Like No Other

Chapter 19: Interlude

                                                        Chapter 19

                                                         Interlude

        

        “Well, how do you find it, Miss Davis? Rather exceptional performance, don’t you think?” Lord March asked amid the clatter of applauses as soon as the concert was concluded.

        “Oh, yes, indeed!” she replied in a monotonous voice of one who found little relish from the treat.

        The Viscount chuckled and shook his head. “No. It is my belief that you derived little diversion from it. In fact, I’d observed that you were rather abstracted for the most part of the concert,” he shrewdly remarked. It occurred to him that the absence of a significant someone might have brought this somewhat lack of interest. But this he kept to himself, and asked instead: “Perhaps there’s something that’s been bothering you?”

        She looked up at him with a puzzled gaze. “Why, nothing at all!”

        “Dear me! Perhaps your remarkable detachment from the whole affair should be laid at my door?” uttered Lord March in a mock dismayed tone. 

        At this, she giggled. “How absurd you are, my lord! Why should it be? You are very attentive to me throughout the evening, and indeed, I’m very happy to find myself in so engaging a company as yours! Did I seem to be an indifferent spectator? I guess I did, but you must know that I am not wholly fond of concerts, you know.”

        “So that explains it then!” exclaimed the Viscount, looking ridiculously pleased. “But how odd for a female not to be fond of concerts! My sisters are very much fascinated by them. When we were young they used to squabble on whose turn it was to play the pianoforte, and they would all of them sing, but which seemed to me back then pretty much like caterwauling — yes, I’d been a detestable brother when I was young, you know— but then I was obliged to sit and listen to it every time, because there was no getting away from it!”

        For one who’d grown up without siblings to play or learn lessons with in the schoolroom, the cosy picture the Viscount had described made Miss Davis a little wistful, but she kept her cheerful countenance, and only said: “Your sisters must be very accomplished indeed!” 

        Moments later Miss Winscott rejoined them once again, and lost no time to share her observations about the concert. She poured them out mostly to her cousin. “Wasn’t it delightful, my dear? I trust you enjoyed it as much as I did! If Mama were here, I daresay the soprano would have reminded her of Angelica Cataloni — you know Caro, the Italian singer whom she often talked about whenever we attended the opera? We never saw her, of course, for she left London stage several years ago; but I daresay she isn’t as beautiful as Miss Rosetti here, don’t you think?”

        Miss Davis, who never even had a glimpse of this fabled soprano, readily agreed to these observations but added in a low voice: “But don’t you think that her gown is a little — revealing? I declare I am a little put off by it.”

        “Well, you know these opera-singers!” came the equivocal reply of Miss Winscott. A matron nearby caught her eyes, and graciously waved at her. Good manners bade her to attend to this lady, but she couldn’t forebear to complain to her cousin’s sympathetic ear how vexing it was when one had many acquaintances to come across with before sallying forth again.

        Supper was not yet announced and everyone was engaged in boisterous discourses and drinks with their acquaintances. Indeed, the evening seemed to augur well, but it was disturbed in some degree by the arrival of a small party of modish young men a little while later. Despite her chastisement for their tardiness, the Countess, always an indulgent hostess, received them impartially and shepherded them into the saloon. Such want of decorum of these gentlemen, and Lady Stokeford’s tolerance to it, did not escape the censures of a few old-fashioned dowagers and matrons present. It so far reached Miss Davis’ attentive ears that the Countess had always been liberal in her ways and hadn’t failed offend propriety any time these past eight years. It naturally appealed to the young lady’s curiosity how the Countess contrived to offend propriety, and therefore put her companion in a great deal of discomfort by impetuously asking it.