“Yes,” Brilliance and Alice answered together.
Clarity suddenly appeared tearful. “I vow by this time during each pregnancy that I am so forgetful I dare not go out, lest I lose my way home.”
Big, fat tears slid down her face, and she yanked a handkerchief out of her thick woolen sleeve. “I am lucky my husband dotes on me when I am a blubbering bundle, more sentiment than sense.” She dabbed at her cheeks and eyes before blowing her nose loudly.
Brilliance exchanged a concerned look with Alice, who shrugged.
“Please don’t cry,” Brilliance told her sister. To see her thusly was an unusual, and unsettling occurrence, except during her other three pregnancies.
“But I forgot the season and thought we could go to Gunter’s, and then I forgot it was Thursday and that my own dear sister-in-law was coming at any minute. What a ninny!”
“You are not,” Alice protested. “Everything is fine, isn’t it? The three of us can as easily have a nice visit as the two of us.” Then her eyes widened. “Unless Bri had something private to discuss, only between sisters.”
Brilliance knew the right answer. “Then everything would still be satisfactory as you are our sister, too. Hot chocolate for three.” She gave the bell-pull a tug. “In fact,Iam the intruder as I came over without asking Clarity first.”
By this time, her eldest sister had dried her eyes and looked more herself.
“Alice and I meet most every week to discuss our lives — mostly our husbands and our children. It is most beneficial to keeping me out of Bedlam.”
Brilliance didn’t know this. “What about Purity and Ray?”
Clarity tilted her head. “Sometimes Purity drops by, too, but she thinks it impolite to bring up our brother in his absence, so that doesn’t help Alice. On the whole, our sister frowns upon gossip, even though I try to explain I am not gossiping about my own dear Alex, just mildly venting. Besides, we often don’t talk about the gentlemen at all.”
Brilliance nodded and then blurted, “I became engaged last night.” And then, like Clarity, she burst into tears.
Alice was the first to reach her while Clarity was rolling back and forth trying to rise to her feet.
“No, don’t move,” Brilliance said, already wiping her face as Alice sat beside her and draped her arm along her shoulders.
“Why is your engagement making you cry?” her sister-in-law asked.
“And to whom have you betrothed yourself?” Clarity asked. Then she raised a hand to each of her rounded cheeks. “Should I know who it is and have forgotten along with every other sensible thought in my head?”
“No, I don’t think you will know him. My betrothed is Lord Hewitt.”Vincent, she nearly added, as his beloved face seemed to come before her eyes.
“He is a member of Parliament, isn’t he?” Alice remarked.
“Yes.” Briefly explaining how she met him, Brilliance told them everything up to the dreadful meeting with Mrs. Lydia Castern. By that time, they were on their second cup of chocolate and also munching on biscuits, although Clarity ate more than her share.
“Then, you have not yet heard what Lord Hewitt has to say in response?” Alice asked.
Brilliance shook her head.
“Is that poor man waiting for you at our home?” Clarity asked, still referring so fondly to the residence she grew up in that it made Brilliance smile at her sister.
“Maybe he is. I don’t know.” What’s more, she wouldn’t classify him as a “poor man,” not feeling particularly generous toward him at that moment. He might be a liar and a scoundrel for all she knew.
“If he isn’t there now, most certainly he soon shall be,” Clarity persisted. “If he cared enough last night to want to marryyou, then he will be concerned today to find out your state of mind. Purity would say it is terribly discourteous to give Lord Hewitt permission to call upon you only to fail to keep the appointment.”
Then she shrugged and picked up another sweet lemon biscuit. “However, I wouldnotagree with our dear sister. He kept the truth from you more than once, and he may have lied about Mr. Castern, whom I have enjoyed in concert.” Then she munched on the sweet treat before adding, “Thus you are forgiven for being a little discourteous toward him. I am sure you are bewildered.”
Alice had remained silently listening, but now she spoke, “I had a tangled beginning with your brother, filled with untruths. But nothing that I kept from him was done to hurt him, only to protect him, as well as myself.”
Brilliance knew Alice’s story of deceit, pretending to be a governess to avoid her deceased husband’s brother. “I believe you were dealing with a threatening situation but managed to fall in love with our brother, anyway. But what if Lord Hewitt is only dealing with vengeance over losing Mrs. Castern?”
“You are a good judge of character,” Clarity said. “Don’t you trust yourself to know the person with whom you fell in love?”
Brilliance startled at hearing her sister say it out loud. “I thought I did.”
