Let Observation with extensive View,
Survey Mankind, from China to Peru;
Remark each anxious Toil, each eager Strife,
And watch the busy Scenes of crowded Life;
Then say how Hope and Fear, Desire and Hate,
O'er spread with Snares the clouded Maze of Fate.

Dr Johnson, The Vanity of Human Wishes

King George's guineas produced a great effect on the Lowndes family. It put Mr Lowndes in such a good mood that it entirely erased the unpleasant memory of his almost-arrest – and had Setauket had such things, Pa would have spent his precious two guineas in a haze of munificence on port-wine and cocked hats and all manner of fripperies.

'No! No port wine,' Lizzie said sharply. Her small face suddenly showed much more strain under the turn of good fortune than Mrs Strong would have believed possible. On the contrary, her face suddenly looked braced and set, as though facing some unpleasant task. 'Pa – when does he want the portrait?'

'Eh? Well, I didn't enter into specifics, my dear –' Mr Lowndes said vaguely. 'I had thought it might be a nice Michaelmas gift…'

'Michaelmas?' Lizzie pushed back her chair, appalled. 'That's a month! You never promised the major a full-length portrait on horseback for Michaelmas, did you? Please tell me you didn't, Pa!'

There was a ragged note of pleading in her voice.

'I don't believe I promised, in so many words…' Mr Lowndes said vaguely. 'Although I may have hinted that –'

'Hinted!' Lizzie stared flatly at her father. 'Pa – if I were a man, I would box your ears.'

Mr Lowndes looked flabbergasted. His eyes popped slightly with indignation. 'Bess! That is most uncalled for-'

'Is it? Is it really, Pa? When's the last time you painted something like this?!' The small painter's daughter was quivering with rage. Her curls were almost standing out from her face, Anna noticed. Like an enraged porcupine. 'There hasn't been a commission like this since Mr Addison, at least! And you talk about a month! And horses! Horses! –'

A sullen silence fell between father and daughter. Mr Lowndes had turned out his bottom lip, looking like a sulky, balding baby huddled in his corner by the fire. Lizzie had turned her face down to glower at the hearth, her jaw set sharp.

'So…' Anna said briskly, affecting not to notice the chill in the atmosphere. 'You'll be staying a month, then, at least?'

'At least,' Lizzie snarled, folding her arms. 'God in heaven, Pa…'

'Well then,' Mrs Strong said firmly, 'That would be, hmm - ten shillings with meals.' She held out her hand. 'In advance, please, Mr Bartholomew. As I know you'll be quite…busy,'

Wordlessly, Pa handed over the sagging cambric purse, his face black with displeasure.

'I suppose some brandy-punch is out of the question?'

Anna Strong looked at him over the bar. She was smaller than Mr Lowndes, but she stared him down, black eyes stern.

'No, sir. I think… not.'

'I must say,' Bartholomew Lowndes swelled like an enraged toad, outrage overcoming his sense of dignity. 'that this – this is all a vicious women's cabal of vapourings and – and sentiment! A pretty state of affairs, when a man of respectabilitation can't even have a drink to celebrate a most –most fortunate -day. Bess – I am most disappointed in you.'

And with that father's curse delivered over the banisters, a growling Pa retreated to his room, to gnaw over his wrongs with a private bottle of sherry.

'I'm sorry,' Lizzie said mechanically, as soon as her father was gone.

'Really?' Mrs Strong raised an eyebrow. 'No need. That's hardly the worst insult I've heard in a tavern.' She snorted. 'Vicious women's cabal, indeed!'

'He doesn't know what he's asking,' Lizzie said, almost to herself, as Mrs Strong took a companiable seat beside her. 'A month! That's no time…'

'What if you called it two?'

'Two?' Lizzie calculated. Say Pa stayed off the bottle – say his hand was firm and his eye true… 'If the under painting went well… maybe.' It could be done. 'But the major will never wait-'

'If he fancies your father as an artist, he will.' Anna said, pouring out a measure of small ale with a generous hand. She pushed the mug over to Lizzie, who drank it down gratefully. 'Besides, there isn't much in Setauket to occupy a man besides the liquor; unless he takes a shine to fishing,'

She handed Lizzie the sagging purse back. 'Keep your purse-strings tight, Miss Lizzie – or is it Bess? I've heard your father call you both.'

'Pa only calls me Bess when he's cross with me,' Lizzie said soberly. 'Thank you. For helping –'

'Not at all.' Anna Strong said gently. She felt a strong twinge of sympathy for the girl in her hand-me-down cap and frayed jacket. She'd been like that once herself. She recognised that baffled frustration. 'And you can call me Anna, Lizzie. I think, between us, we can manage your father.'

Despite the obstinate silence when she knocked on Pa's door to wish him goodnight, Lizzie went to her bed that night in a curious, hopeful mood. There was something here to build on in Setauket. Who knew? Perhaps with Mrs Strong's help, she could wean her father from the bottle. Perhaps he'd begin painting in earnest again, with a proper commission on hand. Perhaps…

Counting her tentative hopes as though they were obedient sheep, Lizzie ruffled up her hair and curled into her lumpy blankets. Setauket was going to be different. She could feel it.

An artist's eye must necessarily be sharp; in order to capture the essence of a moment. Perhaps those who sketch from life simply train their observation to be sharper and a little keener than the average man, but within three days of lodging at the Strong Tavern, there were already some things that hadn't gone unnoticed by Lizzie – who took cautious soundings of Setauket society.

Major Hewlett, their new-found patron, was a 'bloody martinet' according to gossip from the regiment, and in person a neat, fussy little man rather particular about his cuffs and starches. Lizzie's first impression of him as a robin redbreast never entirely went away. Perhaps it was the eyes; Hewlett always had one sharp, bright little dark eye on something – whether it was raising the breastworks around his encampment on the church's hill, or having a full drill parade every Sunday. He was very neat, extremely punctilious, and universally polite – but Lizzie somehow had the impression he was playing "soldiers" like an earnest schoolboy crouched on the hearthrug with painted wooden soldiers at his command. The Continental army was probably not going to complain if they found a private without his stock, or with specks of dust on his cocked hat.

But on the other hand, there was something rather touching about a man who was so earnest over small things.

His horse, for example.

Bucephalus was a grave, placid grey who towered above his small master , stabled rather incongruously in a makeshift stall made out of broken-up old pews and meeting-house benches. He whinnied pleasantly over Hewlett's shoulder as the major wrote his dispatches, nibbled affectionately at his master's epaulettes when feeling neglected, and all in all was probably the most cosseted horse in the Province.

Pa didn't know where to look at the first sitting.

'This is the beast?' he said dubiously, sketchbook in hand. Pa was not fond of horses, whether painting them or approaching them, although he did his best to assume some interest. 'A fine specimen, to be sure, Major…'

'Beast?!' Major Hewlett looked indignant. He laid a protective hand on Bucephalus' pink muzzle. 'Bucephalus is no mere beast, sir! A horse, Mr Lowndes, is a man's constant companion through the vicissitudes of war where both depend on the other for survival…'

Bucephalus snorted.

'There, good boy,' Hewlett said abstractedly, proffering a piece of apple. 'I was thinking, Mr Lowndes, perhaps a caracole? Bucephalus rearing , with me seated?

'An equestrian portrait?' Pa blenched beneath the brim of his hat. 'In the er, grand heroic mode, Major?'

Lizzie, who had been dutifully following behind her father with his sketchbook, paints and a basket of lunchtime provisions in tow, tried to imagine tiny little Major Hewlett astride a rearing Bucephalus and failed. It would be traditional, certainly.

But…

Lizzie thought back to the soft green slope outside, with the sea stretching outwards in a long blue line, the woods tracing the shoreline like a dark velvet ribbon. And she thought of the usual flat backdrops for equestrian portraits. Dull backgrounds.

'What about…outside?' she ventured. 'On the hill?'

'The hill?' the Major broke off to stare at her.

'Overlooking the bay? And – if I may, sir,' Lizzie gently gathered up a slice of apple and offered it, palm flat, to the horse . 'I think that Bucephalus deserves better than a usual portrait. My father has an idea…'

The idea had been Lizzie's devising, early in the hours of the morning. The portrait would be three-quarters rather than a full canvas – a much better size for an officer to take about with his luggage. There would be a hint of blue Atlantic in the background, a gentle curve of the sea – and to the fore, Bucephalus, unsaddled and glossy. The Major would stand to one side in his glorious regimentals, one hand on his bridle ; the perfect picture of man and his constant companion in quiet communion.

The little Major's face brightened as he heard the description of his budding painting.

'What a novel idea, Mr Lowndes!' he said, taking Pa confidentially by the arm. 'And how appropriate, to include Setauket itself – a true colonial painting, through and through…'

Doubtless the major meant to be kind; although 'colonial 'sounded faintly condescending to Lizzie's ear. But Major Hewlett was already waxing enthusiastic.

'I don't suppose we could have the company colours of the regiment draping the scene? Upon my word, I think it would look very well against the green…'

'I'm sure, major…' Pa said dazedly, being tugged away by one arm towards the furled company colours. He darted a parting glare at Lizzie as though to say, what have you got me into?

'Smacks a little of idolatry, doesn't it?' a soft voice said behind her.

Lizzie froze.

Pale Lieutenant Simcoe had somehow insinuated himself softly into the meeting house. Lizzie hadn't even heard the tread of footsteps on the floor; he might as well have slithered in from a crack in the floorboards. But his tone was almost conversational – and thankfully, his eyes were resting on Bucephalus with more than a hint of distaste.

'Idolatry?'

'That horse of Hewlett's,' Simcoe remarked, with an idle flick of his fingers towards the stables. 'He has three, did you know? But only Bucephalus is the favoured one. Man's a fool.' There was a note of veiled contempt in his voice. 'Call the beast Incitatus and have done.'

That's a little hard, surely!' Lizzie protested. Major Edmund Hewlett might be many things, but he certainly was no Caligula.

Still. When not forced to look directly at the waxen lieutenant, conversation seemed almost possible. 'Do you not like horses yourself, Lieutenant?'

But alas, asking that small question drew Simcoe's attention. That wide-eyed, strangely blank stare turned down towards Lizzie.

'Horseflesh is horseflesh,' he said briefly.

Lizzie lowered her eyes again. Serves you right for trying to talk, she scolded herself. The conversation had juddered to a halt – and with that parting remark on horseflesh, Lizzie wasn't at all sure she wanted to renew the conversation.

But, bizarrely, Simcoe didn't seem to feel he'd killed any attempt at conviviality. He carried on as though making the mildest small-talk imaginable.

'I suppose you see a good deal, in your father's line of work?'

'Of what, sir?' Lizzie was floundering.

'Horses?' And then, as Lizzie was trying to find a polite reply, he added, very softly, '…and flesh, of course.'

This was intolerable.

Lizzie started up, cheeks scarlet with fury.

'You are offensive, sir!' she said, in a fierce whisper, darting a glance towards the Major and her father – still deep in involved discussion over the regiment colours. 'And I might remind you, if any sense of – of common decency does not-' she spat the words out like musket balls, ' That Major Hewlett is a man of the strictest morals, and one word to him or my father …'

To her considerable surprise, Simcoe looked genuinely perplexed by her display of temper . Seeing it, Lizzie almost lost sight of her anger. She was used to the boorish sallies of inn-parlour wits, but such genuine, open bafflement took the wind out of her sails. That colourless face of his clearly said, plain as day, how on earth have I offended?

But then that customary smoothness of manner took over, and Lizzie's dislike returned all at once.

'I meant no impertinence –'

'Didn't you?' Lizzie said grimly, frantically trying to catch her father's eye. Damn it, Pa had his back turned – and Major Hewlett was now waxing enthusiastic on the Iliad's description of the horses of Achilles. She was caught. No chance of help. 'Would you address such language, sir, to a sister?'

'I have none,' Simcoe remarked calmly. 'So I hardly know. But if I did offend –'

'-Which you did-'

'… then I heartily crave your pardon.'

In the face of that cool glacial politeness, Lizzie felt rather like a spoilt child stamping her foot – flushed and undignified. Worse yet, the lieutenant proffered one elegant black-gloved hand; possibly the most passive-aggressive tactic in the art of apology.

Lizzie thought fast. To run shrieking to Pa would cause a scene and mean the end of their new-found peace. To accept made her seem timid; worse, as though the insinuation were nothing.

'I don't know what other artists may do,' she said stiffly, ignoring the outstretched hand, 'But my father is no libertine, sir, and I am no York City drab . I am a gentlewoman.'

'I am pleased to hear it,' Lieutenant Simcoe said tranquilly. 'As Major Hewlett is a man of the strictest morals…'

The major and Pa had taken their turn about the room, and were now eagerly swapping morsels of verse.

'- Yes, indeed, descended from Poseidon's own! Quite right, Mr Lowndes. You are a man who knows his Homer?'

'Myself, and my daughter, sir,' Pa said, with an elaborate bow. 'My Elizabeth has such slight education as I can afford, but she takes to it with ardour, Sir. With ardour. Aren't we all mere acolytes at the feet of the Muse of Art?'

Lizzie winced, slightly. Pa was overdoing it.

'And quite right too, sir!' Lieutenant Simcoe raised his voice, daintily elbowing his way into the conversation . 'Although we can't all sit at the feet of Pallas Athene.'

'Eh?' Pa looked nonplussed, and then nodded, hastily. 'Quite right, quite right…very, er, demanding Muse…'

There was a long, embarrassed silence. There was the trace of a derisive smile on Simcoe's lean countenance. Clearly he had taken the full sum of Pa's 'classical education'.

'That would be the goddess, father,' Lizzie said hastily. 'Would you like your drawing pencils?'

It was an awkward sitting. Pa sat on a camp stool outside, trembling a little as he put his hand to paper. Major Hewlett assumed a noble 'communing with nature' pose next to Bucephalus – although the effect was slightly spoilt by the wind, which blew his hat over one eye.

Lizzie sat to one side, diligently sketching. Pa was right. Horses were hard. It was the way the muscles bunched under the skin…

Lizzie was so absorbed in her task, she didn't noticed that the colourless Lieutenant Simcoe was still watching both her and her father; and with an observant eye that would have done credit to any artist.

'Lieutenant? Lieutenant!'

Lizzie awoke as if from a dream, only half-content with her sketch of Bucephalus, to the Major's abrupt bark.

'I'm sure Captain Joyce will want those dispatches today, Simcoe? They're on my desk.'

Lizzie caught something that was almost a snarl twitching across the lieutenant's face as he turned on his heel. There appeared to be little love lost between the "mad dog" and his master.

'Can't say I particularly like the fellow,' Hewlett said uneasily, casting a half-apologetic glance in his artist's direction. 'As a gentleman, you understand? He's perfectly correct as an officer. But he does rather sneer. I can't abide a sneering man, myself.'

Pa ahem-ed, politely. 'Er – I believe your horse is trying to eat your sleeve, Major…'

Seeing Major Hewlett coaxing Bucephalus into position with affectionate little 'tsks'; that was something she wouldn't have missed for the world. Lizzie discreetly sketched some of the less than heroic moments down the side of her page, and found herself enjoying them much more than a stiff figure of allegory. Hewlett would clearly have sacrificed half the cambric shirts he owned for Bucephalus.

By that time the sitting was over, and Lizzie's stick of charcoal worn down to a short stump.

'I think that went well, don't you?' she said merrily, as they trooped down the steep incline of the hill. 'The Major's a pleasant gentleman.'

Pa looked oddly dispirited. He looked glumly down at his leather portfolio. 'Hmm? Oh, yes. Quite agreeable, indeed…Yes.'

'Pa?' Lizzie looked at him. Pa had never sounded so weary after a sitting with a client before… 'What's wrong?'

'Eh? Oh –nothing.' Pa looked away, avoiding her concern. 'I just didn't feel the creative juices flowing this time, that's all… can't say I'm really that, eh, satisfied.'

'Did you not like the way your sketches turned out? That's what sittings are for, Pa.' Lizzie said encouragingly. 'No-one gets it right the first time. You say so yourself!'

'I do, don't I,' Pa said abstractedly. 'You know, I think I may be in need of a little liquid refreshment after my labours, Lizzie?'

'No.' Lizzie said flatly.

'Not even one glass? To steel me for my great task?'

'You know you don't stop at one,' Lizzie said darkly.

' Please, Lizzie…' Pa was almost wheedling, like a child begging for sweets. 'How about an ale, then? Penny ale, to wet my whistle?'

Fortunately Lizzie had a few loose coppers in her cloak pocket. She wouldn't have trusted Pa with the purse after his brandy punch spree. He pulled a gargoyle-face at the fact she had just handed him a penny.

'I don't suppose a little more –'

'No, Pa.' Lizzie said sternly, picking up the pace in case he decided to protest. 'Not this time. We're going to work in Setauket.'

And work they did.

For the first week, Setauket society danced around the newcomers with hesitant step. Artists were surely not entirely respectable, and wanderers are always looked on with suspicion in small, out of the way places. Had Pa been less of a showman with his faded gentleman's manners and graces, the rest of town society would have quickly tired of 'that painter fellow'. But Pa's munificence (and the tale of the brandy punch) was an instant charm, and his countless anecdotes of famous and titled people he had painted or sketched was like an expert thief wielding a lock pick; he simply insinuated his way in. The farming gentlemen liked the saucy tales of his misspent youth in New York.

But it must be said that apart from the Strongs, the families with a more liberal bent declined to make acquaintance with 'the reprobate picture-painter'. Old Mrs Tallmadge, stiff and stately in her Sunday brocades, did not even deign to see Mr Lowndes' courteous bow in the street.

That didn't do Mr Lowndes any harm with the Loyalist families; in fact, it rather worked in his favour. By reason of his patronage by Major Hewlett, Pa gleaned an invitation to the Major's quarters – a house some few miles distant from Setauket proper. Whitehall was apparently the local magistrate's seat, and suited the gravity of command much better than town lodgings.

'Trust old Dick Woodhull to feather his nest,' Selah Strong said with disgust. 'Keeping in with the Major makes life pretty comfortable for him, doesn't it? Sitting there with his fancy French furniture in his gentleman's library–'

Gossip was a frequent feature of the Strong's sittings for their portrait; and in the pale painted wainscoted dining room of Strong Manor, Lizzie had to admit, she was very much at home. The Strongs had taken up Miss Lowndes whole-heartedly, and Lizzie was profoundly grateful for it.

But she saw Anna Strong flinch, slightly, at her husband's mention of the name 'Woodhull'. It was only a moment – but she dropped her eyes, and bent her head slightly, as if her best lace-trimmed cap was suddenly too heavy for her head.

'How is it your father isn't here doing the painting, any way?' Mr Strong said suspiciously, tugging at his neck-cloth with an uncomfortable air. 'Seems like you're doing most of the work…'

'Broadly true,' Lizzie agreed cheerfully. She had long since prepared a ready answer for this; and she was now almost word-perfect. 'He's the master-painter. I merely paint the background.' She picked up a fine horsehair brush. Now if she spread white paint, very thinly, just over that line of the skirt, that would give just the right lustre to Mrs Strong's charcoal silk... 'Pa always calls me the acolyte. He's the high priest. Once my daubings are done, Pa will give it the master touches, and – phew!' Lizzie blew out her cheeks. 'That's his talent.'

'Oh.' Mr Strong appeared satisfied. He looked down fondly at his wife in her Sunday best, one hand gently squeezing her shoulder. 'That's something, isn't it?'

Mr Strong reached up – after a second's hesitation – to take his hand. But it was a conscious effort, Lizzie saw. The wary look Lizzie hadn't managed to entirely erase from the painting told the tale more truly.

Mrs Strong was fond of her husband, true enough. She liked him; respected him, feared for him – and even took a gentle proprietorial way of seeing to his comforts that brought waves of tenderness to Selah Strong's eyes. But love? No. That's too much, Mrs Strong's eyes said. Don't ask for something I can't give.

The real tragedy seemed to be that Selah was hopelessly and passionately in love with his wife – although he overshadowed her with his ideas of 'what was done'. Far more than Anna really liked, Lizzie suspected. Anna Strong was intelligent, sharp, and decisive. She hardly needed shepherding by a careful husband.

Husbands were generally out of love with their wives in books; it was peculiar indeed to find a wife out of love with a husband neither old nor brutal (it must be added that Lizzie had no more idea of marriage than a fish, but she had her opinions). But perhaps he was not her first husband.

Besides – Mrs Strong already knew Lizzie's secret.

'Your father's not been near that portrait, has he?' she said bluntly; once Selah had taken leave to look after his fields.

'I-'

Lizzie looked up, panic-stricken.

'I'm not stupid, Miss Elizabeth.' Mrs Strong walked squarely up to the painting, looking at the wet oils still gleaming on the painted surface. 'You think I don't know? I own that tavern. My servants clean up the dirty rags you clean your brushes with. They also clean up after your father in the parlour. And they know who is where, and when.'

There wasn't a trace of accusation or censure in her voice. 'How long have you been helping him paint?'

Lizzie gave up all thoughts of excuses or lies. That wouldn't work with Mrs Strong.

'Just… this one,' she said, reluctantly.

'This picture? Of me and Selah? That's all you?' Anna took a step back, eying the other Mrs Strong in the picture. It was a good likeness. Better than some of the flat old things at Master DeJong's, with blank-eyed family children with podgy necks. 'It's remarkably fine for a first painting.'

Lizzie looked down at her shoes.

'Pa does well,' she said stoutly. 'No man better. He's a good painter. He just needs…help, sometimes.'

'And you don't mind giving it?'

'He's my father,' Lizzie said quietly – and the way she said it made Mrs Strong momentarily touch her arm, kindly. 'We get by.'

She hesitated. 'Does Mr Strong know – that I-?'

'Selah?' Mrs Strong stood up, smoothing her skirts. 'Bless you, Selah's a man. Of course he doesn't know.' She smiled, a wry light shining in her dark eyes. 'I've told enough lies myself to know. We women do what we can to survive and we - humour men's fancies.' She broke off, looking a little pensive. 'They have peculiar fancies about women's dignity, don't they? Men? Selah fancies I should keep myself to being a lady up here at the house, rather than involve myself with the tavern...'

'Do you want to?' Lizzie asked, tentatively.

Anna Strong looked around at her fine parlour; the sunlight streaming through the windows, the trees lining the approach to the house – and shook her head, vehemently.

'Sit up here like a fine lady, doing embroidery and pretending there's nothing out there? Not I.'

What must it be like, always on the move, with no friends? Anna wondered, looking at the pale, anxious face of the painter's daughter. Granted, friends were fewer in Loyalist Setauket these days – but there had been friends once.

And sweethearts...

Anna winced, inwardly, shying away from that painful thought.

'Well,' she said. 'As long as you don't mind being an - acolyte, was it? But…' she found herself suddenly curious. 'Did you never … want to leave your father?'

'Leave Pa?' Lizzie sounded faintly incredulous. 'Why?'

'There's a lot of world out there, Miss Lizzie,' Anna said, still looking thoughtfully at the painting. 'Friends, neighbours, family. Not all of it has to be cleaning up after your father, you know. Times are changing…'

'Not for us,' Lizzie said tightly. She suddenly felt horribly guilty ; as though she'd been disloyal to Pa, somehow. She threw her brushes down with a quick decisive little movement.

'I'm glad you're pleased with the painting,' she said, firmly closing the subject. 'But I think I really must be going…'

Mrs Strong suddenly looked repentant. After all, it wasn't her place to question the girl's loyalties. But I'd have run away with a sweetheart before I'd reached eighteen, living with an old trout like that, she thought privately. What did the girl really want? Surely not to keep following her father, as he reeled from one gin-shop to the next…

Why do people always ask that, Lizzie thought crossly to herself, as she walked down the road from Strong Manor, cloak fluttering in the wind. She was angry with herself; angry for letting Mrs Strong see that Pa needed… help, and doubly angry that she did want something more than down-at-heel lodgings and last-minute miracles.

Back during a flush of good fortune staying in Brighton, Alexander had caught a head-cold, and been confined to bed for two weeks. Pa had bought himself a battered second-hand bundle of quarto volumes of poetry. There had been some Dryden, a mix of essays by Pope and Johnson, a large moth-eaten schoolboy copy of the Odyssey, and - treasure of treasures! – the poetical works of Edmund Waller. Pa had discarded it as sentimental rubbish, preferring to mark the Odyssey's few engravings for future subjects.

Lizzie had taken up the poetry for reading to Alexander. Alex had then lent her some sonnets a defaulting lodger had left behind – and the rest was a foregone conclusion.

There was nothing particularly sacred about devotion to Art, Lizzie knew full well from experience. But occasionally, when they'd left a lodging house in a hurry - Pa with dirty stockings tied about his neck so he didn't lose them -it was nice to think that somewhere there was a courtly place where handsome gentlemen wrote 'Odes to Sweet Chloris' or 'On Belinda's Eyes'. Alexander had told her gentlemen's colleges were supposed to be like that, amongst all the Latin and Greek.

Sometimes, Lizzie could see a sweet little scene in her mind's eye; Pa, commissioned to make a portrait of a handsome young gentleman with sweet dark eyes and a melancholic disposition - who would become instantly smitten with his 'sweetest Elizabeth' and write acres of poetry in her honour. After one or two touching sentimental scenes (Lizzie had read Fanny Burney's Evelina several times) where she protested her devotion in the painted setting of a rose-garden, the young gentleman earnestly besought Pa's blessing with tears in his eyes and 'much rejoicing'.

The gentleman himself was a mixture of a stage Hamlet she had once seen on the boards of a theatre and a rather good-looking pot-boy at the Three Cripples, and no foundation in reality. The sober truth was that Lizzie's romantic experience had extended to the odd catcall in taverns, and a wink from the good-looking pot-boy – which had shattered her ideals. Heroic gentlemen certainly didn't wink.

Lizzie didn't have many illusions. But the poetic gentleman was one of them, and something that kept her happy moving about New England. Maybe not now. But next time – next town, next place - there could be a heroic gentleman macaroni with dark eyes .

Hope springs eternal, and it is no different for the daughters of painters than for the heroines of novels. All it really needed, Lizzie thought, was the right set of circumstances…

It was almost tragically ironic that this was, in fact, true. Just not in a way Elizabeth would have chosen for herself…