"If you say so," Alfred said with a shrug. He had spent a good deal of time wondering about this particular attachment, back when Evander had started courting her. Everything about it seemed terribly unlikely. Miss Delaney was an American (strike one), her family was involved in Alfred's line of work, which was about as far from Evander's as could be imagined (strike two), and she appeared to actually be interesting and charming (strike three; Evander was neither of those things). Alfred had not spent much time or energy picturing Evander's future wife, before the appearance of Miss Delaney, but what from what vague notions he'd had about it he'd supposed Evander might marry the adult daughter of a coworker solely because he already knew and liked her father, or perhaps one of their cousins when they were approaching spinsterhood and had no serious prospects. A comfortable arrangement, neatly executed with crossed 't's and dotted 'i's. He had never expected his brother would willingly subject himself to the sorts of social events required to meet women*, nor to courting, and certainly not to anything approaching a romantic overture.

(*Alfred thought, having met his own future wife after having capsized a sailboat near a beach she had no particular reason to be on — but he had never been particularly traditional, and Evander was pointedly traditional, so he could only assume Evander had met Miss Delaney at some boring social thing like the one they were currently attending)

"How did he ask?" Alfred asked, curious. He wasn't trying to make fun, necessarily; he honestly could not even begin to picture it.