Half Moon Street - Anne Perry [124]
He stood alone in the dressing room and looked around at the trappings of illusion, the paint and the costumes which help the imagination. They were wrought with skill, but they were a minuscule part of the real magic. That sprang from the soul and the will, the inner world created with such passion it poured through and no material aids were needed to make it leap from one mind to another. Words, movement, gesture, the fire of the spirit made it real.
He looked at the photograph again. How many people were chained by other people’s beliefs of them? Did he expect Charlotte to be something that was not her true nature or what she really wished? Then he thought back to his first meeting with Caroline. In some ways she had been imprisoned . . . but by family, society, her husband—or herself ? The prisoner who loves his bonds is surely also responsible for their continuance?
He would rather Jemima, with her sharp, inquisitive mind, did not ever see a picture like this . . . certainly not until she was at least Charlotte’s present age.
What kind of a man would she marry? That was a preposterous thought! She was a child. He could see her bright little face in his mind’s eye so easily, so vividly, her child’s slender body, but already growing taller, legs longer. One day she would marry someone. Would he be gentle with her, allow her some freedom, and still protect her? Would he be strong enough to wish her happiness in whatever path it lay? Or would he try to make her conform to his own view of what was right? Would he ever see her as herself, or only as what he needed her to be?
So much of him agreed with what Cecily Antrim was trying to do, and yet the picture offended him—not only because he had seen it mimicked in death but because of the innate violence in it.
Was that necessary in order to shatter complacency? He did not know.
But he would have to send Tellman to establish beyond doubt where Cecily Antrim had been on the night of Cathcart’s death, even though he did not believe she had killed him. There had been no fear in her, no shock, no sense of personal involvement at all.
He would also send Tellman to find out precisely where Lord Warriner had been that night, just in case his love for her was less casual than it appeared. But that was a formality, simply something not to be overlooked. She had posed willingly for the picture; in fact, from what she had said, it had been her idea. She wanted them sold. The last thing she intended was for such a performance to be without an audience.
He pushed the picture back into his pocket and went to the door. He found his way out past piled screens and painted trees and walls, and several pieces of beautifully carved wood, to the stage door.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Caroline returned home with new heart and went straight upstairs before she could think better of it. She knocked on the old lady’s door, and when there was no answer, she opened it and went in.
Mrs. Ellison was lying half reclined in bed. The curtains were pulled to keep the light out and she looked asleep. If Caroline had not seen her eyelids flicker she would have believed she was.
“How are you?” she enquired conversationally, sitting on the edge of the bed.
“I was asleep,” Mrs. Ellison replied coldly.
“No, you weren’t,” Caroline contradicted her. “Nor are you going to be until tonight. Would you like to come to the theatre with us?”
The old lady’s eyes flew open. “Whatever for? I haven’t been to the theatre in years. You know that perfectly well. Whatever should I do there?”
“Watch the play?” Caroline suggested. She smiled. “And watch the audience. Sometimes that can be more fun. The drama on the stage is seldom the only one.”
Mariah hesitated for just an instant. “I don’t go to the theatre,” she said sullenly. “It’s usually nonsense they are performing anyway: cheap, modern rubbish!”
“It’s Hamlet.”
“Oh.”
Caroline tried to remember Vespasia’s words.
“Anyway,” she said honestly, “the actress who plays the queen