“The beast. If she is to be a bonne bouche, as she calls it, for anyone, she would do better to stick with her prince. Do you think if you relented and gave her the chicken coop…"
“We’ve been all through that,” he shook his head. “I even promised to throw ina couple of geese and a duck, but she took it for a canard.” The hands went up in derision at his own poor pun.
“What a fowl-that’s f-o-w-l thing to do.”
“You don’t have to spell it out to me, Miss Mallow. You are falling into bad habits with your new suitor. But Ihad better withdraw that, before you have a few words to say on the subject of bad habits yourself. Reverting to Shilla, it was my letting her away from the harem in the first place that did the mischief. All your fault. I followed your intuition.”
“I had an inkling it might be laid at my door. I wonder you still care for her. Her attachment to the fakir seems enough to turn off any sensible fellow.”
“I am conspicuously lacking in sense where women are concerned. I am taking her away for a holiday to see if I can bring her to reason.”
“Usually works, does it?”
“Shrew. Wills is anxious to get her on the boards for the fall Season, and she’s a long way from finished. There are too many distractions in London.”
“Are you going home then, to Longbourne Abbey?”
“No, the Malverns have asked me to Finefields. I finished the last batch of my cantos there earlier.”
“I see.” It was pretty generally known that he had done more than write his cantos there. Even Prudence had heard of his affair with Lady Malvern. “Are you sure you won’t find distraction there waiting for you?” she asked pertly.
“Yes, Mama, quite sure. And I shan’t drink to excess or stay up too late either. You refer, I collect, to the Countess. The rumours of my indecent affairs are grossly exaggerated, Prudence. I am not quite the lecher I am made out.” He looked at her long and searchingly as he said this, as if to reinforce his meaning.
“It is none of my business. I had no right to infer…”
“No, and no right to look at me last night as though I were a ghost either. You looked-awful.”
“I was merely surprised-coming on you so suddenly and unexpectedly. And I was very tired, too.”
“So was I. In fact, I went straight home to bed. Alone,” he added the last word deliberately.
“Dammler!” she said impatiently, colouring quickly. “You know you should not say such things to me. It is quite improper.” Her eyes slid to the carefully closed door. Improper, too, for her to be here alone with him, cap or no.
“Surely my specifying I was alone saves it from any taint of depravity,” he said, following her eyes to the door and smiling.
“It is exactly what makes it wrong, and you know it well. The question ought not to have arisen.”
“I thought it had arisen in your mind, however, and wished to remove the doubt. The statement, in short, was unexceptionable, and the fault lies in yourself. ‘Honi soit qui mal y pense,’ as our polyglot friend the Doctor would say, if he had the wit. We have established by repeating two or three times with no foundation that you are a baggage, Prudence, and you have just confirmed it. If you were half the prude you let on you are, your mind would not have coloured my innocent statement red.”
“I was a prude-a proper lady, I mean,” she corrected as his smile widened into a grin, “until I met you. It is you with your voluptuous harem girls and double-entendres and so on that has been the undoing of me.”
“I wouldn’t say you’re quite undone yet,” he said rather seriously, but he was never serious for long, and was soon back teasing her. “Have I not a dozen times hinted you off from rakes and roués, and pointed out the danger of an excess of flowers and diamonds?”
“Yes, and brought more mischief into my study than ever you kept out of it.”
“I do apologize for Ashington. I ought not to have inflicted that bore on you.”
“He is the least reprehensible person you have introduced me to.”
“God knows he is reprehensible enough.”
“If you pass me in the streets two years hence hanging on some Cit’s arm, wearing the title Phyrne, I hope you will feel at least a pang of guilt.”
“My sweet conscience, don’t say such appalling things to me,” he laughed uncomfortably. “Emotional blackmail is the lowest form of trick. Still, I had rather see you in that title than Mrs. Ashington. I would not think you so utterly lost to any chance of temporal happiness."
“I suspect our ideas of happiness are as divergent as those of love.”
“You are bringing me round to a more proper notion of love. You and Shilla between you. I remember what you said, and she might give me her views while I am at Finefields with her.”
“And Lady Malvern.”
“And Lord Malvern. Your baser nature obtrudes again, Prudence. I’ll escape before you make me sign a pledge of chastity, like a priest or nun. May I see you once again before I leave? Tomorrow…"
“Yes, surely.”
“Morning or afternoon-which is convenient for you?”
“Either one. Say morning.”
“Morning. Don’t I say it well? Obedient as a puppy, you see. Adieu, Prudence.”
She shook her head at his foolishness and they parted, restored to perfect amity and only an empty feeling of sadness clinging with Prudence at the prospect of her study being deprived of mischief in the near future. Looking around at it, she remembered their different visits- strange how it shrank to a prison when Ashington was there with the door wide open, and expanded to a universe when Dammler came in and closed the door behind him. She hardly knew what to make of this last visit. His anger was still not explained to her complete satisfaction. He obviously hated Ashington-she had not known that when the matter of the articles had arisen, but was coming to understand it after her evening at the drama lecture. She was beginning to dread the sight of Ashington herself, and his learning was impressing her less than formerly. Why was his company so dull, when he knew so much? But then, whose company would not be dull after Dammler? A vision of his laughing face floated before her eyes. She would always picture Dammler laughing. So happy, joking, even swearing when he shouldn’t before her, and saying outrageous things. But with a serious side, too-his charity girls, his talk now of politics, and leaving… He wouldn’t ask her to Longbourne, of course. Once he got away he’d forget her, find new friends. She was merely a part of one episode of his life-of this one spring. She’d never forget or regret it, never be the same person after knowing him and all the different aspects of life he had exposed her to. Well, she was the better for the experience, but how she dreaded the future.
Chapter 13
Dammler had every intention of calling on Miss Mallow before leaving for Finefields. To amuse her, he even drew up a ridiculous charter of behaviour, promising not to drink, gamble or so on during his visit, and intended to extract a similar document from her. He had it in his pocket when he went to see Murray to consult with him on business before leaving, and became involved in a longer meeting than he hoped for. It was suddenly lunch time, and too late to call on Prudence before afternoon. She had not seemed particular when he came, so he went to a club with Murray without a worry of missing her.
Back at Grosvenor Square, Prudence sat waiting impatiently, pretending to work while looking at the clock every ten minutes. What a fool I am, she thought. He will not come at all. It won’t be the first time he has broken an appointment. He had lied to me before too-she recalled his pretending to have read her book when she knew well he had given it to Hettie unread. As to saying he meant only to work at Finefields, that surely had not even been intended to be taken seriously. Why should he go to Finefields to work, when his own place would be more private, surely more agreeable for work. She felt her anger to be unfair. If a famous celebrity, a bachelor and a lord, chose to conduct his life in the same manner as his peers, who was she to take offence? It was impertinent of her to take such an officious interest in his private life, and impossible not to.