Recovered. Pressed on.
He did not know whether she heard. He did not play for her hearing. He played because the music was the only language he possessed for the thing Adrian had named and he had refused—the only way to say I am learning the shape of what you lost, and I cannot give it back, but I can sit in the dark and reach for it, badly, stubbornly, until my hands remember what yours deserve.
The melody found its footing. Not perfectly—it would never be perfect, not from these hands—but with a steadiness that hadnot been there a week ago. The notes climbed through the empty corridors, through the marble and the plaster and the careful distances he had built into every wall.
CHAPTER 18
“That cannot possibly be correct.”
Rosamund turned the page of the household ledger and frowned at the column of figures Mrs Alcott had prepared. The numbers were perfectly legible—Mrs Alcott’s penmanship could have shamed a clerk at the Bank of England—but the sum at the bottom refused to reconcile with the receipts, and Rosamund had been staring at them for twenty minutes with the growing suspicion that someone in the kitchen was either spectacularly bad at arithmetic or spectacularly good at cheese.
“Your Grace, if I may.” Mrs Alcott leaned forward and tapped the second column. “Cook has been recording the Stilton under sundries rather than provisions. She considers it a philosophical matter rather than a dietary one.”
“A philosophical matter.”
“She maintains that Stilton transcends the category of food, Your Grace. I believe her exact words were ‘it is an experience.’”
Rosamund pressed her lips together. “Please inform Cook that the household accounts do not accommodate experiences. Stilton is cheese. Cheese is provisions. We shall all survive the indignity.”
“Very good, Your Grace.”
The rain had begun at dawn—not the polite, intermittent variety that London produced as a courtesy, but the flat, committed sort that announced itself against the windows like a debt collector and showed no intention of leaving. Clara had pressed her face to the nursery glass, declared the weather a personal affront, and retreated to the rocking horse with the grim resolve of a cavalry officer whose campaign had been delayed by logistics.
Mrs Alcott gathered the ledger and paused at the door. “Shall I send tea to the library, Your Grace? His Grace has been in there since seven. I do not believe he has eaten.”
“Since seven?”
“I brought a tray at half past eight. It remains untouched.”
Rosamund closed the accounts book. “I will see to it.”
She needed a household reference Mrs Alcott had mentioned—annotated by the previous duchess—and the library was themost likely place to find it. She pushed the door open without knocking, because it was her library too, and stopped.
Tristan sat on the floor. His back was against the leather chair nearest the hearth, papers fanned across the carpet, his coat draped over the armrest—discarded, not placed. His waistcoat hung open. His head was tipped back against the cushion, eyes closed.
“You will catch your death,” she said.
His eyes opened at once, his entire body alert within seconds.
“I was not asleep.”
“Your eyes were closed.”
“I was thinking.”
“With your mouth open.”
He looked at her. Properly, without the careful rationing of attention he usually imposed on himself. The faintest pull at his mouth—not a smile, but the wreckage of one suppressed a fraction too late.
“Have you eaten?” she asked.
“Mrs Alcott sent a tray.”
“Have you eaten anythingfromthe tray, or have you stared at it with the same attention you are giving those documents—which, if I am not mistaken, are upside down.”
Tristan glanced at the paper on his thigh. Turned it with deliberation. “It is a surveyor’s report. It reads equally badly in either direction.”
“I am ringing for tea.”
