‘I don’t suffer fools gladly. No teacher worth his salt does,’ he informed her at an early stage, and she took the hint and made it her business to prepare herself thoroughly for her lessons. Even so, of course, she tripped up sometimes and she thought him unkind in his criticism and arrogant in his demands.
‘You remind me of Jerome Leydon,’ she told him rather resentfully on one of these occasions.
‘I do?’ He looked astonished and not particularly pleased. ‘He wouldn’t be flattered to hear you say that.’
‘Why not?’ she could not resist asking.
Unexpectedly he laughed and pushed up his glasses on his forehead. ‘He’s usually rated as something in the nature of a heart-throb. We were in music college together and he was definitely the star of that period. Why do I remind you of him?’
‘You’re both so—so sure of yourselves. So determined to order one’s existence.’
‘When did he try to order your existence?’ There was a touch of genuine curiosity in the query.
‘He practically ordered me to come and see you and ask to be admitted to your choir and perhaps have lessons with you.’
‘You don’t say?’ Lewis Elsworth looked amused. (She had discovered that his name was Lewis from a church notice, but she had never heard anyone address him as such.) ‘Well, for that at any rate we must be grateful,’ he added—a little enigmatically, she thought. ‘Shall we try that last bit again?’
Looking back now, Amanda saw those first six months through a haze of increasing knowledge and delight—punctuated, admittedly, from time to time by explosions of wrath on his part and near-despair on hers. But, on balance, they were extraordinarily happy months and, at the end of them, there was no question of the experiment finishing there.
‘As I said all along, the conditions are not ideal,’ he told her. ‘But conditions seldom are, and you’re not doing at all badly.’
This was reasonably high praise from him and she was happy. However, she felt bound to bring up the question of fees once more.
‘Don’t be silly,’ he said. And then, with a smile of rare indulgence, ‘You can pay me after your first Covent Garden engagement.’
‘Do you really think that one day——’
‘That was a joke,’ he interrupted curtly. ‘And not a specially good one either. But if you work hard there’s no saying what might happen—one day.’
So she went on working hard. She had been doing so now for close on two years. And from time to time she told herself that anything might happen. Though what she meant by that she was not quite sure. Nor could she imagine what effect the unspecified ‘anything’ might have on her life and family.
On Nan, for instance. Suppose she had some enormous stroke of luck?—met someone who could put her on the road to success—won some contest which brought her publicity—how would that affect Nan? The thought of her sister-in-law was always inextricably mixed in with any hopes or ambitions she might entertain on her own behalf. Even today, when she had thoughtlessly declared it was the kind of day when anything might happen, Nan’s quick, discontented reaction had immediately made her feel guilty.
But as the day went on its reassuringly uneventful way her thoughts veered away from the problem of Nan, and by the time she went to her room to change, late in the afternoon, she was already thinking more of her coming lesson and choir practice than of any family problems.
Just as she was ready to go down she heard a car drive up outside and, glancing from the window, she saw a good-looking woman step out of a very handsome Daimler. She drew her mink jacket round her, glanced up at the sign which hung outside the hotel and called to someone still in the car,
‘It’s called The Nightingale, Isn’t that charmingly appropriate?’
Amanda did not hear the reply. But, catching up her coat, she ran down the back staircase to alert either Nan or Henry to the arrival of this distinguished-looking visitor, before going on her own way to Austin Parva.
There was no one in the family sitting-room when she came in but, before she could go in further search of her brother or sister-in-law, the door from the main part of the hotel opened and Nan came in. A flushed, bright-eyed, strangely lovely-looking Nan, who pushed the door to behind her and leaned against it, catching her breath in such obvious agitation that Amanda exclaimed involuntarily.
‘Nan! What is it?’
‘You can’t imagine who’s just arrived!—Here!—in our ordinary little hotel. Oh, what would I have given to have this happen ten years ago!’
‘But who is she? I did see a gorgeous-looking car draw up, but——’
‘She?’ Nan’s tone dismissed the unknown ‘she’ as almost negligible. ‘She’s just his wife—though a singer in her own right, of course. It’s he who matters. The man who’s just come into our hotel is Oscar Warrender.’
And if Nan had been announcing the arrival of the Archangel Gabriel she could not, Amanda thought, have sounded more awed or excited.
Chapter Two
‘Oscar Warrender?’ Amanda repeated incredulously. ‘Do you mean the Oscar Warrender?’
‘There’s only one,’ replied Nan. ‘And he’s come ten years too late,’ she added bitterly.
‘What do you mean by that?’ In her surprise and excitement, Amanda had for once forgotten Nan’s lost ambitions.
‘They say he’s always on the lookout for new vocal talent. Ten years ago I’d have managed somehow to make him listen to me—take me seriously. I was part of his world of music then, however young and unimportant. I would have gatecrashed in some way. Now—’ Nan glanced round as though assessing her surroundings almost with hatred—‘now I’m the landlady of a small hotel, and the most I can do is go and serve tea to him and his wife.’
‘I’ll go if you like,’ Amanda offered, a quiver of uncontrollable eagerness in her voice. ‘Let me. I’d like to.’
‘No. It’s time you were off to your choir practice, isn’t it? Besides—’ Nan gave a half contemptuous little shrug—‘at least I’ll have a word with him, if it’s only, “Would you like some more hot water, sir?”’
‘Then just let me carry something in,’ pleaded Amanda. ‘One doesn’t often have a chance to brush shoulders with a celebrity. Two celebrities, come to that. She’s famous in her own right, isn’t she? Let me see—what’s her name? Her professional name, I mean. Anthea—Anthea “something”.’
‘She was Anthea Benton before he married her. He discovered her in some romantic circumstances or other. She’s usually known as Anthea Warrender now.—All right, take in the scones and cream and jam. I’ll bring along the tea in a minute or two. But—’ Nan glanced sharply at Amanda—‘don’t say anything gushing or unprofessional, will you? We needn’t seem to be country bumpkins, even if we are now.’
‘Of course not!’ Amanda had already flung down her coat and picked up a tray on to which she piled several of the delectable things which her sister-in-law considered essential to a proper tea. Then, her heart beating with excitement, she went through to the pleasant dining-room at the front of the house.
They were both looking out at the garden, Warrender standing with his back to the room and his wife sitting at the table in the bay window. She turned her head immediately at the sound of Amanda’s entry and exclaimed, ‘What an enchanting place you have here!’
‘It is rather nice, isn’t it?’ Amanda smiled irresistibly because it was difficult not to smile when Anthea Warrender looked so genuinely interested and friendly. ‘My brother and sister-in-law run the place and I help out. I enjoy it, even though it’s quite hard work.’
‘It must be! I like the name of the hotel too.’
‘Yes? I heard you say that “The Nightingale” was charmingly appropriate. I wondered why.’
‘Oh, dear!’ Anthea Warrender looked both amused and slightly shocked. ‘Did my voice actually penetrate into the house? I had no idea I spoke so loudly.’
‘It’s that technique which projects to the last row of
the gallery,’ observed the man, turning round from the window, and Amanda had her first, and overwhelming, impression of the famous conductor. He was smiling slightly, so that she found him less formidable than his reputation had led her to expect, but there was no question about his air of authority.
Warrender must, she supposed, be in his late forties—possibly early fifties—but he gave the impression of such vitality and inner strength that it would have been hard to put an age to him. Like many fair-haired men, he seemed scarcely to have greyed at all, the touch of silver at the temples merely adding an almost youthful brightness to the smooth hair.
‘She doesn’t understand the allusion,’ Anthea Warrender said. ‘We’re stage people,’ she explained in a friendly way, ‘and we tend to speak in theatre terms.’
‘I realise that,’ Amanda said shyly but with an air of almost naïve interest which would have been engaging to the most modest of people. ‘I—know who you are.’
‘Really?’ Anthea seemed amused and surprised. ‘Did you recognise us when you came into the room, then?’
‘No. My sister-in-law recognised you and told me you were here. And I begged to be allowed to bring in some of your tea things and see you for myself,’ Amanda admitted with charming candour.
Both the Warrenders laughed at that, and he said, ‘There’s fame for you! But that still doesn’t tell you why my wife found The Nightingale an appropriate name. I suppose you might say we’re in search of a nightingale. In other words, there’s supposed to be a promising young singer in the district. She’ll probably prove to be nothing of the kind, of course,’ he added in cynical parenthesis. ‘They nearly always do. But we’ll take the chance of hearing her just the same. Do you know a place near here called Austin Parva?’
‘Yes.’ Amanda swallowed hard and tried to stifle a slight gasp. ‘It’s about three miles from here. It—it has a rather beautiful church. L—late Norman.’
‘And a very good choir and choirmaster, I’m told.’ The conductor glanced at her with a touch of interest, and she had the most extraordinary conviction that he knew she was breathless with excitement.
‘Dr Elsworth—yes. He’s very good.’
But at that moment Nan came in, looking admirably calm and collected, and she said, ‘It’s time you were off, Mandy, if you’re not going to be late for choir practice.’
Amanda guessed her sister-in-law had thought up that opening remark with the intention of drawing a word or two about singing from her two visitors. So she replied quickly, ‘Yes. I’m—just going.’
‘To Austin Parva?’ enquired Oscar Warrender coolly. ‘Then we won’t keep you. Go along. You mustn’t be late.’
And, desperately tempted though she was to linger for a few moments longer, Amanda took her departure immediately, aware with absolute certainty that when Oscar Warrender said, ‘Go along,’ one went.
As she glanced at the hall clock she realised that she could not fail to be late for her lesson, a circumstance which would ordinarily have reduced her to agitated dismay. But the recent encounter, and the possibility implicit in what Warrender had told her, combined to make everything else seem almost unimportant.
Almost—but not quite. For even in her euphoric state she remembered the one other time she had been late for a lesson, and the recollection set her off pedalling madly in the hope of making up for lost time. Even so, she was late and rather breathless as she finally entered the church schoolroom, where her lessons usually took place.
Lewis Elsworth was already sitting at the piano, running his hands over the keys, and he said without looking up, ‘You’re late.’
Unusual rebellion rose in Amanda at that tone and, to her own surprise, she heard herself say, ‘I know. I’m sorry. I was talking to Oscar Warrender.’
It was a wonderful comeback, and she was pleased to see that it shook him. He struck a discord on the piano and turned to look at her in the most gratifying surprise.
‘Oscar Warrender? What’s he doing round here?’
‘I think—I’m not quite sure, but I think he may be coming to Austin Parva this evening. He seems to have heard of you and your choir——’
‘From whom?’ he interrupted quickly.
‘I don’t know. Would it perhaps be from Jerome Leydon? They might know each other, I suppose.’
‘Yes, they probably do. Leydon gets around to most places—and people—of importance.’ That was said without rancour, Amanda realised. ‘But how did you come to be talking to Warrender?’
‘He and his wife—Anthea Benton, you know—they both came into the hotel for tea and—and I served them. At least, I managed to take in some of the tea things.’
‘And told him you sang in the choir? At which he said, “God, you’re the soprano we’ve been looking for!” I suppose.’
‘Nothing so silly and amateur,’ she retorted crisply. ‘On the contrary, he offered the information that they were in the district because they’d heard about you and your choir. And he also said——’ She stopped, suddenly ashamed of her own eagerness to assign to herself those magic words about a promising soprano.
‘Yes?’ He glanced at her curiously.
‘Nothing. My sister-in-law came in then and said it was time I went off to choir practice. She still thinks that’s all I do when I come here on Wednesdays. So I had to agree with her and leave at that point. Even so, I’m late and I apologise.’
‘It’s all right,’ he said unexpectedly. ‘I’d have lingered too in those circumstances, I think. Oscar Warrender, hm? He didn’t say anything about——? Well, it doesn’t matter. We’ll get on with the lesson now.’
So they got on with the lesson and, with a tremendous effort, Amanda managed to put the Warrenders sufficiently far into the back of her mind to give ninety per cent of her attention to what she was doing. But an odd thing happened. For the first time since she had known him, Lewis Elsworth failed to note a minor mistake on her part, and it occurred to her that he too seemed to have only ninety per cent of his attention on the lesson.
Towards the end of the session he said, almost casually, ‘I think we might have you sing a solo after Evensong on Sunday. The congregation like that from time to time. How about “Hear ye, Israel”? We might run through it now. It’s some time since you studied it.’
‘Yes,’ said Amanda, and that was all. But she realised that Lewis Elsworth meant her to sing ‘Hear ye, Israel’ if Warrender came into the church that evening, and to sing it to the best of her ability.
They went through it, with only one stop for a slight correction in the repeat of the main theme. Then he said, ‘Yes, that will do,’ and her lesson was over.
Usually at this point, when he went back to his own house at the other end of the village, Amanda went to see a fellow member of the choir with whom she had become friendly. But on this occasion, when he had departed, she decided that she must be alone for a short while, if only to put her thoughts in order and her feelings under control. So she went across to the church.
She hardly ever lifted the heavy latch of the church door without recalling briefly that first time when she had come in to hear Lewis Elsworth playing and stayed to sing for him. This evening, however, she was so deeply absorbed in her own thoughts that she just slipped into the church quietly and sat down at the very back.
For the first few minutes she thought she was the only person in the place. Then she heard the footsteps of someone who was walking slowly round near the altar. There was nothing unusual about this. The church was of sufficient beauty and historical interest to attract the occasional tourist. And she continued to sit there, her head bent over her copy of Elijah, undisturbed by the presence of any casual stranger. Until a man emerged from one of the side aisles, walked up to where she was sitting and said, ‘Hello. I wondered if I might find you here.’
Amanda raised her head and was astonished to find Jerome Leydon standing in front of her.
‘Why—hello!’ Both surprise and pleasure imparted u
nusual warmth to her tone. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I’m staying about twelve miles away with my sister. She has a house at Wetherton.’
‘Is that the sister who says you’re often offensive when you start laying down the law about your profession?’ Amanda asked with a sudden mischievous smile.
‘She does, as a matter of fact. But how did you know?’ He sat down beside her, looking amused in his turn.
‘You told me she did, the first time I ever met you. At the school concert when you heard me sing——’
‘The first time I heard you sing,’ he amended.
‘The only time, surely?’ she looked surprised.
‘No. I’ve heard you twice since then,’ he informed her. ‘I made it my business to do so. I wanted to hear how you were developing. So twice, when I was staying with Diana, I came over here and slipped in at the back to listen for myself. You’re doing well, aren’t you?’
‘I should like to think so,’ Amanda said slowly.
‘You mean old Lewis isn’t exactly lavish with his praise?’
For some inexplicable reason she was faintly annoyed at hearing her teacher described as ‘old Lewis’.
‘He’s a marvellous teacher,’ she said a little curtly, ‘and doesn’t, I suppose, want to make the mistake of giving me inflated ideas about myself.’
‘I bet he doesn’t!’ Jerome Leydon laughed with genuine amusement. ‘But, at the risk of doing that very thing, I’m going to tell you I thought so well of you that I persuaded someone pretty influential to come and hear you tonight.’
‘Oscar Warrender?’ she said, just below her breath.
‘Yes. How did you know?’ He was not entirely pleased, she saw, to have his surprise anticipated, so she quickly explained about the Warrenders’ visit to The Nightingale and added.
Nightingales (Warrender Saga Book 11) Page 3