Imprudent Lady

Chapter 14

Dammler was off to Finefields with Shilla and Lady Malvern (and Lord Malvern), and Prudence was left home with Uncle Clarence and her mother. There was no correspondence between them, and when Fanny Burney called one day a week later, Prudence agreed eagerly to accompany her to call on Lady Melvine. She hoped to hear from his aunt how he progressed, and more importantly, when he was to return. His whereabouts had purposely been kept secret from the press. As Prudence carefully set the buff chip straw bonnet from Mademoiselle Fancot’s on her curls, she had a hope Dammler might even be there. One week was the duration mentioned for his stay, and Hettie was surely the first person he would call on. His only family-a tender pity for him had been growing during the past week. It was this rootlessness that she held to be responsible for his wilder extravagances.

But her hopes were dashed; he was not there, and what she heard of him was of a nature to discourage her completely. The writing was not going well, Hettie told her, there were too many distractions. Prudence felt only one of the distractions was necessary to keep him from his play. He had written mentioning prolonging his visit another week. Possibly two.

“Was it really work he had in mind when he went to Finefields?" Miss Burney asked archly.

“Now Fanny, don’t ask embarrassing questions,” Lady Melvine retorted. She looked to Prudence with a smile as she spoke, trying to understand the girl. Dammler spoke of her a good deal, but whether she was a young innocent thing or a scheming, designing woman always remained unclear. Prudence forced out a worldly laugh, and Hettie said to herself, innocent is it? She is the slyest girl in town. And jealous, too, though she tries not to show it. “He did take his manuscript with him, or said he did,” she added.

“Strange the aura of secrecy surrounding the visit. But they would not want company descending on them,” Miss Burney mentioned.

“No, Dammler is beginning to hide his amours and put on a respectable face. He never tells me of his chères amies any more. I sometimes wonder if he is thinking of marriage. He asked me to write him of all the births, deaths, marriages and important court decisions while he is away. You don’t suppose he is waiting for that perfectly dreadful Lady Margaret to get her divorce?”

“Or for Lord Shelhurst to die?” Fanny laughed.

The specific names meant nothing to Prudence, but the import was clear enough. He had been carrying on with these ladies, while prating to her about improving to please her. In a snit she said, “Perhaps it is the births he is interested in.”

“Miss Mallow, you are too horrid,” Lady Melvine approved happily. She personally had no use for missish women, and felt much more at home with Miss Mallow, the worldly sophisticate. “I shouldn’t think he would marry anyone like Lady Margaret or the Shelhurst woman,” Hettie said consideringly. “They are well enough for flirts, but when it comes to settling down it will be some prim-faced little duke’s daughter with a fat dowry he will settle on. His sort always does. No, he can’t have marriage in mind at all, or he’d have gone to Longbourne Abbey to get things in shape. He said he was purposely not going there as he had such a lot to do at the Abbey he wouldn’t find time to write if he went there.”

Here was another blow for Prudence. That Dammler would look to a high-born, well-dowered lady for a wife had never occurred to her. Here she had been wasting her time being jealous of the Phyrnes, who were actually to be pitied. Naturally it would be a title and a fortune he would eventually marry.

This visit plunged Prudence into gloom, and she could not find solace even in her writing. The sanctity of her study without a little enlightening mischief from Dammler proved too pure. She made any excuse to get out of it. Two days later she wanted to go down town with her mama. She foolishly imagined the carriage would be at her disposal, but was informed otherwise. With never a prestigious caller for nine days save a lady writer Clarence had never heard of, and who looked suspiciously like a nobody, his carriage was busy sitting idle in the stable.

The Backwoods Review arrived and sat unopened on the table. The building of the third shelf to hold it and its brothers was put off, with no one to admire it. “Strange Dr. Ashington does not call,” Clarence said a dozen times a day. He also reverted to the halcyon days of the Marquis de Sevilla. “That Spanish grandee who sent you all the flowers and diamonds, Prue, what do you hear of him lately?”

“Nothing. I do not see him at all.”

“I read in The Observer he has joined the Four Horse Club. He is making his way in the world. He would not have been a bad catch for you. I think your daughter was too quick in turning him off, Wilma.”

Prudence sighed wearily, and her mother, interpreting it, said, “Lord Dammler should be returning soon, should he not, Prudence?”

“No, he has prolonged his stay at Finefields. He does not write his aunt of returning soon.”

“I expect he is working hard on his play,” the mother said.

“Ho, playing hard is more like it,” Clarence corrected. It rankled that he had never got that form on canvas. Thrice he had hinted, and thrice the hint had been ignored on the pretext of work, but he always found time to sit around laughing with Prudence, keeping her from her writing. “I am happy he has stopped badgering Prue. There was no getting anything down with him borrowing all her books twice a day. I suppose he took that French book off with him, did he?” he asked sharply.

“No, he didn’t,” Prue assured him with a slightly wistful smile. Nor was there ever any French book for him to take.

“Well, it seems to me those shelves are half empty, and they used to be full. Why, we spoke at one time of requiring another, but it is not necessary now. They are only half full. Dr. Ashington, now, has five thousand books.” Clarence had taken this statistic for his own, and broadcast it among his friends, sometimes as five hundred, sometimes as five hundred thousand, either of which was equally impressive to him as being an incalculable, unreadable number. Dr. Ashington, still in London with his name appearing in the paper to be pointed out to Mrs. Hering and Sir Alfred, loomed larger in Clarence’s thoughts than Dammler. His title of Doctor, while not raising him to the peerage, was as far removed from Elmtree’s ken as a dukedom, and as valuable.

“He was an interesting man. You should call to see how his mama goes on, Prue. She always liked you. I daresay it is her being so ill that keeps him away from the house. He would appreciate your calling. I read in The Observer that he is giving a lecture on Plato and Aristotle and some other Italian tonight. You will take it in, I suppose?”

“No, I do not plan to attend.”

“The carriage will be free if you would like to go. Wilma will be happy to go with you. She is interested in that sort of thing.”

Prudence exchanged a silent, speaking glance with her mother. The only thing more foolish he could have suggested would be that he was interested himself, but he wasn’t quite so eager for the return of the Doctor as to put himself out an iota. “It is busy this afternoon, however,” he remarked. “John Groom has to give it a wash and polish. It is covered in mud.”

“Mama and I will take a hackney down town,” Prue told him.

“I am feeling a little peakey, dear,” her mother said. She did look pulled, Prudence noticed.

“Never mind, I’ll stay home. I did want to select a frame for my portrait though,” she added cunningly, hoping to eke at least a footman out of her uncle.

“Oh, well, if that is why you want to be off gallivanting, I daresay one of the boys can be spared to go along with you and carry it,” Clarence told her, a little mollified.

It was just outside the framing shop that she ran into Lady Melvine, and stopped for a chat. After the initial exchange of courtesies, Prue asked if she had heard anything more from Dammler. He was the main link between them, and she thought the question not encroaching.

“He does not write me often, naughty boy. No mention of returning to town. But I fancy we know what is keeping him busy.” Neither of them fancied the play for Drury Lane had anything to do with it

Prue laughed in a manner she considered worldly, and added daringly, “And he promised me he would be a good boy, too. Give him a scold for me. Tell him I disapprove of his distraction."

“That I shall. Do you go to the play this evening? It promises to be good. Kean-always a delight.”

“No, not tonight,” Prudence answered, intimating she would put it off until another evening, though, of course, she would not be going at all. “We are busy elsewhere tonight,” and added to herself, busy playing Pope Joan at a penny a hand.

“You have your distractions, too, I see,” Lady Melvine teased gaily. She heartily approved of a pretty young dasher who knew her way about town.

“It doesn’t do to become stale.”

“Much chance! Tell me who he is,” Hettie asked eagerly.

“Oh, just a friend,” Prue replied as airily as though it were true.

“Tell me, does Seville still pester you? Dammler told me of his offer.”

How strong was the temptation to lie and say he did, in hopes that it would be relayed to Finefields, but she contented herself with concealing the truth. “I never accept an offer to go out with him,” she said, truthfully but misleadingly, as no offer was ever made.

“You could do worse, my dear. Full of juice. He has been accepted into the Four Horse Club, I hear. Buying Alvanley’s greys for a thousand pounds might have had something to do with it, though he is a fine whip, Dammler tells me.”

“Yes.” Looking up, Prudence was aghast to see the tall form of Seville approaching them. Guilt and shame overcame her-she would be revealed for the liar she was. She doubted Seville would do more than lift his hat in passing. To forestall any idea that they were on such cool terms, she hailed him merrily as he passed by.

“Why, Mr. Seville, congratulations are due to you. I hear you are in the FHC. Not wearing your outfit I see.”

He stopped and smiled civilly. “No, we do not meet today. Thursdays, you know, in George Street, Hanover Square, to trot over to the Windmill. How do you go on, Miss Mallow? I haven’t seen you since…"

She jumped in to prevent exposure of the date of their last meeting. “From Hanover Square you leave? I must go down and see you off one day. I have never seen it. I hear it is a famous sight.”

“There is usually a pretty good turnout to see us off.”

Seville was astonished at this change in her behaviour. Quite throwing herself at his head. It occurred to him she regretted her decision in refusing him. Her brash manner also led him to suspect she had known all along it was not marriage he had meant. She had been pulling his leg- having a little joke at his expense. He always thought she was up to all the rigs. But she was too late-negotiations were nearing completion for his nuptials with the “Barren” Baroness, and even more interesting plans afoot for teaming up with a pretty little dancer from Covent Garden.

“I will be in the crowd next time. Look out for me,” Prudence said, to keep up the appearance of friendship.

“I won’t be there next time. I am off to Bath tomorrow for a week’s visit.”

“Oh, I have never been to Bath. I should like to see it some time. Is it nice? I thought it was quite dull nowadays."

Why, the minx was clearly throwing herself at his head. If that wasn’t a hint! “A little quiet. One must make one’s own excitement.”

“I’m sure you are well able to do that.”

“I hope to keep from being moped to death,” he answered, then turning aside to Hettie, he addressed some few remarks to her. Happy to think she had brushed through not too badly, Prudence took her leave of them both with a wave of her hand, as though she had a million things to do. She was only looking for a hired hack to climb in and take home the frame she had selected for Clarence’s approval.

“Miss Mallow is so charming-a pity she turned you down,” Lady Melvine continued on talking to Seville. “But one hears you will soon be making an announcement of a match with someone quite different.”

This was the first intimation Seville had that Miss Mallow had told anyone of his offer to her. Since she had appeared to misunderstand it, he was relieved she had kept it to herself. The old Baroness would fly into the boughs if she heard of that tale. He hardly knew what to say-to deny outright having made her a proper offer would be ungentlemanly, and to confirm it would be a disaster to himself. “I hadn’t realized she was bruiting it around,” he parried for time.

“No, now I come to think of it, I believe she told only Dammler, and in the greatest secrecy. He told no one but myself, and I have not breathed a word. But it is no secret to you that you offered for her, so no harm done."

“Is that what she says-that I offered for her? Ha, ha, well it never does to contradict a lady, what? But don’t spread it around. A certain Baroness you know, would not like to hear it.”

Lady Melvine’s suspicions were naturally aroused at this veiled statement “Why, you rascal, Seville, I believe you deceived the poor girl.”

“Deceived her? There was some deceit in the business I begin to think, but you must not be too hasty in placing the blame.”

He left, eager to extract himself from the unpleasant predicament without being too specific. But his words fell on fertile soil. Miss Mallow was not seven years old, and she must have known as well as everyone else in the city that Seville was dangling after the Baroness. Why, he had offered Prudence nothing but a carte blanche, and she had elected to turn it into an offer in form, and for no other reason but to make Dammler jealous. All her sly questions and comments about being displeased of the Countess Malvern. What a clever little article she was, to be sure, and making herself out the picture of innocence. She, with her drawing the line at five by-blows, and her Maidenhair Ferns, and its being the births Dammler was interested in. Such wily behaviour as this was sheer joy to Hettie. She went straight home and penned a long letter to Dammler telling him the whole amusing story, together with every other bit of gossip she could think of, then set it aside and forgot about it until, two days later, Bishop Michael’s wife left him. This was written into another letter, and when she prepared to send it off, she discovered the first one still on the desk, and slipped it into the envelope also.

“Our innocent Miss Prudence has been bamming us all,” she had written. “Seville’s offer may have been in form, but not the form she would have us believe. It was nothing else but his mistress he meant to make her, as I told you all along. Yes, and I think she regrets turning him off, too, for she was fairly throwing her cap at him today on Bond Street. But he escapes her and goes to Bath (with his chère amie, I fancy). How surprised he will be if Miss M. follows him down. She claimed a great interest in seeing Bath. But I may be mistaken-I believe she has some other beau in her eye, as well. She is full of engagements. She tells me to inform you she is not pleased with your ‘distraction’ keeping you from work. What can she mean, I wonder!”

She reread it with a chuckle before sealing it, unaware that she had done anything more than give her nephew a good laugh. He seemed always to be laughing over something Miss Mallow had said or done.

Prudence went home in a state of nerves. Not only her study but all of London was becoming intolerable to her. The book was going poorly, and she wished for a change. Dammler had claimed to want peace and quiet to work-she wanted a noisy holiday with not even the pretence of work. Brighton, where the ton would soon be going with the Season coming to a close, was too steep for her poor resources. Mr. Seville’s mention of Bath came to her. Mama had been feeling poorly lately; the waters might do her some good.

The major flaw in the plan was that Mr. Seville would be there. She did not like to give the impression she was trailing after him, as he might be forgiven for thinking after the saucy way she had hailed him on Bond Street. But he was leaving tomorrow-staying only for a week. By the time she had arranged through an agent for lodgings and got herself and Mama there, the week would be up. In fact, she would not go before a week was up. That this also gave Dammler more than double the time he had claimed to require at Finefields had nothing to do with it. He might stay as long and be as distracted as he liked. It was nothing to her.

The subject of the trip was broached at home, with some little trepidation lest Clarence might object to letting his horses take such a journey on their behalf. But to her relief it proved the very thing to put her back in his good graces. Her manner of introducing it may have had something to do with it.

“I was speaking to Mr. Seville today, Uncle,” she said cleverly.

“Seville? Were you indeed? Well, that is nice. I think you gave the marquis short shrift. I am happy to see he is dangling after you again. A Spanish title is no small thing when all’s said and done. So, Seville is back after you, is he? I am happy to hear It.”

“He is going to Bath,” she added. “He spoke very highly of it. I quite wished I were going myself. I shouldn’t wonder if the waters would be good for you, too, Mama.”

Mrs. Mallow was delighted to see her daughter divert her thoughts from the impossible direction of Lord Dammler and she too thought the waters would do her a world of good. The very thing. Even more good to see Prudence settled with Mr. Seville. She had no illusions as to his having a title up his sleeve.

“So you are off to Bath with Seville, eh?” Clarence ran on, making up a story to please himself and Mrs. Hering.

“Not with Mr. Seville, Uncle. He leaves tomorrow. But I should like to go along a little later.”

“You will be needing the carriage then. I am happy I had John Groom give it a good scrubbing down for you. We will hire an extra team and send you off in style with four. We wouldn’t want Seville to think us skints.”

"I am not going there for the purpose of meeting Mr. Seville,” Prudence pointed out very precisely. “It was not his idea, but my own.”

“Ho, you are waking up now, milady. You are well named. Very prudent of you to tag along after him. Well, I don’t expect he will be surprised to see you show up all the same. The idea will not be displeasing to him.” Before many more such sentences, it was Seville who was following her there, a week before her.

A trip to Bath for a month’s holiday might have been a small undertaking for some, but for the Mallows, who hadn’t spent a night away from Mr. Elmtree’s house since their moving in with him but for their two weeks’ visit with friends in Kent, it was an operation of major dimensions. There were many trips to the agent’s office to determine where they would stay, whether they must take their own linen and plate, what servants, if any, were provided, and a dozen other details. A week was hardly long enough to arrange it, but the great day was finally looming close before them.

Prudence was anxious to know one more thing before she left. When did Dammler intend to return to London?

She also wanted to tell someone he knew and whom he would be seeing where she was going. She didn’t hope he would actually drive all the way to Bath to see her, but she wanted him to know she was there, in case he should be in the vicinity. Lady Melvine occurred to her only to be rejected; they were not close enough to make such a quizzing visit possible. A much better person would be Murray, their publisher. She must tell him she was leaving. If she went in person, he might have news of Dammler. She went to his office the day before she left, and it was he who mentioned his most famous writer, but alas, he didn’t know when he would come back.

Nor at Finefields did Dammler know himself when he would be returning to town. He had arrived in a peaceful state of mind, happy to be away from the hurly-burly of London to get down to serious work. The first two days went amazingly well. Shilla agreed to part with her fakir with no reluctance at all-almost seemed glad to get rid of him. He knew his choosing Finefields for a retreat had raised eyebrows in certain quarters, but his and Lady Malvern’s relationship was not what it appeared to the world. She had quite a different lover hovering in the neighbourhood, but he was not known or glorious, and she was happy to give the illusion of being better occupied than she actually was. Dammler was content to let the world think what it would; it gave him some measure of relief from the other importunate females who badgered him. They met only at meals, and for a ritual flirtation under her husband’s nose for half an hour after dinner. Old Malvern took it as a personal insult if you didn’t fall in love with his lovely wife. He was more jealous of her suitors than she, and more demanding. He would not have approved of Mr. Varley, the present possessor of Constance’s heart.

Dammler wrote in the mornings, rode or hunted in the afternoon, for he was an active person and couldn’t stay cooped up all day, and returned to his work at night. But after almost two days of successful writing, he came to a halt. Shilla, having parted with her fakir, dug in her heels and refused utterly to return to either the Prince or the Mogul. Under duress, he forced her back to the first, then the other, but she wouldn’t say a clever word. He could not think a sullen, scowling face would please the audience at Drury Lane for two acts. He wished Miss Mallow were there for him to talk to. Shilla had a lot of Prudence in her, he realized. What would Prudence do in such a circumstance? She had turned off her hypocritical Doctor friend, just as Shilla had given her fakir the boot. He wondered if the Ashington incident had influenced him. Very likely, and here he had thought it a fine inspiration on his part.

Sitting at the Louis XVI desk in Lord Malvern’s spacious study set aside for his use he found himself thinking about Miss Mallow more than his play. Well, they were related-he had really turned Shilla into a good likeness of Prudence. The same sharp tongue, the same innocent mind in a milieu too sophisticated for her, though Prue would die sooner than admit it. Their many conversations replayed themselves in his head. Well then, quit deceiving yourself; Shilla is anyone but Prudence. Give her her head, and let us see what develops. Miss Mallow’s heroine-surely herself in disguise-did not sit down halfway through the book and content herself with turning off one lover without having a better one in view. He needed a new character to be acceptable to Shilla-Prudence. Now why was it himself in his literary guise as Marvelman that darted into his head? Why was it himself and no one else he wanted to put into the last acts to rescue Shilla from her woes? Would Prudence approve? “Patience,” he thought, would not. “Looks are not enough,” “a handsome face,” “a fine tooth and a tumbling lock of black hair” were soon replaced by a worthier hero.

Dammler looked into the large gilt-framed mirror across the room, and the first thing that struck his eye was the black lock falling across his brow. Oh, yes, she was too polite to say it, but it was this lock of hair she took exception to. “A fashionable fribble” she had called Hero Number One, and had replaced him by chapter ten. His black jacket, tailored by Weston, set to perfection on his fashionable shoulders. His white cravat was immaculate and tied intricately. Even alone, working at his desk, he was not dishevelled. How often he had gone into Prue’s ascetic little study and seen her head over her work, ink on her fingers, and her hair tumbling about her ears or tucked up under that cap!

“You are quite the ‘Tulip,’ ass!” he told his reflection. He had flaunted his Phyrne in her face, and called her prude. Shilla vanished from his mind and it was now only of Prudence and himself that he thought. His thoughts were not pleasant company. Prudence could hardly think worse of him if he had purposely set out to disgust her. Not a redeeming trait. Women and warm talk, urging her to have Seville, running down Ashington in a fashion she disliked-in a jealous, spiteful manner. How had he not realized, when he wanted to kill Ashington, that he loved Prudence? He had some thought of it the last time he had seen her. More outrageous behaviour! Had whined and begged for sympathy by parading his poor weak attempts at virtue before her, and telling her he was an orphan. What a fool! What a snivelling, underhanded way to try to get around her. But she wasn’t fooled for a minute. “I wasn’t hellraking last night either, but I hadn’t meant to brag to you about it.”

So, jackanapes, you are in love with a clever little prude, and like the simpleton you are, have turned her against you. You will have to get busy and do a volte face to win her over. After a day’s deliberation, he did put Marvelman into the play. Wills would like it-Marvelman had gone over well, and his appearance would ensure some interest in the play. But he’d have to keep Wills from putting an eye patch on whomever played the part. He worked hard, often with success, but as often with worries scuttling through his head that had nothing to do with the play. He postponed his return to London in hopes of finishing it and of being free for romance when he got there.

In the second week of his visit, his man of business found a building he considered suitable for his Magdalen House, and he took a few days off to inspect it. While in the vicinity, he also went to Longbourne Abbey to begin putting it in shape. He didn’t want to have it in a shambles when they arrived. Presumption! In his mind it was quite a settled thing that Prudence would accept him.

And then Hettie’s letter arrived to send his plans all to pieces.