A Lady of Talent by Evelyn Richardson Read Free Book Online Page B

spoke about this part of his life to anyone, and he could not imagine why he was doing so now, except that she seemed to understand everything he was trying to convey. At any rate, he had told her the worst of it, and there was no point in holding back now. He swallowed hard and continued with his story.
    “As someone who had elected to live a bachelor existence, my uncle was not best pleased to have a destitute widow and her son suddenly thrust upon him. He accepted his new responsibilities begrudgingly. I was quickly banished to school, while my mother became little better than his housekeeper. It was a miserable existence, for he was a dreadful miser and mean-spirited to boot, but it did not last very long—for my mother, at least. Worn out with worry, and overwhelmed by the shame of my father’s death, she soon wasted away to an early grave.
    “It was small consolation to me when my uncle died unexpectedly the very next year. I inherited the title, but very little else, for, as he said in his will, leaving me a fortune would only encourage me in the spendthrift ways of my father. He left all his money to the Church—a place he had little enough contact with in his lifetime, but which he found useful for spiting me in death. I was left with the estate, for he could not will that away from me, but not the wherewithal to run it properly. His niggardly ways had left it in such desperate shape that it has taken me years to restore it properly. It did, however, provide me with enough income so that I did not have to be a scholarship student at Cambridge, which would have made me a total outcast. As it was, the fellows at school avoided me because of the unsavory circumstances surrounding my father’s death.”
    Knowing very well what it was like to scrimp and save after an improvident parent’s death, Cecilia nodded sympathetically.
    “Fortunately for me, however, the isolation I had endured at school had turned me into something of a scholar and I did rather well at university, which, while it did not make me popular with the bulk of the students, did win me friends among the like-minded ones.
    “By the time I graduated, I had gained enough of a reputation for cleverness that I was able to find a position in the City, where men are rewarded for their talents rather than their social standing. The men who rule the City do not care what one’s father did or did not do; they only care for the skills one possesses. But by the time I had reached that more forgiving and congenial society, I had been forced to rely on my own resources for so long that I no longer cared one way or another whether they accepted me socially, just so long as they accepted me professionally. There is nothing so cruel as the taunts of fellow schoolmates or as brutal as the way they treat anyone who is set apart from them, especially by misfortune, and I learned early on that it is a rare person who will stand as your friend if you are different from the rest.”
    A lump rose in Cecilia’s throat at the thought of the poor lonely little boy he must have been. “The orderliness of mathematics must have been most reassuring to you. I do hope that you were able to take some comfort at least from being able to apply yourself in an area where your success depended only on you, and not on the superficial likes or dislikes of other people or the fickle nature of society.”
    Overwhelmed by the sympathy in her eyes and the simple joy of being understood, Sebastian raised her gloved hand to his lips. “You are a woman—no—a human being of rare understanding, Lady Cecilia. Small wonder you are such a talented artist. You see through to the souls of your subjects, and you capture them in your painting.”
    It was Cecilia’s turn to find herself at a loss for words. Nothing in a very long time had made her feel as appreciated as Sebastian’s simple, heartfelt words of admiration. And it had been years since anyone had held her hand—not since she had