expression of sweetness mixed with pain. “He was slight, like her, but not really so dark, and of course a lot taller. In fact he was not so unlike Joshua. They used that, sometimes, on stage. He had a lovely sense of humor. He loved to play the most terrible villains and provoke the audience to scream.” She smiled as she said it, then her eyes quite suddenly filled with tears and she sniffed hard and turned her head away for a moment.
“I’m sorry,” Charlotte said quietly. “Please don’t go on if it is painful. It was thoughtless of me to ask. It is Devlin O’Neil we have to know about.”
Clio sniffed again. “That is really too bad of me,” she said fiercely. “I thought I had better control of myself. Please forgive me. Yes, of course. I shall arrange for you to meet Kathleen O’Neil.” She fished for a handkerchief. “I know just how I shall do it. She is very fond of romantic music, and there is a soiree the day after tomorrow, at Lady Blenkinsop’s house in Eaton Square. I know the pianist well, and he will invite us. Can you come?”
Charlotte considered asking if Clio were sure it would be socially acceptable, and then decided she really did not care if it were or not.
“Certainly,” she said firmly. “I shall enjoy it. Tell me who I am supposed to be. I cannot be myself, or they will tell me nothing. In fact they will probably ask me to leave.”
“Of course,” Clio agreed cheerfully. “You had better be a cousin visiting from—from Bath!”
“But I don’t know Bath,” Charlotte argued. “I would look ridiculous if I fell into conversation with someone who knew it well. Let it be Brighton; at least I have been there.”
“By all means.” Clio smiled and stuffed her handkerchief away. “Then it is arranged? If you come here first, we can travel together. I shall say you are up visiting because you are interested in the stage. Can you sing?”
“No. Not at all!”
“Well, you can certainly act! At least your mother says so. She has recounted some of your adventures to Joshua, just two or three days ago, and he told us. We were all very entertained—oh, and impressed, of course.”
“Oh dear.” Charlotte was taken aback. She knew Caroline disapproved of her involvement in Pitt’s cases. How much she had changed, at least on the surface, if she was now regaling her new friends with accounts of them. How much she was denying her previous self in order to please. That was a most uncomfortable thought, and she pushed it away. There was no time for it now.
“I think it is quite thrilling,” Clio went on enthusiastically. “More dramatic than anything we do—because it is real. Remember not to dress too fashionably, won’t you? You are supposed to be a provincial cousin.”
“Oh, certainly,” Charlotte said with a perfectly straight face. What did Clio Farber imagine policemen earned, that their wives might dress in the current vogue?
In the event, without Emily to borrow from, and not daring to approach Vespasia for anything less than a reception or a ball, Charlotte asked Caroline if she might try something of hers from last season, or even the one before. Her request was granted with alacrity, and considerable disappointment that it was really not advisable for her to go also. But it would risk being conspicuous for three of them to turn up to such a function, and Kathleen O’Neil would not find it the chance encounter it was intended to seem.
But she did not refuse the offer of Caroline’s carriage to pick her up at home in Bloomsbury.
She left a note for Pitt on the kitchen table.
Dearest Thomas,
I have been invited to a soiree with a friend of Mama’s and I am going because I am a little anxious about her lately. She is becoming very fond of people I do not know at all, and this will give me an excellent opportunity to make their acquaintance rather better. I shall not be late, it is only an hour or two of music.
Your dinner is in the oven, mutton stew with potatoes and plenty of onion.
I love you,
Charlotte
She went first to Pimlico to collect Clio Farber. They arrived at Eaton Square, alighting in a swirl of nervous laughter, and climbed the wide steps up to a most imposing doorway flanked by liveried footmen who enquired for their names.
Clio took charge, informing them that she was a friend of the soloist who was to perform for their guests’ enjoyment, and was accompanied by her cousin. The footman hesitated for a moment, glanced across at his colleague, then inclined his head graciously and allowed them in.
The hallway was most impressive, flagged in black-and-white marble like a chessboard. There was a large statue of a youth after the Greek style in an alcove near the foot of the stairs, which swept up in an arc to the landing and the balustrade which bordered a gallery along half its length.
It was already filled with people all most elegantly dressed, the women in gowns glitteringly embroidered, lots of bare shoulders gleaming in the light from the chandeliers.
“You didn’t tell me it was going to be so formal,” Charlotte whispered to Clio. Already she was feeling not only like a provincial cousin but a very poor one, positively from the woods. She had thought Caroline’s gown quite becoming when she put it on at home, but now it was not only two seasons out of date, it seemed very unimaginative and pedestrian. The deep brandy shade was far too conservative. She must look fifty in it.
“To tell you the truth, I didn’t know it was going to be,” Clio whispered back. “Reggie said it was just a score or so of friends. They must have enlarged it since then. Still, that will make it easier to run into Kathleen without being so obvious. Come on. This is an adventure.”
Charlotte had rather more experience of adventures, and knew they could very easily become unpleasant if taken too casually. Nevertheless she followed Clio into the huge withdrawing room where sixty or so seats were arranged artistically in groups so people might hold intelligent and uplifting conversations with each other between the musical items.
For several minutes Charlotte and Clio moved around the edge of the throng of people, trying to appear as if they were looking for someone. Clio introduced Charlotte to her friend Reggie, who was standing gracefully in the region of the piano, ready to play when the signal should be given and the hostess introduced him.
They were conversing amiably and perhaps from nervousness. They told of one or two amusing recollections. Charlotte burst into laughter, and Clio put both her hands up to her face to stifle a giggle. Several people glanced at them with severe disapproval. One aristocratic young woman stared over her fan, flicking it noisily.
