Sometimes she felt that he was not as shallow as his almost habitual expression seemed to indicate. She remembered having the same thought during the ball. He was not, she thought with an inward shiver, a man one would be comfortable to know.
“He sometimes p-plays a wrong note,” he said, “and he often p-plays more slowly than he ought. But he plays with his eyes wide-open, Mrs. Keeping, and that is what m-matters. That isallthat really matters, would you not agree?”
And often he spoke in riddles. He would judge her, she sensed, according to how well she was able to interpret them.
“With the eyes of his soul?” she said. “And you are not speaking just about Lord Darleigh or just about the playing of music, are you?”
But his eyes were mocking again.
“You have become too p-profound for me, Mrs. Keeping,” he said. “You are turning philosophical. It is an alarming trait in a l-lady.”
And he had the effrontery to shudder slightly.
Lord Trentham, she saw, had finished talking with Lady Barclay, at least for the moment. Agnes turned her shoulders and asked him whether he lived in London all year.
***
Agnes,Flavian thought as they made their way to the music room from the dining room and he watched her talking to Hugo, her arm through his. One could not imagine reciting a sonnet to the delicately arched eyebrow of sweet Agnes, could one? Or weeping over the immortal tragedy ofRomeo and Agnes. Parents really ought to be more careful when naming their children.
He remained on his feet after seating Lady Harper close to the pianoforte. He clasped his hands behind his back as Vincent played his violin—a lilting folk tune. Vince really had improved—there was more vibrato in his playing than there had been last year—though how he could have learned to play at all when he was blind, who knew? It was a triumph of the human spirit that he had done it. Flavian did not join in the applause that succeeded the piece. Instead he beamed fondly at his friend, forgetting for the moment that Vince could not see him. Onedidtend to forget at times.
The cat purred rather loudly when the applause died down, and there was general laughter.
“I absolutely refrain from commenting,” Flavian said.
Lady Harper played the pianoforte for a few minutes, though she protested that she had only recently resumed playing after a lapse of many years. Then she played and sang a Welsh song—in Welsh. She had a fine mezzo-soprano voice, and somehow made one almost yearn for the hills and mists of Wales. Almost.
Now,therewas a woman, Flavian thought, about whom one might weave romantic and erotic fantasies if she did not happen to be the wife of a dearest friend—and if one felt anything more for her than a purely aesthetic appreciation.
Imogen and Ralph surprised everyone by singing a duet to Lady Trentham’s accompaniment. Flavian did not need to tease them afterward—everyone else did it for him. Lady Trentham then played alone and with practiced skill, while Hugo beamed like an idiot and looked fit to burst with pride.
Vincent played on the harp, and Flavian strolled closer to frown in amazement over the fact that he could distinguish so many strings from one another when he could not even see them.
And then it was Miss Debbins’s turn to play, and Flavian had no further excuse to prowl, for she would surely play for longer than a few minutes. He really ought to have taken a seat earlier. The choice left to him now was to squeeze between George and Ralph on the sofa, which would have looked a trifle peculiar and might have annoyed the cat, currently curled up on the middle cushion—or to sit beside Mrs. Keeping on a love seat a little farther removed from the pianoforte.
He chose not to annoy the cat.
He wondered whether she had told the truth about not going to the meadow this morning, and then realized how conceited it was of him to imagine that perhaps she had gone there and been so disappointed not to find him that she had pretended she had not gone at all.
He had very possibly given her an eternal disgust of him when he kissed her. She had probably not been kissed by any man other than her husband until then. Undoubtedly she had not, in fact. She hadvirtuous womanwritten all over her in invisible ink.
“The serious entertainment is to begin, then?” he said as Miss Debbins seated herself at the harp.
“The implication being that the other performances were trivial?” she said.
He grasped the handle of his quizzing glass and half raised it.
“You are in a combative mood, Mrs. Keeping,” he said. “But I would g-guess none of those who have already played or sung would care to f-follow Miss Debbins.”
“You do have a point there,” she conceded.
She was wearing the same gown she had worn to the harvest ball. Now, how the devil had he remembered that? It was hardly an outstanding item of fashion, though it was pretty enough. The light from one of the candles was sparkling off the silver embroidery at the hem, as he remembered its doing on that occasion.
And then he lowered his glass and gaped. At least, that was how he felt inwardly, even if it did not show on his face. For suddenly music poured and rippled and surged about them and did a number of other startling things that words could not begin to describe. And it all came from one harp and the fingers of one woman. After a minute or two Flavian raised his quizzing glass again all the way to his eye and looked through it at the instrument, at the strings, and at the hands of the woman who played them. How was it possible...
The applause at the end of the piece was more than polite, and Miss Debbins was begged to play again before moving to the pianoforte. When she did go there, George jumped to his feet just like an underling to position the bench for her.
“And do you p-play, Mrs. Keeping?” Flavian asked while her sister prepared herself at the keyboard.
