Rebecca Wentworth's Distraction Read Free

the English countryside. Too much competition and secured patronage about for that. Not only the old British masters still in practice, but a gaggle of foreigners—Moses, Rusca, Soldi, Vandermyn, Vanloo. Even a man of Smibert’s capability, whom George Vertue once ranked above Hogarth, had been wise in his time to escape these crowded fields for the gaping boroughs of America.
    This commission seemed auspicious to him, as if his life was about to turn.
    â€œOh, I’ve never had any real lessons, only a little help from my tutor,” she was saying. “Nor do I think I’d like any lessons, Mr. Sanborn. But I’m very interested in how a painter such as yourself accomplishes his work.”
    Saucy little thing, he thought. He did not respond right away, and she remained quiet.
    Perhaps two or three minutes passed before he said, “Is that so?”
    â€œYes, Mr. Sanborn.”
    â€œWell, if you promise to say nothing, I suppose there’s no harm in it. If you’re so keen on seeing my artifice.”
    â€œOh, thank you, sir!” she blurted, more like the girl she was now.
    He always engaged his sitters in conversation, but he found this child unsettling—whether she saw his depiction of her or not. He shook off his feelings as foolish.
    â€œDo you always dress in white, Rebecca?”
    â€œSpring and summer.”
    â€œAnd what about fall and winter?”
    â€œOh, then I dress in colors. But Mother allows only the deeper hues, nothing so bright as I might wish.”
    A garden fairy. The idea amused him. Perhaps he should paint her in a garden instead of conventional interiors. But he recalled his patron’s request and gave up the idea. She would look like a flower within doors nonetheless. And a rare flower to boot, rather exotic, by the look and sound of her.
    He began to apply his brush to the canvas and the conversation went on in a somewhat more aimless fashion. She loved to read. She loved to arrange flowers. She loved to paint. Then finally more questions: Did he like New England? With whom had he studied in London? What was his source of this pigment or that? What was his first impression of Portsmouth? And so on. She rambled without the decorous reticence more typical of well-bred children, but her queries seemed pointed and purposeful. He didn’t know what to make of her.
    She had, as promised, said not a word upon looking over his work for that day. But her quiet study of his technique, even his fumbling here and there, disarmed him nonetheless. Before he realized what he had said, he asked whether she might in turn show him something of her own. She was delighted. She bid him sit in a chair while she fetched two specimens for him.
    He sat down, tired from his labors. Within several minutes she returned bearing two canvasses. They were conventional subjects—flowers in urns (almost Italianate in spirit) and two small dogs lying upon a floral-patterned rug. But they were so strikingly executed, even in their untutored way, that he could not believe she had done them herself.
    â€œThese are quite extraordinary,” he said as he held the canvasses up one at a time. “And you say you’ve never had lessons?”
    â€œNot proper lessons or study, Mr. Sanborn. You like them?”
    â€œWell, I don’t know if ‘like’ is the right word, but they are extraordinary. Let’s say I appreciate them.”
    He was being honest now, but there was something more about the paintings he could not yet understand. Some energy expressed in them: the flowers and the little dogs presenting an unusual animation and verve. They were more like the work of previous centuries or distant lands. There was nothing of the painting master in them, nor the schoolmaster. They were proudly independent, but true and powerful in a completely unfamiliar way for all that. Most of his own masters would not approve. He did not allow himself to believe she had