With a candlestick in the conservatory
I'd been looking all over for someplace for my hero Ash and my heroine Lydia to have sex. They're in a betrothal of convenience so they can be alone together without a chaperone, but: it's wintertime, cold and wet outside; Ash is staying at an inn where she would be recognized; and Lydia's family home is huge but filled with windows and it's unpredictable when a servant might pop in or a gardener or visitor wander by outside. Then, in an unrelated conversation, Ash (who grew up very poor) asked if Lydia's house had an orangery like he's heard about. And it hit me: the conservatory would be warm, and in the evening there wouldn't be anyone there. Could this be the place? I did some research, online and at the library. I highly recommend the book Glass Houses: A History of Greenhouses, Orangeries, and Conservatories by May Woods and Arete Swartz Warren. I discovered a few things that surprised me (having known absolutely nothing about the topic previously...