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.Charlotte said that she had set the large canvas bag upright, and carefully put everything back inside it except for one of the joints.Now she cradled the dope in her hand like a rolled hundred-dollar bill."I can't believe Gwen would do drugs," Willow murmured, at once appalled and entranced.She had never before seen an actual joint.Certainly she had seen images in health class and on antidrug commercials on TV, but never before had she glimpsed an honest-to-God spliff up close and personal."It's not drugs," Charlotte said, correcting her."It's just marijuana.Cancer patients and people with AIDS smoke it all the time.And, if you want, we can, too.""Charlotte!"Her cousin mimicked her, repeating her name in the singsong voice of a little girl crybaby: "Charrrrrrrr-lotte!""Come on.don't be like that.""Gwen had three of them.She won't miss one.It's okay."Charlotte patted the pockets of her shirt and her shorts, and Willow wondered what she was looking for.Then, without saying a word, the girl stood up again and walked casually back to Gwen's canvas bag.She reached in, and Willow presumed she was taking a second (or even a third) joint, but then she understood that her cousin was swiping--borrowing, she imagined Charlotte would say--the teenager's matches or lighter.When she returned, Willow saw that the girl had indeed brought back a lime-colored Bic, and she was flicking the striker with her thumb.She considered teasing Charlotte about that ridiculous bit of pantomime she had performed a moment earlier: patting herself down like she actually expected to find a lighter of her own in her pockets.But she restrained herself, and then she found herself watching enrapt as Charlotte proceeded to light the joint.She inhaled, hacked loudly and powerfully, rasped.and then inhaled again.This time she didn't cough, and then slowly she exhaled.The smell was sweet, vaguely reminiscent of both blueberries and an exotic herb she had once smelled at an Indian restaurant.She liked it, and when her cousin turned toward her and raised her eyebrows invitingly, she accepted the joint and took a drag, too.Then she took another.And there in the grass the two girls proceeded to smoke and sniff and rasp until the burning paper scorched the tips of Charlotte's fingers, and she dropped it onto the ground as if it were a wooden match that almost had consumed itself.Chapter Ten.Nan Seton wanted desperately to glance at her watch, but she knew if she did this nice but dull Martin and Cecilia Dallmally from Scotland would presume she was either tired or bored (or both).Still, like an itch the desire to know whether it was nine or nine fifteen was growing insufferable.Finally, just when she thought she was going to have to pull back the straw-colored linen on her wrist to look at her watch and make some pretext to leave, she felt a small breeze on her neck.When she turned toward the terrace door, she saw Charlotte and Willow approaching.For a brief second they looked a tad unsteady on their feet--Charlotte seemed to be touching every table and chair within arm's reach as she navigated her way through the crowded clubhouse--but Nan couldn't imagine why that would be and decided her eyes had played a small trick on her."Oh, look," she said to the Dallmallys, "there are my granddaughters now.Will you excuse me?""They're adorable! You'll have to introduce us," Cecilia cooed."Oh, sometime, certainly," she murmured, pulling away from the couple like a sailboat that has at last snared the wind.She put a hand on each of her granddaughters' shoulders and was pleasantly surprised to find the girls smiling up at her."I'll bet you want us to meet some more people, don't you, Grandmother?" Charlotte said, her words giddy and playful.Given the rare and uncharacteristic good cheer that filled the child's voice, her eyes were not as wide as Nan would have expected.But she was so pleased to see Charlotte in such fine spirits that she didn't think anything of it, and she concluded that if she weren't already so anxious to get home she actually might have chosen this moment to show off her granddaughters some more."I always want you to meet people," she answered."And you were both so charming earlier.But we're through for tonight.It's late.""It sure is," Willow agreed, nodding, and then she giggled as if she found something funny in the fact it was after nine
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