The Painted Lady Read Online Free

disaster in its wake.’
    ‘Not this time,’ insisted Henry. ‘All I need is a little assistance from my brother and my destiny will be fulfilled. Play Cupidfor me, I beg you. Bear letters to the lady and contrive a moment when I may speak to her alone.’ He tapped the miniature house. ‘Distract the artist with one model and leave the other one – namely her – to me. Chance has contrived more than I could have dared hope. You are my bridge to Paradise. Help me now and you will one day welcome Araminta as your dear sister-in-law.’
    ‘Araminta?’
    ‘Araminta Jewell. Villemot is engaged to paint her portrait.’
    ‘I do not know the lady.’
    ‘Then you have never looked upon perfection.’
    ‘Indeed, I have,’ said Christopher, thinking of Susan Cheever.
    ‘Araminta is a Jewell by name, and a jewel by nature. I’m consumed with passion for her. She must be mine.’
    ‘Then find someone else to be your pander for I’ll not take on the office. My only business with Monsieur Villemot concerns the new house he asked me to design.’
    ‘Could you not oblige your brother in the process?’
    ‘No, Henry, I could not. Let’s hear no more of Araminta Jewell.’
    ‘Culthorpe,’ corrected the other.
    ‘What?’
    ‘She was tricked into marriage by Sir Martin Culthorpe.’
    Christopher was aghast. ‘You want me to ease you into the bedchamber of someone else’s wife?’ he demanded. ‘Even by your low standards, that’s a revolting suggestion. How could you even ask such a thing of me?’
    ‘Her marriage was a grotesque error.’
    ‘If it took her out of your reach, I’d say that it was a tactical triumph. What can you be thinking about, Henry? Do you really mean to pin your hopes of happiness on such a patent impossibility?’
    ‘ Amor vincit omnia ,’ declaimed Henry, groping for the only Latin tag he could remember. ‘Love conquers all. Araminta wants me, needs me and yearns for me. The fact that she is atpresent encumbered with a husband is but a disagreeable irrelevance. She’s mine, Christopher,’ he asserted, a hand to his heart, ‘and I call upon you, as a brother, to smooth the path of true love.’
    ‘The lady and her husband have already found it.’
    ‘You refuse my request?’
    ‘It would be ignoble of me even to consider it,’ said Christopher with vehemence. ‘She is protected by the bonds of holy matrimony. You meddle with those at your peril.’
    Henry crossed to the door. ‘Then I’ll do so alone,’ he said, huffily. ‘Since you have failed me, I’ll achieve my ends without your help. Come what may, I’m determined to have her – and a dozen husbands will not stand in my way.’
    Sweeping out with a theatrical flourish, he slammed the door.
    Christopher groaned. There was trouble ahead.

Chapter Two
    Traffic was heavy in the Strand that morning but the carriage rumbled along at a steady speed. Inside the vehicle, Sir Martin Culthorpe was too busy giving instructions to his wife to notice the endless series of coaches, carts, barrows, riders and pedestrians that went past. Lady Culthorpe sat beside her husband and listened patiently.
    ‘Be polite but not too forward,’ he told her.
    ‘No, husband.’
    ‘Do not, on any account, discuss any domestic matters.’
    ‘It would never cross my mind to do so.’
    ‘Touch on nothing of a personal nature.’
    ‘You have my word.’
    ‘Above all else, Araminta,’ he stressed, ‘guard against Monsieur Villemot’s charm. He is a ladies’ man with all the faults of the breed.’
    ‘You do him wrong,’ she said, earnestly. ‘He talks of nobody but his wife and he does so with great tenderness.’
    ‘In the company of a Frenchman, a young woman can never be wholly secure.’ She bit back a giggle. ‘I’m serious, Araminta.’
    ‘I know you are.’
    ‘As your husband, it behoves me to think of such things.’
    ‘You’ve dwelt on nothing else these past few days and your fears have proved groundless. Monsieur Villemot