“The strongest emotion is not the sublime.”
Viola crossed her arms, scowling. “What is it, then?”
“It is love.”
That robbed her of speech for the remaining duration of their ride home. By the time she came up with a rejoinder, something as idiotic as “Love, too, is a passion as much as fear, and that is why this is also a romance, because love always wins,” they had arrived at the townhouse, and he nodded at her coolly.
“I must excuse myself for the rest of the evening. There is correspondence I must still attend to.”
Then she was alone in the bedroom, with a candle, listening to his retreating footsteps, wondering if she should have, for once, just grabbed him and asked what she’d wanted to ask since the moment she fell from the ruin and he caught her in his arms.
Whether he loved her.
Even if just a tiny bit.
Chapter Nineteen
Viola wasin a vile mood the next morning, underscored with a pounding headache and a general feeling of malaise, which no doubt led them to have another row at breakfast.
She found him buried in his correspondence again, and Viola had a sudden urge to pick up the salver and throw the entire contents into the fireplace. She found herself inexplicably jealous of that piece of paper he so carefully held in his hands, which took all his attention. As if it were something precious.
When he finally set his work aside, he looked at her briefly and asked what her plans for the day were. He clearly meant it as a polite opening to a conversation, but she replied she wanted to visit Newgate Prison again before dropping by Lady Penworthy’s for tea. There was to be another illicit book club meeting that afternoon, but that she did not share. Which then resulted in Sebastian telling her somewhat testily that she would have to be more circumspect about the places she visited, for the butler had informed him she had been visiting Seven Dials, and that ‘simply would not do’.
She set her fork aside and folded her hands in front of her. “But why ever not? It’s a place like any other.”
“It certainly is not. I cannot have my wife stroll about in St Giles as if she were on a walk in Hyde Park.” He set down his coffee cup with rather more force than necessary. “Aside from the fact that it is improper, it is also highly dangerous.”
“Ah yes. What would the people think and all that. Reputation and whatnot.” She glared at him. “What would the world come to if Mr Fane were ever brought into contact with the indecorous and impolite? I must say, last night’s excursion to the Minerva must have sorely tested your delicate sensibilities. Aren’t you relieved no one recognised you?”
“You are straying from the point. This has nothing to do with me and everything to do with you.” His jaw tightened. “I do not understand your perpetual fascination with the morbid, to the extent that you deliberately expose yourself to danger. The Rookery is dangerous. I want you to stay away from it.”
He was being a pompous ass. That he was not entirely wrong only made it worse.
“Nothing much happened,” Viola said with a careless shrug. “It was a wholly futile excursion. I had hoped to glimpse some notorious nest of villainy, but all I encountered was a decrepit gin shop and a few peculiar, drunken figures. Entirely unremarkable, I assure you.”
“Heaven help me,” Sebastian exclaimed, “how can you so much as set foot in such a place and expect to come out alive again?”
“Ellen was with me,” Viola said quickly, as though that ought to settle the matter. “And there is truly no cause for alarm. We brought a pistol.”
That, at last, robbed him of speech. His jaw worked back and forth, a rare and rather impressive sight considering he was one of the most gifted orators in the Commons, a man never known to lack for words.
Viola folded her napkin and placed it on the table. “Well then, if you don’t mind, I shall rise and ready myself for the day. I have a great manyrespectablethings to do.” And with her chin lifted high, and nary a backward glance, she sailed from the room.
Viola endedup staying at the Penworthy mansion the entire day. It was good for her to be surrounded by feminine energy. By women who actually understood her and who did not spare their sympathies when she unloaded her woes regarding her cold, cruel, insensitive husband.
“He has as much understanding of romance and passion as a turnip. When he looks at the moon, he sees an unwashed plate. He’s the sharpest mind in Parliament, yet he turns into a pudding-headed numbskull when it comes to understanding even the basic notion of the ‘sublime,’” she complained bitterly. “He fails to grasp the essence of what makes it so wonderful, so thrilling. It took all my restraint not to throw my reticule at his head when he called ‘The Monk and The Maiden’ a vulgar play.”
The women clucked disapprovingly. “Well, what else can one expect from Fane? He is well known to be the starchiest stickler of the lot.” Mrs Brownlow, a woman around Viola’s age, sniffed. Next to Josephine, she was one of her most fervent readers. “Though one could also argue that Mr Eldon might outdo him in that regard. I heard he declared Mrs Sable’s books to be ‘wanton, depraved tales that unsettle the female mind’, and he went as far as proposing a formal parliamentary inquiry to prohibit such filth. His words. Can you imagine!”
Viola choked.
“And to give Fane credit, he was the one to stand up and shut him down immediately. Called it a spectacular waste ofParliament’s time to occupy themselves with the reading habits of ladies when they had actual problems to attend to.”
Viola’s jaw dropped. “He did not!”
“He did so,” Josephine affirmed. “Sir William confirmed Mrs Brownlow’s story.”
“Well.” Viola swallowed. “That must have happened before we went to see the play…” He hadn’t mentioned that interlude in Parliament. Why not?
