Highgate Rise - Anne Perry [67]
“I mean the family,” Celeste added, looking at Shaw with sudden distaste. “There are ties of blood which no one else can understand—particularly in a family with a heritage like ours.” Shaw winced but she ignored him. “I never cease to be grateful for our blessings, nor to realize the responsibility they carry. Our dear father, Clemency’s grandfather, was one of the world’s great men. I think outside those of us of his blood, only Josiah truly appreciates what a marvelous man he was.”
“You are quite right,” Shaw said abruptly. “I certainly didn’t and don’t now…. I think he was an opinionated, domineering, sententious and thoroughly selfish old hypocrite—”
“How dare you!” Celeste was furious. Her face purpled and her whole body shook, the jet beads on her bosom scintillating in the light of the chandeliers. “If you do not apologize this instant I shall demand you leave this house.”
“Oh, Stephen, really.” Angeline moved from one foot to the other nervously. “You go too far, you know. That is unforgivable. Papa was a veritable saint.”
Charlotte struggled for something to say, anything that would retrieve an awful situation. Privately she thought Shaw might well be right, but he had no business to say so here, or now. She was still searching her brain wildly when Aunt Vespasia came to the rescue.
“Saints are seldom easy to live with,” she said in the appalled silence. “Least of all by those who are obliged to put up with them every day. Not that I am granting that the late Bishop Worlingham was necessarily a saint,” she added as Shaw’s face darkened. She held up her hand elegantly and her expression was enough to freeze the rebuttal on his lips. “But no doubt he was a man of decided opinions—and such people always arouse controversy, thank heaven. Who wills a nation of sheep who bleat agreement to everything that is said to them?”
Shaw’s temper subsided, and both Celeste and Angeline seemed to feel that honor had been served. Charlotte grabbed for some harmless subject, and heard herself complimenting Celeste on the lilies displayed on the table, rather as if laid out above a coffin.
“Beautiful,” she repeated fatuously. “Where did you find such perfect blooms?”
“Oh, we grow them,” Angeline put in, gushing with relief. “In our conservatory, you know. They require a lot of attention—” She told them all at some length exactly how they were planted, fertilized and cared for. They all listened in sheer gratitude for the respite from unpleasantness.
When Angeline finally ran out of anything to add, they murmured politely and drifted away, pretending to have caught the eye of another acquaintance. Charlotte found herself with Maude Dalgetty again, and then when she went to see if Prudence was recovered, with John Dalgetty, listening to him expound on the latest article he had reviewed, on the subject of liberty of expression.
“One of the sacred principles of civilized men, Mrs. Pitt,” he said, leaning towards her, his face intent. “The tragedy is that there are so many well-meaning but ignorant and frightened people who would bind us in the chains of old ideas. Take Quinton Pascoe.” He nodded towards Pascoe very slightly, to be sure Charlotte knew to whom he was referring. “A good man, in his own way, but terrified of a new thought.” He waved his arm. “Which wouldn’t matter if he were only limiting himself, but he wants to imprison all our minds in what he believes to be best for us.” His voice rose in outrage at the very conception.
Charlotte felt a strong sympathy with him. She could clearly recall her indignation when her father had forbidden her the newspaper, as he had all his daughters, and she felt as if all the interest and excitement in the world were passing her by and she was shut out from it. She had bribed the butler to pass her the political