The Exiled by Posie Graeme-evans Page B

she’d kept him waiting.
    He was used to the caprices of women clients, of course, but he’d thought Anne was different. She hadn’t seemed flighty or stupid in their sittings together — the opposite, in fact. Now she’d disappointed him because she’d not even bothered to send a note from her household. He was a busy man, she knew that.
    ‘Meinheer, I’m so sorry.’ He’d been so deep in disgruntled introspection, he hadn’t heard her soft, leather shoes on his stair. Now she stood in his open doorway — but she was in a blue house-dress and her headdress was a plain gauze veil!
    She saw him frown as he scanned her plain kirtle. ‘Something else to forgive me for, Meinheer. My red dress needs repair. And I’ve been so busy all today that there’s been no time to reconstruct my headdress as you last saw it. Can you still finish the painting?’
    Hans Memlinc grunted. If he was prepared to be even a little honest, he
could
make this the last sitting. All that remained to be finished were some elements of her eyes — the light had not been right to catch them truly, yesterday — and the expression of her mouth. Her dress and her hair — he realised with a start he could finally see the deep, blood-russet chestnut of her hair under her veil — didn’t really matter for what he wanted to do.
    ‘Well, mistress, I shall try. You can speak while I finish your eyes. After that, I shall need your silence. There are final touches to your mouth that I must make.’
    His phrasing was clumsy — he was speaking to her in French, in which she was fluent, rather than Flemish. She’d done well in attempting to master the language of the Lowlands since her arrival in Brugge, but was always more comfortable expressing her lightning-fast thoughts in French. Somehow the language of the troubadours suited her better and he sensed that. It was part of the reason he was such a good painter.
    So once again the afternoon fled past, but this time Anne was impatient to be finished. Finally, by the shadows lengthening on the floor in front of her, she could see the sun beginning the last part of its westerly journey. She didn’t want to be out walking again after dark.
    ‘Meinheer, surely you must be finished now?’ The painter sighed, very deliberately. Well, perhaps she was right. He was happy with the eyes now, but there was something about the mouth, perhaps because her face was so mobile, perhaps that was it. No — just one more little touch with the carmine and a hint of the black — there in the centre, where there was the shadow of the upper lip on the lower?
    Anne had had enough. ‘Meinheer!’ She spoke sharply and was immediately sorry for it. It was a result of the fear — and something else, the exhultation — of this last day.
    ‘Meinheer Memlinc. I’m sorry to be so impatient, but I want to be home before dark, especially tonight.’
    ‘Oh yes, the little incident last evening. Eva told me about it.’ Anne was astonished. She’d been careful not to bring the subject up — she didn’t want to discuss how those men and the threat they represented made her feel — but she’d presumed he didn’t know of it either. That he did, and didn’t think it was important enough to talk about, said volumes about his absorption in his work. Nothing else mattered.
    He threw her the ghost of a smile. ‘I’m not completely heartless, lady. But I didn’t want you to talk about it with me — we would both have become upset.’ He was sincere and that surprised her very much. For Anne, the thought of this stolid man being emotionally affected by her feelings was difficult to understand. He seemed so self-contained.
    ‘But there. You may see it now. It is finished.’ Solemnly he sketched a cross over his work, and over Anne too, as she approached.
    Anne gasped when she looked over his shoulder to see the canvas. For the first time, she saw herself as others must see her and it was a very strange experience. It was