Chapter 29

Frederic Fournier stood on the upper-level terrace of Robertson Barstow’s family home and gazed across the lilac gardens to the Hudson River beyond. The house behind him screamed imitation English aristocracy. His host was circulating through the gardens below, making certain his guests were adequately supplied with canapés and champagne.

Frederic knew he was lucky to be invited here today, yet he noticed that many others had been similarly lucky. The garden was vast, and it was crowded. The terrace around him was packed. The reception rooms on the main floor of the house (“house” was a euphemism) were also crowded. From his position on the terrace, fortuitously poised between inside and out, he recognized more than a few famous faces. He even saw his former student Scott Schiffman (he wasn’t famous) squiring an older lady, his mother, from the look of her, as she strolled amid the fountains and the lilacs.

No sign of Susanna Kessler, however. Her wedding photo from the Times was impressed upon his memory.

A waiter offered him another glass of champagne, and as Frederic turned to take it—there she was. Not ten feet from him. Looking exactly like her photograph. She wore a sleeveless, form-fitting dress. She was chatting with several well-turned-out youngsters, and from her ease among them, and vice versa, Frederic concluded that they must be Rob’s grandchildren.

He was nervous. He, Frederic Fournier, man of the world. His brow turned damp.

What to do? He adjusted his tie, although it was already perfect. His suit jacket was impeccably cut and it smoothed over his imperfections. Now he simply had to await his opportunity. But what would he say to her? His mind grasped for the speech he’d memorized. We haven’t had the pleasure, I’m a college friend of Rob’s. How do you know Rob?

How foolish it sounded, playing in his mind while he contemplated the flesh-and-blood Susanna several steps away from him.

No, no, he reassured himself, he could do this. He’d pulled off greater social challenges. And she’d be bound by politesse, he being (or rather, claiming to be) a friend of Rob’s.

The group of youngsters loosened as a uniformed server appeared carrying a tray of—he couldn’t see what. This was his opportunity. He took the ten steps to Susanna Kessler’s side as if he had nothing but food on his mind.

“Rob certainly has an excellent caterer,” he said to Susanna as he took a sampling of—it turned out to be a strip of roast chicken on a skewer accompanied by some type of sauce on the side. He hated roast chicken on a skewer, he hated sauce on the side, but what could he do?

“Yes,” she said politely. “He does.” She herself did not take a skewer.

“I don’t believe we’ve met.” Balancing both his champagne glass and the skewer in his left hand, he put out his right hand. “Frederic Fournier. Rob and I know each other from Harvard.”

“Susanna Kessler.” She shook his hand. Sensing the start of an intelligent conversation, the youngsters moved away and regrouped.

“How do you know Rob?”

“I work for him.”

“Do you, then. I’m sure he must be quite the taskmaster.”

A sweet laugh. “He’d like to believe that he works us hard, but mostly he leaves us to our own devices.”

“The mark of a confident and creative boss. He knows how to get the best out of people. That’s my philosophy, too.”

“What do you do?”

The perfect transition. “I teach at Yale. Centennial professor, as a matter of fact,” he added with feigned modesty.

“What’s your field?”

“Music history. A specialty in the music of Johann Sebastian Bach.” He spoke with a nonchalance that he’d rehearsed throughout the previous week. This was the moment when she was supposed to exclaim, Music history? Specialty in Johann Sebastian Bach? I found an unknown Bach cantata in the basement (or attic or wherever).

Instead of leaning toward him in excitement, she stepped back, as if to gain a better view of him. She stared steadily. Her gaze made him feel as if she were stripping him, and not in a good way.

“I’ve written four monographs on Bach, including what I must confess is widely considered the definitive study of Bach’s compositional process in the writing of fugues.”

Still she stared, saying nothing, and he felt compelled to fill the silence.

“Yes, my work has led me to some unusual places. Last year I organized the first Bach festival in China. Four cities in two weeks. And to follow up . . .”

He realized he was trying too hard. Slow down, he told himself. Shut up. But like a desperate kid on his first job interview, he couldn’t make himself stop. “And a few years ago in Cracow, a young fellow stumbled upon an old painting of a group of musicians and hadn’t the least idea of what it was, so he went through the usual channels, and when the lawyers came calling”—important to mention lawyers, so she’d know he had experience dealing with unreasonable lawyers, in case any turned up to challenge her possession of the cantata—“as they always do, in these situations, you can count on the lawyers to find an opening . . .”

When would someone, anyone, come to rescue him?

In the garden, Scott Schiffman stood beside his mother as she talked with Robertson Barstow’s mother.

“Isn’t this a lovely spot?” Mrs. Barstow said. She used a walker instead of a wheelchair today.

“Yes, lovely,” Scott’s mother said. With her white hair pulled into a chignon, she was looking very well, Scott thought. He hadn’t seen her in a while. Or rather, he’d seen her, but he hadn’t actually looked at her. She was as chic and gracious as ever.

“We ladies should stay right here,” said Mrs. Barstow. “Claim the best view for ourselves.” She glanced to her right, and instantly a butler was at her side. She gave her instructions. Soon, two wrought-iron garden chairs with green-and-pink striped cushions appeared. Mrs. Barstow sat down. Scott’s mother sat down. A large umbrella was set up to shelter them. A table was brought over and a tier of tea sandwiches was placed upon it.

“I think I’ll excuse myself for a moment, Mother.” Scott hoped to find a gin and tonic. He didn’t like champagne in the afternoon.

“Yes, dear. You go find some younger ladies to talk to.”

Scott felt a familiar sting. What she was actually saying was why aren’t you married like your brother and your sisters? Nonetheless, as impatient as he sometimes became with her, he was glad his mother had friends, her mind was intact, and she took pleasure in the world.

A waiter told him that the bar was on the terrace. He walked up the stairs and saw the bar on his left. He also saw Susanna Kessler. He’d been hoping to run into her at this event. In fact, he’d offered to escort his mother (who attended the lilac fete every year) for the sole purpose of seeking out Susanna and trying to regain her trust.

Who was she talking to? Could it be? It was: Freddy Fournier, lecturing her, leaning close to make his points. Susanna looked as if she were downright allergic to him. Scott could imagine how she felt, not wanting to offend him yet desperate to escape.

Steeling himself for battle, Scott walked across the terrace and joined them. “Susanna, good to see you.”

Freddy looked as if he’d witnessed a miraculous apparition. “Miss Kessler, have you met my prized student, Scott Schiffman?”

Was Freddy introducing them right after Scott had addressed her by name, proving that they already knew each other? Freddy must be way off his game.

“Yes, we’ve met. How good to see you again, Mr. Schiffman.”

Scott noticed her teasing smile as she addressed him formally.

Freddy said, “Mr. Schiffman has done very well for himself, I take some pride in saying.”

“I agree,” Susanna said.

“Well, well, I’d best be moving along,” Freddy said. “So many friends to greet, so little time.” He turned and disappeared into the crowd.

“Who was that?” Susanna asked Scott.

“Oh, just the foremost Bach scholar in America, or rather the second foremost, after Christoph Wolff of Harvard.”

“Are we working with him?”

Scott liked hearing the word we. “Not at the moment, but we may need to at some point in the future. Although Freddy has become more of an impresario than a scholar.”

“An impresario?”

For Susanna’s benefit, Scott reviewed Freddy’s dazzling array of accomplishments in the classical music world.

“Do I want to get to know him?”

“Someday. Possibly.”

“By the way, what are you doing here?” Susanna said.

“Escorting my mother, once again. She’s sitting with Mrs. Barstow down below. Bit of an odd couple, though.”

“How so?”

“Mrs. Barstow is the genuine article: an American aristocrat of high WASP origins. My mother, on the other hand, was—is—a Jew from Darmstadt. A refugee. Came here when she was young. She was lucky enough to marry well.” Immediately he regretted his disloyalty to his parents. “She had family in New York to sponsor her, and so . . .”

He stopped. Her family in America was well-to-do. She met Scott’s father at a wedding. Scott’s father’s family was, in its own way, part of the American aristocracy, the type of people about whom he’d heard the whispered opinion that they were so rich, it didn’t matter that they were Jews.

“You seem upset,” Susanna said quietly.

With embarrassment, Scott realized that he’d been staring at the river. “Oh,” he pretended to shrug it off, “I don’t like to talk about the past.”

“You’re in an odd profession for someone who doesn’t like to talk about the past.”

“I mean the personal past.”

“I know the feeling.”

He felt a bond with her. Their evening at the Met seemed now to rest between them like a shared difficulty that unites people rather than divides them. Nonetheless he wanted to change the subject to something less fraught for them both. He noticed the sweet scent around them. “What is that awful smell?”

“The lilacs. This is a lilac fete, remember?”

He felt back on solid ground, engaging in repartee with an attractive woman. “Right: a lilac fete.”

“I love that smell.”

“Then this is clearly the party for you. I’m searching for a gin and tonic. Can I bring you another glass of champagne?”

“Thank you. Very kind of you.”

Excellent. He was redeeming himself. The afternoon was moving along in an altogether pleasing way.

Frederic Fournier, bloodied but unbowed, watched them from the lawn below. Was a romantic link developing between those two? If so, it could prove useful. He’d monitor the situation.

When a server passed bearing a tray of scallops wrapped in bacon, Frederic placed three on a napkin. He would enjoy them, indeed he would. He took himself to an arbor covered with grapevines. Standing in the arbor’s shade, he relished the canapés one after the other. When he finished, he cleared his palate with another glass of champagne provided by a conveniently passing server.

As expected, his strength returned. Susanna Kessler still needed him. She needed his knowledge and his experience. Nothing had changed. They’d met, the details didn’t matter. Eventually she would wake up to the fact that with Dan and Scott, she was dealing with rookies.

He simply had to be patient until she came to her senses.