Page 16 of Oleander

“It would have been inconvenient if you’d died in my uncle’s arboretum,” he said before disappearing out of the backdoor and into the sunshine.

Luke was livid. With himself. He said he should have inspected the greenhouse before sending me in there. These plants were native to the Mediterranean and he hadn’t evenconsidered that they might be in there, but he should have checked.

Caspien told him in a very responsible and calm voice what he’d done: he’d checked that I hadn’t eaten it, that he’d washed my hands with bleach first and then carbolic soap, and that there were no signs of a rash or irritation.

Luke asked me again how I felt, and it was then that Gideon had arrived.

“I am so desperately sorry, Luke. I had no idea. Seraphina had all sorts of seedlings imported – I never considered it could have been anything poisonous.”

“It’s not your fault, Lord Deveraux. It’s mine,” Luke said.

Caspien looked at me. His eyes said it wasn’t Luke’s fault either; it was mine.

“How are you, young Jude? You look well?” Deveraux asked me.

“I’m fine. I feel fine.”

“He didn’t eat it,” Caspien said.

Gideon nodded.

“Caspien’s looked after him,” Luke said, shooting a grateful look at my saviour before inspecting my hands again. My forearms and my face. “I think we had a lucky escape. You’ll tell me if you start feeling sick? Any pain in your stomach?”

“I didn’t eat it,” I said again.

Luke ruffled my hair and swore with relief.

“I’ve got a contractor I deal with for toxic plants. I’ve called him. He can be here tomorrow to remove it.”

Gideon told him to add whatever it cost to his invoice. I was told to sit and read my book for the rest of the afternoon, where Luke could see me in case I went into cardiac arrest. It all feltvery dramatic, but I wasn’t too annoyed at not having to do any more work that day.

I sat there looking as though I was reading, as though I was taking in a single word on the page, but I wasn’t. I was instead thinking about what Caspien had done. How quickly he’d rushed to help me. How carefully and thoroughly he’d washed my hands, and how he’d almost looked concerned about whether I might die.

It would have been very inconvenient if you’d died in my uncle’s arboretum.

Inconvenient.

Well, I’d thanked him, and that was that. I didn’t owe him anything else. But it annoyed me that I was sitting there thinking about him and whether it meant I had to be nice to him now. I wanted to go right back to loathing the posh twat.

I was lost in those thoughts when the most beautiful sound I’d ever heard began to flutter out of Deveraux House. It was faint, as though being carried to me by the breeze that had travelled in with the lowering of the sun. It was coming from the other side of the house.

It was a piano; of that much I was certain. It didn’t surprise me that there was a piano in there; it wouldn’t surprise me if there was a whole orchestra in there. I rose, closing my book and wandering in the direction of the noise. Around the side of the house was a covered stone patio that ran the length of this side, and about halfway down were a set of glass-panelled doors that opened outward. The music poured out from inside.

As I approached the open doors, the melody changed, turning into something mournful. Beautiful still, but with a sad undercurrent that pulled me closer to it. I crept quietly, feeling like a trespasser, a thief and a peeping tom all at once.

Inside, Caspien sat with his back to the open doors, his fingers flying over the keys of a large black piano. His head was lowered and focused. The song was urgent now but then slowed again. It meandered, flowing from delicate to chaotic, joyous and then heart-breaking. Looping over and back on itself in a spellbinding cadence. I’d never seen anyone play a piano in real life before, and I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. That something so beautiful and delicate and emotional could come from him.

This cruel, horrible menace of a person had done two things today to change the way I looked at him.

I moved toward him without thought, desperate to be closer to the noise and to him, and it was only when he lifted his head that I stopped and held my breath.

The music reached a pinnacle of some kind; a repetitive disconsolate section that made goosebumps rise up on the back of my neck and arms. His head dropped again, and he shook it, his right foot moving furiously but with purpose.

After the crescendo, it slowed again, a light tinkering before it faded to a deafening empty silence.

Caspien wasn’t moving.

“You have played it better,” said a voice said from my right.