Yeats?
Or was it really some obsessed lunatic who killed seemingly at random from the dark chaos in his own mind?
He must learn more about Winthrop, and his marriage, and Bart Mitchell.
Emily looked at Charlotte’s new house with growing approval. There was something acutely satisfying about finding a house in a dilapidated state, then repairing it and decorating it to suit your own tastes. When she had married George she had moved into Ashworth House and found it in perfect order, everything maintained as it had been for generations. Every room had been added to by each succeeding chatelaine until by 1882 there had been little room for improvement or individual expression in any part of it. Even her own bedroom was curtained and mirrored in the taste of the previous incumbent, and it would have been wasteful to have altered it. Indeed, it was so lavish and so beautiful it could not have been bettered, it would simply have been Emily’s own choice rather than someone else’s.
Now, of course, Ashworth House was hers, and she shared it with Jack, but it still contained little that was of her creation or taste, even though she could find no fault with any of it. She was delighted for Charlotte, and also just a very little bit envious.
They were in the bedroom which overlooked the garden. Charlotte had chosen green after all, and today with a bright sun and the trees in full leaf, the whole room had the feeling of a shaded bower, full of light and shadow and the soft sound of moving leaves. What it would be like in winter remained to be seen, but at this moment it could hardly have been lovelier.
“I like it,” Emily said decisively. “In fact I think it is quite marvelous.” She screwed up her face unhappily and her hands with their gorgeous rings were knotted in her muslin skirts.
“But …” Charlotte said, feeling a sharp disappointment. She was so happy with the room, it was exactly what she had most hoped for, but it hurt her that Emily should have reservations, and to judge from her expression, very serious ones.
Emily sighed. “But have you seen Mama’s bedroom lately? I called there.” She turned to face Charlotte, her blue eyes very wide. “I had a chance to go upstairs. Have you? It’s—it’s so—I don’t know what to say. It’s just not Mama! It’s as if she were someone totally different. It’s—it’s worse than romantic—it’s lush. Yes, that’s the word, lush.”
“You are still trying to pretend it is a passing thing,” Charlotte said slowly, going to the window and leaning her elbows on it to stare out at the garden. The lawn, now neatly clipped, stretched away under the trees to the rose- covered wall at the end. “It isn’t, you know. I think I have faced that now. She really loves him.”
Emily came beside her, also looking down at the garden in the dappled sunlight. “It will still end in tragedy,” she said quietly. “There’s nothing else it can do.”
“She could marry him.”
Emily turned to face her. “And do what?” she demanded. “She could hardly remain in society, and she would never fit in with the theater people. She would be neither one thing nor another. And how long could it last— happiness, I mean?”
“How long does it ever last?” Charlotte replied.
“Oh come on! I am very happy, and don’t tell me you are not, because I should not believe you.”
“Certainly I am. And look how many people predicated I should end in disaster.”
Emily looked back at the garden. “That is rather different.”
“No it isn’t,” Charlotte argued. “I married someone nearly all my friends said was hopelessly beneath me, and had no money to speak of.”
“But he is your age. Or at least he is only a few years older, which is precisely as it should be. And he is a Christian!”
“I admit that is a difficulty, Joshua’s being a Jew,” Charlotte conceded unhappily. “But Mr. Disraeli was a Jew. That didn’t stop him becoming Prime Minister, and the Queen thought he was wonderful. She liked him very much.”
“Because he flattered her shamelessly, and Mr. Gladstone wouldn’t,” Emily responded. “He was a miserable old man, always talking about virtue.” Her face lightened. “Although I did hear he was actually very fond of women himself—very fond indeed. In fact I heard it from Eliza Harrogate.” Her voice dropped to little above a whisper. “She said she knew for a fact that he could hardly contain himself when in the presence of a pretty woman, whatever her age or state. That makes him seem a little different, doesn’t it?”
Charlotte stared at her, uncertain if she were serious or joking. Then she burst into laughter. The thought was delicious, and completely novel.
“Perhaps he made an intimate suggestion to the Queen?” Emily went on, beginning to giggle as well. “Maybe that is why she didn’t care for him?”
“You are talking the most arrant rubbish,” Charlotte said at last. “And it has nothing at all to do with what we were discussing.”
“No, I suppose it doesn’t.” Emily was suddenly solemn again. “What can we do about it? I refuse simply to stand by and watch Mama walk straight into a disaster.”
“I don’t see that you have a choice,” Charlotte said grimly. “The only thing we can hope for is that it should come to a natural end before irreparable harm has been done.”
“That’s hopeless. We can’t be so—so ineffectual,” Emily protested, turning away from the window again.
“It’s not ineffectual; it’s a matter of not interfering, and robbing Mama of the right to choose for herself.” Charlotte turned away as well.
“But—” Emily began.
“How is the election progressing?” Charlotte cut across her deliberately, a smile on her face.
Emily shrugged. “All right, for the moment I give up. Actually, it’s going surprisingly well.” Her delicate eyebrows rose, her eyes wide. “There have been a few extremely good articles in the newspapers in the last two
