Traitors Gate tp-15 Page 6

  “Do what?”

  Charlotte smiled and did exactly the same, slipping her hand through Pitt’s arm and moving half a step closer.

  “She is still in love with him,” she said a little above a whisper.

  Pitt knew he had missed something, but also that it had been in some way a compliment.

  Further discussion of the subject was circumvented by the approach of one of the most homely men Charlotte had ever seen. The most charitable description of him possible could only have said there was no malice in his face, and no ill temper. He was barely Charlotte’s height, although she was admittedly rather tall for a woman. He was very heavily set, with plump arms and shoulders and a massive series of chins which gave his face a most odd shape, as if it were dominated by the excellent hair and brown eyes under inadequate brows, and then it all faded away into his shoulders. Nevertheless, it was not in the least displeasing, and when he spoke his voice was beautiful and quite individual.

  “Good evening, Mr. Pitt. How pleasant to see you at such a gathering.” He waited politely to be introduced to Charlotte.

  “Good evening, Mr. Aylmer,” Pitt responded, and turned to Charlotte. “May I present Mr. Garston Aylmer, of the Colonial Office?” He completed the introduction.

  “How do you do, Mrs. Pitt.” Aylmer bowed very slightly, an elegant gesture which seemed to come to him quite naturally. He regarded her with interest. “I hope you will enjoy yourself, although these functions can become tedious if one remains too long. Everybody says the same thing each time, and seldom means it anyway.” He smiled suddenly and it illuminated his face. “But since we have not met before, perhaps we shall have something new and quite different to say, and be enthralled.”

  “I should love to be enthralled,” Charlotte answered instantly. “I am not in the slightest interested in the weather, or in gossip as to who has dined with whom, or been seen in whose company.”

  “Nor I,” Aylmer agreed. “It will all be different next week anyway, and then no doubt back to the same the week after. What shall we discuss?”

  Pitt was more than happy to be ignored. He took a step backwards, excusing himself inaudibly, and drifted towards Linus Chancellor and the woman at his side.

  Charlotte thought hastily. It was an opportunity too precious to miss.

  “Something I know nothing about,” she said with a smile. “Then you can tell me whatever you please, and I shall not find fault with any of it, because I shall have no idea if you are right or wrong.”

  “What an original and superb idea,” he agreed, entering the spirit of it with enthusiasm. “What do you know nothing about, Mrs. Pitt?” He offered her his arm.

  “Oh, countless things,” she said, taking it. “But many of them are of no interest anyway, which is why I have not bothered with them. But some must be engrossing,” she added as they walked up towards the steps to the terrace. “What about Africa? If you are in the Colonial Office, you must know immeasurably more than I do about it.”

  “Oh certainly,” he agreed with a broad smile. “Although I warn you, a great deal of it is either violent or tragic, or of course both.”

  “But everything that people fight over is worth something,” she reasoned. “Or they wouldn’t be fighting. I expect it is terribly different from England, isn’t it? I have seen pictures, engravings and so on, of jungles, and endless plains with every kind of animal imaginable. And curious trees that look as if they have all been sawn off at the top, sort of … level.”

  “Acacias,” he replied. “Yes, undoubtedly it is different from England. I hate to confess it, Mrs. Pitt, because probably it robs me instantly of all real interest, but I have never been there. I know an enormous amount of facts about it, but I have them all secondhand. Isn’t it a shame?”

  She looked at him for only an instant before being perfectly certain he had no sense of loss whatever, and was still enjoying the conversation. It would be an overstatement to say he was flirting, but he was quite at ease with women, and obviously found their company pleasing.

  “Perhaps there isn’t any appreciable difference between secondhand and thirdhand,” she responded as they made their way past a group of men in earnest conversation. “And it will be only a matter of description to me, because I shall never know if you are right or not. So please tell me, and make it very vivid, even if you have to invent it. And full of facts, of course,” she plunged on. “Tell me about Zambezia, and gold and diamonds, and Doctor Livingstone and Mr. Stanley, and the Germans.”

  “Good heavens,” he said in much alarm. “All of them?”

  “As many as you can,” she returned.

  A footman offered them a silver tray with glasses of champagne.

  “Well to begin with, the diamonds we know about are all in South Africa,” Aylmer answered, taking a glass and giving it to her, then one for himself. “But there is a possibility of enormous amounts of gold in Zambezia. There are massive ruins of a civilization, a city called Zimbabwe, and we are only beginning to estimate the fortune that could be there. Which, quite naturally, is also what the Germans are interested in. And possibly everyone else as well.” He was watching her face with wide brown eyes, and she had no idea how serious he was, or whether it was at least partially invention, to amuse her.

  “Does Britain own it now?” she asked, taking a sip from her glass.

  “No,” Aylmer replied, moving a step away from the footman. “Not yet.”

  “But we will?”

  “Ah-that is a very important question, to which I do not have the answer.” He led the way on up the steps.

  “And if you did, no doubt it would be highly secret,” she added.

  “But of course.” He smiled and went on to tell her about Cecil Rhodes and his adventures and exploits in South Africa, the Rand and Johannesburg, and the discovery of the Kimberley diamond mine, until they were interrupted by a young man with a long nose and a hearty manner who swept Aylmer away with apologies, and obviously to his annoyance. Charlotte was left momentarily alone.

  She looked around her to see whom she might recognize from photographs in the London Illustrated News. She saw a most imposing man with lush side-whiskers and curling beard, the light of the chandeliers gleaming on the bald dome of his head, his sad, bloodhound eyes gazing around the room. She thought he might be Lord Salisbury, the Foreign Secretary, but she was not certain. A photograph with only shades of gray was not like a living person.

  Linus Chancellor was talking to a man superficially not unlike himself, but without the ambition in his face, or the mercurial temperament. They were deep in conversation, almost as if oblivious of the whirl of silks and glitter of lights, or the buzz of chatter all around them. Beside the second man, but facing the other way, apparently waiting for him, was a most unusual woman. She was of arresting appearance because of her supreme confidence and the intelligence which seemed to radiate from her. But she was also quite unusually plain. Her nose was so high at the bridge, in profile it was almost a continuation of the line of her forehead. Her chin was a little too short, and her eyes were wide set, tilted down at the corners, and too large. It was an extraordinary face, compelling and even a trifle frightening. She was dressed extremely well, but one was so startled by her countenance it was of no importance whatever.

  Charlotte exchanged a few polite and meaningless words with a couple who made it their duty to speak to everyone. A man with light auburn hair addressed her with effusive admiration, then once again she found herself alone. She did not mind in the least. She knew Pitt was here to pursue a specific case.

  A delicately pale woman of about her own age was standing a few yards away, her fair hair elaborately coiffed, her pastel gown stitched with pearls and beads. She glanced discreetly at Charlotte over her fan and turned to the good-looking young man next to her.

  “She must be from the country, poor creature.”

  “Must she?” the young man said with surprise. “Do you know her?” He made a move as if to
approach Charlotte, his face alight with anticipation.

  The woman’s eyes widened dramatically. “Of course not. Really, Gerald! How would I know such a person? I merely remarked that she must have come up from the country because of her unfortunate coloring.” She grasped Gerald’s arm firmly, restraining him.

  “I thought it was rather pleasing.” He stopped short. “Sort of like well-polished mahogany.”

  “Not her hair. Her complexion. Obviously she cannot be a milkmaid, or she would not be here, but she looks as if she could have been. I daresay it is riding to hounds, or some such thing.” She wrinkled her nose very slightly. “She looks positively robust. Most unbecoming. But I daresay she is unaware of it, poor creature. Just as well.”

  Gerald pulled his mouth down at the corner. “How typical of you to feel such compassion for her, my dear. That is one of your most charming traits, your sensitivity to the feelings of others.”

  She glanced at him very quickly, some inkling in the back of her mind that there was an element in him she had missed, then chose to ignore it and swept forward to speak to a viscountess she knew.

  Gerald shot a look of undisguised admiration at Charlotte, then followed obediently.

  Charlotte smiled to herself and went to look for Pitt.

  She glimpsed Great-Aunt Vespasia across the room, looking quite magnificent in a gown of steel-gray satin, her heavy-lidded silver eyes brilliant, her white hair a more gracious ornament to her head than many of the tiaras glistening around her.

  As Charlotte looked at her, Vespasia quite slowly and deliberately winked, then resumed her conversation.

  It took Charlotte several minutes to find Pitt. He had moved from the main reception room with its blazing chandeliers up a shallow flight of steps into a quieter room where he was deep in conversation with the man who resembled Linus Chancellor, and the extraordinary woman who was with him.

  Charlotte hesitated, uncertain whether if she approached, she might be interrupting, but the woman glanced up and their eyes met with a jolt of interest that was almost a familiarity.

  The man followed her line of sight, and Pitt also turned.

  Charlotte went forward and was introduced.

  “Mr. Jeremiah Thorne of the Colonial Office,” Pitt said quietly. “And Mrs. Thorne. May I present my wife.”

  “How do you do, Mrs. Pitt,” Mrs. Thorne said immediately. “Are you interested in Africa? I do hope not. I am bored to weeping with it. Please come and talk to me about something else. Almost anything would do, except India, which from this distance is much the same.”

  “Christabel …” Thorne said with alarm, but Charlotte could see that it was largely assumed, and he was possibly quite used to her manner, and in no way truly disturbed.

  “Yes my dear,” she said absently. “I am going to speak with Mrs. Pitt. We shall find something to entertain us, either something profoundly serious and worthy, like saving souls or bodies; or else totally trivial, like criticizing the fashions of everyone else we can see, and speculating on which respectable lady of uncertain years is seeking which wretched young man to marry her daughter.”

  Thorne smiled and groaned at the same time, but there was quite obviously profound affection in it; then he turned back to Pitt.

  Charlotte followed Christabel Thorne with considerable interest; the conversation promised to be different and lively.

  “If you come to these sort of things as often as I do, you must find them desperately tedious by now,” Christabel said with a smile. Her large eyes were very penetrating, and Charlotte could imagine she would paralyze many a timid soul into silence, or stuttering and incoherent sentences.

  “I have never been to one before.” Charlotte decided to be just as frank. It was the only defense against pretentiousness, and being caught at it. “Since my marriage I have been out socially only on certain specific occasions that have called for …” She stopped. To have admitted they were when she was involving herself in Pitt’s investigations was perhaps a little too candid even for this occasion.

  Christabel’s high eyebrows rose even higher, her face full of interest. “Yes?”

  Charlotte still hesitated.

  “You were going to say?” Christabel prompted. There was nothing unfriendly in her stare, simply a consuming interest.

  Charlotte gave up. She knew already Christabel would not forgive a lie, or even half of one, and naturally since Thorne knew Pitt’s profession, she assumed Christabel did too. “A little meddling in my husband’s cases,” she finished with a slight smile. “There are sometimes places which as a member of the police-”

  “How perfectly marvelous!” Christabel interrupted her. “But of course. You have no need to explain, my dear. It is all quite clear, and completely justified. This time you are here because he has been invited on this wretched business of African information going missing.” A look of contempt crossed her face. “Greed can make people do the grubbiest of things … at least some people.” She caught sight of Charlotte’s face. “Don’t look so upset, my dear. I overheard my husband speaking about it just now. One was always aware of the possibility. Wherever there is a fortune to be made, there will be those who cheat to get advantage. It is simply unusual that they have had the courage and openness to bring in the police. I applaud it. But you will still find this evening growing dull, because very few people say anything they really mean.”

  A footman stopped by them with another tray of champagne glasses. Christabel declined with a wave of her hand, and Charlotte followed suit.

  “If you wish to meet someone interesting,” Christabel went on, “and I cannot think what she is doing here, of all places-come and meet Nobby Gunne.” She turned as if to lead the way, assuming assent. “She’s a marvelous woman. Been up the Congo River in a canoe, or something equally unlikely. Maybe it was the Niger, or the Limpopo. Somewhere in Africa where nobody had ever been before.”

  “Did you say Nobby Gunne?” Charlotte asked with surprise.

  “Yes-extraordinary name, isn’t it? I believe it is actually short for Zenobia … which is even more odd.”

  “I know her!” Charlotte said quickly. “She’s about fifty or so, isn’t she? Dark hair and a most unusual face, not at all conventionally pretty, but full of character, and not in the least displeasing.”

  A group of young women passed them, giggling and looking over their fans.

  “Yes, that’s right! What a generous description of her.” Christabel’s face was filled with amusement. “You must have liked her.”

  “I did.”

  “If it is not an impertinent question, how did a policeman’s wife come to meet an African explorer like Nobby Gunne?”

  “She is a friend of my sister’s great-aunt by marriage,” Charlotte began, then was obliged to smile at the convolution of it. “I am also very fond indeed of Great-Aunt Vespasia, and see her whenever I am able.”

  They were at the foot of the stair and brushed by an urn filled with flowers. Christabel whisked her skirt out of the way absentmindedly.

  “Vespasia?” she said with interest. “Now there is another remarkable name. Your aunt could not by any chance be Lady Vespasia Cumming-Gould?”

  “Yes, she is. You know her also?”

  “Only by repute, unfortunately. But that has been sufficient for me to form a great respect for her.” The banter and air of mockery drained out of her face. “She has been concerned in some very fine work to bring about social reform, most particularly the poor laws, and those regarding education.”

  “Yes, I remember. My sister did what she could to assist. We tried our hardest.”

  “Don’t tell me you gave up!” It was more of a challenge than a question.

  “We gave up on that approach.” Charlotte met her gaze squarely. “Now Emily’s husband has just become a member of Parliament. I am concerned with my husband’s cases which fight injustice of various sorts, which I am not at liberty to discuss.” She knew enough not to mention the Inner Circ
le, no matter how she might be drawn to anyone. “And Aunt Vespasia is still fighting one thing and another, but I do not know precisely what at the moment.”

  “I didn’t mean to insult you,” Christabel apologized warmly.

  Charlotte smiled. “Yes you did. You thought I might simply have been playing at it, to give myself something to do, and to feel good about, and then given it up at the first failure.”

  “You’re right, of course.” Christabel smiled dazzlingly. “Jeremiah tells me I am far too obsessed with causes, and that I lose all sense of proportion. Would you care to meet Zenobia Gunne again? I see her just at the top of the stairs.”

  “I should indeed,” Charlotte accepted, and followed Christabel’s glance to where a very dark woman in green stood staring across the room from the balcony, her eyes wandering from one person to another, her face only mildly interested. Charlotte recognized her with a jolt of memory. They had met during the murders on Westminster Bridge, when Florence Ivory was fighting so hard for women to have the right to vote. Of course there was no conceivable chance of her succeeding, but Charlotte could understand the cause well enough, more particularly when she had seen the results of some of the worst inequities under present law. “We were concerned for women’s franchise,” she added as she followed Christabel up the stairs.

  “Good heavens!” Christabel stopped and turned; her face was full of curiosity. “How very forward thinking of you!” she said with admiration. “And completely unrealistic.”

  “And what are you concerned with?” Charlotte challenged.

  Christabel laughed, but there was intense emotion in her face. “Oh, something equally unrealistic,” she answered quickly. “Do you know what an ‘odd woman’ is, in modern parlance?”

  “Not ‘peculiar’?” Charlotte had not heard the term.

  “Not in the least, and becoming more common all the time …” Christabel ignored the fact that they were on the stairs and people were obliged to brush past them. “She is a woman who is not paired up with some man, and therefore surplus, in a sense, unprovided for, without her accepted role of caring for a man. I would like to see ‘odd women’ able to educate themselves and take up professions, just as men do, provide for themselves, and have a place of honor and fulfillment in society.”