“Three gentlemen suitors!” Aunt Eunice said with barely restrained excitement. “Three!” She patted Ashley’s knee, beaming.
Ashley shook her head. “Lord Ravencroft is my friend Georgia’s uncle. Westbrook and Fairfax are his friends. They were merely being polite.”
“As you say.” Aunt patted her knee again. “You know it is my fondest wish to see you happily settled before we return to Jamaica.”
The two matrons seated on Ashley’s other side left to go sit with other friends, and Georgia and Miss Kenyon took their places. The three of them exchanged hushed greetings as everyone in the room settled.
The assembled crowd quieted as Lord Bristol and the three other members of his group, again wearing matching red neckcloths, took their place around the pianoforte. They sang the same song about valor in battle, though this time she was more aware of the bass singer. He wore a red neckcloth like his companions, but unlike their neatly shorn locks, his dark blonde hair reached past his sharply defined jawline. Was there some rule of fashion that all bass singers must have long hair?
As before, they finished the first song, then included the crowd in performingAnacreon in Heaven, and took their bows and their seats.
Lord Fairfax and three companions, wearing matching green neckcloths, sang next. They each stood an arm’s reach apart, no instruments accompanying them. As the song progressed, an Italian aria, it became apparent they had arranged themselves in order from highest to lowest voice. The tenor on the far left had the face and voice of an angel, his clear tone reaching higher than she thought possible for a man past adolescence. He looked young enough to still be a university student. The other tenor and baritone were in their thirties to mid-forties, and then Fairfax singing bass. They each stayed in the range she expected of them as the song progressed, with Fairfax sometimes hitting notes lower than seemed humanly possible, a rumble that seemed to make the floor shake.
He didn’t give her goosebumps though, the way Ravencroft did. The timbre of his voice was different. Plenty of women in the room, and more than a few men, did seem deeply affected. Several ladies were vigorously plying their fans, their cheeks flushed. Some of the reaction may have been from his blatant flirting—smiling at certain women, a wink here and there. When he directed one at Ashley, Aunt Eunice squeezed Ashley’s knee. She thought she heard an indignant snort from Georgia.
They finished the first song and performed a second, each singer getting a chance to solo on the melody at some point while the others provided background harmony.
Many in the audience cheeredHuzzah! when they finished in addition to applauding.
“They’re good,” Ashley whispered to Georgia.
“They’re technically proficient,” she replied with a dismissive sniff.
Ashley quickly returned her attention to the stage, where Lord Fairfax’s group had left and the next group was getting ready to perform—Lords Templeton, Mansfield, Ravencroft, Mr. Westbrook, and Georgia’s brother, Parker.
“The blue neckcloths were Mother’s idea,” Georgia confided as the men prepared.
Lord Mansfield seated himself at the pianoforte, Parker and Templeton standing behind him, while Westbrook settled with a mandolin on his lap and Ravencroft balanced the viola da gamba on his calves, and they began to play.
Ashley recognized the opening lyrics of a Thomas Moore song, “‘Tis the Last Rose of Summer.” This arrangement made the most of the deeper tones of the instruments and the men’s voices, as if Moore had arranged the tune for baritone and bass voices rather than harp and tenors. Each singer had a solo for a stanza before the others joined back in. Her breath caught as she finally heard Ravencroft sing by himself. His magnificent bass voice slid in a smooth glissando up to tenor before settling back to baritone. Several audience members gasped. The fine hairs beside her face stirred with so many fans in the room madly fluttering.
Of course. It had to be Ravencroft’s arrangement. She stared transfixed at him, giving free rein to her expression of delight at the beautiful music.
Unlike at Lady Bristol’s soirée, Ravencroft was not trying to hide tonight. His glances took in his fellow performers as well as the audience and the instrument he was playing. He looked directly at Ashley as he sang the line, “I’ll not leave thee, thou lone one, to pine on the stem.”
She couldn’t breathe.
It wasn’t until Westbrook took over the lead in his sweet baritone and Ravencroft checked the placement of his bow on the strings that she could draw air again. She should probably fan herself but she still couldn’t move, even when Aunt Eunice and Georgia briefly stared at her before turning their attention back to the quintet.
They finished the song, paused for the applause, and then played the song she’d heard them rehearsing at Lord Mansfield’s townhouse. Ravencroft’s version of the arrangement, not Lady Templeton’s.
Lovely as it was, her mind kept going back to the line he’d sung to her, “I’ll not leave thee.”
No, he hadn’t been singing to her. It was just a line in a song, written by another man years ago. Purely coincidental that Ravencroft had looked at her while singing those words.
Ashley was oblivious to the other groups who followed them, her mind replaying the two songs Ravencroft had performed, trying to recall every facial expression, every note, every nuance. Eventually Lord Calvert stood up to thank everyone who had generously shared their talents tonight.
Ashley wanted to linger near the refreshment table, to speak with Ravencroft even as he and Lord Fairfax critiqued each other’s performance. She came crashing back to reality when Aunt Eunice touched her elbow.
“Our carriage is here, my dear,” she said.
With great reluctance, Ashley bid good night to her friends, knowing she would not see them for at least two days while her aunt visited her former music teacher. Ravencroft was conversing with Mansfield, Fairfax, and Westbrook. Even though his back was turned, his deep voice carried clearly beneath the din of conversation. Lord Fairfax, facing her, raised his cup of punch in farewell to her.
* * *
A rainstorm moved in overnight. Rain was still falling when Ashley went downstairs to breakfast the next morning. As soon as they’d finished eating, Uncle Edward and Aunt Eunice prepared to depart.
“Are you certain you do not wish to come with us?” Aunt Eunice cast a worried glance at servants attending to their duties farther down the hall. “I hesitated to leave you for one night, and now here I am leaving you alone for two.”
