The Winter Bride (A Chance Sisters Romance) by Anne Gracíe Page B

given him a piece of me mind—blistered ’is ear’oles good and proper, I did—and if ’e knows what’s good for ’im, he won’t be back to bother you again, so let’s get to work.”
    Damaris nodded and resumed her seat at the bench. Her hands had stopped shaking but she had to press her lips together to hide the smile that kept threatening to break out. She could just imagine Mr. Monkton-Coombes’s face when he was confronted with Mrs. Jenkins, four foot eight of Righteous Indignation. “Are there any special requests?”
    “No, we’ll keep going with the blue and white designs—they’re flyin’ off the shelves, can’t make ’em fast enough, so off you go, me dear, as many as you can. Leaving at two again, are you?”
    Damaris nodded. If she left at two, she’d just be able to make it home in time to change and be ready for Lady Beatrice’s literary society. She picked up the brush. She was lucky to be able to set her own hours. The other girls who worked here had no such option. Damaris’s unique skills gave her choices they did not have.
    Once again she thanked God for giving Papa the impulse to send her to Master Cheng for lessons. And for Master Cheng, the gentle, elderly scholar and artist who’d treated a mere girl-child—a foreign girl-child at that—with a generosity of spirit that still humbled her.
    It had been forbidden for Chinese to teach foreigners their language, on pain of death, but as a child, Damaris had picked up the spoken language quickly. Papa’s great dream was to translate the Bible into Chinese, but he had no ear for the language and struggled to be understood in even the most simple transactions. Almost from the start, he’d relied on her to interpret for him. And after her mother died, he sent Damaris to Master Cheng to learn to write the language she spoke so well.
    It was risky for Master Cheng too, but the old man had told her knowledge was a gift to be shared, and that he was too old to worry about being beheaded, that such a death would be clean and quick. Still, it was wise to be careful, so painting became the ostensible reason for her lessons, and because he was a man of his word, he incorporated painting with reading and writing lessons; calligraphy was an art, as well as a discipline, he said.
    Had it not been for Master Cheng, Damaris would never have discovered she had a gift for painting.
    She lined up a dozen bowls in front of her, then closed her eyes for a moment, visualizing exactly what she would paint. A bamboo theme today, she thought; her bamboo designs were always popular.
    In her mind’s eye she pictured the bamboo grove that Master Cheng cultivated in his small enclosed garden, the long graceful canes of black-stemmed bamboo, the precise angle of the elegant green leaves. She sat quietly, breathing deeply, until she could almost smell the garden. How many times had he made her paint that bamboo, over and over in black ink, until in just a few strokes she could make it come alive.
    With a deep breath, she opened her eyes, dipped her brush in the mix that would become a brilliant blue after firing, and started to paint in sure, confident strokes. A slender stem of bamboo sprang to life on the pristine white glaze, the leaves almost quivering from a sudden summer shower.
    Damaris smiled. It would be a good day’s painting, she could feel it. She loved this work, really loved it. Even if she didn’t need the money so desperately, she would still want to paint. This way she could do both.
    After half a dozen bowls, with her rhythm established and her brush moving as if of its own accord, her thoughts returned to the confrontation with Mr. Monkton-Coombes.
    He was bound to tell Lady Bea. Damaris had always known her secret would come out eventually, but this was too soon; she didn’t have nearly enough money yet.
    Lady Bea wouldn’t be at all happy about her having a job. Perhaps she could talk to Mr. Monkton-Coombes at this afternoon’s literary