So they had not infected the cat.

After the scales, Ruth played some simple pieces by Clementi. Adamus spoke to her quietly. He never corrected her while she was playing, but after, sometimes making her return and assay the piece again.

Rachaela listened to the sounds they made, and the piano, until a sort of trance had her, in which what they did seemed quite natural, as if their relationship were ordinary, or nonexistent.

Finally the lesson ended.

‘Play to me,’ said Ruth. ‘Play the Chopin, I like that best.’ She pronounced the name Chopping, a child’s joke of her own.

Adamus began to play.

Rachaela steeled herself.

As the notes sprang round the room like flung silver daggers, she glanced at the two of them, her lover and his child.

Ruth stood at Adamus’s shoulder. She did not touch him. She stared at his hands, curved slightly forward like a slender branch in the breeze. Less than ever did she look like a child, in her moss-green party frock and tortoiseshell combs. She looked like a spirit, a malign fairy, the Devil’s handmaiden at Adamus’s shoulder.

Rachaela felt a wave of rage.

Yes, I am jealous. I have every cause to be. There is my successor.

When he stopped playing, Ruth said, ‘Play the Prokofioffyev now.’

‘Not now, Ruth. That’s enough for tonight.’

Ruth did not remonstrate.

She twirled round and came back to the hearth, throwing herself lightly down beside the cat to stroke and caress it.

‘Ruth,’ Rachaela said, ‘say goodnight to the cat, and then go back downstairs.’

‘I’ll stay here,’ Ruth said.

‘No,’ Rachaela said, ‘not tonight.’

Ruth looked up at her. She said, ‘I always stay an hour after the music.’

‘I told you, not tonight.’

Would Ruth obey her now? There was no reason. All the old laws were vanquished.

But Ruth got up. ‘All right.’

She went back to Adamus, who sat still at the silent piano.

‘Mummy says I’m to go down now.’ A pause, perhaps for his contradiction. Which did not come. ‘Good night.’

‘Good night, Ruth.’

And Ruth bowed forward and kissed the man on the cheek.

Then she went out and down the stair, her dress slipping after her along the treads.

Rachaela heard the lower door open and close.

The cat raised its head, listened, and lay back to sleep again.

‘I’m sorry to curtail your evening,’ Rachaela said too harshly. ‘I realize you must have a lot to say to her.’

‘I have nothing to say to her,’ he said. ‘I teach her to play. The rest of the conversation comes from Ruth.’

‘Are you defending yourself?’ Rachaela said. ‘You’re indefensible.’

‘Am I.’

‘You know that you are.’ She stopped, and tried to slow her breathing. ‘Or have I misunderstood all of it?’

‘Probably not.’

‘Can it be true then, can it really be true, that you are to be mated to that child?’

‘Mated,’ he said.