There was no need for drama; I could see she really did not know the yachtsman's whereabouts.
'I don't. I wish I did! If you find him, will you tell me?' she pleaded.
'No.'
'I have to see him-'
'You have to forget him! Play your harp, lady!'
The lady played her harp.
She was still playing, and there was still a slight atmosphere which a stranger might misinterpret, when a cheery voice cried, 'I'll see myself in!' and Helena Justina arrived.
I was demonstrating fingering. The best way to do that is to sit beside your pupil on a double seat, and put both arms round her.
'Ooh, lovely! Don't stop!' cooed Helena in a facetious tone which nearly made me choke. Aemilia Fausta played on stolidly.
It was a warm day so I and my pupil were casually clad in a few light drapes of nothing much. For my musical role I always adopted a laurel wreath; it tended to slide down over one eye when I bent towards my pupil (as a harp teacher has to). Helena Justina was sensibly wrapped in several layers, though with a rather odd sunhat on (it looked like a folded cabbage). She let the contrast between herself and us speak a lot.
She leaned on a marble pediment oozing queenly distaste.
'I never knew you were musical, Falco!'
'I come from a long line of self-taught strummers and squeakers. But actually this is not my instrument.'
'Let me guess-panpipes?' she mocked derisively.
Feeling left out, Aemilia Fausta twanged into her rather stately version of a whirling Bacchic dance.