that wretched young man was rude. It must be impossibly difficult for you to do anything, in your diplomatic position. It really was inexcusable of him.” She turned to the girl, then realized she was uncertain how fluent her English might be. “I hope you are all right?” she said a little awkwardly. “I apologize. We should have made sure you were not placed in such an ugly situation.”
Angeles smiled, but her eyes filled with tears. “Oh, I am quite all right, madam, I assure you. I … I am not hurt. I …” She gulped. “I just did not know how to answer him.”
Isaura put a protective arm around her daughter’s shoulder. “She is well, of course. Just a little embarrassed. In our own language she would’ve known what to say.” She gave a little shrug. “In English one is not always sure if one is being amusing, or perhaps insulting. It is better not to speak than risk saying something one cannot later withdraw.”
“Of course,” Charlotte said, although she felt uneasy. It seemed like Angeles had actually been far more distressed than they were admitting. “The more awkward the situation, the harder it is to find the words in another language,” she agreed. “That is why he should have known better than to behave as he did. I am so sorry.”
Isaura smiled at her, her dark eyes unreadable. “You are very kind, but I assure you there is no harm done beyond a few moments’ unpleasantness. That is unavoidable in life. It happens to all of us at some time or another. The Season is full of events. I hope we will meet again.”
It was gracious, but it was also a dismissal, as if they wished to be left alone for a while, perhaps even to leave.
“I hope so too,” Charlotte agreed, and excused herself. Her feeling of unease was, if anything, greater.
As she returned to where she had left Pitt, she passed several groups of people talking. One of half a dozen included the woman in green, of whom she had undoubtedly made an enemy.
“Very excitable temperament,” she was saying. “Unreliable, I’m afraid. But we have no choice except to deal with them, I suppose.”
“No choice at all, so my husband informs me,” another assured her. “It seems we have a treaty with Portugal that is over five hundred years old, and for some reason or another, we consider it important.”
“One of the great colonial powers, I’m told,” a third woman said with a lift of her fair eyebrows, as if the fact was scarcely credible. “I thought it was just a rather agreeable little country off the west side of Spain.” She gave a tinkling laugh.
Charlotte was unreasonably irritated, given that she knew very little more of Portuguese colonial history than the woman who had spoken.
“Frankly, my dear, I think she had possibly taken rather too much wine and was the worse for it,” the woman in green said confidentially. “When I was sixteen we never drank more than lemonade.”
The second woman leaned forward conspiratorially. “And too young to be engaged, don’t you think?”
“She is engaged? Good heavens, yes.” Her voice was emphatic. “Should wait another year, at the very least. She is far too immature, as she has just most unfortunately demonstrated. To whom is she engaged?”
“That’s the thing,” the third woman said, shrugging elegantly. “Very good marriage, I believe. Tiago de Freitas. Excellent family. Enormous amount of money, I think from Brazil. Could it be Brazil?”
“Well, there’s gold there, and Brazil is Portuguese,” a fourth woman told them, smoothing the silk of her skirt. “So it could well be so. And Angola in the southwest of Africa is Portuguese, and so is Mozambique in southeast Africa, and they say there’s gold there too.”
“Then how did we come to let the Portuguese have it?” the woman in green asked irritably. “Somebody wasn’t paying attention!”
“Perhaps they’ve quarreled?” one of them suggested.
“Who? The Portuguese?” the woman in green demanded. “Or do you mean the Africans?”
“I meant Angeles Castelbranco and Tiago de Freitas,” came the impatient reply. “That would account for her being a bit hysterical.”
“It doesn’t excuse bad manners,” the woman in green said sharply, lifting her rather pronounced chin, and thereby making more of the diamonds at her throat. “If one is indisposed, one should say so and remain at home.”
At that rate, you should never set foot out of the door, Charlotte thought bitterly. And we should all be the happier for it. But she