Appassionata by Jilly Cooper

down beat, so the orchestra knew exactly when to come in. But when Rodney was on the rostrum, the leader gave a nod to start everyone off, but it was very discreet because the orchestra had such respect for him.
    ‘I may go to sleep in the cadenza,’ he warned Abby.
    ‘When shall we wake you up, Sir Rodney?’ asked the leader.
    ‘When you hear me snore.’
    The orchestra were in stitches, but despite such jokes and the legendary blasé-ness of musicians, they all stood up and cheered Abby at the end, and they were joined by people who’d crept into the seats all over the auditorium.
    Abby burst into tears and fled to her dressing-room.
    ‘Rannaldini should be shot,’ said the leader furiously.
    Rodney mopped Abby up over a cup of Earl Grey tea, insisting she have one of the sticky cream cakes he’d bought in white cardboard boxes for the entire orchestra.
    ‘Don’t worry about this evening, we will get ecstatic reviews, because you are breathtakingly beautiful, and because I am old and have a beard. What an easy way to eminence – to grow a beard. If you’re free, we might have a little supper after the concert.’
    ‘Won’t you be exhausted?’ Abby bit into a huge eclair.
    ‘Certainly not, I’ll have a good sleep during the Maxwell Davies which comes after the interval. I’m off home to Lucerne in the morning.’
    Abby returned to the Hyatt Hotel and followed her usual routine, eating a small bowl of pasta for lunch, which gave her time if necessary to throw it up before the concert, a precaution she’d taken since bad fish had sabotaged her in Tel Aviv. She then lay down but didn’t sleep because she kept praying Christopher might call. An hour before she had to leave for the concert, she washed her hair, then warmed up for twenty minutes in her dressing-room, changing and making up during the overture which gave her as little time as possible to be nervous.
    In defiance of Christopher she put on a very short sleeveless dress, covered in midnight-blue sequins, which glittered with every movement, and wore her hair loose but pulled off her face with a crimson bow. She also ringed her eyes with black eye-liner, but left off her mascara in case the Brahms made her cry again.
    Rodney had the entire orchestra and the audience in fits of laughter when he waddled on to conduct the overture from Il Seraglio , and sent one of the cymbals flying with his big belly.
    His jaw dropped ten minutes later when he popped in to collect Abby.
    ‘Dear God, child. What a smasher you are. I ought to wave a sword rather than a baton to drive them off.’
    ‘And you look great too,’ sighed Abby. ‘I love that black-and-silver cummerbund.’
    ‘Madame Harefield,’ said Rodney acidly. ‘Couldn’t think where I’d found one big enough. If that woman were bowling for England, we’d have no difficulty retaining the Ashes . . . Tiddle om pom pom. Don’t be nervous. Birmingham’s in for a treat.’
    Although Rodney dozed off twice in the first movement, he managed to wake up and bring the orchestra in after the cadenza. The audience sat spellbound by the beauty of Abby’s sound and the sadness on her face. Abby always felt the last moments of the concerto were the saddest, as the Hungarian gypsy seemed to romp down the hill, her feet, coloured skirts, earrings and dark curls flying, then suddenly to break down like a mechanical toy, and as the whole orchestra went quiet, limp stumbling through the last two bars, before the three final thunderous chords.
    Invariably when Abby played, there was a long stunned silence at the end, as though it were intrusive to interrupt such sorrow and depth of emotion. Then the audience went wild, breaking into deafening rioting applause. Rodney turned, his plump hands apart, his head on one side – ‘What can I say?’ – before enfolding her in a warm, scented bear-hug.
    The audience, crazy for an encore, would have gone on clapping for ages. Abby longed to oblige them, then to