Esme swirled her skirts as she passed through the archway. Yards of silk rustled a soft announcement of her arrival.

Serving girls curtsied as she made her way to the head table, late like usual. No one else paid heed to her grand entrance. Her lips pursed in a pretty pout, but nobody saw. Parents and siblings and various relations focused attention on a traveling harper tuning his strings.

Esme let the pout slide away as she took in the harper's fair skin and raven-black hair, the fine lines of his cheek and jaw, the strength and confidence spoken by every movement of his lithe arms.

An alluring smile took the pout's place. Esme struck a pose of grace and beauty, and waited to capture the first glance of this handsome young Irishman.

He did not look up from his harp.

She cleared her throat, ready to ask like always why they hadn't waited dinner for her.

A chorus of voices hushed her. "He's nearly ready to start."

"Is he indeed?" Esme said, pitching the words to reach the young man. She wished the quality of her voice matched that of her looks.

The harper glanced up, sweeping his gaze across Esme without pausing to take her in, then turned back to his harp.

The young woman huffed and flounced to her chair, prepared to despise the stupid Irishman.

Then he began to play. Her resolve vanished, wafted away by the harper's enchantment. His music rippled and trilled. It pealed like bells and tinkled like rain on a pond. At song's end Esme clapped longest of all.

Again his gaze skimmed across her without a meeting of the eyes.

"Play Cockles and Mussels!" someone called.

He played old tunes and new, slow and solemn, light and lilting.

He never met Esme's gaze. The more delight she felt in his music, the more distressed she grew. It was Esme's part to bedazzle and enchant. How dare he bring such beauty into her realm, and not offer it at her feet?

She could not bear the agony a moment longer, such heavenly music played by a heartless devil. Esme sprang from her seat and fled the dining hall, her velvet slippers slapping out of time with the harp.

The butler, listening at the door, caught her arm. "Mistress Esme, are you ill?"

"I can't bear it any longer!"

His brows arched. "You can't bear listening to the finest harper in the land?"

"Finest? I'll say he is, his music chiming ripples along every inch of skin. But how rude! All I want is one glance, one smile, but he won't look at me!"

"The finest, I said. Turlough O'Carolan."

Esme's lower lip went beyond a pretty pout. "The finest harper ought to manage the finest manners."

"Five years ago Turlough was struck by smallpox and blinded, Miss. When he lost his eyesight, that's when he took up the harp."

Esme blinked. "Oh." All Turlough had "seen" of her was a scritchy voice and angry slapping feet – and a heart blinded silly by vanity.

Turlough O'Carolan was born in 1670.