Would this have been what marriage to Killin would have been like? Were all the men her father would consider marriageable cast from the same mould? And were women any less uniform? Reluctantly, Margaret had concluded that she and Julia would never be close. Julia’s reserve was almost impossible to penetrate. Though she knew, from their single heart-to-heart, that Julia had feelings, she almost never betrayed them. She reminded Margaret of Victoria, which made her wonder if her sister’s outward compliance and stoic forbearance hid a more emotional, and therefore much more interesting, person. It might well be so, but now Margaret would never know. One thing she had concluded, from her forced close observation of Julia’s marriage, was that she could never bring herself to replicate it. Witnessing Julia’s polite suffering while her husband relentlessly held forth made her scream silently with frustration. Speak up, Margaret wanted to shout. Remind him that you actually have a voice! She knew now with utter certainty that she had been absolutely right to reject Killin.

On just one occasion had the viscount’s volubility deserted him. A chance mention of his deceased brother, Maurice, had set his beard trembling and had him first scrubbing furiously at his eyes, then clenching his fists. “A good man,” he muttered. “An officer decorated by the queen herself, by God. A real man, unlike that—that frivolous fop!”

“Lewis,” Julia had explained as her husband stormed out of the room. “My husband held Maurice in such high esteem, his younger brother is bound to suffer in comparison. That Lewis is so very determined to be different doesn’t help.”

“Different in what way?”

Julia pursed her lips. “He has a penchant for low company and no respect for either the Wingfield name or his elder brother. Fortunately, the feeling is mutual. We rarely see him.”

Margaret pondered the paradox of a viscount who loathed his current heir but took a very lax approach to the task of replacing him with a son of his own. She could see no evidence of intimacy in the everyday behaviour of the married couple. Wingfield held the door open for his wife, he held her chair out at dinner, but that seemed to be the extent of their contact. A more physical dimension must exist behind the closed doors of Julia’s bedchamber, Margaret thought as she studied the pair of them over the breakfast table, but her toes curled trying to imagine what form it might take. Would the viscount have himself announced by his valet? Would he ask for Julia’s permission in advance, in writing? Would he initiate proceedings with a kiss or simply proceed to—ah, but, no, she was putting herself off her coddled eggs.

“What is it, Margaret? Are you choking on something?”