Farriers' Lane - Anne Perry [152]
Charlotte gave up without further struggle. To continue to argue would lose her far more than she could possibly gain. And the look in Adah’s eyes still haunted her mind.
“That must have been a wonderful experience,” she said dutifully. “Are there good Greek exhibits here?”
“Most certainly. Let us go and see some of the urns and vases. This way, I think!” And with a sweeping gesture Adah led the way out of the Egyptian hall and into the next chamber.
Charlotte passed Clio and Kathleen on the steps. She smiled, then hurried after Adah, catching up with her just as they entered the room where the Greek artifacts were displayed.
“How very fortunate of Mr. O’Neil to have been able to go to Greece,” she said conversationally. “Was it recently?”
“About seven years ago,” Adah replied.
“Did Mrs. O’Neil go with him?” Charlotte kept her voice politely interested, although she knew Kathleen had been married to Kingsley Blaine then.
“No,” Adah said flatly. “That was before their marriage. But no doubt they will go again some time in the future. I take it you have not been to Greece, Miss Pitt?”
“No, I am afraid not. That is why it is so fortunate to be able to come to the museum and see such lovely things here. Have you been, Mrs. Harri more?”
“No. No, I never traveled. My husband did not care to.” A look of bleak unhappiness crossed her face, a tightness of the skin and of the muscles beneath as if a pain uglier than mere grief had been reopened.
“It does not suit everyone,” Charlotte said quietly, answering the words because the feeling was too private to acknowledge, and too subtle to understand. “Some people become quite ill, especially at sea.”
“So I believe,” Adah said through thin lips.
“And it can be very costly,” Charlotte went on, walking in step with her. “If the family is large. One does not always wish to leave younger children behind for long periods of time, and yet one also does not feel advised to take them where the climate may not be healthy, the food will certainly not be what they are accustomed to, and one has no idea what medical help may be available. There are many reasons for such a decision.”
Adah stared at a large marble figure of a woman clothed in fine drapes, her body solid, massive, and yet the very lines of the stone giving it all such a simple and fluid grace one felt a draft might move the suggested fabric. It was chipped, the face disfigured, and yet it still had a grave loveliness.
“We were not a large family.” Adah spoke to the statue, not to Charlotte. “There is only Prosper, no more.”
They stood close in front of the statue. Clio and Kathleen had followed them and were admiring some exhibit at the far end of the room, and out of earshot. Adah seemed to have forgotten them, and there was no one else except two elderly gentlemen, one apparently lecturing the other on the artistic merits of a vase. Her emotions consumed her, as if she had found a place of complete privacy where she could relax her inner vigilance for a few moments before taking up the burden again. She looked tired, and oddly naked.
Charlotte wished she could touch her, extend some comfort less crass than words, but it would have been intrusive and impertinent on so short an acquaintance—and considering their respective ages. And always at the edge of her mind was Aaron Godman. Funny how she had given him a face, although she had never met him, nor seen a likeness.
“What a shame. Mr. Harrimore is a man of such character …”
“You do not understand.” Adah stared at the stone figure ahead of her a moment longer, then moved on to a fine black and terra-cotta vase with figures around it in a scene of debauchery Charlotte was quite sure the older woman did not see, in spite of her fixed