“Thank you.” Hester could think of nothing else to say, no excuse or explanation to offer for herself. The whole affair was even worse than she had foreseen. She should have declined the invitation and excused herself. She could have told Edith all she needed to know quite simply and left the rest to Peverell. But it was too late now.
Felicia nodded to the maid and the tureen was brought in and the soup served in silence.
After taking several sips Randolph turned to Hester.
“Well-if it is not a doctor you are counseling us about, Miss Latterly, perhaps we had better know what it is.”
Felicia looked at him sharply, but he chose to ignore her.
Hester would like to have told him it was between her and Peverell, but she did not dare. No words came to her that could have been even remotely civil. She looked back at his rather baleful stare and felt acutely uncomfortable.
There was silence around the table. No one came to her rescue, as if their courage had suddenly deserted them also.
“I-” She took a deep breath and began again. “I have the acquaintance of a most excellent barrister who has previously fought and won seemingly impossible cases. I thought-I thought Mr. Erskine might wish to consider his services for Mrs. Carlyon.”
Felicia's nostrils flared and a spark of cold anger lit her face.
“Thank you, Miss Latterly, but as I think I have already pointed out, a barrister is not required. My daughter-in-law has already confessed to the crime; there is no case to be argued. It is only a matter of arranging for her to be put away as discreetly as possible in the place best suited to care for her in her state.”
“She may not be guilty, Mama,” Edith said tentatively, the force and enthusiasm gone out of her voice.
“Then why would she admit to it, Edith?” Felicia asked without bothering to look at her.
Edith's face tightened. “To protect Sabella. Alex isn't insane, we all know that. But Sabella may well be…”
“Nonsense!” Felicia said sharply. “She was a trifle emotional after her child was born. It happens from time to time. It passes.” She broke a little brown bread on the plate to her left, her fingers powerful. “Women have been known to kill their children sometimes, in such fits of melancholia, but not their fathers. You should not offer opinions in matters you know nothing about.”
“She hated Thaddeus!” Edith persisted, two spots of color in her cheeks, and it came to Hester sharply that the reference to Edith's ignorance of childbirth had been a deliberate cruelty.
“Don't be ridiculous!” Felicia said to her sharply. “She was unruly and very self-willed. Alexandra should have been much firmer with her. But that is hardly the same thing as being homicidal.”
Peverell smiled charmingly. “It really doesn't matter, Mama-in-law, because Alexandra will give me whatever instructions she wishes, and I shall be obliged to act accordingly. After she has thought about it awhile, and realized that it will not simply be a matter of being shut away in some agreeable nursing establishment, but of being hanged…” He ignored Felicia's indrawn breath and wince of distaste at the grossness of his choice of words. “… then she may change her plea and wish to be defended.” He took another sip from his spoon. “And of course I shall have to put all the alternatives before her.”
Felicia's face darkened. “For goodness sake, Peverell, are you not competent to get the matter taken care of decently and with some discretion?” she said with exasperated contempt. “Poor Alexandra's mind has snapped. She has taken leave of her wits and allowed her jealous fancies to provoke her into a moment of insane rage. It can help no one to expose her to public ridicule and hatred. It is the most absurd of crimes. What would happen if every woman who imagined her husband paid more attention to another woman than he should-which must be half London!-were to resort to murder? Society would fall apart, and everything that goes with it.” She took a deep breath and began again, more gently, as if explaining to a child. “Can you not put it to her, when you see her, that even if she has no feeling left for herself, or for us, that she must consider her family, especially her son, who is a child? Think what the scandal will do to him! If she makes public this jealousy of hers, and goodness knows there was no ground for it except in her poor mad brain, then she will ruin Cassian's future and at the very least be a source of embarrassment to her daughters.”
Peverell seemed unmoved, except by politeness and a certain outward sympathy for Felicia.
“I will point out all the possible courses to her, Mama-in-law, and the results, as I believe them, of any action she might make.” He dabbed his lips with his napkin and his face retained so smooth an expression he might have been discussing the transfer of a few acres of farmland, with no real perception of the passions and tragedies of which they were speaking.
Damaris watched him with wide eyes. Edith was silent. Randolph continued with his soup.
Felicia was so angry with him she had great difficulty in controlling her expression, and on the edge of the table her fingers were knotted around her napkin. But she would not permit him to see that he had beaten her.
Randolph put his spoon down. “I suppose you know what you are doing,” he said with a scowl. “But it sounds very unsatisfactory to me.”
“Well the army is rather different from the law.” Peverell's expression was still one of interest and unbroken patience. “It's still war, of course; conflict, adversarial system. But weapons are different and rules have to be obeyed. All in the brain.” He smiled as if inwardly pleased with something the rest of them could not see, not a secret pleasure so much as a private one. “We also deal in life and death, and the taking of property and land-but the weapons are words and the arena is in the mind.”
Randolph muttered something inaudible, but there was acute dislike in his heavy face.
“Sometimes you make yourself sound overly important, Peverell,” Felicia said acidly.
“Yes.” Peverell was not put out of countenance in the least. He smiled at the ceiling. “Damaris says I am pompous.” He turned to look at Hester. “Who is your barrister, Miss Latterly?”
“Oliver Rathbone, of Vere Street, just off Lincoln's Inn Fields,” Hester replied immediately.
“Really?” His eyes were wide. “He is quite brilliant. I remember him in the Grey case. What an extraordinary verdict! And do you really think he would be prepared to act for Alexandra?”
“If she wishes him to.” Hester felt a surge of self-consciousness that took her by surprise. She found herself unable to meet anyone's eyes, even Peverell's, not because he was critical but because he was so remarkably perceptive.
“How excellent,” he said quietly. “How absolutely excellent. It is very good of you, Miss Latterly. I am sufficiently aware of Mr. Rathbone's reputation to be most obliged. I shall inform Mrs. Carryon.”
“But you will not allow her to entertain any false notions as to her choices in the matter,” Felicia said grimly. “No matter how brilliant”-she said the word with a peculiar curl of her lip as though it were a quality to be held in contempt- “this Mr. Rathbone may be, he cannot twist or defy the law, nor would it be desirable that he should.” She took a deep breath and let it out in an inaudible sigh, her mouth suddenly tight with pain. “Thaddeus is dead, and the law will require that someone answer for it.”
“Everyone is entitled to defend themselves in their own way, whatever they believe is in their interest, Mama-in-law,” Peverell said clearly.
“Possibly, but society also has rights, surely-it must!” She stared at him defiantly. “Alexandra's ideas will not be allowed to override those of the rest of us. I will not permit it.” She turned to Hester. “Perhaps now you will tell us something of your experiences with Miss Nightingale, Miss Latterly. It would be most inspiring. She is truly a remarkable woman.”