Chapter 23

I shooed Camilla out of the kitchen while I put away the fruits of our shopping trip; she didn't know where anything went and she'd only get in the way. She went back to the piano and found my Tosca score and amused herself by idly picking away at bits of her own music and singing them softly to herself. Even softly her voice was a glory.

When I got finished I closed up all the cabinet doors and crumpled the grocery bags for the recycle bin. Apparently she picked up on the sounds, because there was a short pause and then I heard the notes that just precede Scarpia's initial entrance in Act I. She got to the entrance just as I walked through the kitchen door, and I obliged her by belting out my initial exclama­tion:

"Un tal baccano in chiesa? Bel rispetto!"—"Such a racket in church? Show some respect!" The sacristan and choristers are bouncing around in merry song, and Scarpia ironically chides them.

"Half voice, Nick, half voice!" she said in a shocked tone, turning to face me. "You told me you just found that voice in you, don't lose it again! Protect it!"

I laughed. "It's like a new toy still, I want to play with it all the time." Then I sobered. "Sorry, you're right, I know."

"It sounded great, though," she relented. "But— Go back to the kitchen and do it again, will you? Half-voice this time."

I obliged. She played the intro and I walked in and started my reprimand.

"No," she said, cutting me off in mid-phrase.

I arched my eyebrows at her. "No?"

"No. Look, Nick, this is your first entrance, the first time the audience lays eyes on you. You need to set a tone. You're just walking in like ... like Marullo. Scarpia doesn't 'just walk' anywhere, he swaggers. Well, not exactly swaggers, he ... Look, try it like this: Walk in, but as you do think swagger. You need to own that stage the moment you appear, draw every eye to you just by your manner."

I got her point. I was used to coming on as a comprimario, a second banana. But Scarpia wasn't a comprimario, he was a star—both in the opera itself and in his fictitious life. I nodded to her, went back out, and we did the whole thing again. This time I didn't just walk in, I strode in as she hammered out my signature music on the piano and mentally took command of the room as I did.

"That's it!" she enthused. "That's the Scarpia who beat me up in the audition yesterday! You can't just play off me—or Mario or whoever—you have to initiate. Be Scarpia whenever you're on, the scariest guy in Rome, the one everybody fears. He knows who he is, and you have to show that."

We spent the next two hours going through Act I line by line, often phrase by phrase, and I started to really hone the score. She sang all the other roles—sounding eerily like each different character—including, mostly, her own, and again and again she'd stop and offer a suggestion. Mostly they were great ones, and even when I disagreed we'd talk about it and settle on something. I realized how raw I must have sounded the day before; in those two hours I learned more about singing opera than I'd thought there was to learn.

Finally she closed the piano lid with a bang. "OK, that's enough for today," she said. "Nick, it's wonderful. You've got a huge stage talent to go with that voice, you've been wasted in those little parts. We're going to set the world on fire next month!"

"Wouldn't that be something?" I marveled. "I mean, the whole thing is already surreal to me. And the things you've showed me ... God, you're a great teacher as well as a great singer."

"Why, thank you, sir," she said, standing up to drop me a mock curtsy. In jeans, no less; it was endearing. "Hey, where's your cat, As-whatsis? I haven't seen him since we got home."

"Asmedogh," I told her automatically. But my mind was much more on that "home"; I liked it a lot that the word popped out of her so easily. Then I just pointed; in the middle of our rehearsing he'd hopped up on the couch and settled down to observe. I mean, it was why he'd agreed to stay, to watch humans interact. He was doing it.

"Oh," she said. She got up and started to walk over to him carefully. "I wonder if he'll— Guess not," she added as he hopped back down quickly at her approach and again scurried off. "Well, I'll win him over."

"Mmm," I said uncomfortably. No, she wouldn't, not if he had anything to say about it; I knew he'd avoid contact like the plague to keep his camouflage from unraveling.

"I sometimes get a glass of wine and go out on the porch to look at the sunset around now," I said to change the subject. "Beautiful view of it from there, and it's a pretty day. Interested?"

"Sure!" she said enthusiastically.

"You might want a sweater," I cautioned. "It's not really cold, but it gets a little chilly as the sun goes down."

"Got one upstairs. I'll just be a minute." She headed off.

"Red or white?" I called after her.

She paused a couple of steps up. "Steak tonight, right?" she asked.

"Right."

"Red, then," she said decisively, and resumed her progress.

I opened a bottle of French Bordeaux I'd been keeping around for a special occasion. It didn't get much more special than having Camilla St. John in my house. The wine hadn't had a chance to breathe, of course, but I figured it could do that in our glasses. She was back as I finished pouring, with not only a cardigan sweater but a light scarf around her neck.

"My voice makes my money," she said when I glanced at it. "I protect the voice. Well, I guess my tits help too, but they don't need extra protection."