“I suppose,” she said, “that playing the pianoforte, composing music, loving it, is something quite unworthy of a Dudley male.”
“Bordering on the effeminate,” he agreed.
“Bach was a man,” she said, walking toward him and setting her candle down on the pianoforte beside the candelabrum that had been giving him light. “Were all the famous composers effeminate?”
“They would have been if they had been Dudleys.” He grinned rather wolfishly at her. “Bare feet, Jane? Such shocking dishabille!”
“According to whom?” She would not allow him to change the subject. “You? Or your father and grandfather?”
“We are all one,” he said. “Like the trinity, Jane.”
“That is blasphemous,” she told him firmly. “Your father must have been aware of your talent. Something like that cannot be hidden indefinitely. It will burst forth, as it has tonight. He did not encourage you to develop it?”
“I soon learned never to play when he was at home,” he said. “Not after he caught me at it twice. I never did particularly enjoy having to sleep on my front all night because my rear was too sore.”
Jane was too angry to say anything. She merely stared at him with compressed lips—at the hard, cynical, dangerous rake who had had all traces of his more sensitive, artistic nature thrashed out of him by a father who had been ignorant enough and weak enough to fear all things feminine. Why was it that men of that type did not realize that the mature, balanced person, regardless of gender, was a fine mix of masculine and feminine qualities? And here was this foolish man trying to live up to the ideal set him by ignorant men—and doing rather a good job of it most of the time.
He turned his attention back to the keyboard and began to play softly. This time it was a familiar tune.
“Do you know it?” he asked without looking up.
“Yes,” she said. “It is ‘Barbara Allen.’” One of the lovelier and sadder folk songs.
“Do you sing?” he asked her.
“Yes,” she admitted softly.
“And do you know the words?”
“Yes.”
“Sing them, then.” He stopped playing and looked at her. “Sit on the bench here beside me and sing. Since you have come, you might as well make yourself useful. I shall try to play as if my fingers were not all thumbs.”
She did as she was bidden and watched his hands as he played some introductory bars. She had noticed before that he had long fingers. Because he was the Duke of Tresham, it had not occurred to her then that they were artistic hands. It was obvious now. They caressed the keys as if he made love to the music rather than merely produced it.
She sang the song through from beginning to end, long as it was. After an initial self-consciousness, she forgot everything but the music and the sad story of Barbara Allen. Singing had always been one of her greatest joys.
There was silence when the song came to an end. Jane sat straight-backed on the pianoforte bench, her hands clasped in her lap. The duke sat with his hands poised over the keys. It was, Jane thought, without quite understanding the meaning of the thought, one of life’s most blessed moments.
“My God!” he murmured into the silence. It did not sound like one of his all-too-common blasphemies. “Contralto. I expected you to have a soprano voice.”
The moment passed and Jane was very aware that she was sitting beside the Duke of Tresham in the music room, clad only in her nightgown and outdoor cloak, her braid loose down her back. With bare feet. He was wearing very tight pantaloons and a white shirt open at the neck.
She could think of no way to stand up and remove herself from the room without making a grand production out of it.
“I have never in my life,” he said, “heard such a lovely voice. Or one that adapted itself so perfectly to the music and the sentiment of the song.”
She was pleased despite her discomfort.
“Why did you not tell me,” he asked her, “when I had you play for me and gave you an honest assessment of your talent? Why did you not tell me that you sing?”
“You did not ask,” she told him.
“Damn you, Jane,” he said. “How dare you keep yourself so much to yourself? A talent like yours is to be shared, not hidden away from the world.”
“Touché,” she said quietly.
They sat side by side in silence for a while. And then he took her hand in his and held it on the bench between them. Suddenly half the air seemed to have been sucked from the room.
