pushing him into the sitting-room.
Peter Hardy was a few years older than Kate, but looked
less, because his features were less mature. Sam had once
said that Peter looked like a Viking, talked like a professor
and hardly knew one girl from another. Blond, grey-eyed and
pleasant, he was too passionately involved with his work to
be aware of anything else.
Kate, who had fallen in love with him years ago and had
only managed to make him notice her by being continually
underfoot, often wondered if he remembered that they were
engaged to be married. Certainly he never suggested a
wedding date. But she curled up beside him on the sofa and
let him talk of Roman urns while her mind wandered to more
romantic ideas.
A few days later Miss Carter came into the music room and
&
nbsp; introduced her to Pallas Lillitos.
Kate was taken aback to find her new pupil to be far more
adult than she had expected. She was wearing a plain black
skirt and white blouse, the usual sixth form version of the
school uniform. But she managed to invest it with a Parisian
chic which, with her sleek black hair and matt complexion,
made her look nearer twenty than sixteen.
Miss Carter left them alone together after a moment or
two, and Kate looked thoughtfully at the new girl.
“Perhaps you’d better show me what you can do,” she
suggested. “Shall we start with the violin?”
Pallas shrugged indifferently. Taking out her violin, she
played a dazzling piece of Paganini, her face remote and
austere beneath her black cap of hair.