The man in the vanguard might, just might, have been Freddy Staines. He was certainly of the same type. His coat possessed enough cloaks to garb a small Indian village and his many watch fobs jangled like a dancing girl’s bracelets as he walked. His light brown hair had been brushed into careful disarray before being topped with a high-crowned beaver hat. Rings jostled for precedence on his fingers, a signet ring bumping up against a curiously scratched ruby in an overly ornate setting.

“Miss Deveraux!” he exclaimed, before adding, as an afterthought, “Lady Charlotte.”

He raised his glass in a toast to the two ladies, sloshing mulled wine over the side in the process. It made a sticky trail through the mud on Robert’s boot.

No, decided Robert. It wasn’t Staines. This man’s skin was too fair ever to have weathered an Indian summer, and the pronounced veins beginning to show along his nose suggested a prolonged course of heavy drinking with the best smuggled brandy London had to offer.

He eyed Robert arrogantly through a slightly grimy quizzing glass. “And you are?”

“This is Dovedale,” Miss Deveraux said bluntly, before Robert could get a word in edgewise. “It’s his mistletoe you’re cutting.”

“Good Gad! You’re Dovedale?”

If a duke fell in the forest, there was no doubt that the entire ton would hear it. The mention of his title commanded universal attention. Conversations stopped. Baskets dropped. Even the dogs ceased barking, except for one spaniel who yipped out of turn before whimpering into silence.

Robert sketched a wave. “Hullo. Carry on.”

“Makes me feel like I ought to curtsy,” murmured Tommy.