Galina laughed, nodding her head slowly with approval. She watched the young man's gaze, assessing her nursemaid and old friend with new eyes. This was a thing she liked to see, this thoughtfulness. If she must leave Klara with this man, he should know the elder woman was no shrinking violet herself. There had been no lie to her earlier words, when she said the Baron Demidov had a always had a way with the vicious and intractable. Not even the family's nursemaids were entirely without teeth and claws of their own. Let him beware...
... Because neither Goemon's apologetic words nor demeanor were true, of course. Oh this young man was a consummate professional, without a single, solitary doubt. For the space of no more than a moment, she had let her guard down, and Goemon had pressed - as, of course, he should.
Only a complete fool would not.
His was an agile mind, armed with deftly-wielded words and a nimble voice. Galina had been inexcusably stupid, and she knew this all too well. There was no good excuse for this lapse in judgment though there were, of course, many reasons she could easily enumerate: unrelieved loneliness, with neither mother nor sister nor trustworthy lady friend in whom to confide; a ridiculous, girlish fantasy left to run amok in the otherwise orderly, pristine halls of her mind; a man whose conversation she genuinely enjoyed, whose face held the vaguest resemblance, to the one she would truly prefer to see this night...
Not a one of these "reasons" was sufficient to keep the self-disgust tamped down in her gut, the bitter taste like bile in the back of her throat.
She was absolutely ridiculous. She was an idiot. Galina was done with this dinner.
"No need for apologies, Mr. Goemon," she replied, returning his seated bow politely and gracefully, "Quite the opposite, actually."
"And I am sure Klara will be glad to remind you to coordinate with the ship's chef, and order your fish left uncooked for the remainder of this ocean voyage." Galina glanced to Klara with a sweet smile that never reached her dark eyes. In turn, Klara nodded her agreement with the young lady's reassurances that Goemon's fish dishes at least, for the rest of this cruise, would be as unspeakably rare as he could possibly wish, if she had a single thing to say on the matter.
"But if you give me the choice?" Galina continued, with a small apologetic shrug of her shoulders, as if she were helpless to stop the words that followed. "I hope you do not think me too rude of course, or forward, but I would prefer to meet with Mr. Selvin this very moment."
Galina dabbed lightly at her lips with her napkin, even though there was hardly a need when she'd eaten precious little of this meal at any rate. Still, there were appearances to be preserved, before both the diners aboard the Empress and, of course, her fellow spy. Laying the napkin down lightly alongside her still-full plate, she rose to her feet, pushing her chair back.
"I must return to my rooms and retrieve a few items before we meet with our mutual friend," she said, holding the back of Klara's chair as she rose before turning back to Goemon, still smiling. "Would you care to accompany us, or shall I meet you elsewhere before we finally speak with Mr. Slevin?"