But she felt quite differently about this. It was not a case of accompanying Mama so that she might be paraded before suitable potential husbands. This time she was secure in Pitt’s love, not anxious what Society should think of her, and not especially concerned to impress. She could go and be quite naturally herself, and there was no effort required since she was essentially a spectator. The dramas in Paragon Walk did not affect her, because the main tragedy did not touch Emily, and if Emily wished to become involved in the minor farces, that was her own affair.
It was quite a small dinner by the Dilbridges’ usual standards, not more than two or three faces that Charlotte did not already know. Simeon Isaacs was there, with Albertine Dilbridge, much to Lady Tamworth’s obvious disapproval. The Misses Horbury were dressed in pink, and it looked surprisingly well on Miss Laetitia.
Jessamyn Nash floated in in silver gray, looking quite marvelous. Only she could have contrived at once to warm the color with life, and at the same time leave untarnished its wraithlike essence. For a moment Charlotte envied her.
Then she saw Paul Alaric, standing next to Selena, his head bent a little to listen to her, elegant and faintly humorous.
Charlotte raised her chin a little higher and approached them with a dazzling smile.
“Mrs. Montague,” she said brightly, “I’m so glad to see you looking so well.” She did not want to be obvious, above all not in front of Alaric. Waspishness might amuse him, but he would not admire it.
Selena looked slightly surprised. Apparently it was not what she had expected.
“I am in excellent health, thank you,” she said, with eyebrows raised.
They swapped polite nothings, but, as Charlotte looked more closely at Selena, she realized that her initial words had been perfectly true. Selena did appear in excellent health. She looked nothing like a woman who had recently suffered the violence and obscenity of rape. Her eyes were brilliant, and there was a flush on her cheeks that was so high and yet so delicate Charlotte was convinced it owed nothing to art. She moved a little quickly, small gestures of her hands, eyes glancing round the room. If this was a display of courage, a defiance of the tacit consensus that a women ravished was somehow justly despoiled and must remember it all her life, then, for all her dislike, Charlotte could only admire it.
She did not allude to the incident again, and the conversation passed to other things, small items in the news, trivia of fashion. Presently she drifted away, leaving Selena still with Alaric.
“She looks remarkably well, don’t you think?” Grace Dilbridge observed with a small shake of her head. “I don’t know how the poor creature bears it!”
“It must take a great deal of courage,” Charlotte replied. It did not come easily to her to praise Selena, but honesty obliged it. “One cannot help admiring her.”
“Admire!” Miss Lucinda spun round, her face flushed with anger. “You must admire whom you choose, Mrs. Pitt, but I call it brazen! She is disgracing the whole of womanhood! I really think next Season I must go somewhere else. It will be extremely hard for me, but the Walk has become defiled beyond endurance.”
Charlotte was too surprised to answer immediately, and Grace Dilbridge did not seem to know what to say either.
“Brazen,” Miss Lucinda repeated, staring at Selena, now walking on Alaric’s arm across the floor toward the open French doors. Alaric was smiling, but there was something in the angle of his head that betrayed courtesy rather than interest. He seemed even faintly amused.
Miss Lucinda snorted.
Charlotte found her tongue at last.
“I think that is a most unkind thing to say, Miss Horbury, and quite unjust! Mrs. Montague was the victim, not the perpetrator, of the crime.”
“What utter nonsense!” It was Afton Nash, pale-faced, eyes glittering. “I find it hard to imagine you can really be so naive, Mrs. Pitt. Feminine charms may be considerable-to some.” He raked her up and down with a contempt that seemed to strip her of her gorgeous satins and leave her naked to the prying and derision of everyone. “But if you imagine they are such as to drive men to force themselves upon the unwilling, you overrate your own sex.” He smiled icily. “There are enough willing, positively eager, for titillation, who even find a perverse pleasure in violence and submission to it. No man need risk his reputation by assaulting the unwilling, whatever any given woman may choose to say afterward.”
“That’s a disgusting thing to say!” Algernon Burnon had been close enough to overhear. Now he stepped forward, ashen faced, his slight body shaking. “I demand that you withdraw it, and apologize!”
“Or you will-what?” Afton’s smile did not alter. “Request me to choose between pistols and swords? Don’t be ridiculous, man! Nurse your offense, by all means, if you must. Believe whatever you want to about women; but don’t try to make me believe it too!”
“A decent man,” Algernon said stiffly, “would not speak ill of the dead, nor insult another man’s grief. And whatever anyone’s most private weaknesses or shame, he would not make public mock of it!”
To Charlotte’s amazement Afton did not reply. His face drained of all blood, and he stared at Algernon as if no one else existed in the room. Seconds ticked by, and even Algernon seemed frightened by the intensity of Afton’s frozen hatred. Then Afton turned on his heel and strode away.
Charlotte breathed out slowly; she did not even know why she was frightened. She did not understand what had happened. Neither, apparently, did Algernon himself. He blinked and turned to Charlotte.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Pitt. I’m sure we must have embarrassed you. It is not a subject we should have discussed in front of ladies. But,” he took in a deep breath and let it out. “I am grateful to you for defending Selena-for Fanny’s sake-you-”
Charlotte smiled.
“I understand. And no person who is worth counting a friend would think otherwise.”
His face relaxed a little.
“Thank you,” he said quietly.
A moment later she found Emily at her elbow.
“What happened?” Emily demanded anxiously. “It looked dreadful!”
“It was unpleasant,” Charlotte agreed. “But I don’t really know exactly what it meant.”
“Well, what did you do?” Emily snapped.
“I praised Selena for her courage,” Charlotte replied, looking at Emily very directly. She had no intention of going back on it, and Emily might as well know.
Emily’s brows wrinkled, her mood changed in the instant from anger to puzzlement.
“Yes, isn’t it extraordinary. She seems almost-elated! It is as if she had won some secret victory that none of the rest of us know about. She is even nice to Jessamyn. And Jessamyn is nice to her, too. It’s ridiculous!”
“Well, I don’t like Selena either,” Charlotte admitted. “But I am obliged to admire her courage. She is defying all the bigoted little people who say she is somehow to blame for what happened to her. Whoever had the fire to do that would have my regard.”
Emily stood staring across the enormous room to where Selena was talking to Albertine Dilbridge and Mr. Isaacs. A few feet away from them, Jessamyn stood with a champagne glass in her hand, watching Hallam Cayley take what must have been his third or fourth rum punch since his arrival. Her expression was unreadable. It could have been pity or contempt, or it might have had nothing to do with Hallam at all. But when her eyes moved to Selena, there was nothing in them but pure, delicious laughter.
Emily shook her head.
“I wish I understood,” she said slowly. “Perhaps I’m mean-spirited, but I really don’t think it’s just courage. I’ve never seen Selena in that way. Maybe it’s my fault, but I don’t know. That’s not defiance; she’s pleased with herself. I swear it. You know she’s set her cap at Monsieur Alaric?”
Charlotte gave her a withering look.
“Of course I know it! Do you think I’m blind and deaf, too?”
Emily ignored the barb.
“Promise you won’t tell Thomas, or I shan’t tell you!”
Charlotte promised immediately. She could not possibly forego the secret, whatever conflicts followed afterward.
Emily pulled a face.
“On the night it happened I was the first person there, as you know-”
