Inferno

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The night had turned unseasonally chilly. Captain Sir Thomas Kydd sat before the fire with his particular friend, the Earl of Farndon, and his wife, who also happened to be Sir Thomas’s sister. The evening’s reception and stately ball had been accounted the most splendid held for many years, and he’d been introduced to a dizzying quantity of the county’s highest society, who’d been particularly attentive to the acclaimed sea hero. But now he gazed vacantly into the flames.

‘Are you not enjoying your Armagnac, Thomas?’ Cecilia asked in concern. ‘Nicholas keeps back his ’seventy-nine for your visits alone, my dear.’

‘Pray take no notice of me, sis. I’m in a complicated mood.’

‘Oh? What can this mean?’ she teased.

‘To tell it straight, Cec, my intellects are in a whirl for all the fanfaronade since we made port, and I’ve a mort of things to think on. I confess what I crave most is nothing more than to sit and stare at a wall for above a day.’

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