Rivals and Revels (A Regency Romance)

24. The Secret Assignation

The lamps coloured imposing portico of the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden into a pleasing golden hue. The aficionados crowded the gangway so thickly that picking out acquaintances became a game of chance rather than scheming. Mabel would have given up on locating Harriette if the surge of the crowd didn't deposit a certain silver-moustached colonel with them. He recalled Lady Catherine's adolescent accomplishments with such gusto that she must have been mortified inside, despite covering her suffering with silvery peals of laughter.

The last thing Mabel expected is for her desperate eyes to meet Everett's blue ones. Meet! She drowned in them after an inhale worthy of a pearl-diver. The cad was serious about joining them at the Opera! Or else it was a coincidence. At least a ten-day had passed since the fateful dinner. Everett didn't once darken Chesterton's manor threshold since then, and... It didn't matter. She turned her back on him in a way that should send a crystal-clear message.

"Mother!" Everett's voice carried over the din.

She stifled a sigh. How could she have expected Everett to consider anyone's pleasure but Everett's?

The crowd parted for him like the waves of the Red Sea for Moses. He offered a cursory smile to the Colonel. The older man boomed, "Everett, my good fellow! Fancy to meet you here!"

Yes, fancy that indeed...

Everett bowed gallantly to his mother. "As you've bid, so I present myself at the Opera."

"It's such a joy to see you, my dear," Lady Catherine gashed.

Yes, Mabel's heart exclaimed, contradicting the rational person she otherwise was.

In the evening attire of stark black-and-white Everett looked dashing. His lips curved in a cheerful smile. He could have walked across the stage and impressed the ladies more than any play could have. Merciful Heavens, he almost glowed with his own light tonight!

'Everett didn't change a yote,' she reminded her stupid heart. 'The man is a two-faced Janus.'

"You chose your evening well," Lady Catherine was saying in the meantime, beaming at her son. "The 'Country Gentleman Abroad' could alleviate the sourest mood, you'll see."

"You disagree, Miss Walton?" Everett must have been watching her face to notice a sardonic smile she allowed herself. "Or are you not one for comic operas?"

"I like them well enough when it's Rossini's."

"I'm afraid our dear Mabel loves Italian music more than our home-grown talents'," Lady Catherine said. "But I assure you, the play is no worse for being written on the foggy shores of Albion and very cheerful."

"Far it would be from me to disparage Miss Walton's taste," Everett said gallantly. It didn't look that way until he made a show of admiring her appearance. "Isn't she a vision in this pale lilac shade!"

The Colonel made agreeable noises, indeed, indeed, a vision. Mabel reminded herself that the poor old man wouldn't have recognized one of Cordelia's handed-downs. Everett, on the other hand... "I adore this colour."

"I adore it on you," he insisted with a saccharine smile. Blood rushed into her face. Before Cordelia had children, her figure was slimmer than Mabel's. They were also close in height, so Lady Catherine ordered alterations made of all the dresses left from her daughter's debutante days.

"I wish that the Heavens gave me more daughters," Lady Catherine had exclaimed, dabbing her eyes, while she watched the windfall wardrobe fitted on Mabel and adapted to current fashion trends by the seamstress.