After Innocence by Brenda Joyce

only been another form of flirtation. Yet in her fancy summer dress she felt quite pretty, and last night she had almost felt beautiful. Sofie gazed at herself, trying to glimpse a trace of beauty in her appearance, but she was disappointed.
    A pretty summer dress did not change the fact that she was prim and plain and that her face was only ordinary. She was not ever going to be a flamboyant beauty like Hilary or Lisa—and no amount of flirtation was going to ever change that fact.
    She hurried from her room and down the stairs, almost tripping in her haste. She paused in the salon as pairs and groups of guests trooped in, laughing and chatting, progressing towards the dining room. Edward still did not appear. She wished her pulse would slow down from its rapid, staccato beat.
    “Good day, Miss O’Neil.”
    Sofie started. Henry Marten stood behind her, blushing slightly. Sofie managed a smile. “Good morning, Mr. Marten. Did you enjoy your ride?”
    “Yes, I did, thank you, Miss O’Neil. Might I escort you in to eat?”
    Sofie lifted a brow in surprise. Last night Henry had not said a word to her, either before or after supper. She wondered at his change of heart, but smiled. “Of course.”
    Inside the dining room all the guests were assembled, awaiting their turn at the buffet Suzanne offered. Sofie was touched with dismay. “I wonder,” she said softly, her cheeks growing warm, “where Mr. Delanza is?”
    Henry stared at her. “You did not know that he has departed? He did not tell you?”
    Sofie thought that she had misheard—surely she had misheard. “I beg your pardon?”
    “He has left Newport for the city. Miss O’Neil, are you all right?”
    She could not respond. She was stunned.
    “Miss O’Neil?”
    Sofie inhaled hard, shocked. Her disappointment was vast. No matter how she had tried to dissemble to herself, she had looked forward to another shared flirtation with Edward Delanza. In truth, this time she had hoped to be more demure and less frank, more ladylike and less eccentric.
    And she had secretly hoped that Edward would find her somewhat intriguing, and see her not as an object for his kindness but as a flesh-and-blood woman like any other.
    “Miss O’Neil?” Henry gripped her arm, real concern in his tone.
    Sofie realized just what a fool she was. Hadn’t she known all along that theirs had been an insignificant meeting for him, one single and casual flirtation? Sofie pulled herself together with great effort. She realized she was close to shedding tears. That was ridiculous, and instead, she smiled at Henry, hoping her dismay was not too obvious. She held out her arm. “If you would, Mr. Marten,” she murmured.
    Luncheon proved to be endless.
    *    *    *
    Sofie sat upstairs on her bed, hands clasped, wondering at herself for her wild emotionalism.
    She had teamed, at a tender age, to hold in her feelings. At least outwardly and publicly. Shortly after her father left, Sofie became fixated with painting. Her childhood art had been a wild and shocking explosion of color and line. She had missed her father tremendously and didn’t understand then why he had left her. In the beginning, she knew now, much of her art had been angry.
    Sofie smiled slightly. When she had begun to study art in earnest, at the age of thirteen, she had been forced into the carefully circumscribed mold of classicism, of precise linear drawing and absolute adherence to realistic detail. It had not escaped her that recently her art was unraveling in a regression back to her early childhood years, that her use of line and color was rapidly becoming explosive again, although hardly primitive.
    Sofie reached for the new sketchbook she had been working on last night. She flipped it open, staring at Edward Delanza’s portrait. Her use of line was so bold that his cheekbones and jaw stood out like slashes, yet the portrayal was astoundingly accurate. She gazed at his eyes, lit up as they were with suggestions