Regency Improprieties. Diane Gaston

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       Truth is a fixed star. Eileen Aroon …

      Applause thundered skywards as the music faded. Rose stole a peek at the gentleman who had captured her interest. He continued to stand, statue-still, his eyes still upon her. She felt her cheeks go warm.

      She bowed and threw a kiss, eyes slanting towards her quiet admirer, before beginning her next song. As she continued through her performance, her gaze roved over all her admirers, but her eyes always returned to him.

      Soon the orchestra began her final tune of the evening, ‘The Warning’.

      ‘List to me, ye gentle fair; Cupid oft in ambush lies …’ Rose began softly, animating her facial expressions and her gestures. ‘Of the urchin have a care, Lest he take you by surprise …’

      She let her voice grow louder and had to force herself not to direct the song at the mysterious gentleman, who still had not moved. She could neither distinguish his features nor see what colour were his eyes, but she fancied them locked upon her, as she wished to lock hers upon him.

      Flynn tried to shake off his reaction to Rose O’Keefe, tried to tell himself she was merely another of Tanner’s many interests, but he could not make himself look away from her. Had his grandfather been standing next to him and not in his grave these last twenty years, he’d have said, ‘‘Tis the fairies t’blame.’

      Perhaps not fairies, but certainly a fancy of Flynn’s own making. It seemed to Flynn that Rose O’Keefe was singing directly to him.

      An illusion, certainly. There could be nothing of a personal nature between him and this woman he had not yet met. All he experienced while listening to her was illusion, as fanciful as believing in fairies. His role was clear. He must approach Miss O’Keefe’s father and convince the man to allow him to plead Tanner’s suit directly to the daughter. Perhaps he would also be required to deliver gifts, or to escort her to Tanner’s choice of meeting place. He’d performed such errands in the past without a thought.

      It was unfortunate that this rationality fled in the music of her voice, the allure of her person. She sang of Cupid, and Flynn understood why the ancients gave the little fellow an arrow. He felt pierced with exquisite pain, emotions scraping him raw.

      With one more refrain, her song ended, and, as she curtsied deeply to the applause that erupted all around him, he roused himself from this ridiculous reverie.

      ‘Bravo!’ shouted Tanner, nearly shattering Flynn’s eardrum. ‘Bravo!’

      A moment later she had vanished as if she’d been only a dream. Tanner clapped until the principle performer on the programme, Charles Dignum, began singing.

      Flynn stared at Tanner, feeling suddenly as if this man who employed him were Cromwell come to seize his lands and take his woman, an even more ridiculous fancy. Flynn’s mother was English, though she’d spent most of her life in Ireland. He had as much English blood in his veins as Irish. What’s more, Flynn embraced his Englishness. England was where his life was bound. England was where his ambitions lay.

      He shook his head, trying to rid himself of this madness. Rose O’Keefe had been a mere fleeting reminder of home, nothing more.

      He pressed his fingers against his temple. He would soon recover his sanity and return to serving Tanner with dispassionate efficiency.

      But as Tanner grabbed his arm and led him back to the supper box, the sweet voice of Rose O’Keefe lingered in Flynn’s ear, an echoing reverie:

       List to me, ye gentle fair; Cupid oft in ambush lies …

       Chapter Two

      Rose peeked through the curtain at the throng of men outside the gazebo, some carrying flowers, others waving their cards, all calling her name. There were so many, she could not see them all. If he was there, the man who had watched her with such rapture, she could not see him.

      She turned to her father. ‘There are more tonight.’

      ‘Are there now, Mary Rose?’ Her father placed his oboe in its case.

      The woman at his side, a robust creature with ample dé-colletage—the woman who shared his bed—added, ‘We have our pick, I’d say.’

      Rose frowned. ‘I do not wish to pick, Letty. I am content merely to sing.’

      She had known nothing of Letty Dawes when Rose had surprised her father by appearing on his doorstep four months ago. The letters her father had sent to her at the school in Killyleagh made no mention of Letty, but then his letters had never been very informative.

      Her father had been very surprised and perhaps somewhat disappointed to see that Rose had come to London with the ambition to sing. He had always told her to stay in Ireland, to remain at the school he’d sent her to after her mother died, the school that had kept her on as a music teacher. But teaching was not for her. Rose burned with the passion to perform, to sing.

      Like her mother.

      Rose’s most treasured memories were of sitting by her mother’s sickbed, listening to her tales of the London stages, the excitement of the music, the lights, the applause, the glory of her finest hour, performing at the King’s Theatre. Even seven years of schooling and four more of teaching could not extinguish the fire that had been ignited so early within Rose to follow in her mother’s footsteps. Rose had saved her pennies until she had enough to make the journey to London.

      But any fantasies she’d had about a loving reunion with her father had been thoroughly dashed in those first few minutes of his surprised hugs and kisses. Letty Dawes had appeared from behind him, lamenting the sacrifices they would have to make to house and feed her, laughing at her desire to sing on the London stage. What theatre would employ an Irish country lass? Letty had said.

      At first Rose thought her father had married again, but her father explained that entertainers lived by different rules from those she learned in school. He and Letty did not need marriage to share a bed. Then her father offered to pay Rose’s way back to Ireland, and Letty exploded in rage at how much it would cost. A huge row broke out between them, and Rose walked out to escape hearing it, knowing she had caused it. She was glad now that she had walked out, because otherwise she would never have met Miss Hart.

      It was Miss Hart who brought her to Vauxhall Gardens that glorious night when Rose had another tearful reunion with her father, and he introduced her to Mr Hook. Mr Hook let her sing one song and, seeing as she was not yet twenty-one, asked her father if he might hire her. So when it came time to leave Miss Hart’s house, Rose returned to her father and Letty, who suddenly perceived her as a source of more income. To sing at Vauxhall, Rose would endure anything, even living with Letty.

      It seemed she must also endure this frenzy of interest from gentlemen, all pressing her father to meet her. It was all part of the profession, her father told her.

      He glanced out of the window. ‘Perhaps there will be some titled gentlemen among these fellows. That is who you must court if you wish to move ahead.’

      ‘Yes, indeed,’ Letty added, putting an arm around Rose’s shoulders as if in affection. ‘A titled gentleman would be grand. There is no telling how much you might make, Rose. Why, some men even buy houses for their.’

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