Microscopes and Canvases - Chapter 14

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Episode 14
“I’ve been looking everywhere for you! I had a feeling you’d be wandering around.”
Dominic grabbed Patrick’s arm and pulled him along, clicking his tongue in mock disapproval.
“Wait, Dominic. I need to meet someone first.”
Patrick turned to move deeper into the Banquet Hall, but Dominic shook his head firmly.
“I know you’re a devoted fan of Mr. Greenleaf. But not tonight.”
“Still?”
“I just came from the main hall, and he’s still got hours to go. I had no idea our countrymen were so interested in biology. Do you know how many newspapers showed up? The way things are going, tomorrow’s papers will have his face plastered across the front page.”
“Good grief.”
Patrick turned back toward the Banquet Hall alongside Dominic.
Indeed, the area around Edward Rockwell remained thronged with people. Between the layers of admirers, those clutching autographs beamed like delighted children.
“Will things calm down if we wait a bit longer?”
“Not for another couple of hours, at least. Besides, you’re not planning to meet him just for an autograph, are you?”
Dominic gestured toward the Document Bag and Stack of Papers Patrick carried.
“If you want to have a proper conversation with him with all that thick research material, tonight is absolutely out of the question.”
“….”
“Forget it. There are people our age gathered in the Private Room. Let’s go show our faces there.”
And so Patrick found himself half-dragged toward the Private Room.
* * *
“Marchioness! Just one word, please—”
“Did you know your younger brother was Mr. Greenleaf?”
“What was the new museum director like as a child?”
The Marquis and Marchioness of Somerset, dodging reporters as they moved about the hall, had finally managed to claim a table hidden behind a towering potted palm.
“Unbearable people!”
The Marchioness let out a groan of exasperation and, the moment she sat, unfurled a large Ostrich Feather Fan to shield her face.
She had already turned away three waves of reporters clutching notepads. The Marquis of Somerset, who had been wanting to slip into the Cigar Room all evening, sank deep into his chair with nothing but a sigh.
“I must have aged ten years tonight.”
The Marquis was noticeably haggard. It had been days since his daughter had dropped her bombshell announcement that she would study abroad in Berkyon, and he had scarcely slept or eaten since.
“My dear. Do you think Edward can convince our Beatrice to reconsider? If he can’t—”
“Don’t talk nonsense. Even if he can’t, we simply must make her stay.”
Forgetting propriety in her distress, the Marchioness drained a glass of Champagne in just a few sips.
“If you ask me, you’ve spoiled that girl far too much, and for far too long.”
“Why blame me? When our precious daughter cries, my heart shatters.”
Their youngest, Beatrice Somerset, had first declared her intention to attend art school at around eighteen years old.
After becoming embroiled in an unfortunate incident at her Boarding School, Beatrice had spent an entire year on leave and returned to the Somerset Estate, where she had barricaded herself in her bedroom for a long time, suffering from what seemed a sickness of the spirit.
The Marquis, whenever he recalled those days, invariably felt tears prick his eyes.
In those times, the Marquis was frequently away on diplomatic duties, and each time he left for an assignment, his young daughter weighed so heavily on his mind that he had petitioned the King for his resignation several times—only to be refused each time, which made matters all the harder to bear.
‘My dear girl, you must regain your spirits. Is there anything you wish to do? Your father will provide anything. Anything at all?’
Those days when she would not answer, no matter how desperately he asked. Each time he saw his daughter wasting away before his eyes, his heart felt torn to shreds.
Then one day, Beatrice finally spoke. ‘I want to draw pictures,’ she said.
‘Yes, yes. Father will procure everything for you. Do you need materials? Shall I buy you new brushes?’
At that moment, his daughter had murmured something, her face drained of all color, utterly listless.
‘Father… I would like to attend the Royal Art School….’
‘Now, my dear, that’s a truly wonderful dream, but that place… it doesn’t seem like somewhere you could attend. If I understand correctly, it’s primarily a school for common men….’
‘Father, please….’
His heart had truly shattered then….
When the Marchioness would accuse the Marquis of Somerset of being the one who had brought on his daughter’s ‘Artistic Affliction,’ he would recall that moment in this way.
Had anyone witnessed that tender girl—whispering as though it were her final wish in life, as though she might abandon her parents at any moment—with a heart of steel and ice, they too would have wept hot tears. It was, he insisted to himself, nothing more than a father’s sublime decision to save his daughter’s fading life….
“It wasn’t nearly that bad.”
The Marchioness of Somerset spoke with finality.
“I was there too. She was simply being stubborn, and you’re far too sentimental. Even then, Beatrice never cried.”
“No, no. I’m certain I remember that moment clearly.”
The Marquis rubbed his face and sighed, hastily wiping the corners of his eyes, which had grown moist, before the Marchioness could scold him further.
Though the couple’s recollection differed somewhat, in any case, the Marquis of Somerset had rather hastily promised to grant Beatrice’s request, and she had immediately risen from her seat, locked herself in her room, and prepared for the entrance examination entirely on her own.
To be honest now….
Neither the Marquis nor the Marchioness of Somerset had expected Beatrice to pass the entrance examination to the Royal Art School.
The shock when Beatrice came bursting through the door, waving her Admission Letter as if to mock her parents’ expectations!
“My dear, speaking now in hindsight, perhaps we should have insisted she only attend the Royal Art School and nothing more.”
The Marquis of Somerset sighed, dwelling on the past.
“Well. It’s not as though we were imposing a curfew.”
The Marchioness of Somerset, having drained her second glass of Champagne, offered another quiet barb.
“You know as well as I do. Anne is brimming with hunger for learning. What good would such a promise be? She would have leapt into the world regardless.”
The Marchioness sighed softly and reclined against the chair’s backing. Still, she did not understand her daughter at all.
A girl who could be pacified by her father’s affection and empty promises—she was not such a creature.
The Marchioness rested her chin on her hand and surveyed every corner of the Banquet Hall. Watching a young couple whose engagement had recently been concluded blush shyly as they whispered to one another, she found herself envying their parents.
How fortunate they must be. At least their daughter would not scheme to flee across the sea and turn her parents’ world upside down.
“But that aside.”
The Marquis suddenly glanced around the hall.
“Where is she? I haven’t caught a glimpse of her all evening.”
“She’ll come presently. I saw her slip into the Private Room earlier, so don’t worry. That’s where the young people gather, and they all know one another through various connections.”
“Why would she go to the Private Room? That’s where all the troublemakers congregate.”
The Marquis’s expression darkened at once. The Marchioness, knowing well what her husband’s words implied, fell silent for a moment.
When she thought about it, her daughter’s insistence on crossing the sea was likely not merely a matter of painting.
Even though she appeared completely recovered, perhaps the old scars were reopening. The thought seized her suddenly, and her breath caught.
Until now, it had always fallen to her to speak harshly to her daughter. Someone had to draw the line, since her husband was too tenderhearted to do it, always on the verge of tears for the child’s sake.
She had believed that because her daughter chose the harder path than most, she could not afford to indulge her—that hardship now would mean less pain when she stumbled.
But how, then, could she ever find happiness?
The Marchioness swept her gaze across the Banquet Hall and spotted her brother. Edward Rockwell—that rascal was still being pestered by reporters.
“It seems unlikely to resolve tonight. Tomorrow morning, as soon as it’s light, I’ll speak with Edward about this.”
“Yes. Let us entrust it to her uncle.”
The Marchioness gazed down at her lukewarm Champagne and continued.
“However it is, sending her to Berkyon is unthinkable. You must ask him to understand her heart and persuade her to stay here.”
“Of course. That goes without saying.”
“Once we’ve soothed her spirits, we must arrange her marriage as well. You know that.”
“I know, I know indeed….”
“Reality is harsh, but her future without marriage will be even more wretched. She may taste freedom for a while, but soon she’ll become someone who belongs nowhere, adrift on the margins of society.”
As the Marchioness reiterated this in a somber tone, the Marquis of Somerset turned his gaze away, his expression rueful.
Yes. That was how the world was.
An unmarried woman, lacking financial independence or legal protection, faced a bleak future.
Already five-and-twenty. Too seasoned an age to remain unwed in aristocratic society.
Now their daughter, too, must confront the harsh wall of matrimony.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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