Page 5 of One Last Regret

Etienne smiles tenderly at her, then lays his hand on his son’s shoulder. “This is Gabriel, my son.”

Amelia rolls her eyes. “Well, obviously he’s your son.”

“Amelia, hush,” Josephine says without a trace of anger.

Gabriel says nothing, but he takes my hand when I offer it. “It’s lovely to meet you too, Gabriel.”

“He doesn’t talk much,” Amelia informs me. “But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t like you. He’s just a little shy.”

“That’s perfectly all right. I’m shy too.”

She cocks her head. “You don’t look shy.”

“I’ve had many years to practice looking that way,” I tell her with a wink.

The door to the kitchen opens and a pretty young woman in her late twenties walks into the room with a plate of breaded shrimp wrapped in puff pastry. There’s a name for this dish, I’m sure, but it eludes me at the moment.

We sit to eat, and I notice that the servant—Philippa, I assume—blushes deeply whenever she’s around Etienne. For his part, he seems not to notice her attraction. I can’t tell if that’s because he truly doesn’t see it, or if he ignores it out ofpoliteness. Or perhaps he ignores it because he doesn’t want his mother to know he returns the feelings.

Amelia notices, however. As soon as Philippa leaves, she leans to me and whispers, “She likes Dad, but she’s afraid to tell him. She thinks he won’t like her because she’s a servant.”

I lift an eyebrow. “That is an interesting observation,” I reply, “However, it’s not polite to whisper about others behind their back.”

Amelia receives her correction with good grace. “Okay, Mary.”

“And in any case,” Etienne adds, “Philippa is an employee of your grandmother’s, a very valued one. We shouldn’t be spreading rumors about her.”

“Why don’t you like her back?” Amelia asks. “She’s pretty.”

“That is not a conversation for dinner, Amelia,” Josephine corrects, with slightly more irritation than her earlier reprimand.

Amelia once more lets the reproof roll off her back. “Yes, Grandma.”

“Have you told Mary the story about the piano?” Etienne asks.

Josephine tenses slightly. “I haven’t gotten around to it. I wanted to allow Mary to get settled before we bore her with tales of family history.”

“Oh please,” I say, “I’d love to hear it.”

I say that only to be polite to Etienne. Well, notonlyto be polite. I notice how Josephine tenses, and I’m curious to know why. But I don’t really need to hear the story. I know it already.

“Well, it was actually made for J.D. Rockefeller.”

He looks expectantly at me, and I feign surprise. “Really?TheJ.D. Rockefeller?”

Etienne grins, pleased at my shock. “Is there any other? Well, Mr. Rockefeller bought the piano for entertaining, of course, andwould hire musicians to play for him at his parties. When he died, the estate donated it to the Musee Musique here in New Orleans. They owned it for many years, but when my father was twelve years old, he sneaked into the display and began to play. I believe the piece was a Nocturne by Chopin, but I could be wrong. Anyway, his playing was so soulful that the museum director allowed my grandfather to purchase the instrument at a steep discount.”

“I hardly think two hundred fifty thousand dollars is a steep discount,” Josephine says, “especially fifty-three years ago.”

“It is when the instrument is worth over ten million,” Etienne counters.

“Oh please, there’s no way it’s worth that much. Just because Rockefeller owned it?”

“Your grandfather clock has never been owned by anyone of note, but weren’t you offered eight million dollars for it by that collector in Boston? To the right people, that piano is just as much a work of art.”

Josephine purses her lips, frustrated at being beaten. There can be no mistake now at the animosity she feels when hearing of the piano. But it cannot be a simple instrument that causes her to feel such vitriol. I wonder what lies behind that feeling?

"My father would allow no one else to touch that piano," he says, "not that anyone else dared to try. I still remember growing up listening to him play. He became famous as a jazz pianist, of course, but that was by choice. He could have played anything he wanted and become world-renowned. Some people have a connection to music that goes beyond talent. It's a visceral thing, spiritual. It comes from their very soul."

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