Marianne looked down at her feet, which hung above the floor, given how high her bed was.
“Up until now, we were naught to each other.”
“No, you weren’t—because of his behavior. You must speak with him. Tell him that he cannot continue to treat you in such a manner.”
“Perhaps I need to grant him time to become accustomed.”
Juliet took a deep breath. “I know this is unwelcome, but I must tell you what I have heard below stairs. And it is not simply idle gossip. It is from people who knew him and his first wife, and how they lived together. They were cold to each other. He was cold to her. They said in the beginning, he lavished gifts and attentions upon her. Granted her every desire. But then a change came over him quite suddenly. He scarcely addressed her anymore. They took their meals separately and resided apart sometimes. He was with her as he is with you. Alternately warm and distant.”
“It sounds as though he turned from warmth to coldness,” Marianne corrected her friend. “As if perhaps he loved her, and then found her not to be what he had believed.”
“Her maid, Maisie, told me that she was quite wretched. Lady Wexford, that is. She wanted to be with him. She wanted to withall her heart, but he spurned her repeatedly. You must not find yourself thus situated.”
Marianne thought about this. She thought about everything. Lucien had told her his marriage had been an unhappy one. She knew this. But she was not his first wife. She was not the same person. And every account he had given her suggested there was more to it. Was there? Was it just as simple as his mercurial personality having rendered the union untenable? Perhaps his first wife was the way she was because of his behavior?
She sat back. What was she to do?
She nodded at Juliet. “You speak truly. I cannot allow him to continue this way. I will speak to him.”
“Very good,” Juliet replied, “but not in your current state. You look as though you have passed the night in your gown.”
“I did,” she said.
“Well,” Juliet said. “I think what you ought to do is take a bath, don your finest morning dress, dress your hair properly, and apply some rouge to appear at your best. He must see all that he may forfeit by continuing to act like a horse’s arse.”
Marianne let out a laugh. “If Sister Bernadette heard you using such language, you would be upon your knees in penance for hours.”
“She has heard me speaking thus, and in fact, she has made me pray like that as well. And once she washed my mouth out with soap. It was most unpleasant.”
“I see,” Marianne said, her spirits lifting as she always did when she spoke to her friend.
“Well, you are under no threat of having your mouth washed out here. But do not let Mrs. Greaves hear such language.”
“I think her rebuke would be far sterner than soap in the mouth,” Juliet said as she pulled an evening primrose colored dress from the armoire.
Then she rang for the footman to bring up the hot water for a bath.
By the time the afternoon hour approached, Marianne had bathed, slept for a few hours, and dressed in her prettiest gown. She hadn’t applied rouge as Juliet had suggested. She wanted to look like herself. Still, she had put on some of her oils as well as lip pomade. When she made her way to his study, her resolve strengthened. She would speak to him. She would tell him that she could see what was happening between them, and she was not going to let him withdraw again.
She took a deep breath and knocked on the door.
“Enter,” he called.
When she did, he looked up, their gazes meeting. For a brief moment, she saw a smile on his lips, and it emboldened her. But then it was gone.
“Marianne,” he said. “Are you well?”
He was asking her if she was well, as though she were an acquaintance he had encountered by happenstance. Not the woman he was married to. Not the woman he had passionately kissed in the maze just hours before.
“I am unwell.” She took a seat unbidden. It was her house as well as his.
“I cannot bear it,” she began.
Lucian looked up as though stung by a bee. “Cannot bear what?”
“You know perfectly well what I mean. Your changeability. I could understand it to a degree when you were sometimes warm and at ease with me and at other times remote—when we were in a marriage in name only. But we are no longer?—”
“Aren’t we?” he said, tipping his head to one side.
