She took a moment to lament her lack of parasol. Every time she left the house, she felt keenly the absence of her heretofore ubiquitous accessory.

What’s wrong with you? Are you ill? I forbid you to be ill, wife.

She would have colored gracefully with embarrassment had she not possessed the complexion of one of those “heathen Italians,” as her mother said, who never colored, gracefully or otherwise. (Convincing her mother that Christianity had, to all intents and purposes, originated with the Italians, thus making them the exact opposite of heathen, was a waste of time and breath.)

Lord Maccon looked up. “Grovel, you say?” Lyall did not glance away from the latest vampire report he was perusing. “Grovel, my lord.

And I find perfect beauty excessively boring, don't you?

Really, Alexia, what could have possessed you to attach yourself to the side of the ship in such a juvenile fashion? It is positively barnacle-like.

No, Lord Maccon was riproaring, tumble down, without a doubt, pickled beyond the gherkin.