In the library, she picked up Edward’s new Golden Globe statue, won for Best Original Score, and held it in her hand, feeling the cool weight of it. She put it down next to the Tony he’d gotten in the ’70s for his hit musical based on Colley Cibber’s play The Careless Husband. On the desk, there was music for a piece he was currently working on, and she studied it while listening to the third movement of Mahler through the open door.
When they were young, she and Gwen would sit with their father for hours to hear recordings, while he pointed out tempo shifts or unusual interpretations of a certain movement and judged the excellent or heinous results for which the conductor (usually Karajan or Seiji Ozawa and later Edward himself) was wholly responsible. He would replay the same measure over and over again until they could distinguish subtle differences between two different recordings of it. Then he would test the girls to prove they could hear it. Gwen, at six or so, was good at it, better than Bridget, although sometimes Bridget suspected she was simply a better guesser.
One day, Edward took the testing in a different direction, declaring proudly, “What fun—Bridget has perfect pitch.”
Gwen had tapped her father on the arm. “Do I? Do I have perfect pitch?”
No, he told her. She didn’t.
Bridget was proud, thinking this actually meant something, that she had an innate skill that would propel her to mastery of the cello. “Don’t get too excited,” said her father when he heard her boasting about it. “It might help with ear training, but otherwise it’s nothing but a party trick. The only thing that matters is practice. Perfect pitch won’t get you anywhere.” So instead of relying on her aptitude, Bridget put in her twenty-five thousand hours.
* * *
Picking up a catalog of the collection from the Victoria and Albert, Bridget sat down on the leather chesterfield sofa and leafed through it. Right down the hall in Edward’s first-floor master suite, there was an early Turner over the headboard and a late Gainsborough over the dresser, dreamy British landscapes that had belonged to her mother. Bridget would stare at them and feel transported. The Turner, depicting a sky that looked like it was either about to storm or had just stopped—Bridget could never quite decide—showed an eerie light reflecting off a pond, and it seemed to change every time Bridget studied it. The Gainsborough was similar in that the field was lit in the background, while dark clouds formed over shadowy trees in the foreground, leaving her unsure if trouble was coming or going.
“I like his face,” a voice whispered in her ear.
Startled, Bridget turned to see Marge, holding a photo album under her arm and a duster in her hand, looking over her shoulder at Nicholas.
“Sorry to disappoint you,” Bridget whispered back, “but he’s taken. He has a very attractive wife.”
“He’s fancy-pants, like your father.”
Nicholas was not, Bridget noticed, wearing fancy pants. He had on jeans with a linen blazer, giving him the look of a much younger professor.
Marge looked down at Bridget. “I don’t want to hurt your feelings, poodle, but you look like you spent last night on a park bench.”
Marge had worked for the Stratton family ever since the day Bridget got her first Chapin School uniform. Bridget tried it on and said she looked stupid in it, and Marge had agreed with her. “Stupid indeed. So wear it ironically,” she suggested. Marge lived with her son in Yonkers now, but Edward still asked her to spend the summers at his country house. Edward used the title “Housekeeper Emeritus” and paid her a good salary to call the right person when anything needed attention, to order fresh flowers, dust the antiques, and write shopping lists. She cooked for Edward, but if there were more than three guests, she called the caterer.
“It’s not my fault,” Bridget whispered, showing Marge her arm. “I got electrocuted this morning.”
Marge examined the red mark, looking horrified. “Hire an electrician. Today. Do you need the name of ours?”
“Is it Baxter and something?”
“Braxton and Sons.”
Bridget liked to have more than one problem before she dragged any workers to the house. “Maybe I’ll get some new fixtures put in while I’m at it. Sterling prefers lights with dimmer switches.”
Marge straightened up. “I get the feeling your beau is sort of difficult.”
“Not at all.”
“Persnickety.”
“He’s not persnickety; he’s brilliant and thoughtful. A few weeks ago, he recorded me playing a piece, and now he listens to it while he takes walks. Isn’t that sweet?”
Marge pursed her lips together disapprovingly and then said, “I’ll let you know when I make up my mind about him.”
Bridget wasn’t worried. By the end of the summer, Marge would like Sterling just fine.
She was looking into the living room now with a puzzled expression. “He’s got something cooking, and I don’t know what it is.”
“Dad?” Bridget asked. “What’s he got cooking?”
Marge shrugged. “I thought maybe you knew.”
“Do you think he’s retiring?”
Marge shook her head. “The opposite. I think he’s got a new passion project.”
“Gwen said he’s in overdrive,” Bridget said, giving his state of mind more attention now that Marge was backing up Gwen’s opinion.
“He talks about you girls a lot lately.”
“Is he going soft in his old age?”
“Aren’t we all?” Marge asked, patting her hip. She offered the photo album to Bridget. “Would you like to take this in and say hello?”
“Absolutely not.”
Bridget craned her head to the side so she could watch as Marge walked into the living room. Her father took the leather album, delighted to see it, while giving Marge a clear smile of appreciation. Marge went out the far door, waving her duster at the furniture like a wand.
All around this massive house were old-world antiques, the seventeenth-century armoire, the Empire rolltop desk, carved headboards in the bedrooms and medieval-looking wooden candelabras in the dining room. On the table next to Bridget, in an antique silver frame, was a picture of Edward conducting the Munich Philharmonic. She recognized the concert hall by the details of the ceiling (which led to controversy about the hall’s acoustics), and her father by the familiar view of his back. Munich was home to Edward’s oldest friend, Johannes, a man he’d known for sixty years until he’d died about a year ago. Sixty years! A friendship lasting that long was something to be treasured.
Bridget’s phone pinged, and she quickly silenced it.
Will had texted to check on her: Are you recovered from your electric shock???
Bridget responded with a string of emojis (lightning bolt, surprised face, thumbs-up). Then she wrote: All okay. Hanging out at my dad’s.
There was a pause. And then: Didst thou receive an audience with his Majesty?
Ha and no, Bridget texted. He’s holding court with a loyal subject.
Will was the only person Bridget knew who didn’t hero-worship her father, mostly because he resented Edward for the insecurity Bridget had when she started conservatory. This was not irrational; Edward had told her bluntly when she was young that, in spite of her dedication, he didn’t think she was good enough to become a professional cellist. When she turned sixteen, he admitted she had become a decent player, but said it was unlikely she would ever become an exceptional one. It would not be a constructive use of her time, said Edward, to go to conservatory, and she probably wouldn’t finish anyway once she met the competition: prodigies who were far superior. She insisted on going anyway, so he suggested she spend a summer in London, living with her grandmother while attending an intensive program (that culminated in a master class she’d barely survived) so that she could work on her “wholly inadequate” technique (poor thumb position and bow balance, to name a few issues). He was less critical of her after she returned, but Will spent a lot of his time in college convincing Bridget that she deserved to be at Juilliard, that she could succeed as a professional musician, no matter what Edward had told her when she was a kid. Will finally met Edward the day he and Bridget graduated. Will threatened to say something snarky to him, but he didn’t, of course. It would have been rude, and Will was unfailingly polite. Besides, Edward was intimidating. He was a genius. He had charmed the pope. He’d delighted dictators. Everyone loved Edward.