Oliver knew it too. He gazed after the sleigh, his face twisted with bitterness. Chloe was the woman he wanted, but she was now denied to him forever because of Sybil Garsington. If ever a man rued something, it was Oliver March, because if he hadn't made the salutary mistake of using his charm and subtleties upon Sybil, her mother, and Mellish, in order to make trouble for Cousin Megan, Sybil's interest in him might never have been reawakened. Now it had come to this! Success had been handed to Rupert on a veritable platter of gold, and he, Oliver, was going to find it very difficult indeed-if not impossible-to wriggle out of marrying Sybil, whom he had certainly never bedded! He had only paid court to the awful creature because Ralph Strickland had wagered him he wouldn't dare! Dear God, Oliver wished he had just paid up cravenly, for if there was one thing he didn't dare now, it was to defy Sigismund Garsington! Even thinking the fellow's name made his knees tremble, so he looked nervously across to Garsington House on the other side of the Steine. To his dismay he saw Sybil standing at an upstairs window. She had seen him, and was waving and beckoning. He could see her lips moving, and did not need to hear her to know what she was saying.
"Cooee, Oliver! Cooee! COOEE!"
He shuddered, and imagined being awakened by her of a morning. No doubt she would put her lips to his slumbering ear in the marriage bed, and send him into a state of witless shock with just such a shrill squeal. A nerve flickered at his temple. He had to have someone to blame, and one person sprang instantly to mind. His eyes swung toward Megan as she stood with Greville, Evangeline, and Sir Jocelyn. It was her fault, he thought with savage illogicality, and he would see that she reaped the consequences! Then he flung the curricle forward around the chariot, and away down the Steine toward the seafront.
Evangeline observed his departure, and tilted her head close to Sir Jocelyn. "Behold, one very sulky bear," she murmured.
"One very sulky, very self-pitying bear," Sir Jocelyn replied shrewdly.
The sleigh was returning, and as Megan hurried to speak to Chloe, Evangeline turned quickly to Greville. "Now you must take Miss Mortimer out, sir," she said with a smile. "I am sure you would like to do that, would you not?"
He met her eyes. "You know so, Aunt E."
She nodded. "Well, after that, er, kiss beneath the mistletoe last night, I would be very surprised if you did not."
"I trust you mean to soon allow us all into your secret?"
"Secret?" She played the innocent.
"You know exactly what I mean, Aunt E," he chided. "There is something going on that concerns Megan, and since I have very obligingly done as you hoped by forming an attachment for her, I think the very least you can do is explain yourself."
Evangeline looked at him for a long moment. "You have seen through me, I fancy."
"I think so."
She nodded. "Very well, I think you are right to expect an explanation. I promise I will tell you everything when we are back at the house, but for the time being I mean to enjoy the social glory of the sleigh. It is not every day that one can be assured of being the undisputed queen of Brighton. But first I wish you and Miss Mortimer to enjoy it."
There were murmurs as Greville handed Megan into the sleigh, for Oliver's contretemps with the Garsingtons had not entirely banished Lady Evangeline Radcliffe's impudent companion from the beau monde's mind. Megan was hardly aware of anything, she was too speechless with delight to be seated in the Prince of Wales's sleigh. Just over a week ago she had been Lady Jane Strickland's nobody of a companion, now she was about to be driven around the Steine like royalty. She turned to smile up at Greville as he stepped up behind her and took the reins. The black Arabs sprang forward, their plumes dancing, and the sleigh sped away over the snow as if upon air. The runners sang, the bells jingled, and it seemed that the horses trotted in time to the Marine Pavilion band, which was now playing "God rest you merry, gentlemen!"
Megan expected to simply navigate the Steine, but suddenly Greville turned the team toward the Castle Inn, then down Ship Street, where everyone turned to gaze open-mouthed as it passed. On reaching the foot of the street, Greville turned west to drive along the undulating cliff top, where very few people were to be found on a Sunday. The sea was blue to match the sky, and the horses' breath stood out in clouds as Greville brought them up to a canter. At the western edge of the town, he turned the vehicle, and then drove back again at the same brisk speed, but instead of driving up Ship Street again, he followed the track on toward the Star and Garter and Mahomed's Baths, where it swung inland again toward the Steine.
A stagecoach was just leaving the inn, and as Greville reined in to allow it to pass, a woman called to him from the roadside in a broad Sussex accent. "Some mistletoe for your lady, sir?" It was a red-cloaked countrywoman with an enormous basket of carefully tied mistletoe posies, one of which she held out hopefully to Greville.
He laughed and tossed her a coin, which she caught deftly and tested with her teeth before stepping from the curb to give him the posy. "Give the lady a kiss for Christmas, sir, for 'tis not only lucky, 'tis expected!"
"Expected, eh? Well, I must not disappoint," he replied, and to the delight of onlookers he held the mistletoe above Megan's head. "Madam, your lips are needed," he said softly.
She blushed as she turned and tilted her face to meet him. Their lips joined in a warm kiss that drew a rousing cheer from some men who had just emerged from the Star and Garter. The countrywoman gave a satisfied cackle of laughter. "May you both have the finest Christmas ever!" she cried as Greville pressed the mistletoe into Megan's hands, then urged the team on again.
Chapter 30
As Megan and Greville glided along the low cliff top in the sleigh, Ralph Strickland's travel-stained carriage was descending wearily from the Downs toward Brighton. He had left London at noon the previous day, but had been benighted by the weather at the village of Clayton. After setting out once more at daybreak, the carriage had taken until now to labor the final few miles through the snow, and as the first houses of the town appeared by the roadside, Ralph lowered the blinds in order not to be seen, for he sported a black eye that might have been dealt by Tom Belcher himself. The eye wasn't the work of a professional pugilist, however, but of Ralph's wife Sophia, whose build and right hook were every bit as fearsome as her sister Sybil's.
Ralph might have succeeded initially in convincing his better half that he'd been trying to fend off Megan's unwelcome advances when apparently caught in the act in Bath, but doubts had soon begun to trouble Sophia, who knew him rather too well. There had been arguments, some of them very fiery indeed, and she had finally resorted to fisticuffs. Humiliated at being so visibly damaged at a woman's hands, and annoyed at having ultimately failed to pull the wool over that same woman's eyes, Ralph was teaching Sophia a lesson by disappearing for Christmas. Brighton might have seemed a strange choice of hiding place, given that it was a stronghold of Garsingtons and was where he and Sophia were to spend the holiday anyway, but Ralph's plan was to impose himself upon his good friend Oliver. Sophia could go to Hades; he was going to enjoy himself! He imagined an excellent Yuletide, with just the two of them skulking secretly in Oliver's lodgings, imbibing to their hearts' content, and no irritating females to spoil their fun. With luck, there would be a few furtive visits to a certain house of ill repute in Lewes, where the wenches, oh, the wenches… He sighed with anticipation.