One day in the 1860s, so the story goes, an ambitious up-and-coming female sculptor was making love to an older, married man in an art studio. It was complicated because the man was not only one of the most famous sculptors in the country, but the young woman's teacher and mentor. Things got worse when they were rudely interrupted by the woman's mother, accompanied by her faithful servant. The mother, shocked at what she had stumbled across, was dressed in black, still mourning the death of her beloved husband. She screamed at her daughter.
And on this occasion, the young woman screamed back, one of the very few people who would dare stand up to such a formidable figure. The daughter accused her mother of hypisy, of having an affair with the kilted servant who stood by her side, and threatened to expose her mother's affair to the wider world if she continued to menace her. (An excerpt from the Chapter XIII)
People have long been fascinated by the...
