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dormer window in her bedroom and propped a piece of paper on the drawing board. She was beginning to feel like a real artist.
    â€œI wish you wouldn’t spend so much time drawing,” Alice grumbled as she swept the floor around the legs of the easel.
    â€œBut I have to practice if I want to be an artist,” Emily said.
    â€œAn artist?” Alice said. “Ladies don’t become artists. It’s good to be accomplished in drawing and painting, as well as things like embroidery and music, but you’ll have no time to be an artist when you’re a wife and a mother.”
    â€œThen I won’t be a wife and a mother,” Emily said.
    Alice looked shocked for a moment, then she smiled and shook her head. She went back to sweeping, and Emily knew Alice was thinking that Emily was being silly again and would change her mind soon enough.
    I won’t change my mind, Emily said to herself. But could she do it? Could she be a real artist? Doubt crept back into her, niggling at her like an itch. She tried to put Alice’s words about ladies not being artists out of her mind.

10
Dede’s Visitors
    Emily continued to go to art lessons and to practice drawing at home. She even found an old set of watercolor paints and some old brushes and was thrilled when color appeared on her paper. Still, her work seemed to be nothing more than sketches with color. She still had a lot to learn.
    In class, Miss Woods told them that to be a real artist you had to go to art school. At art school the students drew from statues and plaster casts, and sometimes they sketched live models. Emily saved her pocket money and bought plaster casts of hands, lips, noses and eyes from the Victoria tombstonemaker who used the casts to help him model angels for his tombstones.
    At home, Emily set the plaster casts on the windowsill in front of her easel where she could look at them and draw. She filled paper after paper with hands, lips, noses and eyes. She felt satisfied with her work, but still, she felt that itch of uncertainty. Were the drawings any good? She couldn’t tell.
    One day, Emily stood at the window in her bedroom looking out at the bare branches of trees and the gray sky. She felt restless. Suddenly, Emily wanted to be outside. She set down her paintbrush and hurried out of the room to the top of the stairs. She paused, looking down over the glossy wood railing. No one was around. Surely no one would notice if she took one slide down the banister.
    â€œWait!” Alice called from behind her. She hurried after Emily.
    â€œDede has guests in the drawing room,” she warned Emily in a whisper. “It’s Mr. and Mrs. Smith, the artists.”
    â€œThey’re both artists?” Emily asked. She leaned farther over the railing, straining to catch a glimpse of the guests through the drawing room door at the bottom of the stairs.
    â€œYes,” Alice answered. “That’s what Dede said. They’re visiting from England. Please don’t lean so far out, Milly.”
    For Alice’s sake, Emily stopped leaning. She couldn’t see anything, anyway.
    â€œBut I thought you said ladies couldn’t be artists?” Emily said.
    â€œWell, the Smiths have no children, and perhaps Mrs. Smith is wealthy enough to do as she wishes,” Alice suggested.
    Emily wasn’t listening. Whatever the reason, a real artist was a real artist. She wanted to get a closer look. Step by step, she tiptoed down the stairs. Maybe they would talk about art. Maybe she could pick up some clues that would help her become a real artist.
    Voices drifted up to her from the drawing room. One was Dede’s voice, politely inquiring. A male voice with an English accentanswered. Emily got to the bottom of the steps and crept to the side of the drawing room door.
    â€œHow are you enjoying sketching our Canadian landscape?” Dede’s voice asked.
    â€œI’m afraid it is too wild for my