I was secretly terrified that Father would actually take Edgar’s advice and I’d wake to find my bags packed, a train ticket purchased, and a position in a convent secured. But perhaps the incident gave me leverage, for Father knew I was upset, and he hates it when I’m upset.
He came to me this morning in the parlor, where I sat in a patch of sunlight at the reading table by the window, enraptured by a newspaper article discussing the recent subject of intrigue, that of the mysterious—and delicious—Lord Denbury painting.
Now, Father doesn’t rightly know how to deal with me, it’s true. I must resort to writing notes as he still hasn’t grasped the particulars of sign language. But thankfully, he gives me money for newspapers. Any paper, every paper, and has always encouraged my reading and education. So I was the first in the household to see the etching of Lord Denbury himself. I was thoroughly engrossed in staring at it when Father interrupted.
“Natalie, my dear girl, I apologize for what Edgar said. Perhaps he forgets that you can hear very clearly—”
My eyes surely must have flashed with anger, for Father was quick to clarify. “Not that it would have been an appropriate comment under any circumstance.”
I turned away. He sat across from me and waited until I decided to return his gaze.
“Tell me,” he began a bit nervously, “what would you like to do? I’ll try my best. Anything. What would you wish for in your adult life that a girl…in your condition…could reliably attain?”
I studied my father for a moment, as if weighing my options. But I knew what I wanted. The morning paper had made it clear. I scrawled capital letters on the blank end of the opposite page: ACQUISITIONS. Big, bold, and expectant.
Father blinked a moment. “Acquisitions,” he repeated slowly. “At the museum?”
I gave him an expression as if he were daft. Where else?
“Indeed…” After a moment, he nodded. “I think you’d make a fine consultant.” I nodded enthusiastically. He eyed me and then added, “Tell me. Is there something you’d like to acquire?”
Offering my most pleased smile—why, how lovely of him to ask—I pointed directly to the hasty charcoal likeness of Lord Denbury’s painting in the paper. The sketch alone was engaging so I could only imagine the piece in the flesh, or rather, the canvas. Something about that young lord called to me.
According to the paper, Mrs. Evelyn Northe, a wealthy spiritualist known for keeping interesting friends (wealth has a way of allowing you to be “interesting” when in other circles you’d be denounced as scandalous or mad), was closing in on the purchase of the Denbury painting. We simply couldn’t let her have it over the Metropolitan.
“The Lord Denbury nonsense?” Father’s nose wrinkled in disapproval. I nodded, undaunted. He examined the article.
“Well indeed,” he sighed. “If Mrs. Northe is considering it so seriously, I’d be called a curmudgeon, not to mention incredibly out of fashion, if we didn’t at least stake a claim…” Father rose, straightened his suit coat, and nodded crisply, as he always did when sealing a decision.
“Good then. We’ll go call upon Mrs. Northe. If she’s hell-bent on buying it, I’ll press her to offer it to us on loan. I wouldn’t wish to make an enemy of her. Charms aside, I hear she always gets her way. Let’s hope it works out the best for all of us.”
He kissed me lightly on the head and left for the museum offices.
Grinning, I jumped to my feet, too excited to sit still. How I longed to join the bustle of the city I could see through the window: the people striding swiftly to their destinations, the carriages jockeying for place on such a fine day, the shopkeepers calling to passersby. But now I had purpose. Perhaps I might become part of their world after all.
Then again, there are always shadows in the back of my mind. Those lovely people down below move effortlessly in carefree sunlight, far from nightmares, while this haunted painting is the stuff of nightmares. And yet this is what calls to me most strongly. As if it’s where I belong. I turned away from the window.
I have included the article about the portrait herein for my future reference and for commemoration.
The Tribune, June 4, 1880
A portrait recently arrived at the vault of the Art Association on Twenty-Third Street has become such a sensation in various circles that public viewing is now prohibited.
No one can deny the appeal of the portrait’s eighteen-year-old subject, Jonathon Whitby, Lord Denbury, who is said to have perished by drowning in Greenwich, England. The promising young medical scholar suffered what appeared to be a most devastating loss of both parents in a tragic accident. He soon followed with his own demise, when a body surfacing downriver was hastily assumed to be his.
However, the young lord is survived by a startling likeness in a life-sized portrait mysteriously commissioned just before his death. Those who have seen it report that the air around the painting is impossibly chilly and that the eyes are too lifelike, as if Denbury’s ghost hovers in the very room. Some of a more delicate nature have even fainted at the sight.
Mrs. Evelyn Northe, wife of the late industrialist Peter Northe, an acclaimed collector and no stranger to a poltergeist or séance, oddly rejects the idea of the painting being haunted but offers no alternate explanation. She’s among the elite who have been courted to purchase the piece by the estate’s creditors. As for the reported fainting spells of some women who have viewed the portrait, Mrs. Northe had this swift retort: “He’s devastatingly handsome, this Lord Denbury. I daresay they fainted for love of his looks, not fright.”
If not purchased directly into private ownership, the painting will go to public auction next week. Due to the insatiable curiosity surrounding the piece, it has now been closed off from viewing as the Art Association has stated that they do not employ enough guards to manage the task of keeping the public from touching the young Lord’s likeness.