and several other people were sitting in large cane chairs, involved in animated conversation. Scripts lay about on table tops and several on the floor in piles. Miranda Passmore sat on a heap of cushions; this time the door had been opened by a youth with curly hair, bearing a strong resemblance to her.
As soon as Caroline and Charlotte came in, Joshua rose to his feet and welcomed them. Charlotte saw with remarkably mixed emotions the instant pleasure in his face and a gentleness in him unique in his glance towards Caroline. If it were possible he cared for her more than mere friendship, or a gratitude that she was so concerned for his welfare, then Caroline was not so wildly vulnerable, not open to such a humiliating rejection. That brought a rush of warmth to Charlotte and smoothed away some of her own fear.
And yet if he did have such feeling, it would only lead to disaster. At best a sad parting, because it was impossible—or at worst an affaire, with all the heartbreak when it ended, when he grew tired of her, or she came to her senses. And the ever-present risk of the most fearful scandal. Grandmama had no gentleness in her, no tenderness, but her fears were not ill founded. Society did not forgive. It was full of women like Mrs. Parkin with her prying questions and intrusive, knowing eyes. Those who broke the rules were never permitted to return. There would be no place for Caroline after that.
Joshua was speaking to Charlotte, and she had not heard a word he had said. He was standing in front of her smiling, with a shadow of anxiety in his eyes. He had a remarkably mobile and expressive face, full of possibilities for humor, passion, pain and wry, relentless self-knowledge. It would be terribly difficult not to like him, however much the thought of him with Caroline disturbed her.
“I’m so sorry,” she apologized. “My mind was woolgathering.”
“I doubt it,” he said candidly. “I think you are concerned for this wretched affair, most generously on our behalf, and you are wondering what we can do next that would be of any use. Am I not right?”
She seized the chance. “Yes, indeed you are,” she lied, meeting his eyes and forcing herself to smile back. “I think it is time we made the acquaintance of Mr. Devlin O’Neil, if Miss Farber is able to help us.”
He turned and beckoned to a young woman in her, early thirties, but casually dressed in something like an artist’s smock. Her fair hair was wildly curly and she had not bothered to dress it except to pile it on her head and secure it with a couple of pins and a length of bright red fabric. It was quite beautiful, and flattered her wide- cheekboned face with blue eyes and broad, soft mouth. It was a face Charlotte liked immediately. As soon as the most perfunctory introductions were made, and acknowledgment of the others in the room, she turned to Clio.
“Has Mr. Fielding spoken to you of our concern?”
“Oh yes,” Clio replied quickly. “And I am so glad you are going to do something! We none of us believed it was Aaron. We simply had no idea how to succeed in making anyone else accept that. Poor Tamar has struggled alone for all these years. It is wonderful to have someone really capable with her now.”
Charlotte opened her mouth to say that she was not really so very capable, then changed her mind. It would be most unhelpful, even if true. It would discourage Tamar and make Clio Farber less likely to trust her.
“Well, we need all the help you can find,” she said instead. “You see, it all depends on being able to observe people when they are unaware you have any interest in the matter at all.”
“Oh yes, I see that,” Clio agreed. “Tamar explained it quite clearly. I shall contrive a situation where you can meet Kathleen O’Neil in such a way it will all look most natural. I am good at that.” Her face shadowed and she moved very slightly so that her back was towards the others in the room.
“I don’t know if Joshua told you,” she went on, “but I am … acquainted”—she hesitated delicately, but there was nothing sly in her, or intending innuendo—“with Judge Oswyn, who sat on the appeal.” Her face shadowed. “With poor Judge Stafford.”
“Did he know Judge Stafford?” Charlotte asked. “I mean personally?”
Clio’s face was thoughtful, her answer quick, as if she had already considered the question and it troubled her. “Of course they were acquainted, but how much it was personal rather than simply professional I do not know. I feel it may have been. Granville, that is, Judge Oswyn, seemed to have some deep feeling about him. I rather think it was a kind of embarrassment. Or perhaps that is not quite right—maybe a sort of anger mixed with discomfort. But when I asked him why, he was evasive, which is most unlike him.”
Charlotte was confused. She had assumed Clio’s relationship with Judge Oswyn was casual and social, but from the candor with which she apparently spoke to him about the most indiscreet subjects, perhaps it was much more. Was she his mistress? It would be inexcusably clumsy to ask. How could she phrase her questions so as to elicit the information and yet remain reasonably tactful?
“You think he would have discussed it differently had it not troubled him?” she said aloud.
“I am quite sure,” Clio replied with a smile. “He is a very frank and gentle man. He likes to be open, to speak freely, to laugh about things, not unkindly, but to”—she shrugged slightly, an elegant and expressive gesture—“to be with friends. You know, friendship is rarer than one would care to think, especially for a man in his position.”
“And he had not that friendship with Judge Stafford?”
“No—I think not. I formed the impression there was some matter between them which Judge Stafford kept pressing, and which Granville did not wish to discuss anymore.”
“Aaron Godman?”
Clio frowned. “I am not certain. I know Granville was unhappy about it, and hated to speak of it. The trial was perfectly proper, of course, but he felt it had been poorly handled. It was a source of embarrassment to him.”
“By Judge Quade?” Charlotte said with surprise.
Clio shook her head quickly. “Oh no—not at all. By the police, I think. I am redly not sure. He would not discuss it with me. But then that is quite natural, since I knew Aaron, and cared for him very much. He was a very sweet man.”
“Was he? No one has said very much about him, personally, only about the case. Tell me about him,” Charlotte asked.
Clio lowered her voice even more, so Tamar, a few feet away, could not hear her.
“He was two years younger than Tamar—twenty-eight—when he died five years ago.” Her face had a curious
