Henry
London, 1665
Lely’s studio is a hub of activity. Boys run in and out through the open doors, flung wide to allow light and fresh air to carry away the fumes. Their cheerful chatter echoes around the courtyard. Their faces are freckled with paint and ink. As they thrust their hands into a bucket of water to scrub away the morning’s sins, they chant a selection of Lely’s mangled Dutch proverbs. He who has spilt his porridge has not learned to fly a kite. The herring hangs by its own feet. A wall with cracks will soon mend itself. Their laughter reaches Henry, waiting inside the workshop for them to return.
Henry is exhausted. Swaying on his feet, he closes his eyes and leans against the wall, wishing he was back in bed. If he could find some time for himself, snatching a spare moment during the day’s tasks, he might be able to regain his equilibrium. But the relentless demands of his new role are a strain on his energy. Each new day is like a copy of the one before. A month ago, he was ushering different clients into Lely’s workshop every hour, inviting them to sit down, making enquiries about their spirits and the health of their families. His routine now looks very different. The space inside his head that was once occupied by lists of clients and their habits has been taken over by the daily care for Lely’s young students. He always assumed that children, once they reached a certain age, became self-sufficient. The youngest of three siblings, his interactions with children were limited to those belonging to visiting neighbours and friends. Henry had thought the students would behave the way he did when he first arrived at Lely’s studio – obedient, deferential, loyal. But these boys are different. Raised by parents who witnessed the dissolution of a monarchy at the hands of the public, they are bold and inquisitive, unafraid to question a process or speak their minds. Each night before he falls asleep, Henry sees their faces and hears their voices challenging him, demanding to know why subjects must be drawn before the top layer is applied instead of after, why imprimatura is better for a ground layer than burnt umber, why madder lake is more colourfast than vermillion.
While Henry helps the students, Mary arranges sittings and completes portraits the master is too busy to finish. Lely has allowed her unrestricted access to his workshop within the studio. She has been given a list of all their clients, ranked most important to least according to their titles and the price of their commissions. Her name has been noted down at the art shop that supplies the studio with equipment. Whatever Mary needs, she must have.
Henry can still remember how he felt the first time he walked into the shop and gazed around in wonder, knowing that the most expensive pigments, the finest brushes, could all be his. The closest Henry will come to painting anything brilliant this year will be the variants and copies of Lely’s masterpieces he will be told to paint, which are often bought by court favourites and noblemen to embellish their houses at a fraction of the cost. Copies act as insurance, off-setting the risk of the original being destroyed by fire or accident. Sometimes they are commissioned as gifts. Then there are the works he helps Lely’s students complete. Considered far less important than the portraits paid for by members of the nobility, most are inferior artworks commissioned by local business owners or guildmembers. It’s dull work, plodding and monotonous, requiring no real vision or special talent. Henry never thought he’d be painting such uninspiring portraits again. Yet here is, day in, day out, helping the boys complete one after another. This is his real punishment. He hasn’t seen or spoken to Mary in days but wherever she is, he knows she is satisfied. The transfer of power between them is complete.
‘What’s next, sir? I’ve finished the portrait of Master Scott.’
Henry opens his eyes. The apprentice’s name is George. His round face and curly fair hair are reminiscent of a Renaissance cherub. He’s good-natured, too, as one would expect a cherub to be. He executes every menial task Henry assigns him as if it’s the most important job in the world. Henry has never had to raise his voice or repeat instructions. Perhaps George’s background as a clothmaker’s son makes him more vulnerable. As one of the students apprenticed by Lely on account of his talent rather than his family’s money, George has more to prove.
‘I suppose you’d better move on to Master Hubert the bookseller,’ Henry says. ‘Don’t forget to include a portrait of the king and a heraldic banner over the gentleman’s shoulder. He was very particular about that.’
George hesitates. ‘Mary insisted on seeing our work before we were allowed to move on, sir. That was her rule.’
So, Mary did things differently, Henry thinks. She probably punished the boys if they forgot to seek approval. Henry is determined to be different.
He lets the boy lead him towards his easel, located in the farthest corner of the workshop. Each boy has his own workstation furnished with an easel, a chair and a palette. Individual workbaskets hold bristled brushes. Pigments are locked away in a high cabinet. Canvases, stretched and primed, are stacked in a corner. Despite these neat divisions, the room’s chaotic purpose is revealed by the paint-spattered walls and the ink-stained floor which is dotted with lumps of dried glue.
The portrait is inferior to the works commissioned by Lely’s richer clients. Master Scott is a chandler and George has captured him holding a burning tallow. Light plays over the man’s face and neck. The structure of the composition is solid, but the technique lacks refinement, and the quality of the paint gives the subject’s flesh a sickly, yellowish cast. Apprentices aren’t permitted to use the best and most expensive pigments. By the time he moved into his role as Lely’s principal assistant, Henry had devised a method of tinting white lead with buckthorn juice to produce a more realistic flesh tone. He’s surprised Mary hasn’t passed this on to the students. Then he remembers he never told her.
‘It’s well executed,’ he says. ‘The three-quarter pose works well. The way you’ve used the light to conceal the man’s age is clever. The dark space around his head makes the candle the central focus, highlighting the – the prominence of his profession… his commitment to…’ Henry’s attention is arrested by the detail George has woven into the man’s jacket. The damask cloth, although appearing from a distance to be black, is in fact midnight blue and patterned with fine filigree shapes that bend and crease around the wearer’s body. The distinctive monochrome pattern is only visible in the light. It takes a skilled painter to notice such intricacies, even more skill to capture them on canvas. That George has managed to achieve this using the second-rate tools at his disposal is astonishing.
‘How old are you, George?’
‘Eleven, sir. Is something wrong? I can do it again.’ Fastening his finger around a lock of hair, George twists it nervously, tugging it away from his scalp. Henry remembers doing the same thing during the months following his mother’s disappearance. His father had to beat him with a birch rod to get him to stop. George must miss his parents. Henry has overheard him telling the others in quiet voice that his family live in Lincoln, a week’s travel from London. Most of the other apprentices are London-based and visit their families regularly. Henry can only imagine how much courage it must have required for George to leave his family behind and come here.
‘Who showed you how to paint the pattern on the underside of the cloth this way?’ he says.
George hesitates. ‘You did, sir. I copied your portrait of Sir Philip Dudley. His sash is a similar shade and pattern.’
‘Well, you’ve succeeded admirably.’
Relief spreads over George’s features. He grins at Henry, who smiles back.
‘My father’s employer travels to Flanders each year to buy silks and furs and sell them on,’ the boy says. ‘He took me with him once, as a favour to my father. One of the mercers invited us to his daughter’s wedding. Her gown was made of the finest brocade I’d ever seen. Father’s employer asked me to make a sketch of it so he could remember. Without his help, I’d never have been able to work up a portfolio and apply for this apprenticeship. I can’t afford to disappoint my family.’
‘You won’t,’ Henry assures him. An idea is forming inside his head. For the first time in days, he sees a way forward.
A week later, Henry is in the student’s workroom, completing a copy of a portrait of the Countess of Ailesbury. The countess is missing her mantle and half her face. She requested to be painted in a manner befitting her married status, so Lely styled her as St Agnes, martyr and patroness of brides. Mary has roughed out the woman’s figure and the lamb, leaving everything else for Henry to fill in. Allowing for drying time, the copy is due to be finished this week. For a change, the workroom is quiet. The boys at their easels are entirely focused on the tasks Henry has assigned them. After spending a day analysing their strengths and capabilities, he decided to divide the work based on their particular skills. Arthur is now responsible for filling in the stormy skies and classical ruins behind the human subjects. Paul paints pottery. Henry has put Jacob in charge of greenery; as well as mischief, the boy displays a natural talent for capturing flowers and foliage. George has been given the job of painting their subject’s clothes. The system has been a blessing. Everyone knows their place. Everyone feels valued. There’s even been a little time for Henry to show them some techniques he devised himself. Copying Lely’s original artworks as per Mary’s instruction is as dull as he imagined, but the opportunity to teach has proven to be an unexpected benefit. Through the student’s eyes, Henry can see how much progress he himself has made, how far he has come from the early days of his own apprenticeship when he hardly knew the correct method of underpainting a canvas. He’s never taken the time to analyse his own methods. He’s never needed to try.
He tells George to mix up some blue pigment for the countess’s mantle, then shows him how to work up the canvas, following the contours of the flowing fabric. He talks to George as he paints, pointing out the areas where the colour will need to be deepened, the pigment darkened to mimic shadows and creases. Despite the importance of planning, so much of painting is intuitive, so much of it is worked out on the canvas. Lely himself has been known to alter elements of a painting during the dead-colouring phase, removing chairs, dogs, maps, instruments that marred the balance of the composition. When Henry used to paint with Lely, in the initial phase of his employment, the master never spoke except to himself. He worked in relative silence, only pausing every now and then to point to a tool or a brush he wanted Henry to pass him. It made Henry feel stupid and invisible, and he began to wonder if he had made a mistake. How would he ever learn anything from a master who preferred solitude and rarely explained his methods? It was only when Lely began to pass on the larger commissions to him that he understood how crucial the silence was, how the spaces and pauses between layers were filled with thoughts that alchemised on the canvas in ways you couldn’t always predict. The mark of a master painter isn’t just the technical competence of a finished artwork, but everything running beneath the surface. The artist must strike a balance between what exists and what cannot be explained. It is a process of endless refinement and transformation. Henry says as much to George as he blends two shades of blue together, softening the transition with a badger brush. George listens intently, his brow furrowed, hardly blinking.
When Henry holds out the brush to him, he takes a step back, a look of fear crossing his face.
‘Me, sir?’
‘I think you’re ready. If you make a mistake, I’ll help you fix it.’
George shuffles his feet. The other boys have stopped working. Henry senses them crowding in, curious to see what will happen.
‘Come on, George,’ he says, or maybe he just thinks it, for George doesn’t move. It is a big thing to ask a boy of eleven to paint a portrait for a countess, even under supervision.
Jacob laughs softly and leans over to whisper into Arthur’s ear. George’s head snaps up. In his eagerness to prove himself, he almost snatches the paintbrush out of Henry’s hand. There is a second’s hesitation before he begins to blend the hues together, seamlessly fusing the lapis with the azurite until it shimmers like real silk. Good boy. Leaving George to his work, Henry orders the other apprentices back to their easels. The studio fills with the sounds of bristles scratching canvas, brushes being swirled, a pestle grinding pigment into dust in a stone bowl. For a short time, peace returns. Then Mary arrives. She greets the boys wearily as she steps inside the workshop. Although dressed in her new finery, her expression is tired and careworn. Meeting clients and taking down their likenesses in preparation for later studio sittings is draining work. The mental fortitude required to remember their habits robs a person of the energy they could expend on other areas of their life. Yet Henry would still exchange that kind of exhaustion for the responsibility of educating and caring for twelve boys.
Henry decides to go on the offensive. ‘Morning, Mary. I’m surprised to see you. Master Lely said you would be preoccupied for the rest of the week. Something about the Countess of Sunderland being unavailable.’
Reluctantly, she meets his gaze. ‘I’ve just come from there. I thought I might be needed here.’
‘Let me guess. The countess has cancelled her sitting, begging illness?’ He shakes his head. ‘The reason behind her frequent headaches is the earl’s acquisition of yet another mistress. I’ll tell you a secret. You must befriend the poor countess’s lady-in-waiting, Abigail Cooke. Abigail Cooke controls the countess’s dosage of galen water, relieving her headaches and giving her sufficient time to recover from her upset. She’ll know the best time to catch the countess between spells of drowsiness and wakeful anxiety.’
Mary’s eyes narrow. She’s too proud to thank him. Casting about the room, she says, ‘What about you, Arthur? Care to update me on your progress?’
The older boy rattles off the paintings he’s recently finished, emphasising his attention to detail, how he has captured a perfect cloudy twilight in a painting of the glassmaker’s bride. Mary asks him to show her, and Arthur leads her into the corridor, where they have lined up the finished paintings ready for collection. Henry hears her measured praise.
‘I can see how much care you’ve taken, but you must allow adequate drying time before applying a glaze or the colours will bleed.’
She doesn’t catch his eye as she walks back into the room but circles around, hands clasped behind her back, checking the other boys’ work. When she reaches Henry’s easel, where George is standing, she stops.
‘George? Have you been working up this costume?’
The boy nods. He still holds his small palette, blue pigment smearing the surface. The tips of his fingertips are stained blue, as if he is slowly suffocating.
Mary huffs through her nostrils. ‘This is wrong, George. Very wrong. There are rules in this studio, child. If we don’t follow them, we end up with… with chaos and poor workmanship. Who said you could paint the Countess of Ailesbury’s mantle? Who gave you permission?’ She shoots Henry a bitter look. ‘As if I need ask.’
Henry feels his temper ignite. He tries to smother the flames, if not for himself then for George, who looks terrified. He speaks in a low, urgent voice although he’s aware of the apprentices listening in. ‘George is ready for this next step, Mary. You haven’t been here. I’ve been working with him, staying back late. He has an aptitude for clothing and textiles. So why not let him try?’
‘Yes, Henry, an aptitude. Potential. That doesn’t mean you can assign him passages of a painting which is destined to hang in Ailesbury House. The master says a portrait of the highest quality should be completed in three layers or less – even a copy. This isn’t a dress rehearsal – we’re painting for our lives. But you know that. Which leads me to conclude there must be another reason you have offloaded work you should be doing yourself, and I can guess what it is: sheer laziness.’
‘You’re wrong. George, tell her.’
George looks from Henry to Mary, his mouth open. He tries to speak but turns away, suddenly, his shoulders shaking. Henry realises the boy has begun to cry. The other apprentices laugh softly, and Mary shakes her head. Henry swallows. The boy’s sobs are stirring up memories he would rather forget. Henry had wept inconsolably during the days following his mother’s disappearance. He couldn’t eat, couldn’t drink. The lump lodged in his throat felt so large he feared it would stop his breath. He had stopped crying when he realised there was no help coming from any quarter. He hasn’t cried since. Now he wonders what he would have done if he had stumbled across his younger self crying in the garden, his face pressed into the lavender, which was his mother’s favourite. What would he have said? What would he have done? Helpless in the face of George’s misery, he is torn between comforting the boy and compelling him to stand up to Mary and admit the truth.
While he hesitates, Mary steps in, patting George’s shoulder awkwardly, telling him there’s no need to cry, he isn’t in trouble, if he simply follows the rules as he is supposed to then all will be well.
George’s sobs subside. He wipes his nose on a cloth and asks in a small voice if he can go upstairs to wash his face.
As he walks away, Mary addresses Henry. ‘Can I speak to you outside?’
In the corridor, watched by half a dozen paintings, she unleashes a torrent of hostility and frustration. Can he not do anything right? She is trying to save them both by winning over clients and elevating the studio from something little better than an engraver’s workshop to a fine art studio, assuring quality and expediency and consistency of style. All he must do is watch a dozen boys and oversee production. Yet he can’t even be trusted to complete the tasks she has assigned him. Doesn’t he understand the stress she is under, the mental and physical burden of dealing with sitters every day, ensuring the master has access to everything he needs to complete the portrait series that represents the pinnacle of his career?
Henry bears her abuse and hysterics in silence, waiting for his turn to speak. Before he can begin, the door at the end of the corridor opens and the master appears. He comes towards them. His cheeks are a blotchy pink; a tell-tale sign of his displeasure. He’s wearing his stained painter’s smock. He must have heard them squabbling and come to investigate. Henry braces himself for Lely’s approbation, but it is to Mary that his master turns.
‘There you are, Mary. I expected you back hours ago. I trust things went well with the countess. I really must see her this afternoon for her sitting or risk falling behind. Can I presume you managed to secure her for her appointment at two, as we agreed?’
Mary blanches. Glancing at Henry, she moistens her lips. Henry smiles. This is a moment which deserves to be savoured. If she’d asked for his help in the first instance, things might be different. He’s spent years cultivating relationships with Lely’s clients. Did she think she could just walk in and seize everything he’s worked so hard to achieve? She has clearly lost control of the countess. Lely will see her failure as a portent of things to come. Her lack of insight means Henry will be one step closer to restoring his position, one step closer to rebuilding his life. Even as he thinks this, he finds himself opening his mouth to say, ‘I’m afraid the countess’s delay is all my doing, sir.’
Lely frowns. ‘I don’t see how that’s possible. You are not responsible for booking sittings, Henry. Unless you’ve been acting behind my back.’
‘I haven’t. But I forgot to pass on a message from Miss Cooke, the countess’s lady-in-waiting. She wants you to know that the countess has taken ill today but she should be well enough to make a new appointment in a mere matter of days. It’s only a small scheduling conflict. There’s no question of her not being ready within the week.’
Lely’s expression clears. ‘Well, see that it happens. I can’t wait forever. The woman’s portrait needs a face.’
Retreating to his workshop, he closes the door firmly between them.
Mary lets out a sigh. Colour returns to her cheeks. Her hands are shaking. Noting the direction of Henry’s gaze, she hides them in her pockets.
‘Why did you do that?’ she says, her tone full of suspicion.
Henry massages his temples, already regretting his decision. ‘Because what you said before is true. We are painting for our lives. This series could be the making of all our careers. And I suppose if you fail, we all do. I’ve only bought you a bit of extra time. You’ll still need to speak to Mistress Cooke. With her on your side, you’ll find the door to the countess’s door magically opens when required.’
‘Thank you,’ Mary says, grudgingly.
‘You’re welcome. Perhaps you can speak favourably of my work when you’re making your visits to the nobility.’
She taps her foot restlessly, the new spangled embellishments on her slippers glinting in the candlelight. ‘I’ll have to consider it. We aren’t friends.’
‘If you say so.’
‘This studio would sink if we just did whatever we liked. We must improve our practices. It’s critically important.’
‘That’s what I’ve been doing, Mary, if you’d taken the time to listen before attacking George.’
‘I never attacked him. I only asked for clarification. If George makes a mistake, it falls squarely on your shoulders.’
‘I’ll bear it. Just let me direct the students.’ He hates how his voice sounds; as if he’s begging. She should be the one asking him for permission. ‘Things can change. They must. Let me try things my way. You focus on the Beauties. I’ll work with the boys. It needn’t be a battle between us. We could be equals.’
She turns away, not before he’s caught the ghost of a smile on her lips. ‘You weren’t born a woman, Henry. So, we will never be equals. To suggest otherwise indicates foolishness beyond words.’