Page 16 of The Virtuoso
“The boys will be all right in their tent?” Val asked as he poured two cups of tea from the pot on the stove while a few drops of rain spattered the roof of the carriage house.
“They’re waterproof,” Darius replied, accepting his cup. “Rain or shine, this whole summer is a lark to them, as it should be.”
“They’ve gotten a lot done this week. There’s not a sapling standing in the yard, the beds are dug and planted, the vegetables are in, and the drive is looking better.”
Darius regarded Val by the flickering light of a single candle. “But you are not satisfied.”
“With them? Of course I am. They’re good boys, and they work hard. I’m lucky to have them.”
“With them, maybe, not with yourself.”
“And you are such a paragon of self-satisfaction?” The last thing Val wanted at the end of yet another grueling day was Darius Lindsey peering into his soul.
“You will take the boys and Mrs. Fitz to Candlewick tomorrow,” Darius replied. “Get some decent cooking into you, play Belmont’s grand piano for a few hours, and set yourself to rights.”
Val was silent a long time, until he expelled a hard breath and set his mug down on the bricks under the stove. “I will not be playing Belmont’s piano or any other, and I will thank you not to raise the matter before others.” He crossed the room in two strides and sat on his bunk, hauling off his boots and tossing them hard against the opposite wall.
“So that’s what all the gloves are about?” Darius asked, reclining on his cot. “Your left hand is still buggered up?”
“How did you know?”
“I have eyes, Valentine. It took me about two days to figure out you own the world’s largest collection of gloves, because you’ve bought them ready-made in two different sizes. From there, I observed your left hand is swollen, the thumb, index, and middle fingers noticeably red and painful-looking. You make every effort not to favor the hand for fine tasks but beat it to death on manual labor. One has to wonder if your actions are well advised.”
“Fairly forbid me the piano,” Val bit out. “So I don’t play the bloody piano.”
“And does your hand improve?”
“Not much.” Val tried to match his companion’s casual tone. “At first, there was some improvement, but lately, it’s no better. I might as well use it for what I can, while I can.”
“You say that like you are angry at your hand,” Darius mused, “though you do every kind of rough work there is to do with it, and you certainly make me look like I’m barely pulling my weight most days.”
“I do every kind of work the common laborers do,” Val corrected him. He rose and crossed the room to where his boots lay against the far wall and set them tidily next to the door. “I just can’t do the kind of work I was born to do.”
“And that would be?”
“Play the piano. My art is how I go on, Darius, and the only thing I know how to do well enough to matter.”
“Doing it a bit dramatic, don’t you think?” Darius crossed his arms behind his head and regarded Val where he once again sat on his cot.
“No, I don’t think. Were I going to be dramatic, I’d slit my wrists, hang myself, or jump into the Thames when the tide was leaving.”
“Valentine.” Darius sat up. “That is not funny.”
“How funny do you think it feels not to be able to play the piano when it’s all I’ve done of worth in the past twenty-some years? I did not excel at school, and I can’t point to an illustrious career like my brother, the former cavalry officer. I haven’t Westhaven’s head for business. I wasn’t a jolly good time like Bart or a charmer like Vic.But, by God, I could play the piano.”
“And you can build stone walls and referee between Day and Phil and keep an eye on Nick Haddonfield when he hares all over the Home Counties,” Darius retorted. “Do you think one activity defines you?”
“I’m like a whore, Darius, in that, yes, the one activity, in my case playing the piano, defines me.” Val heard weariness in his own voice. “When Dev was driven mad by nightmares, I played for him so he couldn’t hear the battles anymore. When his little Winnie was scared witless by all the changes in her life, I played for her and taught her a few things to play for herself. When Victor was so sick, I’d play for him, and he’d stop coughing for a little while. It’s how I let people know they matter to me, Darius, and now…”
Darius got up and crossed the room, then lowered himself to sit beside Val in the shifting candlelight. “Now all this playing for others has left you one-handed, angry, and beating yourself up.”
Not beating himself up, precisely, butfeelingbeaten up. “The piano is the way I have a soul, Dare. It’s always there for me, always able to say the things I can’t, always worth somebody’s notice, even if they don’t know they notice. It has never let me down, never ridiculed me before others, never taken a sudden notion not to know who I am or what I want. As mistresses go, the piano has been loyal, predictable, and lovely.”
“You talk about an instrument as if it’s animate,” Darius said, hunching forward. “I know you are grieving the inability to exercise a considerable talent, but you are too old—and far too dear a man—to be relying on an imaginary friend. You deserve more than to think of yourself as merely the slave of your muse.”
Val shot off the bed and crossed to the door, pausing only long enough to tug on his boots.
“I’m sorry.” Darius rose and might have stopped him, but Val turned his back and got his hand on the door latch first. “I don’t like seeing you suffer, but were you really happy spending your entire life on the piano bench?”
