Midnight at Marble Arch Read Free

the west side of Spain.” She gave a tinkling laugh.
    Charlotte was unreasonably irritated, given that she knew very little more of Portuguese colonial history than the woman who had spoken.
    “Frankly, my dear, I think she had possibly taken rather too much wine and was the worse for it,” the woman in green said confidentially. “When I was sixteen we never drank more than lemonade.”
    The second woman leaned forward conspiratorially. “And too young to be engaged, don’t you think?”
    “She is engaged? Good heavens, yes.” Her voice was emphatic. “Should wait another year, at the very least. She is far too immature, as she has just most unfortunately demonstrated. To whom is she engaged?”
    “That’s the thing,” the third woman said, shrugging elegantly. “Very good marriage, I believe. Tiago de Freitas. Excellent family. Enormous amount of money, I think from Brazil. Could it be Brazil?”
    “Well, there’s gold there, and Brazil is Portuguese,” a fourth woman told them, smoothing the silk of her skirt. “So it could well be so. And Angola in the southwest of Africa is Portuguese, and so is Mozambique in southeast Africa, and they say there’s gold there too.”
    “Then how did we come to let the Portuguese have it?” the woman in green asked irritably. “Somebody wasn’t paying attention!”
    “Perhaps they’ve quarreled?” one of them suggested.
    “Who? The Portuguese?” the woman in green demanded. “Or do you mean the Africans?”
    “I meant Angeles Castelbranco and Tiago de Freitas,” came the impatient reply. “That would account for her being a bit hysterical.”
    “It doesn’t excuse bad manners,” the woman in green said sharply, lifting her rather pronounced chin, and thereby making more of the diamonds at her throat. “If one is indisposed, one should say so and remain at home.”
    At that rate, you should never set foot out of the door
, Charlotte thought bitterly.
And we should all be the happier for it
. But she could not say so. She was an eavesdropper, not part of the conversation. Shemoved on quickly before they became aware that she had been standing in the same spot for several moments, for no apparent reason except to overhear.
    She found Pitt speaking with a group of people she didn’t know. In case it might be important, she did not interrupt. When there was a break in the discussion, he excused himself temporarily and came over to her.
    “Did you find the ambassador’s wife?” he asked, his brow slightly furrowed with concern.
    “Yes,” she said quietly. “Thomas, I’m afraid she’s still very upset. It was a miserable thing to do to a young girl from a foreign country. At the very least, he made public fun of her. She’s only sixteen, just two years older than Jemima.” In the moment of saying her own daughter’s name she felt a tug of fear, conscious of how terribly vulnerable Jemima was. She was partway between child and woman, her body seeming to change every week, to leave behind the comfort of girlhood but not yet gain the grace and confidence of an adult.
    Pitt looked startled. Clearly he had not even imagined Jemima in a ball gown with her hair coiled up on her head and young men seeing so much more than the child she was.
    Charlotte smiled at him. “You should look more carefully, Thomas. Jemima’s still a little self-conscious, but she has curves, and more than one young man has looked at her a second and third time—including her dance teacher and the rector’s son.”
    Pitt stiffened.
    She put her hand on his arm, gently. “There’s no need to be alarmed. I’m watching. She’s still two years younger than Angeles Castelbranco, and at this age two years is a lot. But she’s full of moods. One minute she’s so happy she can’t stop singing, an hour later she’s in tears or has lost her temper. She quarrels with poor Daniel, who doesn’t know what’s the matter with her, and then she’s so reticent she doesn’t want to come