intensely after the revelations made during the murders at Highgate Rise.
“I shall be the soul of tact to absolutely everyone,” Charlotte finished triumphantly. “Even if I burst my stays with the effort.”
Emily giggled. “Be especially nice to Lord Anstiss, please? He will probably be the most important man here.” Suddenly the lightness vanished and she was utterly serious. “If anyone drives you frantic, stop before you say anything and think of that poor little woman in her wretched rooms Stephen Shaw took you to, and tens of thousands like her, sick and hungry and cold because their landlords won’t mend the roofs or the drains, and they cannot afford to leave because there’s nowhere else to go. Then you’ll be civil to the Devil himself if it will help.”
“I will,” Charlotte promised, leaning forward and brushing the hair off Emily’s brow gently. “Believe me, I am not so self-indulgent or so undisciplined as you think.”
Emily said nothing, but lowered her eyes and smiled more widely.
For another thirty minutes they talked of fashion, gossip, who might be coming this evening, whom they liked or disliked, and why. Then Charlotte tidied the bed, straightening the sheets and plumping the pillows, and assured Emily one more time of her preparations, and the tact she would exercise, regardless of temptation, and took her leave ready to await the first arrivals.
Jack met her on the stairs. He was a handsome man, not perhaps in the most traditional way, but he had remarkably fine dark gray eyes with lashes any woman would have committed crimes for, and the most utterly charming smile. Indeed in their first acquaintance both Emily and Charlotte had discounted him as a deal too smooth to be of any virtue at all. But a guarded wariness had gradually turned into respect and then affection when he had proved himself a friend of both courage and judgment in exceptionally difficult circumstances after Emily’s first husband had been murdered, and Emily herself had fallen under suspicion. It had been some time before Emily had learned to love him, but now she had no doubt about it whatever, and Charlotte was happy every time she thought of them both.
“How is she?” Jack asked, glancing upwards towards Emily’s room.
“She’ll be all right,” Charlotte said quickly. “It will pass, I promise you.”
He made an attempt to look unconcerned. “Are you ready?” He glanced at her new gown, a gift from Emily for the occasion and something she would never have had the money for herself, nor indeed an event at which to wear such a thing. It was a deep Prussian blue, a shade which suited her dark auburn hair and honey-warm complexion. Naturally, since it was Emily’s gift, it was up to the minute in fashion, decollete at the front, with a paneled skirt embroidered asymmetrically, very a la mode, and scarcely any bustle at all. The best people were wearing only the very slightest padding this season, but a most elegant train.
Jack had been farsighted enough to learn something about fashion, and he fully appreciated the gown both for its social statement and for the way it flattered her. But mostly, she suspected, because he understood the way it made her feel. He too had spent a good deal of his life with insufficient money to dress or behave as he wished.
His smile broadened to a grin. There was no need for words; explanations would have been crass.
They had reached the top of the stairs when the clatter of horses outside announced the first arrivals, and a moment later the doors opened to a babble of chatter and laughter, a rustle of cloaks being removed, hard heels on the marble floor, and silk and taffeta skirts rattling against each other, and against the balustrade of the stair. The guests swept upward to be greeted, mortified that they were first, but totally unable to retreat and return at a better time. It was simply not done to be first. Then who else would mark one’s arrival?
“Sir Reginald-Lady West, how delightful to see you,” Charlotte said with a radiant smile. “I am Mrs. Pitt. Mrs. Radley is my sister, but most unfortunately she has been taken unwell, so it is my good fortune to stand in her place and make you welcome. Of course you are already acquainted with my brother-in-law, Mr. Jack Radley.”
“How do you do, Mrs. Pitt,” Lady West said a trifle coolly, taken aback at not finding whom she expected. “I hope Mrs. Radley’s indisposition is nothing serious?”
“Not at all,” Charlotte assured her. It would be indelicate to mention its cause, but it could be implied. “It is one of the trials women have to bear, and it is best done graciously.”
“Oh-of course-I see.” Lady West collected her wits and managed to force a smile. It was annoying to be caught out in slow thinking and she was irritated with herself for being stupid, and also with Charlotte for having observed it. “Please give her my very best wishes for her recovery.”
“I will-most kind of you. I am sure she will be obliged.” And with that the Wests moved on to greet Jack, and for him to escort them into the first room cleared for dancing. Charlotte turned to the couple immediately behind them, a dyspeptic-looking young man with ginger hair and a girl in pink, while at the foot of the stairs yet another couple were already being helped out of their cloaks and looking upward.
It was a further half hour before the first guest arrived whom Charlotte knew even by reputation other than Emily’s careful schooling, and a further fifteen minutes before she saw with great pleasure the tall, erect, almost gaunt figure of Lady Vespasia Cumming-Gould. She had been Emily’s first husband’s great-aunt, and for many years now one of Charlotte’s dearest friends. Indeed Great-Aunt Vespasia had conspired with Charlotte and Emily in helping to solve many of Pitt’s cases, meddling with considerable flair in the detection of crime, and less successfully in the reform of laws regarding social conditions about which they felt most passionately.
Had it not been totally unacceptable, and therefore embarrassing to everyone, Charlotte would have raced down the stairs and taken Aunt Vespasia’s cloak herself. As it was she had to be content to mutter some polite nonsense to the large woman she was at that moment greeting, and something agreeable but equally inane to her husband, who was dressed more vividly than she. There was a scarlet sash over his chest with a wonderful array of medals and orders bejeweling him. She could do no more than glance over their shoulders at Great-Aunt Vespasia climbing slowly up the curve of the staircase, her silver head high, her tiara winking in the lights, her dove-gray gown sewn with crystals like stars, and her train precisely, to the inch, the most fashionable length.
“Good evening Charlotte, my dear,” she said calmly when she reached the top. “I assume you are standing in for Emily?”
“I am afraid she is not feeling well this evening.” Charlotte dropped the very slightest curtsey. “She will be terribly disappointed not to have seen you, but I am delighted to be in her place.”
Vespasia smiled with perfectly genuine pleasure, inclined her head in acknowledgment, spoke warmly to Jack, and then swept past to join the throng in the first reception room. As she entered there was a hush, a turning of heads and a quick murmur of appreciation. Everyone knew who she was. Fifty years ago she had been one of the great beauties of her day, and even now at eighty she had a structure of bone and a hairline across the brow that made many a younger woman envious. She was frailer than she had been even a short while ago, but she still held her head as if her tiara were a crown, and could with a glance freeze an impertinent comment on the lips of an unfortunate offender.
Charlotte felt a lift of pleasure, almost excitement, as she watched Aunt Vespasia disappear among the crowd. With her here the whole evening would have a quality of glamour and purpose far deeper than a mere social exercise. Something of importance might be begun.
A few moments later she welcomed Mr. Addison Carswell and his wife. Emily had told her he was a magistrate of considerable influence, sitting in one of the central city courts. He was not a remarkable man in appearance, of average height and slightly stocky build. His hair was receding although it was still thick from the top of his head backwards, but it was nondescript brown, and his mustache was minimal, his cheeks clean shaven. It was only when she was speaking to him in the usual polite, rather stilted phrases that she observed the strength of his features, and the intelligence in his eyes. It was a face of good balance, and without meanness.
Mrs. Carswell was a solid woman, strong and thickset, but her face was handsome in its own fashion, with straight nose, steady eye and a candor of bearing that indicated an inner calm. This social whirl might find her out of her depth. She looked the kind of woman who had no ready wit to swap comments with the ladies of high fashion, but neither would she need it for her happiness. Her values might rest largely in her home and family.
Accompanying their parents were the four Carswell daughters, each presented in turn. The eldest, Mary Ann, had come with her husband, Algernon Spencer. He was a large, rather bluff young man with too much hair for the current mode, but presentable enough otherwise. Mary Ann herself was as pleased as any girl might be who has succeeded in marrying reasonably well, and ahead of her sisters.
Miss Maude, Miss Marguerite and Miss Mabel were all fair haired, rose skinned and comely enough, if rather too like each other to be easily told apart or offer any memorable individuality. They all curtseyed gracefully, looked
