The first thing she saw when she entered the green parlor was the painting. It took up the wall above the fireplace with a life-sized Charlie. Charlie and his bride. He stood next to a chair, posture erect, chest thrust forward and his right arm by his side. His left hand rested on the back of the chair, behind his bride’s strawberry blond head. She was half in profile, adoringly gazing up at her husband-to-be, while Charlie stared straight ahead at the observer from under the familiar golden quiff. There was a barely perceptible tilt to his lips. Was he sneering? Smiling? Feeling constipated?
“A lovely pair, aren’t they,” said Lady Middleton. “We had it commissioned to celebrate their engagement.”
She had risen from the sofa to greet Catriona. A broad streak of white wound through her neat coiffure, but she was still as nimble and sharply angled as when Catriona had last seen her, during the night of Charlie’s ball. Her style of dress seemed to have reversed, however, had mellowed from stiff fabrics to lace and pastel. The interior of the room, too, was decidedly frothier than before.
“Indeed,” Catriona said, belatedly. “It’s a lovely painting.”
Her forehead was already aching.
With a small, efficient gesture, Lady Middleton invited her to sit.
“You aren’t married, are you?” she asked, her green eyes on Catriona while pouring tea.
“No.”
“I thought not. I would have heard. Engaged, then.”
“I’m not engaged, either.”
“I expected as much. You never were the marrying sort, that was obvious before you were a debutante. Wester Ross is quite patient with you, considering.”
Considering that she was the last in the line of her Campbell branch. She was here under false pretenses, so the false smile came easily, like part of a play.
“I’m just terribly pleased for Charles, ma’am,” she said.
“Lady Sophie is a lovely gal,” Lady Middleton replied, and placed saucer and cup before her. “Are you acquainted? No, I would not think so, she came out years after you made your debut. In any case, between Charles’s and my consistent guidance, one hopes that she will eventually rise to the demands of her position as mistress of Middleton House.”
Catriona’s gaze crept back to the painting. What if it were her, on the chair, in the flowing white gown, looking up at him. Awaiting his consistent guidance. She felt empty at the thought. Not numb, empty. Charlie looked pleasant enough, but, disturbingly, he also looked just like any other young gentleman she might pass on the streets of London.
Lady Middleton leaned forward. “Now, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit?”
On the other wall, the pendulum clock said she had twelve minutes left.
“Wester Ross and Lord Middleton are currently doing business together—”
Lady Middleton stiffened. “I wouldn’t know,” she said. “I don’t concern myself with Lord Middleton’s affairs these days.” She gave Catriona a cool little smile. “It’s quite refreshing.”
“Ah. Congratulations.”
That gained her an odd look.
“The truth is,” Catriona said, “I was hoping you could advise me precisely on that matter.”
“On what matter, dear?”
“The matter of separation . . . I’m wondering whether you could recommend me to a few ladies who live separately from their husbands.”
Lady Middleton’s expression became exceedingly bland. “Whatever for, I wonder?”
“It’s a matter of . . .” Her tongue tied. It was too bad that words like women’s rights and justice made most decent people terribly uncooperative.
“。 . . it’s a matter of research.”
“Research?”
“For my novel. I’m writing . . . a novel.”
“A novel. Oh. Well, you always were scribbling away at something.”
Yes, at your son’s term papers.
“It’s a romantic novel,” she lied with reluctance, “where the heroine and her husband separate, and then she tries to bring him back home with absolutely all means possible.”
Lady Middleton drew back slightly. “I say,” she said. “That sounds quite tawdry.”
“No, on the contrary. The heroine, you see, she is trying to order him back with the help of a Writ for Restitution of Conjugal Rights.”
Lady Middleton looked aghast. “That’s bold—mark my words, it shan’t rekindle her husband’s tender feelings.”