“Of course. Have you ever heard of an unmarried couple who have to stay at an inn being presented with separate beds?”
Her wits dragged themselves up, shoving arms into jackets, slapping helmets on heads, coming more or less to attention. “This room will suit me,” she said. It sounded good and gave her wits the confidence to stand even straighter, gripping the pommels of their swords; one even saluted. “Will you take another nearby?”
“No,” the captain replied. “I don’t trust you not to climb out the window and run away.”
“I wouldn’t do that,” Cecilia retorted, and her wits nodded vigorously, although this was not such a good idea—her stomach looked up with a green countenance and moaned.
“You wouldn’t?” the captain asked with a skeptical grin.
“Of course not. I’d leave through the door.”
“Ha. I’m staying. Nobody knows Cecilia Bassingthwaite is here, and Lady Victoria doesn’t exist, so your reputation will be safe.”
Her wits looked at each other blankly, then shrugged and wandered off again, leaving Cecilia alone. The bed was shimmering so prettilyin the light. Music played somewhere in the distance, and the light began to sway as if it was dancing, a lithe golden ballerina on a plush golden stage, as Cecilia once had a childhood dream to do herself, ballerining through Europe, dressed in tulle and what was the question again?
“Will you please get into bed before you fall down?” Captain Lightbourne said. “I’ll turn my back whilst you disrobe.”
“A gentleman doesn’t talk about disrobing,” Cecilia said archly, and then had to fan herself with a hand. Did the gas lamps exude heat as well as light? Perhaps she should ask the captain to open a window. But he had turned away, facing the wall, and so instead she hurried to unbutton her dress. She got as far as slapping her hands against her back a few times before giving up with a sigh. “The buttons keep moving. I need your help, Lord Albert. If you would kindly disrobe me—but you’re not to speak of it; that would be scandalous.”
Captain Lightbourne turned and considered the situation warily. “Are you sure?”
“I cannot answer that with the ladylike vocabulary available to me. Half of what I’m wearing is unmentionable. Suffice it to say, if you were dressed as a woman, you would understand the impossibility of going to bed in your clothes.”
He hesitated, brushing the hair back from his face. “I don’t know. Your aunt would kill me.Youwould kill me if you weren’t so drunk.”
“I am not drunk, sir. I am in full possession of my flaccidities.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Your faculties?”
“As I said. Come now, a gentleman would help.”
“But not mention that he was helping?”
“Essact—Ezast—Yes.”
He shrugged, then came over to stand behind her and unbutton the dress. While she waited, Cecilia began to sway along with the ballerinalight, and Captain Lightbourne placed a hand on her shoulder to still her. “Don’t touch me,” she murmured, and the hand slipped across the naked nape of her neck before moving away. She swallowed a shuddering breath.
“All done.” He stepped back.
“Wait.” She pulled the dress down. “Mycorset.” She winced as she whispered this word, sure that the entire hotel must have heard her. “Without help, I am trapped, utterly trapped, unable to breathe, doomed to a lifetime of—”
“All right,” he said. “But how do you normally—”
“Don’t say it.”
“I beg your pardon.”
“Pleasance helps me.”
“Ah.”
“You needn’t recite the prayer to guard me against flesh-devouring spirits of the blighted netherworld. Pleasance is overcautious, and I’m sure I’ll be safe for one night. Just, er, you-know-what with the thingamies. Do you understand?”
“I’ve done it before.”
She glanced over her shoulder at him. “You’ve worn acorset?”
“No,” he said, and grinned.
