Softly, slowly and elegantly, a hand swept across the ivory colour of the parchment, leaving behind it a trail of smoky charcoal in a definitive line. It rounded, the illusion of a half circle growing as the artist sketched out the outline of its subject. The artist shaded in the dark parts of the subject and left the lighter parts blank, her fingers dirtying as they smudged the markings with her forefinger. The artist completed the drawing, sat back to admire it, and compared the sketch to the subject; it was a sketch of a sleeping black and white cat on the top of a dark mahogany pianoforte. The lines were off slightly, and the poor cat's figure in the sketch appeared as if it had eaten too much ham at Christmas, but nevertheless, the artist had improved much since she first began sketching only a few short months before. The artist, satisfied with the sketch for now, closed her sketchbook and rubbed her fingers clean on a once-white linen handkerchief with the initials 'K.B.' embroidered on the corner; she checked the elegant clock that ticked away on the wall and stood, departing the room with her sketch resting on the arms of the chair she had just vacated, her dirtied handkerchief lying on the floor.