“I hate blind vanity,” Charlotte answered. “And I deplore stupidity. The fact that they occur in the army more dangerously than anywhere else, except perhaps in Parliament, does not make my respect for courage of the soldier any less.”
“In Parliament?” Augusta was incredulous. “Really, my dear Miss Ellison! Whatever can you mean?”
“A fool in Parliament can oppress millions,” Balantyne offered. “And God knows there are enough of them! And vain ones, too.” He looked at Charlotte with complete frankness, as if he had temporarily forgotten she was a woman. “I have not heard so much sense put so succinctly in years,” he added with a slight drawing together of his brows. “I had a feeling you were about to say something else when Christina brought back the subject of the army. Please tell me what it was?”
“I-” Charlotte was acutely conscious of his eyes upon her. They were a brighter, clearer blue than she had remembered. And she was increasingly aware of his power, the will that had enabled him to command men in danger and fear of death. She abandoned the effort to phrase her feelings politely.
“I was going to say that when I have time to spare, I involve myself in an attempt to have some of the laws upon child prostitution reformed, so that they would be a great deal more rigid than at present, and it would be a very grave offense either to use children oneself or to traffic in the use of them, whether they are boys or girls.”
Alan Ross turned to face her, his eyes keen.
“Really?” Augusta’s expression was one of complete incomprehension. “I would not have imagined one could have any success in such a venture without considerable knowledge upon the subject, Miss Ellison.”
“Of course not.” Charlotte accepted the challenge and stared back at her unflinchingly. “It is necessary to acquire it, or one can have no influence at all.”
“How extremely distasteful,” Augusta said, closing the subject.
“Of course it is distasteful.” Alan Ross refused to be silenced. “I think that is what Brandy was saying the other evening-you remember Brandy, Miss Ellison? But then if those of us who are able to reach the ears of Parliament do not care about such ills, who will effect any change?”
“The church,” Augusta said finally. “And I am quite sure they will do a better job of it than we will by indulging in wild and unprofitable speculation over the dinner table. Brandon, will you be so good as to pass me the mustard? Christina, you had better have a word with your cook-this sauce is totally insipid. It is no better than cotton wool! Do you not think so, Miss Ellison?”
“It is mild,” Charlotte replied with a slight smile. “But I do not find it disagreeable.”
“How odd.” Augusta turned over her fork. “I would have expected mustard to be much more to your taste!”
After the meal was finished, the butler brought in the port. Augusta, Christina, Emily, and Charlotte excused themselves to the withdrawing room to leave the gentlemen to drink, and to smoke if they wished. It was the part of the evening Charlotte had looked forward to least. She was sharply aware of Christina’s dislike, and now also of Augusta’s disapproval. And above either of these unpleasant feelings, she felt acutely nervous about what Emily might do. She had come for the sole purpose of pursuing the names and characteristics of Christina’s less reputable friends, with a view to discovering if any of them might have been seduced by Max. Please heaven she was at least subtle about it-if one could conceivably be subtle about such a thing.
Emily gave her a warning look before they sat down. “You know, I do so agree with you,” she said to Christina with an air of conspiracy. “I long to do something a little more adventurous than calling upon people one already knows positively everything about-and making polite and tedious conversation. Or else doing ‘good works.’ I am sure they are very worthy, and I admire those who can enjoy them. But I confess I do not.”
“If you attend church occasionally, and look after the families of your servants, that is all that is required of you,” Augusta pointed out. “Other good works of visiting, and so on, are only necessary for single ladies who have nothing else to do. It keeps them occupied and makes them feel useful. Heaven knows there are enough of them-one must not usurp their function!”
They all seemed for the moment to have forgotten that, as far as they knew, Charlotte fell into that category.
“I think perhaps I shall take to riding in the park,” Emily mused. “One might meet all manner of interesting people there-or so I have heard.”
“Indeed,” Christina said. “I know exactly what you mean. But believe me, there are things which one may do that have far more spirit of adventure, and are a great deal more entertaining, than writing letters or making social calls upon people who are inexpressibly dull. It is not really improper, if one does not go alone, for one to visit-”
“Do you paint, Miss Ellison?” Augusta cut across Christina in a loud, penetrating voice. “Or play the pianoforte? Or perhaps you sing?”
“I paint,” Charlotte replied immediately.
“How pleasant for you.” Christina’s opinion of painting was implicit in her tone. Single women who could think of nothing more exciting to do than sit about with brushes and bits of wet paper were too pathetic to waste emotion upon. She turned back to Emily. “I have quite decided that I shall ride in the Row every morning that the wish takes me and the weather is agreeable! I am sure that with a spirited animal one might have a great deal of pleasure.”
“With a spirited animal, my girl, one may very well land flat on one’s face in the mud!” Augusta snapped. “And I would have you remember it, and not behave as if taking a fall were a light thing!”
Christina’s face drained of all color. She stared straight ahead, looking neither at Augusta nor at Emily. If she had any rebuttal, it was stillborn inside her.
Charlotte tried desperately to think of something to say to cover the silence, but everything trivial and polite seemed grotesque after the sudden reality of emotion, even though she did not understand it or its cause. If Christina had injured herself, perhaps in some recklessness on horseback, it was a most indelicate subject to refer to. It did flicker wildly into her mind that perhaps that was the reason she appeared as yet to have no family. The uprush of pity was painful; she did not wish to feel anything for Christina but dislike.
“Emily plays the piano,” Charlotte said emptily, merely to change the subject and dismiss her thoughts.
“I beg your pardon?” Augusta swallowed. There were very fine lines on her throat that Charlotte had not noticed before.
“Emily plays the piano,” Charlotte repeated with increasing embarrassment. Now she felt ridiculous.
“Indeed? And you did not learn?”
‘No. I preferred to paint, and Papa did not insist.”
“How wise of him. It is a waste of time to force a child who has no talent.”
There was no civil answer to that. Charlotte suddenly ceased to feel guilty about the softness she had seen in the general’s face, or the quick honesty in his eyes when he had forgotten the niceties of the table and simply spoken to her as a friend with whom he might speak of things that mattered, things of the mind and the emotions.
Indeed, when the gentlemen rejoined them shortly afterward, she was perfectly happy to find herself almost immediately engaged in a long discussion with him about the retreat from Moscow. She did not need to make the least pretense to follow his every word and share his fascination with the wide sweep of history as the tide of Europe turned, or the wound of pity for the solitary deaths of men in the bitter snows of Russia.
When they rose to leave, it was the general’s face that was in her mind, not Christina’s. It was only afterward, when Emily spoke to her on the way home, that any sense of guilt returned.
“Really, Charlotte, I asked you to engage the general’s sympathy so that we might learn something of use to us-not enchant the man out of his wits!” she said acidly. “I really do think you might learn to control yourself. That apricot gown has gone to your head!”