“I do suffer a bit, knowing that she’s uncomfortable,” she added.
“Mrs. Cuthbert not physically uncomfortable,” Angelique said firmly. “We take good care of her, and we personally placed a copy of the house rules into her hands before we took her money, so the sitting room ought not to have been a surprise. Then again, there’s no easy way to prepare anyone for Mr. Delacorte.”
Angelique was always a little stricter and more pragmatic than Delilah, and Delilah knew in this instance she was right. But they both worried a little when one of their guests was less than enchanted with their experience in the sitting room.
“You call Lucien ‘darling’?” Delilah asked a moment later.
Angelique nodded. Her cheeks colored a little. “We call each other that, and... other things.”
“Tristan likes to say ‘sweetheart,’” Delilah confessed on a whisper.
They were both a little rosy now and they exchanged swift smiles.
They knew how lucky they were.
“Have you noticed the Brightwalls don’t seem to use endearments?” Angelique said. “They don’t really address each other directly at all. But they seem to be enjoying the company of everyone else in thesitting room, and at the dinner table,” Delilah said. “Individually... they fit right in.”
“But Mrs. Brightwall was so pretty this evening in that pink dress. And Colonel Brightwall was dashing.”
“They did look handsome. I wish either one of them also looked happy.”
Both had seemed trepidatious for two people about to attend a ball in honor of one of them.
Delilah fished in the basket for one of Mr. Delacorte’s waistcoats. His love affair with Helga’s cooking meant his waistcoats frequently shed buttons due to enormous strain. He was always so touchingly grateful to have them restored. It really was a pleasure to make him happy.
“Well, we know for certain we have at least one happy couple lodged at The Grand Palace on the Thames, currently,” Angelique said somewhat grimly.
“That must be why the Dawsons have been so quiet in the sitting room at night,” Delilah reflected. “They’re conserving their energies.”
Angelique laughed. “Or they’re too exhausted for conversation.”
“Isn’t it funny... I suspect we were all guilty of thinking the Dawsons were a bit meek and unexceptional, which was unfair. People will surprise you,” Angelique mused.
“They will, indeed. I suppose it’s only a surprise that something like this hasn’t happened sooner. But we already have a rule about being quietly considerate of other guests. I sincerelyhope we won’t have to get any more specific than that. We just had new rule cards printed. And I wouldn’t know how to begin to spell the sounds Mrs. Dawson makes in order to forbid them.”
Angelique laughed.
“And I am not looking forward to having a word with them, if it comes to that,” Delilah added.
“Well, I expect something like that probably happened every day, back in its Palace of Rogues incarnation,” Angelique pointed out.
“True enough.”
Gordon, their fat striped cat, stretched in his basket and trilled in his sleep. Delilah bent over to give him some strokes. He pointed his toes like a ballerina.
“Do you feel a little wistful that neither of us were able to spend that kind of time with our husbands when we were first married?” Angelique ventured.
Delilah considered this. “Perhaps?” she confessed on a hush. “Just a little?”
“Me, too. A little.”
In truth, they were both skirting around the fact they missed Lucien and Tristan lately, as their schedules had been at cross-purposes. And all the sounds emanating from the Dawsons’ room only reminded them of what wasn’t happening behind the doors oftheirrooms. It was unnerving to discover how easy it was to begin to feel just a very little less close to the men they loved when they couldn’t love them with their heartsandtheir bodies, and the palpable reserve between the Brightwalls seemed evidence of what could happen when couples spent too much time apart.
“I’m just hoping desperately Mrs. Cuthbert hasn’t heard those noises yet. She already thinks we’re libertines.”
Angelique laughed. “We were prescient when we put her on the floor below, in the corner.”
“Arewe libertines?” Delilah wondered, gingerly, only half jesting. “Our conversations do tend to careen a bit. Perhaps we’ve created quite a daring salon in the sitting room without realizing it.”