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shooting up only to slip down to the lowest range of the contralto voice. The final sweep up and down the scale left Flavia limp with physical delight and more than a little relieved that she would never have to compete with this singer, whoever she was.
    Just as she reached this conclusion, a man’s voice came to her from her right: ‘Flavia, I’m here.’
    She turned, but so strong was the spell of the music that it took her a moment to recognize Riccardo, the ripetitore with whom she had worked on Tosca and who had offered to help her prepare the Donizetti opera. Short, stocky, bearded, nose askew, Riccardo could easily be mistaken for a person given to aggression, and yet his playing was sensitive and luminous, especially in the soft introductions to arias, to which, he insisted, too many singers failed to pay sufficient attention. In the weeks they’d worked on the Puccini opera together, he had shown her more than a few nuances in the music she had not seen when reading the score, nor heard when singing it on her own. His playing had made them audible, halting after passages he thought required dramatic emphasis. It was only after the successful first performance, when his work was effectively over, that he admitted to Flavia how much he disliked Tosca . For him, opera had stopped with Mozart.
    They kissed, he told her how wonderful her performance had been the night before, but she interrupted him to ask, ‘Do you know who’s in there?’ pointing to the door opposite her.
    ‘No,’ Riccardo answered. ‘Let’s find out,’ he added and knocked on the door. Flavia was too slow to stop him.
    A man’s voice called out ‘ Momento ’, a woman’s voice said something, and then the door was pulled open by a tall man holding a few sheets of music. ‘ Cosa c’è ?’ he said as he stepped into the corridor, but when he recognized his colleague, and then Flavia, he stopped and raised the score in front of his chest as if he wanted to hide behind it.
    ‘Signora Petrelli,’ he said, unable to contain his surprise, or to say more. Behind him Flavia saw the girl who had waited at the stage door after the performance the night before, the one with the beautiful speaking voice and nervous manner. She looked much better today, hair brushed back from her face and no attempt at makeup. Without the badly chosen lipstick, she had quite a pretty face. She too held sheets of music in her hand, and Flavia saw in her the glow of someone who has just sung well and knows it.
    ‘They teach you very well in Paris, my dear,’ Flavia said, entering the room without asking permission and walking over to the girl. Flavia leaned forward and kissed her on both cheeks, patted her arm, smiled, and patted her arm again. ‘I’m amazed you’d try a role like that.’ Before the girl could speak in defence or explanation, Flavia went on, ‘But you’re perfect for it, even at your age. What else are you preparing?’
    The girl opened her mouth to answer but seemed unable to speak. ‘I . . . I . . .’ she began, then flipped the papers and pointed to one.
    ‘“Ottavia’s Lament”,’ Flavia read. ‘It’s a heartbreaker, isn’t it?’ she asked the girl, who nodded but still proved incapable of speech. ‘I’ve always wanted to sing it, but it’s far too low for me.’
    Flavia gave herself a sudden shake and said, addressing both the girl and the pianist, ‘I’m sorry to interrupt.’
    ‘We were just finishing,’ the man said. ‘The session is an hour, and we’ve been here more than that already.’
    Flavia glanced at the girl, who seemed to have calmed down a bit.
    ‘Did you really like it, Signora?’ she managed to ask.
    This time Flavia laughed outright. ‘It was beautifully sung. That’s why I came in: to tell you that.’
    The girl’s face flushed again and she bit her lips as if fighting back tears.
    ‘What’s your name?’ Flavia asked.
    ‘Francesca Santello,’ she said.
    ‘She’s my daughter,