The Wayward Muse by Elizabeth Hickey Read Free Book Online

rather severe.
    “Not today,” said Rossetti. “I suppose that’s what we all have to look forward to when we do marry, to be ignored and taken for granted. I wouldn’t be in a hurry, Ned, if I were you.”
    Brown smiled wryly. “I just hope no one is ill,” he said.
    “Topsy, your only letter is from your mother. I think we should hear that one read aloud; Mrs. Morris is always so entertaining.”
    Miss Lipscombe rubbed her fingers together and winked at Jane. Rossetti opened the letter and began to read:
    “ ‘Dear Son, I hope you are well, et cetera.’” He paused as he skimmed the letter. “‘Weather at home, cook has been sick…’ it goes on in that vein for some time. Here we are: ‘I know that I have no influence over you at all, that you are a stubborn and defiant boy and determined to do as you please, but I must beg you to reconsider this desire to be a painter. If your father were alive, I am sure he would be able to dissuade you, but I am only a feeble old woman.’” Here Rossetti stopped and waited for the laugh.
    “Feeble like a circus strongman,” roared Faulkner. Morris looked angry but said nothing.
    “ ‘You have your inheritance and you are free to squander it as you like, on paints and degenerate companions.’ Yes, she describes us accurately, doesn’t she, gentlemen?”
    “All right,” said Brown, taking the letter from Rossetti. “That’s enough. Let poor Topsy read his mother’s diatribe in peace.”
    Rossetti and the others groaned, but they always deferred to Brown on the rare occasions when he checked them.
    “Poor fellow,” said Brown as he watched Morris exit the room, the letter crushed in his hand.
    “Poor fellow?” said Rossetti. “I’d like to be as poor a fellow as Topsy. I’d find great consolation in my bank account after a letter like that.”
    “He’s too young for me, I think,” whispered Miss Lipscombe. “How old do you suppose he is—twenty-one or twenty-two? And that hair, like a bristle brush! But you might try for him. He’s been watching you, I’ve seen him.”
    “He hasn’t.” Jane did not know where to look. She fiddled with her teacup.
    Miss Lipscombe put a hand on hers.
    “His father owned a copper mine. Just think of it!”
    After luncheon Jane tried to put the suggestions the other girl had given her into practice, and she found that she did not tire as easily. Morris left the hall immediately after the meal to check on some armor he was having forged. The others worked until three. Rossetti seemed pleased with her progress, and when he shook her hand at the end of the day he held it much longer than was polite. Jane was relieved that her brother was late and not there to see it.
    After waiting for twenty minutes with still no sign of Jamey, she began the walk home alone, stopping along the way to look in the shop windows. Her favorite was the pastry shop. She liked to look at the cakes in the window. Today there was a four-layer tower frosted with white buttercream and decorated with gold leaf. Tendrils of icing swirled along the sides. The base was piled with ladyfingers. A wedding cake, she thought. There were rings of pound cake and sheets of gingerbread. There were small custard tarts with whipped cream, apple tarts with caramelized-sugar tops, and lemon tarts adorned with glazed fruit. The coins in her pocket jingled and for a wild moment Jane thought about going in and buying something, a pecan sticky bun or a piece of marzipan cake, but she knew what her mother would say, so after a last longing look, she walked on.
    She came to Blackwell’s Book Shop. A volume of Spenser was laid open on a stand, revealing a dainty watercolor illustration. How she would love to own it! How she would love to sit in some soft chair in a warm room and turn the fragile pages! The card next to the book said that it was offered for thirty pounds. It almost made her laugh through her tears. Thirty pounds! Her father earned nine pounds a year,