The Beauty Within Page 8

  ‘No! Cressida, it is perfecto. Sei bellísima.’

  ‘Well, it is a very nice gown, I have to agree. I think the fashions of Mama’s youth …’

  ‘It is not the gown, it is you.’ Giovanni smiled. ‘Though the hair—if you will permit me?’

  She stood still, hardly daring to breathe as he quickly adjusted her falling tresses. He smelled of fresh soap and turpentine. There was a bluish stubble on his jaw. Why did he have to look so—and why did she have to react so …?

  ‘There! This is inspired.’

  He gently pushed her back into the chair and arranged the folds of her gown and then retreated behind his easel, pulling the covering sheet from the canvas. What on earth had she been expecting? That he would fall at her feet, or pull her into his arms, or bury his head in the valley of her really quite impressive bosom? His stubble would be abrasive on her skin. The décolleté of Mama’s gown was so low that the least movement would expose her nipples to his attentions. Would he use his tongue? ‘Oh, dear.’

  ‘Is there something wrong?’

  ‘No, no. It’s nothing.’

  ‘The dress is uncomfortable?’

  ‘No. It is just a little—no.’

  ‘You and your mother must share a very similar figure. It fits you perfectly.’

  ‘Does it?’ Cressie eyed herself doubtfully.

  ‘You are very similar in looks too, if her portrait in the gallery is a good likeness.’

  ‘You are flattering me today. Am I to be painted blushing with your compliments?’

  Giovanni put down his brush. ‘You think my compliments are professional artifice?’

  Cressie shrugged. ‘It doesn’t matter, does it, so long as they are effective?’

  Anger flashed in his eyes, but it was quickly suppressed. He made a point of focusing on his palette. Cressie fought the urge to pick at her fingers, another habit she was trying to cure herself of since Giovanni had pointed it out to her. ‘Is it beautiful?’ she asked. ‘The picture, I mean. Are you pleased with it?’

  He nodded. ‘Si. I am satisfied. It is what I said it would be. It will be finished sufficiently for me to begin the second portrait very soon.’

  ‘Have you decided how I should be depicted?’

  ‘I thought of you as the Amazonian, Penthiselea, since it is your pen name, but as a warrior queen she would traditionally be portrayed with her breast bared …’

  ‘I feel as if my breast is all but bared in this dress. It is verging on the indecent.’ Too late, she realised she had drawn his attention to her bosom, which Giovanni was now staring at, his eyes dark with something that did not look at all painterly. He had looked the same when he had kissed her. It made her feel as before, a sort of hot, unspecified anticipation. A hunger. ‘I am not so sure that I really am a warrior queen,’ Cressie said hurriedly, embarrassed by the turn her thoughts had taken. ‘I am not even brave enough to face up to my father, never mind Achilles.’

  ‘You do yourself an injustice! The first time I met you, you had just been facing up to your father—I remember it most clearly, the defiant look on your face when I walked into the room. And despite what you have told me of his attempts to marry you off, you remain stubbornly unwed.’

  ‘I am unwed because I am unasked.’ Give or take one belated proposal offered under duress, that is. ‘You overestimate my charms, as I have several times pointed out.’

  ‘And you are determined to rate yourself even lower than your father does, as I have also several times pointed out. Had you chosen to, I have no doubt that you could have elicited offers from any number of Lord Armstrong’s candidates for your hand. But you did not choose to. In fact, I am willing to wager that you were the very opposite of conciliatory. What is the real truth, Cressie? Why are you not married? Was it that man your stepmother mentioned? Did he break your heart?’

  Be careful what you wish for, Cressie Armstrong! That would teach her to hope Giovanni would break his silence. ‘What about you?’ she countered. ‘Are you married? Have you ever been in love?’

  ‘No and no. And we were discussing you.’

  ‘I was not discussing anyone.’

  ‘Now you sound just like one of your little brothers.’ Giovanni laughed. ‘Ti ho messo con le spalle al muro. You don’t like having your back against the wall, do you?’

  ‘I do not—I have not—my back against the wall. Why are you suddenly interested in Giles Peyton?’

  ‘I am not, but I am interested in the effect he had on you. I want to understand you better, now that the first portrait is almost complete and my knowledge will not cloud the purity of the image. Do you understand?’

  ‘So this—this interrogation—is just another of your techniques?’

  ‘For the love of God!’ Giovanni threw his brush at the easel. It bounced off the wooden strut and landed on the floor. ‘There is a woman hidden inside you, a passionate, witty, interesting woman. I have seen her, I have touched her, I have kissed her. But you won’t admit she exists, never mind set her free.’

  He stooped to retrieve his paintbrush. Straightening, he crossed the room to stand before her. ‘You think that no one sees you, and yet you want to be seen. You want people to know that there is more to you than mere bloodstock. I can help you, I can show that person, but only if you will let me see her.’

  Cressie bit back the automatic denial just in time, forcing herself to consider his words. ‘I don’t want you to capture my weaknesses, my past mistakes and indiscretions,’ she said with difficulty. ‘What happened with Giles, it was because I was so young and so naïve and so—I don’t know, so desperate to please. But I’m none of those things now, Giovanni.’

  ‘Then show me the real you. Think of this studio as a form of confessional. We are bound by a solemn vow of secrecy. Whatever is said here, remains here. You have my word on it.’

  ‘And if I do confess? Unfortunately you cannot absolve me of my sins.’ She hadn’t meant to sound so defensive, but she was not at all sure she liked where this conversation was heading. She had never discussed Giles with anyone. She could hardly bring herself to think of it. ‘You are offering to play not only the artist but the priest, are you?’

  Giovanni stiffened. ‘I do not play at being an artist.’

  ‘I am not the only one who dislikes having my back against the wall,’ Cressie retorted, leaping at the chance to get her own back, for that remark had stung. ‘You do play at it, by your own admission. That canvas in front of you, it is not a portrait but an exercise in aesthetics. You have enormous natural talent, I’ve seen it in those drawings you did of my brothers, but you choose not to use it, and to instead paint what people wish to see. You could be an artist, but you choose to play the painter.’

  She wanted only to deflect his questions, but for a moment she thought she had gone too far. Giovanni’s mouth tightened, his eyes flashed, darkly threatening, but even as she watched, his anger faded, brought to heel like a disobedient hound. Running his fingers through his short crop of hair, and rubbing his eyes with his knuckles, he smiled wanly. ‘You are right. It is what I have built my career on. And it is no longer enough.’

  He pulled at his neckcloth, setting the perfect knot awry, and sat down on an ancient chest at right angles to her, throwing up a cloud of dust which clung to his black trousers. It was the first time Cressie had ever seen him dishevelled, the first time she had seen his expression naked, confused. The first time she had seen him look vulnerable. He was resting his chin on his hands, his elbows on his thighs.

  Cressie twisted one of the spangles on her overdress round and round, until the thread which held it came loose. ‘I’m frightened,’ she admitted finally. ‘I’m frightened that the person you paint will be a pathetic, unattractive creature.’

  The spangle came loose, leaving a tiny hole in the gauze. Cressie stared at it, for she could not bring herself to look at Giovanni. ‘You don’t understand. How could you, for you cannot possibly have had any problem in attractin
g women, but—’

  His harsh crack of laughter interrupted her, and forced her to look up. ‘This,’ he said, indicating his face, ‘you think this is an asset? You think I like to be fawned over and petted? You think I like it that this perfect profile is the only thing people see?’

  ‘Is that why you won’t socialise with us, Bella and I? Why you eat alone, and …’

  ‘Sleep alone. Always. Since—always. There, now you have me confessing to you.’ Giovanni got to his feet, catching her hand in his and pulling her with him. ‘From the moment I met you, I saw something different in you, Cressie. It’s something I can’t really explain but I know if I don’t capture it I’ll regret it for the rest of my life. To capture you, I need to know you. Do you see?’

  She was acutely conscious of his body, of his skin, of his mouth, and just as acutely aware that he had confided in her, in her, things that he had not told anyone else. It made him vulnerable and even more enticing, it made her want to hold him tightly, and to kiss him and to beg to know more, to know it all. But she owed him a confidence back in return for his candour, and for that she needed to steel herself.

  ‘Very well, here is the truth of it, if you must have it.’ Cressie disengaged herself, making for the dormer window, where she gazed out absently at the view. ‘I was in my third Season. Despite what you think Giovanni, I had done my best to make myself—amenable—to the men my father brought forwards. But it didn’t work. I was so gauche, and when I wasn’t completely tongue-tied I was boring my potential suitors to death by talking endlessly about my studies. Bella is right, you know—no man can abide a blue-stocking.’

  ‘No men of your father’s acquaintance perhaps,’ Giovanni said sardonically. ‘Which says much about Lord Armstrong.’

  Cressie smiled weakly. ‘Thank you. It does not alter the facts, however. The more I tried, the more I seemed to scare the candidates for my hand away, and the more desperate I became. You have to understand, I have been raised to accept that marriage is not only a duty but my only option. Back then, I did not even consider an alternative. I had to make a match. So when Giles came along, and actually showed a modicum of interest in me rather than my family, I managed to persuade myself that he would make a good husband.

  ‘I was not in love with him, but I thought with time—for that is what my Aunt Sophia counselled, you know, that one grew into affection. Only I suppose that my lack of certainty must have shown—and it was hardly flattering—for just when I began to think of Giles as mine, he began to lose interest. I could not have borne it—or so I believed—to lose him when I had already told my father that I expected Giles to call. I had never seen Father so proud of me before. “That’s my girl,” he said, “always knew you’d come up trumps in the end.” So I—I …’ She took a deep breath and dug her nails hard into her palms. ‘I thought that if I allowed Giles to make love to me, then he would be obliged to marry me,’ she confessed painfully.

  Moments passed. Cressie pressed her heated forehead to the cool of the window glass. Running her finger down the pane, she was surprised to discover that it was clean and realised this must be Giovanni’s doing, on account of the light. She felt sick, but now that she had started, she had no choice but to finish. ‘It was a dreadful thing to do,’ she continued, turning back to face him. ‘To try to manipulate Giles like that, it was shameful. That my stupidity had quite the opposite effect from the one I intended is my only saving grace. That, and the fact that no one else knows,’ she finished with a pathetic attempt at a smile.

  ‘Are you telling me that you gave yourself to this man, and he abandoned you?’

  The stark disbelief in his voice made her squirm. ‘No, no. Giles was an honourable man. He did offer for me—at least, he said he would marry me, because he ought to—but I knew he didn’t mean it. I knew it would be like a death sentence for us both, even worse than having to endure my father’s bitter disappointment. I had achieved my goal, and yet I simply couldn’t bring myself to accept.’

  Cressie dropped her head into her hands. She wouldn’t cry, she wouldn’t, but the memory of that dreadful scene between her and Giles was a wound that could still inflict much pain. She took another deep breath, muffling her distress by speaking determinedly to her shoes. ‘Poor Giles, in a way he was every bit as naïve as I. I tried to make light of it at first you see—during—when—in the bedchamber. I thought to put us both at ease, but I must have sounded like an idiot. And when that did not work, I resorted to asking for instruction, only my questions rather brought Giles’s lack of experience to the fore and—I will leave the rest to your imagination, though I doubt very much you can imagine anything so truly awful. Anyway, the net result was that I turned down my only offer of marriage, and Giles left to join the army soon after. I think he was as mortified by the whole episode as I was.’

  Cressie forced herself to look up. ‘It was a salutary lesson, for I realised I am simply not the kind of woman whom men—who can enjoy that kind of thing. If I could have analysed less and felt more—but that is not in my nature. Logic and facts, supposition and proof, those are the things I am good at. I decided that I would find a way, somehow, to make mathematics rather than matrimony my destiny. You know where you are with formulae.’ She straightened her shoulders. ‘There you have it, the whole sordid tale. It was some years ago now,’ she said firmly. ‘I am quite over it.’

  ‘You think so!’ Giovanni exclaimed. ‘I am not so certain. To think, if the experience had been only a little less unpleasant, you would have married this man, making your father happy and yourself miserable.’

  ‘Why are you so angry?’ Cressie’s own hackles began to rise. She had never told anyone what had happened between her and Giles. It was shocking and shameful, yet Giovanni seemed only furious. ‘According to you, I am miserable anyway. At least if my misguided tactics had resulted in the acquisition of a husband, I would have done my duty.’

  ‘Your duty! It seems to me you do little else. May I remind you that you are currently saving your father the expense and inconvenience of hiring a vastly inferior governess. You are trying at some great personal cost to provide your stepmother with the company he should rightly be providing her with. You have also taken the place of your eldest sister in looking after the youngest two—another duty your father has avoided—and I have no doubt that there are a thousand other things besides. You have nothing to reproach yourself with, Cressie, but what on earth possessed you to give away something so precious to a man you did not even want to marry? That I do not understand.’

  When he put it like that, she really didn’t know. ‘I told you, I was desperate to please both Giles and my father. You have no idea what it was like,’ Cressie said wretchedly. ‘Bella had just provided my father with a son, and she made it so clear that she wanted me off her hands just as quickly as possible, and back then, Papa—I mean my father, would do anything to please her. You cannot imagine how important having a son and heir is to a man like him.’

  ‘I understand only too well.’

  ‘I don’t see how you possibly can.’ She could feel the tears welling, but she was determined not to let them fall. She would not pity herself. She most certainly did not want Giovanni’s pity. Cressie clenched her fists. ‘I surrendered my virtue in the hope of receiving an offer.’ She blinked furiously. ‘I know, do not tell me because I know, that if I confessed that fact to my father, it would most likely achieve what I most desire, to be taken off the marriage mart, but I could not bear to have him gloat over my being so stupid. I, who foolishly considers herself clever. My actions have already cost me a considerable portion of my self-respect. I could not compound the felony.’

  As she rested her head on the dormer window, her hair finally unravelled, tumbling down over her bare shoulders. Giovanni did not speak. The silence felt thick, ominous. In all probability, he was disgusted with her. ‘Your assertion that I am unhappy would appear to be well founded after all,’ Cressie said, her voice not much more than a
whisper. ‘But unfortunately I can see no way to improve the situation. I cannot please my father save by marrying, but I am not marriageable and even if I were …’ She threw back her head defiantly. ‘Even if I were, do you know, I would not! I will not give myself to a man simply to expand to the dynastic web my father is weaving. I don’t want to, and I won’t! ’

  A slow handclap made her look up. ‘Bravissimo! This is progress.’

  Cressie smiled weakly. ‘It doesn’t feel like it.’ She crossed the room towards him, the train of her mother’s gown sweeping behind her on the dusty floorboards. ‘Is this the part of my confession where you decide my penance and absolve me of sin?’

  Giovanni shook his head, clasping both of her hands between his. ‘You have already done far more penance than you deserve. I do not believe you have committed any sin, save the one of allowing people to judge you. It does not matter what they think, your father, your stepmother, that stupid oaf Giles, even your sisters. Only what you think really matters.’

  ‘I don’t know what to think any more. I will confess freely to one thing—I am thoroughly confused.’

  Giovanni led her gently over to the easel. ‘There, you see. This is in fact the woman you thought you wanted to be.’

  Cressie was so taken aback by this unexpected revelation that it was a few moments before she could focus on the portrait. Though the lower half of the body was merely outlined, the dress to be painted in later, the face, shoulders and arms were fully realised. She stared at the woman on the canvas who was her, and yet was not. As Giovanni had promised, all the requisite angles and proportions were there. And as he had promised, she looked beautiful, somehow softer and yes, more feminine, more alluring than she really was. There was a hint of promise in her eyes, the whisper of a kiss on her lips. This Lady Cressida was the kind of woman a man would fight to marry and boast about bedding.