was dominated by charity-shop finds, but the cushions and the pleasantly faded bedspread in subdued crimson and gold were chosen, as were the posters of South America on the wall, because their rich hues satisfied a hunger for colour and movement and drama that her clothes couldn’t.
While the kettle boiled she checked out her bank balance. It made less than encouraging reading. In the past she’d always made enough over the summer break to pay her fees at university, but that wasn’t going to happen this year. The recession was biting hard and people just didn’t have the money to spend on itinerant buskers. Even if the rest of the run-up to Christmas was as good as it had been so far, she still wouldn’t have enough.
And after Christmas, Wellington, like every other New Zealand city except the tourist towns, died over the summer.
Flicking the bankbook shut, she frowned. Now that her bachelor’s degree was safely under her belt she was determined to carry on, although a master’s meant an even greater commitment of time and effort for two years, and if the recession continued she wasn’t going to be able to afford to eat, much less pay her fees.
When she left home her ultimate goal had been university. It had been a hard slog, and she had sometimes regretted her obsession, but a fierce, unyielding obstinacy kept her going. That same stubbornness compressed her mouth now; she had gone too far to give up.
After putting her bankbook away, she made herself a cup of herbal tea. She had survived before; she’d do it again. Some months ago, when Tansy was still sure she’d be able to manage, Professor Paxton had talked to a friend about a possible scholarship. Tomorrow morning she’d contact him and find out what was offering.
Slowly she reached across the table and began to go through the sheets of music she had left stacked there that morning. It was awful. Totally banal. Derivative. An ironic smile tucked in the corners of her mouth. Of course, she always thought that.
Did other composers look at their work and wonder whether they would ever produce anything worthwhile? Had Beethoven? Or Mozart? It didn’t seem likely. As she drank her tea she scanned the sheets, hearing the music in her head. Then she made some corrections, and finally sat with her chin in her hand, wondering why she should be so convinced that her future lay in writing music. Not just songs, either. She enjoyed them, but they were ephemeral. She wanted to write music that would be listened to for the next hundred years.
Her eyes narrowed. It wasn’t a matter of wanting to write; she didn’t have any choice. Even if no one ever heard the sounds that filled her head, she would still be buying paper she couldn’t afford and setting them down. It was a compulsion she no longer tried to resist.
But her heart wasn’t in it tonight, and she knew why: Leo Dacre’s arrival had thrown her completely.
What a mess! Rick had been utterly convinced that this was his one chance to wrest control of his life away from the demons that were driving him to destruction, and she had agreed. Still did.
Which was why she had lied to Leo; she couldn’t let Rick down.
Nevertheless she felt like a worm. Even though Rick had warned her his brother would find her, she hadn’t expected Leo Dacre to erupt into her life like the Demon King in a pantomime. And she certainly hadn’t expected to feel that shiver of fear. She’d discounted most of Rick’s endless discussions of his brother as adolescent hero-worship.
She’d been wrong; Leo Dacre was disturbingly forceful.
That was a mild way of putting it. He was an arrogant bastard with a cynical belief that money could buy everything. But did he know why Rick had run away from school halfway through the year?
She frowned, trying to remember if there had been any indication in his tone or expression. No; although that aloof, self-possessed face revealed very little, he hadn’t appeared to know. Rick had said no one did.
And now Grace Dacre was ill. Tansy hated the thought of Rick’s mother grieving and suspecting the worst, yet she still couldn’t convince herself that she should go against Rick’s wishes and tell his brother where he was. So much depended on it. Rick’s whole future, in fact.
She chewed a moment on her lip. Damn Leo Dacre; why had he come and upset her comparatively serene life?
And how had he found her? Sudden tension prickled up her backbone as she wondered whether he had set a spy to watch her.
Not that anyone could force her back home now. That caution was merely a leftover from the time when she’d lived looking over her shoulder in case someone arrived to drag her back home.
Tonight at the café, she decided as she got up to shower, she’d ask if she could ring the camp where Rick was trying to put his life back together again. He wouldn’t be able to speak to her, but she’d tell the man who ran the camp about this development. He’d be impartial, and she, cowardly though it probably was, would offload the responsibility on to him.
Three hours later she was sitting on a stool in the café when she realised Leo Dacre had followed her. The quaver in her smoky voice wasn’t obvious, but she saw his quick smile and cursed herself for the small betrayal. Nobody else noticed. But then, her rendition of French songs à la Edith Piaf two nights a week was merely a background to flirting and eating and drinking and, during the university year, deep philosophical discussions on the meaning of life and the possible existence of a theory of everything.
Leo Dacre looked as though he was well aware of the meaning of life and had his own, perfectly satisfactory, universal theory. For a fleeting moment Tansy wondered whether anything ever shook that powerful self-confidence. Only for a moment. She remembered the tiny, ominous flick of muscle against his angular jaw, and felt another twist of inchoate alarm at the barely caged emotions she had sensed behind his sophisticated front.
But the fact that he was here meant that unless she could get rid of him first she dare not ring the camp tonight.
Avoiding his eyes, she smiled at the applause and went with smooth precision into the rest of the set. By showing up he was sending a message. She was, she realised grimly, in for a hard time until she managed to convince him that she wasn’t going to tell him where Rick was.
Her life had suddenly become far too complicated. Perhaps she deserved it; anyone with any sense of self-preservation at all would have left thin, twitchy, obviously nervous Rick at the railway station that night six months ago, instead of taking him in like a starving stray and feeding him and keeping him warm and letting him talk to her as though his life and sanity depended on it.
Her voice lingered softly over the final silken syllables before trailing away into a plaintive silence. She smiled at the applause and slid down from the stool. Without looking at the table where Leo Dacre sat, she headed for the kitchen door. When it closed behind her with a soft thunk, her breath puffed through her lips in a sharp, relieved sigh.
‘Brilliant as ever,’ Arabella, who owned the café, said with her customary generosity. Large, flamboyant and in her late fifties, she was just outrageous enough to make it seem possible that it was her real name.
Tansy grinned. Arabella always tossed her the same compliment, and it didn’t mean a thing. The main reason she was employed here two nights a week was that she looked the part; skinny and intense and soulful. Arabella thought she gave the crowded café a bit of Continental flair.
‘Want something to eat, love?’ The older woman inspected Tansy with a perceptive eye. ‘You look a bit pale. Got some nice linguine tonight.’
‘Your
