Lady Jenny's Christmas Portrait Read Online Free PDF

half hour and then some, Mr. Harrison. I would not impose further.”
    “Nonsense. My model has been very patient, as has my assistant, and I’m sure they’d be fascinated to see what we’ve created.”
    “I can show you my sketch,” Fleur volunteered.
    “What’s a critique session?” Amanda asked.
    A critique session was when you put your heart in the middle of a busy thoroughfare and hoped at least some of the passing traffic didn’t roll directly over it.
    Mr. Harrison smiled down at Amanda. “A critique session is when people who share a similar passion try to help each other improve their work. Like when you read your papa’s poetry and suggest a better rhyme to him.”
    “Mama does that,” Fleur said. “She makes Papa smile. I know a lot of rhymes. Do you want to see my sketch?”
    He held out a hand. “Of course.”
    In one gesture and two words, he’d given Fleur a gift of confidence no one would take from her. Jenny envied her niece and understood now why people enjoyed sitting to Elijah Harrison.
    He was quiet; he was reserved. He was not the most cheerful individual, and he could be brusque, but he was kind. She had not appreciated this about him when he’d joined in the critique sessions at Antoine’s, though her recollection was of a man who’d offered suggestions and observations, not criticisms.
    He appropriated the brocade pillows and arranged them on the hearth, then held out a hand to her. “Come, Lady Jenny. Let us assemble the jury.”
    His hand was warm, and he seated her as graciously as if they were at one of the Duchess of Moreland’s entertainments. Fleur and Amanda each tucked themselves against an adult, and Jenny tried to quiet her nerves.
    He would not laugh at her work in front of the children, would he?
    “Miss Fleur, your work comes first, lest you burst with excitement and rain feathers all over the room.” He took Fleur’s proffered sketch pad and regarded her efforts in silence for some moments.
    “You are an honest artist,” he remarked. “You have chosen to present your aunt without even a hint of a smile. That was brave of you, but also accurate, given how hard Lady Jenny concentrates on her art. Lady Jenny, what can you add?”
    Jenny took the little sketch, prepared to wax enthusiastic about some lines and squiggles, only to be brought up short.
    “Fleur, you have a good eye.” On the page, a lady sat hunched in a rocking chair, the composition a heap of dress, chin, and severe bun, as if crabbed with age. No particular features were evident, and proportion was a lost cause, as was perspective, and yet, the child had managed to catch something of an unhappy intensity about Jenny’s posture. “I’m very impressed.”
    “Let me see,” Amanda demanded. She plucked the sketch from Jenny’s hands. “That’s Aunt Jen. She loves to draw.”
    Jenny wanted to study Fleur’s childish rendering at greater length, she wanted to draw Mr. Harrison forever, and she wanted him gone from the house.
    “Lady Jenny, your turn.”
    She passed her sketch pad over to him, feeling a pang of sympathy for accused criminals as they stood in the dock. And yet, she’d asked for this. Gotten together all of her courage to ask for this one moment of artistic communion.
    “Well,” Mr. Harrison said, “isn’t he a handsome fellow? What do you think, ladies?”
    “You look like a papa,” Fleur observed. “Though our papa doesn’t sketch. He reads stories.”
    “And hates his ledgers,” Amanda added. “Is my hair that long in back?”
    “Yes,” Jenny said, because she’d drawn not only Elijah Harrison’s hands, but all of him, looking relaxed, elegant, and handsome, with Amanda crouched at his side, fascinated with what he created on the page.
    “I look…” He regarded the sketch in silence, while Jenny heard a coach-and-four rumbling toward her vulnerable heart. “I look… a bit tired, slightly rumpled, but quite at home. You are very quick, Lady Genevieve, and