—was all she’d intended to spend at Steyne House. No more than a formal morning call. Instead, she’d remained over two hours. She could only hope her mother’s protégé would finish with her before she was due back at Montford House to dress for the evening.
    With an effort, Rosamund pushed her thoughts beyond the humiliation she felt.