Diana looked up as the man, her husband, entered the room. Outside, it had gone dark and for a moment, she thought she could detect something fae and unnatural about him. For that time, he was touched as if by a wild spirit, and despite his being well turned out, a common enough look, her imagination was touched by the gloaming outside her garden window and perhaps the five years had not gone unnoticed by him after all. He had been at war, had he not? He had had to perform atrocities against his fellows, had thrust young men into battle. Not to mention the savages there! The wild tempests during the journey, the creatures she'd only seen plates of. The Americas were a wild adventure she could not fully comprehend and he had been there, then returned to her changed. 

But no, as he moved into the room and further into the light, he was merely her husband; brisk, untouched by even her presence, and angered at the lack of care by those who should have cared deepest. Robert hadn't any difference about him but for his disregard of her and her needs. But then, he was a man. What else was there? 

She rose. “Dinner guests, this Sunday next?” she parroted. Would that Fannie were there by then! She'd endeavor to press he friend into coming earlier. It would do them well to have more at the table if there were to be soldiers there. “Of course,” she smiled at him. “I shall make inquiries as to the exact number and have the work done. If you could have someone come and clear the garden before then. They look a fright. I'd meant to go into the village and acquire a gardener, but perhaps you can find one.” 

She watched him, her dark eyes gauging him. She had seen a man or three coming back from the Americas. They were not all that changed, but for her husband. Then, she had heard tell that those most changed had not returned to society at all. But that would not do! He had all opportunity carefully tended as she had in his absence. Perhaps with some friendly conversation, with some others who were of high enough estate and courtly manner as this Major would no doubt be, her husband would return to his former nature and thus, return to her fold. 

“I had meant to ask this a.m.,” she tilted her head in a comely manner, fingers curling about one another before her trim waist, “if you had thought to open our doors for the coming months. We are near enough to the Willoughbys and the Duchess is said to come to her estate which is not far either. It would do us well to consider it.”