The next Yvette was only half alive, pinned to the back of the chair by an invisible spike. Her eyes were foundering in sadness, her hands hauntingly empty in her lap. The third Yvette burst on me in mid-sentence, her lips in motion, a glimmer in her eyes.

Philip came and knelt down next to me, setting two saucerless cups on the floor.

“This one”—I pushed the sad drawing toward him—“is terribly good. Keep it. But I never want to see it again.”

“I’m sorry.” He laid it aside. “I went too far.”

“As I said, you have license. You must draw what you see.” I held up the last picture. “This is me. How I used to be, anyway, before the baby.”

The glimmer, I saw, was a square of light—the window, reflected in my eyes.

“Oh, that girl is here,” he said. “I believe I met her last week.”

“Really?”

“Mmm. She said, ‘men in the nip’!”

I looked up at him. Everything about him, his comical nose, his narrowed hazelish eyes, his curling thin lips, mischievous and playful. So easy to let my own smile widen, to meet those eyes. Then I sniffed.

“Philip, what do you call that spirit, the liquid for cleaning paintbrushes?”

“Turps,” he said.

“Teups?” Some English words, you simply couldn’t get them on the first try.

“Turpentine.” He gave a gentle laugh. “You’re telling me I smell of turpentine.”

“Don’t worry. It’s not unpleasant.”

We drank our tea and looked at the drawing. “Color,” Philip said. “I want to surround you with color and light and heat.” He touched the drawing, swept his hand around my head and down my side. Then, with the back of his forefinger, the back of the tip of his forefinger, he stroked my face. My face in the drawing.

“My clothes are all rather drab, I’m afraid,” I heard myself say.

His finger was still stroking the sketch girl’s face. The sketch girl turned toward his hand until his palm cupped her cheek, and she closed her eyes. Because his hand was so warm and gentle and tender—

“Philip,” I blurted. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t know about the clothes?”

I couldn’t find any words. The silence extended hideously.

“You mean, you don’t know if you’ll sit for me again,” he said at last. “I see. Well, it’s entirely up to you.”

“It’s a question of time, you see. I have so many things—”

“Things to do at home, of course you have. You’re a vicar’s wife, after all.”

“Yes.”

“Vicar’s wives are generally quite involved with the parish, I’ve heard.”

He sounded desolate.

“We are.”

“Helping your husbands.”

We were still kneeling on the floor, side by side.

“You’ve become very serious.” I was almost whispering. I couldn’t believe what I was saying.