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The Artist | Jasper

Thirty-Three | Mr. Nightingale Untitled Gentry

Formally Announced or Addressed on Social Correspondence: Mr. Nightingale

Informally Announced or Addressed on Social Correspondence: Mr. Nightingale

Formal Correspondence Salutation: "Sir," or  "Dear Sir,"

Informal Correspondence Salutation: “Dear Mr. Nightingale” or more familiarly, “Dear Nightingale”

Addressed in Speech: “Mr. Nightingale” or more familiarly “Nightingale”

Referred to in Speech: Mr. Nightingale” or more familiarly “Nightingale”

Social Correspondence Signature: “Jasper Nightingale” or “Nightingale”

Biography

The union of Percival Nightingale and Joanna Vaughan was not one of love — or even fondness, for that matter — but one carefully selected for them by their parents to combine generational fortunes. Percival was the eldest and only son amongst a flock of Nightingale women ( one elder sister, and four younger, to be exact ), and thus would inherit the ( rather impressive ) family fortune when the time came. Joanna was not graced with such a bountiful family, and was the only surviving child borne of her parents; it was to be her matrimony that would carry on her family’s legacy. And so, they were wed. Percival and Joanna did not love one another, and whether they do now is dubious at best, but they were amicable.

Only a year into their marriage, they were blessed with their first child; a bumbling bundle of joy and laughter, and a son, no less! Just how fortuitous it was! He was given the name Jasper in remembrance of his maternal grandfather.  Jasper was a happy baby, and more importantly, a silent one. He did not cry — save for when dear Nanny Agatha was just a smidge too late in uniting him with his mother for mealtime — and had only smiles to offer when his parents would make a rare appearance in the nursery. It was when he learned to speak that the trouble truly began.

From a young age, it was apparent Jasper was a rather opinionated boy. The moment he could comprehend and form sentences of his own, he had quite a bit to say about the world around him. His mother brushed it off as nothing more than a silly phase, and his father found it to be rather troublesome. The first son was to be a picture of grace and manners, and Jasper was quickly proving to be anything but.

He wasn’t an only child for long — seven years after his birth being the eldest of four Nightingale children. Jasper was rather ecstatic to be an older brother ( or rather, to no longer feel so lonely playing in the nursery by himself ) and yet, his siblings seemed to get on better with each other than they ever did with him. Perhaps ( and he liked to convince himself this was, indeed, the reason ) it was because of his status as oldest brother. It was intimidating, no? Or, perhaps ( and he liked to convince himself this was, in fact, not the reason ) it was because they simply didn’t like him. He was entirely unlike his siblings. They were reserved, well mannered, good young gentle men and women … and Jasper was anything but: he was eccentric, uninhibited, spoke exclusively out of turn, and simply did not care for the intricacies of the society he was born in to. He could tell in following years that his younger siblings, despite the fact they were supposed to respect him, viewed him with the same disdain his parents did.

Come his tenth birthday ( give or take a few weeks ) Jasper found himself growing rather attached to his father’s eldest sister, Charlotte ( Tottie, affectionately ), after her return to English Society. She was quite the eccentric old maid — by society’s standards, at least — and used what money and time she had come her twentieth birthday to travel beyond the North Sea.  She was an artist with no desire to marry, and taught Jasper everything he knows. They would often spend afternoons poised side by side, sketching and painting for hours and hours until their hands cramped and they create no further. Tottie was, in many ways, Jasper’s only companion — save for dear Nanny Agatha, but she was employed and received payment to humor the young boy, so it was a smidge different — growing up. She was Jasper’s dearest friend in a home that felt more like a maze than a sanctuary.

Jasper spent his adolescence completely immersing himself in his craft, often times skipping lessons with the governess to hide away in his study, painting and drawing and thinking — always thinking. He was an intelligent young man, there was no doubt about it, he simply cared more for the arts than he ever did his academics. And hell, was he good at it. A natural talent for the arts, nurtured with hours of practice and lessons led to a rather impressive artistic sense in Jasper from the age of 12.

In his fifteenth year, there was a new ( and final ) addition to the family — Teresa. She and Jasper were just the same; full to the brim with joy and laughter. Though she was fifteen years his junior, Jasper loved his baby sister fiercely in such a way that he wished he had been loved as a child. She would grow into a promising young woman, eventually following in his artistic footsteps, but that wouldn’t be for many more years.

As soon as he was old enough, and was granted the permission by his father, Jasper accompanied Tottie across the sea to Paris, France. For the better part of two years, he explored and painted and discovered who he truly was, all at the encouragement of his dear Aunt Tottie. Though it was his first time away from British soil, Jasper just knew he had to see more, had to experience more. He could feel it in his bones. But, just before his twentieth birthday — when he was to return to England for the season — Tottie fell ill with an awful fever, one she simply couldn’t shake. It was a frigid, silent winter’s eve when she passed, Jasper at her side. He returned to England alone.

Rather than attending the season with his family members as he had intended to, Jasper spent his twentieth year across seas — mourning in a rather strange way of his own. He painted, and painted, and painted until no piece of his wardrobe was spared the fate of a splatter or two of paint and his hands ached from how he worked. It was cathartic, and painting with such fervor and frequency began to develop quite the name for himself.

Jasper attended his first season at twenty one, outfitted with a certain charm that accompanied a travelled artist ( though, truth be told, he had absolutely no idea what he was doing and made it by entirely on the seat of his pants ). He was a rather handsome marriage prospect, being both a good looking young man and the inheritor of a rather impressive fortune, and yet Jasper did not marry and would not marry for his next 14 seasons.

His time was spent, between yearly trips to London, traveling farther and father past the North Sea: Paris, Milan, Athens, Istanbul … If there was a way to get there, he’d find it. He documented his travels through his art, painting every beautiful landscape, flower, tree, man & woman he came across. It was entirely for himself, a rather selfish deed to leave behind his family in England in pursuit of Wanderlust, but it didn’t hurt that members of the Haut Ton would scramble to buy his one of a kind works upon his return to London.

Seventeen years of travel and artistry led him to become a rather hot commodity at the social gatherings of the season. Provided with enough punch, Jasper could regale dozes upon dozens of people with stories of what grandeur he encountered on his travels for hours. He was not always so confident, in fact he almost never was, but there was just something so changing about the season, something that made him a different man … He could never decide whether he liked this different man more or less.

Now, in his thirty-fifth year, Jasper Nightingale is still unmarried. Rumors have begun to circulate that perhaps he never intends to marry, instead devoting himself to the uncertain life of a bachelor; leaving broken hearts in his wake wherever he may go ( Though, in his defense, the broken hearts of his past were more often his own other’s). There have also been rumors circulating that after Jasper’s rather tardy arrival to London that the elder Mr. Nightingale launched quite the verbal tirade against his first born son. The kind of monologue that ended in the dreadful promise:t if Jasper was not engaged by end of season and give up his entirely hedonistic ways, he’d be thrown to the wayside and all inheritance would be instead passed to Lucien instead.

But, those are, of course, only rumors … Right? For Jasper always thought if he were to marry, it would out for love, not necessity! And he could survive without his family’s money, for he makes enough of his own! … Right? … Right?

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