Free Girl in Hyacinth Blue by Susan Vreeland

Countess Maurits, and then others, and I had to content myself by greeting him without a private word.
    During the Haydn I adopted the attitude I imagined him to cherish—a lofty, ethereal dreami ness. I leaned forward to show I was intensely in terested, although it shot a pain through my lower back, and the vertical bones in my corset dug into my stomach—which would not have happened had we been in Paris where we belonged.
    I noticed Gerard looking around the room dis tractedly instead of paying full attention to the notes. How could anyone not keep his eyes fas tened on the musicians?
    I concentrated on Monsieur le C—'s mouth, how he puckered it in a precious little pout when he had to play something allegro. His hands, how deft and light, like birds. And his plucking! My heartstrings vibrated. To create such heavenly sounds, such moods, to have the power so to lift the spirit—was it any surprise that he stirred my passion? Heartwrenchingly, I wondered, as you are, if that could be the budding of love. I wasn't quite sure how to identify it. Was it something that made one all aflutter, or gave one an inner pool of great calm? That sounded too aged. Like a cheese. I pre ferred the flutter of birds, and my mind gamboled under their spell for all of the Mozart.
    After an appropriate time mingling with the guests, I approached him, said that he played like an angel, and let him kiss my hand. It was not diffi cult thereafter to lure him into the drawing room. I only had to say I had a small Dutch masterpiece to show him. "A painting of a young girl, a virgin," I taunted, though now I'm ashamed I used her so. Passing through the petite salle, I turned down the wick in the oil lamp, then took his hand and led him to the darkened drawing room and quickly closed the door behind us. We could see nothing.
    I counted the six steps to the divan and we sank into sinful luxury with a sigh. He kissed. I kissed, and I discovered, with the very tip of my tongue, a callous under his left jawbone. With a start I real ized that must be where he squeezed the violin with his jowl, an occupational malady I could for give for the grace of his bowing arm.
    And I did forgive, for his hands played me like a beloved instrument. He danced his fingers across my throat pianissimo and executed a glissando down my spine. His prelude, an arpeggio trilling through my entire being. His plucking, all that I had hoped for.
    Desperately he was rustling through dress, che mise, petticoat, crinoline and shift, and I thought with gratitude how impractical pantalets would have been. Breathing. There was deafening breath ing and such rustling. Was he suffocating under there? So as not to be indelicate, I'll just say that his strings were swelling into a vibrato. He uttered a soft cry, in tremolo, until he sang one thin note, falsetto.
    Was it my imagination or did I hear devilish sti fled laughter? Decidedly feminine. We were not alone! Moreover, we might have been seen com ing in the door at that moment of illumination. Lighting a lamp would tell me who it was, that is to say, who must be presented with a lavish gift, and quickly too, so that she would remain silent. Under my billowing gown Monsieur le C— stirred, and seemed about to begin the second movement, but I was so distracted by that pres ence, the rustling of fabric—taffeta it was—that all pleasure I had imagined for weeks flitted as quickly as a grace note. I tried to think who had been wearing taffeta this late into summer. I pushed myself away from him, felt for the table, struck a match and in the first flicker of lamplight saw, on the chaise beneath the chaste eye of the girl in the painting, with his breeches lowered like a plucked goose, Gerard.
    And with him, not that Agatha creature of the bird's nest headgear, but the Countess Maurits, both of them staring at both of us.
    I was caught, yes, but released too, in the same instant. Heaven's blessing! This would send me back to Paris!
    I