" the cuckolded husband but there was also laughter, a pity profoundly scarred with cruelty, relief that it was someone else. There were ribald jokes, slurs against manhood—and that was the ultimate insult, the unbearable thing that robbed the stuff of life but denied the peace of death. The victim was still sentient and raw to all the awareness of his loss. He would never have brought that upon himself, never—not in hot temper nor in cold revenge. "

― Anne Perry , Cardington Crescent (Charlotte & Thomas Pitt, #8)