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Should I read it?
Fuck.
Maybe I should burn it?
* * *
Alessia dampens down her nerves and steps into the audition room to meet a flank of the faculty, two men and a woman, sitting behind a long table. This room is airier than the last—big enough to house the Steinway grand piano in the center of the room—and there’s a large sash window that looks out over the Royal Albert Hall.
The older man rises from behind the table. “Alessia Trevelyan. Welcome. I’m Professor Laithwaite, and I’m joined by Professors Carusi and Stells.”
Alessia takes his offered hand. “Good morning, Professor. Good morning,” she says to the other staff, who offer her smiles in greeting.
“Do you have your music?”
“Yes.” From her bag, she retrieves all the scores and places them on the table in front of the tutors.
“Please take a seat at the piano.”
“Thank you.”
“Oh. What’s this?” Professor Carusi asks as she looks at one of the scores. “Valle e Vogël?”
“Yes. By an Albanian composer. Feim Ibrahimi.”
“Please. It’s short. Let’s hear it. And then move onto the Liszt.”
Alessia nods, pleased that they want to hear from one of her country’s leading composers. She takes a deep breath and places her fingers on the keys, the familiarity of the ivories calming her, and starts to play. The music is bright and expressive, an homage to an Albanian folk song darting through the room in shades of purples and blues, morphing into paler blue colors. Once the final notes fade, Alessia places her hands on her lap, takes another deep breath, and begins the Liszt… the notes taking her back to the apartment in Chelsea, with the snow swirling through the window as she played for Maxim that first time.
“That’s enough, thank you,” Professor Laithwaite interrupts at the beginning of the penultimate crescendo.
“Oh.”
“The Beethoven. I’d like to hear that from the thirty-seventh bar,” Stells says.
“Okay,” Alessia says, feeling a little shaken. Did they hate it? Is she bad?
She blows out a breath while her mind zips through the hues of the score to the thirty-seventh bar. She settles her hands on the keys once more, then starts pouring her heart and soul into the rest of the piece while the colors flare in angry reds and oranges around her.
* * *
Oliver’s beaming smile and hearty handshake imply that he’s delighted to see me. “What did you think of Gladwell?” he asks.
“I thought he was fantastic. What’s more, so did our tenants.”
Oliver claps his hands together in an unusual and spontaneous act of delight. “Michael has been trying to get this regenerative farming idea off the ground for over a year.”
“He didn’t tell me that.”
“Yes. Kit just wasn’t interested.” Oliver shakes his head and looks away as if he’s embarrassed or he’s said too much, and I realize he doesn’t want to be disloyal to his friend, my brother.
“Well, I think Kit missed a trick. I’m excited about it. Our next move is to galvanize the tenants at Angwin and Tyok. Gladwell’s up for it. And we should talk in more depth about purchasing or leasing some capital equipment. It’s going to be pricey.”
“We can budget for it. I’ll talk to each of the estate managers and get a date in.”
“Great. Anything pressing?”
“Just the interior design for the mansion block.”
“Caro?”
“Yes.” And I don’t think I’ve ever heard him say that word with such weariness.
“Is there a problem?”
“No. Of course not.” Oliver clears his throat, and I make my way into my office.
That was weird.
My first task is to call Leticia and tell her about Sergeant Nancarrow’s news.
* * *
“And why do you want to study at the Royal College of Music?” Professor Carusi asks, her shrewd eyes assessing Alessia.
“I need a backbone to my music. My musical education so far has been…um…quite local. No, parochial, and I know I can take it further with the right tuition.”
“Where do you think you need help?”
“With my technique. I want to develop my voice, my playing. And my musical vocabulary.”
“To what end?” asks Professor Stells.
“I would love to perform. All over the world.”
Alessia cannot believe she’s said that out loud.
They nod as if this might be a possibility, and Alessia is thrilled at the thought. She doesn’t want to tell them that the other reason she needs to be there is because she needs a student visa.
“Well, thank you for coming to see us. Are you auditioning for other conservatoires?”
“I am.”
Professor Laithwaite nods. “You’ll be hearing from us.”
Alessia has no idea if it went well, but she’s relieved it’s over. She knows she played well… but was it good enough? In the cab, on a whim, she calls her great-uncle on FaceTime.
“Alessia, my darling. How are you?”
She fills him in on the past week in Cornwall and tells him about her audition.
“Who did you see?”
“What do you mean?”
“Who auditioned you?”
