Free Elisabeth Fairchild by The Counterfeit Coachman Page A

who stood uncertainly on the bathing box steps.
    “Go on, be a good niece. Go with auntie,” Charley encouraged from behind his glass.
    Beau frowned at him, but then regretted his distracted attention, for Charley let loose a whoop. “That’s the spirit! Have a go!”
    By the time Beau refocused on the little tableau, Nell Quinby had collapsed her parasol, accepted the bathing garment, and mounted the steps.
    “Ah, what I wouldn’t give to be rolling out to sea in that box,” Charley breathed, allowing his glass to fall.
    “Oh, button it!” Beau flared angrily, the outburst giving rise to his dog’s ears, and best friend’s eyebrows.
    “I say, that’s how the wind blows, does it? I d no idea you were so taken with her. What happened to you on the drive down, anyway? No need to be close-mouthed.”
    “Nothing happened,” Beau locked his gaze on the slow progress of the horse-drawn box as it trundled into the foaming surf. He could hear unwarranted irritation in his own voice as he said, “I cannot imagine why anyone would willingly immerse themselves in that briny drink without explicit direction from a physician. Not only does one come up smelling of salt and fish, but you can see they’ve been unloading coal along the pier. The sea is positively black with the stuff in places.”
    Charley laughed. “Testy, aren’t we? And awfully quick to change the subject over this  “nothing” that happened. Have they stopped?” He chuckled and fit glass to eye once again. “Or do you mind me getting a good gander at the gel?”
    “How can I object,” Beau responded irritably, “When every man-jack along the entire coastline is privy to the scene?”
    “You’re a brick, old man,” Charley squinted at the bathing box, which had come to a halt, with the surf knee-deep on the horse. “Ah, the door opens,” he breathed. “Who shall come first? Age or beauty?”
    Beau sucked in his breath. Encased in one of the ill-fitting and unflattering smocks, Nell peeped out. Assisted by the dipper, she moved carefully down the wet stepsto sink, gasping at the cold, thigh deep into the water. The dipper indicated that Nell would no longer feel the cold if she would only immerse herself, and gave a lively and splashy demonstration of how to hold one’s breath and nose, the more comfortably to go under.
    “There we go,” Charley kept up a running repartee. “All the way under, my dear. Ugh, there goes the hair like a dark mass of seaweed. Now, bob on up again, and let us have a look at you.”
    But Nell, once under, stayed under, at least up to her neck.
    She seemed to realize that she risked exposure in standing. She splashed about quite contentedly, while her aunt came uncertainly onto the steps, bashfully dipped her toes into a wave, and swiftly jerked them out again.
    The dipper seemed unable to coax the older woman into taking to the water, but Nell, cajoled and pleaded and playfully splashed water until her aunt agreed to release her grip on the bathing box door, and began to come down, with the dipper’s assistance.
    “Help her in, love,” Charley crooned, “The old gel might slip without your shoulder to lean on.”
    As if Charley somehow directed the Fates, Ursula Dunn did come close to slipping, and up shot Miss Quinby out of the water, like a glistening nymph swum up from the depths to lend the gleaming wet support of one thinly clad shoulder to her aunt. Beau caught his breath. Fanella Quinby was a water bound sylph, a Venus, a Siren come to life. The outline of her body; breast, waist, and hip, was curvaceous, water-bejewelled perfection against the glittering backdrop of the sea.
    “Good God!” Charley breathed. In the same instant that he spoke, a shout was raised from the combined throats of half a dozen officers who lounged along the Steine, also watching her. This accolade was echoed by a little whoop from an old gentleman to their left, who had, open-mouthed, allowed his peering glass to slip out