Mildred almost thought she was speaking of the grouse.
“I mean Castellani,” said Cecilia, in answer to her interrogative look. “Isn’t he a heap of talent? You heard him play, of course, and you heard his divine voice? When I think of his genius for music, and remember that he wrote that book, I am actually wonderstruck.”
“The book is clever, no doubt,” answered Mildred thoughtfully, “almost too clever to be quite sincere. And as for genius—well, I suppose his musical talent does almost reach genius; and yet what more can one say of Mozart, Beethoven, or Chopin? I think genius is too large a word for any one less than they.”
“But I say he is a genius,” cried Mrs. Tomkison, elated by grouse and dry sherry (the champagne had been put aside when Mildred refused it). “Does he not carry one out of oneself by his playing? Does not his singing open the floodgates of our hard, battered old hearts? No one ever interested me so much.”
“Have you known him long?”
“For the last three seasons. He is with me three or four times a week when he is in town. He is like a son of the house.”
“And does Mr. Tomkison like him?”
“O, you know Adam,” said Cecilia, with an expressive shrug. “You know Adam’s way. He doesn’t mind. ‘You always must have somebody hanging about you,’ he said, ‘so you may as well have that French fool as any one else.’ Adam calls all foreigners Frenchmen, if they are not obtrusively German. Castellani has been devoted to me; and I daresay I may have got myself talked about on his account,” pursued Cecilia, with the pious resignation of a blameless matron of five-and-forty, who rather likes to be suspected of an intrigue; “but I can’t help that. He is one of the few young men I have ever met who understands me. And then we are such near neighbours, and it is easy for him to run in at any hour. ‘You ought to give him a latchkey,’ says Adam; ‘it would save the servants a lot of trouble.’”
“Yes, I remember; he lives in Queen Anne’s Mansions,” Mildred answered listlessly.
“He has a suite of rooms near the top, looking over half London, and exquisitely furnished. He gives afternoon tea to a few chosen friends who don’t mind the lift; and we have had a Materialisation in his rooms, but it wasn’t a particularly good one,” added Mrs. Tomkison, as if she were talking of something to eat.