John Abbott (john_abbott) wrote in v_nocturne_rpg, @ 2009-08-04 20:16:00 |
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Entry tags: | john abbott, maría catalina martín de sitges |
The Art of Flattery
As far as polite society knew, Celia Abbott Ashby lay cold and lifeless in the ground. The story went that the girl fell victim to a fiend who stripped off her dress, slit her throat, and disappeared with her attire and reticule. Many saw her laid to rest at Kensal Green, and they remembered the great distress of the Abbott family, in particular her brother John. None knew that, on the next full moon, she clawed out of her coffin as a vampire and drained him.
Celia was clever. Rather than allowing John's body to be found and buried, she paid for a room in a public house of positively no repute, tucked him in, pulled up the bedclothes, and there he remained. No one, save a few tenants with sensitive noses, was the wiser. Perhaps that unusual method of waking up, as if from a blistering hangover instead of death, was why John didn't embrace a typical vampire lifestyle.
Invitations to dinners and parties no longer landed on Celia's doorstep, but they occasionally landed on John's. To his old society, he was very much alive... Simply five years into a protracted grieving process. They attributed his strange behaviors -- neglecting his professorial post, surrounding himself with people of loose moral character -- to it. One never knew in which mood he would attend social occasions. When in good spirits, he was a lively guest and quite the conversationalist. When not, he arrived unkempt and was prone to blackening the atmosphere. Only the pedigree of his family kept him from being blacklisted.
The Harrisons hosted a soiree every summer. It was famous for its socialites, excellent food and drink, and lively card games. The Abbotts received their annual invitation, and though his parents gracefully declined, John made it his business to attend. He stationed himself in the front parlor, where he could see the comings and goings. When a young lady sat on the piano bench and began to tickle the ivory keys, hoping to display her accomplishments, he rested his elbows on the piano and watched.
Catalina, for her part, would have been hard-pressed to refuse such an invitation. While it was gratifying in some sense to have received one simply for its own sake, far more important than that was the prospect of a good party. She'd been invited for the first time last year, but familial obligations in the form of an enormous Caló-Romany gathering in the north of Italy last summer had caused her to decline. Even so, what might have been taken as a grave insult from a relative newcomer to London society had been forgiven thanks to good business and several successful high teas, and now that she'd warmly greeted her hosts, she was enjoying a drink. She watched the piano with a keen eye, her expression even but for the slight smile playing at her lips. One never knew how such a performance might turn out - most of the young ladies who played the piano had enough skill to be pleasant enough, but occasionally there came a girl who was a bit... overambitious.
These secretly amused Catalina to no end.
But then there was the man.
Tall, with curls rather unruly for such a party, but perhaps charmingly so. Attractive, as the pale English went.
But he was pale.
Perhaps not worth noting so far north, but none of these were what drew her eye. It was his presence. Predatory without intent - as though his nature made him so without his full consent. His posture, perhaps, but given Catalina's particular talents and sensibilities, she'd have described it more specifically as something in his aura. He didn't feel as he should. It was familiar - something far off, something she'd seen before but couldn't place.
Possibly against her better judgment, she moved closer - a polite distance, certainly, but allowing herself to be seen as she offered him a smile and a slight nod as she settled near him at the piano.
John hovered. His attention was fixed on the girl's hands as she struck the notes, how the bones in them jumped beneath the outline of bluish veins. Her fingers deftly traveled along the keys, both precise and sure, but John was made to wonder how many hours she spent stooped over the instrument to master it, for there was no natural artistry in her presentation.
Neither did it grace her singing. The girl opened her pink mouth for a ululating crescendo of notes that, while on pitch, left everything else to be desired. It was then that John looked up and spotted the dark-haired woman. His face was in a sort of paralysis, caught between a grimace and the smile he tried to return. John kept his elbows on the piano, so that he looked at her from diminished height. As such, he became distracted by her dress. Its bright fabric was exceptional, and her scented skin dark against it, so that he thought of an exotic flower.
Aware that he was staring, he rubbed the bridge of his nose and lazily looked at the pianist, who bludgeoned the song to its end and let her hands rest in her lap. "That was... perfunctory," he offered, a comment that skirted the territory of rude, but encouragement would only usher a second performance, and he would rather not hear it.
The expression on her neighbor's face might have elicited a laugh in itself had Catalina not been well-practiced in hiding her amusement at inappropriate moments during these sorts of events. The smile was appreciated, but that pained look he was trying to cover with it was priceless.
His comment, however, surprised Catalina into a brief, truncated noise that could have as easily been a cough as a laugh - and she quickly hid it behind a fan that cleverly complemented her gown. It was a struggle to make it a gracious sound, but she somehow managed before putting her gloved hands together in a polite clap as the blushing, glaring creature rose from the bench with a brief curtsy and departed for some other part of the house. This was of little import to Catalina aside from the relief the girl's abandonment of the piano provided. Too often the music at such gatherings seemed bloodless and painfully contrived - qualities not entirely foreign among the English aristocracy, often enough. But in people, at least, there was always something savage beneath the surface, no matter how deeply buried. Music could far more easily perform while utterly devoid of life.
The man's comment, however, gave an indication that bloodless he was not, and therefore he must at least be entertaining conversation. The feel of him was even more acutely different at close range, but the caution it inspired was tempered by an equal measure of curiosity, and the scales were tipped by Catalina's amusement.
"Well played, sir," she said to him quietly, that smile still teasing her lips as she raised her glass to him in a subtle gesture before taking a demure sip.
"Indeed," he said, continuing to look as if he wanted to climb on the piano and take a nap. John's fingers tapped out a rhythm on it. "I think we will be safe for a few moments." He looked around the front parlor. Clusters of people stood about, sharing drinks and idle conversation by the mantle, remarking on a piece of hanging art. By appearances, there were no other young girls itching to try their hands at the instrument. If there had been, his comment may've dissuaded them. "As long as you don't request I take the bench in her place."
Catalina's half-smile was partially obscured by the flutter of her fan, but it reached her eyes with no trouble at all. "Of course," she nodded.
Because his poor posture was rude, he straightened up and collected his drink from a table. "We haven't been introduced," he said. "Should I do the proper thing and ask the hosts to give me the pleasure?" John inhaled the rich scent of her and found it an unusual concoction of natural human fragrances, spices, and earthier things. He couldn't place them. The difference from how most women smelled might be contributed to a foreign diet; he had noticed an accent, in addition to her coloring.
The intricately made and decorated fan slid gracefully shut at his observation, revealing a poised smile that might have distracted from the impish glitter of her eyes. "I think," she offered, casting her gaze briefly around the room in a noble effort to find one or both of the Harrisons before it returned solidly to him, "they might be otherwise occupied. As such, it would simply be bad form to trouble them, don't you think?" With that, she gave him a slight, demure, gracious little bow, and spoke:
"I am called Doña María Catalina Martín de Sitges." She gave him the shortest form of the name; the English tended to find just this trimmed version quite a lot to remember, and so she rarely bothered to use the full name except on legal documents and the like. "Though generally the English seem to find it easier to call me 'Lady Martín de Sitges,'" she added with mirth glimmering in her eyes and the corners of her lips quirked up in that little smile again.
"Do we?" John's head cocked. "Well, that's rude of us. I can't imagine why." Though he delivered the words in earnest, amusement hitched up the corner of his mouth. He dropped a gentlemanly bow and would've taken her hand, but it wasn't offered. He wasn't so gone on manners that he reached for what wasn't given, unless in that particular kind of hurry brought on by thirst.
The comment earned him a full and genuine grin, which was soon smoothed into a bit of a smile.
"I am called John Abbott," he said, punctuating his words with a little movement of his glass. "As names go, I'm afraid it's rather truncated and not nearly so impressive as yours. Please, feel free to append it with whatever you deem most appropriate." The ridiculous statement might have marked him as full of himself, if there wasn't such a laissez faire delivery, as if he didn't even take himself seriously. "I've been called Professor Abbott in some circles, though you might find another title suits your fancy."
"Never fear, Professor Abbott. I have noticed that the English could be a considered a far more efficient people than my own." She leaned forward conspiratorially, opening her fan with a sharp little click as it added to her secretive air. "To be frank, my dear Professor, you needn't be too impressed; I suspect our lengthy names in Spain are simply a means of keeping track of how we're supposed to know each other." That grin returned, and she took the opportunity to wink at him - though her expression again became more subdued as she leaned back.
Lady Martin de Sitges's smile brought out a slow one of his own. How refreshing this woman was, John thought, particularly in the context of their company. He much preferred personalities that bordered on improper to those suffocated under the dictates of social rules. Now that an entertaining guest had arrived, he might have to wake himself up and engage in the evening.
"But now you've piqued my interest; you must tell me what is your area of expertise, as I must decide how to judge your character based on which discipline you've given so much of your time." Her eyes hadn't lost their twinkle; indeed, now she arched a brow in a cheeky little expression accented by the quirk of her lips in to that impish smile.
"Hmm, should I tell a falsehood, on the chance that you won't discover it?" John braced a hand on the piano and crossed one foot in front of the other, a more familiar and comfortable stance, though he was careful to maintain appropriate distance. At least, as appropriate as circumstances allowed, since they were a pair of strangers in one another's confidence at a party.
"No," he decided, narrowing one eye and giving the lady's face a discerning look. "Something tells me you'd detect a lie. But you'll forgive me for suggesting it, I hope. After all, a man of science is much more intriguing than one who specializes in literature. Some of my peers bore even me." He took a sip of his drink.
Catalina shrugged a slender shoulder easily, her expression something like innocent as she took another sip of her own drink - though that little curve of her lips gave her away.
"You are a flatterer, Professor Abbott; but I do enjoy being flattered, and so we'll get along famously." She smiled around the curve of her glass before she lowered it from her mouth. "But as it happens, I think your assessment of men of science versus men of literature to be a bit unfair."
Her own posture shifted, then; she did not lean on the piano, and her back remained straight, but she opened her fan with a 'snick' and managed somehow to stand almost languidly as she delicately waved it and looked up at him. The respectable distance they'd established was maintained, but there was something subtly welcoming, if not so much as inviting, in her expression and in the way she held herself. He was charming her, this one, with his unruly hair and his wit and his intellect. There was still that warning sense in the back of her mind, but it was pushed still further back with every word exchanged, and his self-deprecation. Creatures of the darkness tended to take themselves far more seriously than Professor John Abbott seemed to.
"Men of science," she said thoughtfully, "tend to be far too committed to a single perspective. They believe in single answers to single questions, and almost unerringly, they adhere to ideas of things being correct and incorrect. Men of literature, indeed, of the arts in general, seem to have a much better understanding of the distinction between truth and fact, and thereby, in my humble opinion, of the world itself."
Humble, indeed! Somewhere in the midst of Lady Martin de Sitges's remarks, John's eyebrows began to creep towards his hairline.
"But then, it seems that there is an element of academics in any discipline that is lamentably stodgy and poorly dressed." Her eyebrow rose again, and that teasing curve of her lips was back.
"Ah, yes," he said, granting her that point and toasting his glass to the lady. "And we professors of literature are the most guilty of parties. If I may offer a hypothesis on that," he said, pretending to wait for permission before he kept talking, "It's because the lighting is poor in our libraries, and we so rarely get out of those. Also, it happens that dust blends quite well with brown tweed."
This much elicited a laugh from her, the vibrant sound somewhat contained by her fan.
John watched the skill with which she wielded the fan. The art of flirtation was made much simpler with such an accessory. It concealed what she wanted to hide, and drew attention where she wanted it to go, all the while maintaining proper etiquette. It was an extension of the lady, and perhaps symbolic of her. He found himself mesmerized by the subtle flutter of it, and the way the colors flashed between its folds. "I find myself grateful that I left my bad suit at home tonight."
"Well, admittedly, one cannot imagine the damage to your charm a tweed suit might have done; and who knows, you might have been something altogether different this evening had you worn more professorial attire. How is the saying here... 'The clothes make the man'?" Her eyes looked keenly at him, belying the playful smile at her lips. That niggling voice in her mind cautioning her about him had wended its way to a more prominent position in the wake of those words, and she could not help but wonder...
"You are quite unlike most other English aristos and gentry I have met, Professor Abbott. Why is that?"
John tipped his glass, getting a visual on how much of his drink remained, and he considered what to say. Certainly, he should not speak the truth... That most differences she noted were due to him being five years dead, having his second lease on life, and therefore uncaring of social norms, and the others were leftover behaviors from a misfit youth.
"Well, milady," he said, pulling himself to full height and bringing his heels together. "First, allow me to humbly reply that as a scholar, I am not so high on the totem pole as a member of the peerage, and these inferior bloodlines of mine bear some of the blame for my indiscretions. But why don't I wager a guess as to what they would tell you," he suggested, using his pinky finger to point out people around the room, "If you asked about Professor Abbott's unusual temperament."
Catalina's expression registered amusement, and her gaze followed where he directed it with his finger as discreetly as she could.
He gestured at a soft-chinned girl in a mauve gown and said, "Miss Eloise would say that... that recent tragedies in his family have left the gentleman altered. He never recovered from the loss of his sister. You see, Eloise is sentimental. She's also a cousin."
The revelation earned him a sidelong glance, something more of empathy than sympathy in her gaze. Before she had the opportunity to give voice to it, however, he was effectively diverting his speculation to rather lighter subjects.
He stepped slightly closer to Lady Martin de Sitges, in order to point at an austere-looking woman with silver hair and England's largest broach pinned to her shoulder. "Oh, but not the case with Madame Thomas, who would say that he drinks too much and stays out all hours of the night, and that's to blame for his familiar behavior. And... Mister Winthrop there, the old fellow with the spectacles? He would say that there's nothing odd about Professor Abbott that marriage to an accomplished young lady wouldn't correct. Preferably one of his seven granddaughters."
At Madam Thomas' projected assessment, Catalina gave Professor Abbott a mockingly chastising look; at Mister Winthrop's, she laughed aloud again, this time obscuring both sound and expression with her fan quite deftly, though by standing so close, the good professor would easily be able to detect the expression.
He raised his eyebrows after the avalanche of supposed opinions, and used his thumb to scratch at one. "I do drink too much."
Still looking up at him - her chin tilted at a greater angle due to his new proximity - her smile remained, though its quality had changed. There was measurement in it as she took each facet of the persona he presented; even as she spoke. "Well, we are fortunate, then, in that I come from a country not nearly so concerned with the dangers of life's pleasures as yours, Professor, and also in that your singular demeanor makes you a very interesting conversational partner. It is a rare man indeed who reveals all his vices in one go."
Her smile turned a bit coy, a bit clever as she raised an eyebrow.
"Which is not to say I believe for one moment that you are such a man. But," she continued, "I have decided that I do like you, debauché or no. Though I have to wonder what we ought to do for entertainment in light of the obvious danger that lingering near the piano presents..."
"Mm, yes." John nodded and made a show of surveying their compatriots, weighing up the evening's other options with his eyes. "I must answer all that with two comments. First," he put a palm to his chest, "Thank you for the vote of confidence in my personality, however flawed. I remain in your debt and I promise not to put too many of my vices on display tonight. I left several colorful ones off the list. Second--"
He interrupted himself to take her glass, the contents of which had dwindled during their talk. A stuffy evening like this was more tolerable when properly inebriated. "Second, I suggest another round of drinks. Then we could join a game of cards or hone in on a conversation, long enough to start a vicious rumor. What do you think?"
"I think," she said with a smile, her fan flittering back and forth, giving the appearance of a moving picture, "that is a brilliant, brilliant scheme, Professor Abbott. You are a man after my own heart." Turning her head to look over the room, she offered him a grin. "I am certain we could discover all manner of mischief, real and imagined, this evening."