Reprise Part 15

"Usually the way with those wild young blades. They make the best men after all, when they settle down. They are more understanding from having been about the world a bit. He has certainly settled down."

"He hasn't quite settled into an old man, yet," f.a.n.n.y Burney told them. "He was telling me he plans to go to Greece next spring. We may have another installment of theCantos from that trip."

"Thought he was thinking of getting married?" Moore asked.

"It may be a honeymoon he plans," she replied. "Odd, the match hasn't come off yet. I know Lady Melvine is all in favor of it. No doubt she is pus.h.i.+ng him too hard. One can only push Dammler so far, then he digs in both heels and bucks."

How well Prudence knew it!

"He's young yet," Moore answered, then the talk turned to other matters.

Prudence went home to consider that soon he would be out of the country. It would be almost a relief not to scan the streets for his form every time she went out, to go to a party without the churning in her breast in hopes of seeing him, to think every time the door knocker sounded that it was he, come to make it up at last. She was coming to realize there was to be no making up. He hadn't even been angry when he left, nor when they met since. His hot anger had turned to cold judgment against her. She couldn't believe it.

Dammler thought he had got his life under control at last. He was busy, useful, by no means dull. He attended many social functions, as many as his work in Parliament and his writing allowed. No one called him a wild buck any longer, nor was there any reason to. He had grown up. Had abandoned his lightskirts, but not women. He looked with the greatest interest at the eligible ladies, fancying himself from time to time to be falling in love with a bright eye or a flas.h.i.+ng dimple. Lady Catherine had lovely dimples. If only he weren't so busy he might find time to fall in love with her. That there was a great gaping hole at the center of all his busyness never occurred to him. He was too busy writing speeches, models of reasoning, and essays, brilliant a.n.a.lyses of the works of others with nothing of himself in them but his literary judgment.

It was impossible not to entertain a pa.s.sing thought of Prudence Mallow occasionally. Any mentionof s.h.i.+lla or the sonnets must bring a vision of her into mind. He wished her well. Sincerely he wished her success, and rather wished he might see a little more of her, too, for he always enjoyed talking to her. He felt he ought to explain to her why he had decided to publish the sonnets, only he didn't quite know himself, except that their suppression was given so much significance, and Murray kept after him to do it. He was always putty in the hands of his friends. He wanted to get married, so that any possible a.s.sociation with Prudence might become once and for all impossible. If you had to lose something you had loved, it was better to do it with a quick cut, and while they two were single, there seemed to be some invisible cord drawing him back to her. He was determined that would never happen. Heliked her, he told himself, but love with such a woman was impossible. He could never live with her. If he patted a servant girl's head or visited a female neighbor she'd be at his throat. It was his way-he was warm, impulsive, he reasoned coldly. Still he was finding it difficult to live in London without running back to her, so he decided to go on another trip. That would give him something to look forward to, something he could really put his heart into, and until spring rolled around he would plan his route and finish getting his bill through Parliament. Writing became such a bore he hardly bothered with it. Nothing creative was possible to him.

Christmas came and went, a lonely, miserable time for Prudence; a family affair at Longbourne Abbey with his aunt and some relatives for Dammler, then it was back to London. Things became dull at Grosvenor Square for Clarence. He missed his atelier. He missed Dammler and the rest of the set that had once favored him through his niece. He could not be hard on Prudence, losing Dammler, for he knew what she was going through. His heart, too, was broken, and a foolish heart aches as hard as a clever one. He mentioned going to Bath, a stunt that had worked in the past to send Dammler running back to Prue, but she was disinterested in going. As spring hovered in the not too distant future, he mentioned a tour of the lake district, a spot he thought might appeal to her, famous as it was for a poetic colony. This, too, was spurned. It seemed she wanted to stay exactly where she was. In desperation, he hit on Cornwall-had something to do with the book she was writing, taking her an age to get on with it. Oddly enough, this bleak spot hit a responsive cord.

It sounded different enough from London and Bath to provide some interest of a picturesque nature. The cold sea, the bleak, barren rock sh.o.r.e and the winds appealed to her present mood. There she might get Patience into her proper setting, and finish up her book. That it was on the coast, and she could look at the sea carrying Dammler away from her, held the sort of morbid fascination she indulged in at that dismal time of her life. Plans were forwarded, and at the end of January they were off in the traveling carriage with four horses to go to Cornwall. She did not prevent her uncle from inserting a notice in theObserver to the effect they were leaving, and though it brought several callers, it did not bring Dammler. He read it, feeling a wrench inside that she was leaving, but he would be leaving himself soon, so it was best to get used to the idea of their being miles apart.

With her safely outside the city, he could think of her more often without any danger of going to her. As a member of Parliament, he could also nip into the library and scan the Cornwall papers for her name. There was no mention of her having arrived, but as February drew to a close there began to appear a series of essays of a travelogue nature about the countryside and customs under her name. He read them all eagerly, picturing her walking over the hills, thinking these thoughts she wrote, and could almost imagine he was with her. Throughout March they appeared weekly, then the last week there was none. She had left, then, would be back before he had to leave the first week of June. He would call, say goodbye to her. It was foolish to act as though they were strangers. He had never denied to himself he liked her. He would be going to say goodbye to f.a.n.n.y Burney, to Tom and all his friends. Certainly he must say goodbye to Prudence Mallow and her family. He kept looking out in the London papers for her return, and began to wonder as mid-April turned into late-April and still she didn't come. A feeling of uneasiness came over him at the delay. What was taking her so long? Something must have happened.

The last week of April he stopped by f.a.n.n.y Burney's to visit, thinking he might hear if she were back unannounced. He had hardly taken a seat before f.a.n.n.y said, "It was too bad about Miss Mallow, was it not?"

"What about her?" he asked, while a wave of fear washed over him. What had happened? It had such a final sound to it, almost as though she were dead!

"Did you not hear of her accident?"

"What accident? I heard nothing!" His voice was loud in the small saloon.

"She was thrown from a horse in Cornwall, and was badly hurt."

"Prudence doesn't ride!"

"Does she not? Then that explains the accident-she must have been learning. I was to pay her a visit, you know. I am going to friends in Bristol and was invited to run down to Padstow to spend a week with her, but she is unable to receive me. Her mother wrote to cancel the trip."

"Hermother wrote? You mean she isn't even able to hold a pen! f.a.n.n.y, how bad is it?" He was on his feet.

"Why, she didn't say it was so very serious, but she took quite a spill. Her back was damaged her mother said, and she was unable to walk."

"Oh, my G.o.d! When did it happen?"

"Early in April. I wondered she stopped writing those articles in the paper. They were very good, don't you think?"

"f.a.n.n.y, you don't mean she'scrippled for life!"

"Oh no, Mrs. Mallow didn't say so. She is having trouble walking, is all she said."

"Where is she staying? Can you give me her address?"

"Yes, but I have already written and should hear soon..."

"Get it for me!"

"I have it written down somewhere-Dammler, you don't mean you aregoing to her?" she asked, as she began looking around herself for the address.

"Of course I'm going."

She didn't have to ask why. His face was white, his hand trembling so she had to write the address for him. She a.s.sured him the accident was not so terrible as he imagined, but he pictured Prudence lying on a bed, racked with pain, crippled, despondent,dying.

While he drove at madman's pace toward her, seeing in his mind this helpless wreck of a woman, she lay on a bed of pillows, being tempted with every delicacy the county offered. Her forgiving, understanding heart and her articles had made her a great favorite in the new neighborhood. There was a mystery and a romance around her, with the broken engagement and her solitary walks over the rocks. She was thought to have done the place a very pretty favor too, to write them up in the papers. Her back did give a twinge from time to time, of course. She had wrenched it rather badly when the mule-she would never have ventured on the back of a horse-slipped and she fell. She was sorry to have to put f.a.n.n.y off, but the countryside offered so few diversions that if she couldn't even walk about with her, it seemed a poor idea to ask her to come. Her fall, which had necessitated her walking home alone-the mule had bolted-had been less serious than the chill she had taken. She had a bad cold, and it was really this that confined her to her bed, and made her go off a little in her looks. She had lost three pounds, which Clarence was trying to get back on her by feeding her a.s.s's milk. The articles she had discontinued because she had already written all she could think of.

There was nothing to prevent her being up and about now but inertia, which Clarence called, and soon induced the doctor to call, melancholia, that she might have a known, discussable ailment. She hadn't the heart to get up off of her bed. For what? To face another day of walking to the seaside, of walking home and taking tea with Clarence, of saying to get away from him she thought she'd do a little writing, only to sit with a hateful white sheet before her and nothing to say? No, she lay in bed, reading novels and London newspapers a good week old that never said anything about Allan. At least they didn't say he had left, or got married. He might hear she was ill. If she got up and around, he could never hear she was ill. Oh, Dammler, you don't know the worst of me yet, she thought. You never called me conniving, but I am!

Such a long trip it was, over two hundred and fifty miles. Time to picture her not only crippled but dead, cold and buried, without ever telling her he was sorry. Why had he been such a fool? How had he imagined he could live without her? He hadn't imagined it, and he knew she couldn't live without him, either. He had done it to punish her. That was it. To get the upper hand once and for all, that she not be pointing out to him how wretchedly, miserablyawful he was. He knew she loved him; knew every time they met she hoped he would come to her. He could see her growing sorrier by the day, and wanted her to be good and sorry before he went back to her. Greece? He never intended to leave England, not alone in any case.

Chapter 19.

He arrived in Padstow latein the afternoon. Dusk was approaching by the time he found their cottage. When he was admitted at the door, he looked more ill than Prudence. He was haggard from the long trip, from worry, from not eating or sleeping worth a d.a.m.n.

"Lord Dammler!" Mrs. Mallow exclaimed in surprise.

"How is she?" were his first words, uttered before he removed his hat or said good day.

A caller at the cottage was enough of an occasion to bring Clarence trotting into the little hallway. Such a caller as Dammler was a rare and blessed event in this dull existence. It promised a new round of social doings. If Dammler came, society would not be far behind.

"She is flat on her back," was his greeting, spoken in perfectly cheerful accents. "A terrible fall she took.

She should never have tried riding, but she is so fond of those rocks out there we couldn't keep her home. She is become a regular goat for clambering over them, and writes up every trip, too. You've no idea the history attaching to that bunch of rocks. Prudence is looking into it at the library."

"Can I see her?"

"Prepare yourself for a shock," Clarence warned, while Wilma slipped upstairs to tell Prudence he was here. "She's fading away to a shadow."

Abovestairs, the mother said, "Prue, Dammler has come."

The answer was even less verbose. "Oh!" was all she could say. No more was necessary between them. It was all there. Wilma could not entirely approve of him, but she was happy he came, since it brought the light back to her daughter's eyes. Got her atlast up off her bed, flying to a mirror to brush her hair, put on a fresh cap and bed jacket. The exercise made her dizzy, bedridden as she had been for some time. She sunk weakly back on the mattress and pulled up the counterpane just as he tapped at the door.

"I'll leave you," Wilma said, feeling criminally irresponsible to do it. Her daughter didn't hear her.

Dammler stepped in, hesitant, frightened at what he would see. The crisis robbed her of color, left her limp against the pillows, her breath short. He thought she looked appallingly thin and wan, but he looked worse himself. She smiled softly, unable to keep her eyes quite dry. His impulse was to rush forward and take her into his arms, but with Clarence come upstairs and peeking over his shoulder, he could not. "So, Miss Mallow, malingering in your bed, are you?" he asked in a tone of forced heartiness. "You mean to go into a decline and become an interesting consumptive, no doubt."

"Come along, Clarence," Wilma said, and led him protesting down the hall.

Dammler advanced to the bedside. "You won't have the opportunity to lay it atmy door, my girl."

"I don't intend to," she answered weakly.

"Society will. Who but that loose liver of a Dammler could influence a maiden so ill? Loose liver-a terrible phrase! I envisage a discrete organ floating like a meringue in custard, waiting to attach itself to something it shouldn't, or collide with an unwary intestine. I'm babbling. Forgive me." The suddenly intense expression to his last speech indicated it was not his habitual babbling he asked to be forgiven.

She smiled to hear him speak so much like himself. "Incorrigible as ever."

"No! I am eager to be corrected! I've missed your restraining hand on my grosser-metaphors. How are you, Prue?"

"They tell me I'll live. You look pale, Allan. Why don't you sit down?" She indicated a chair by the bedside. "What have you been doing with yourself'? Are you doing any writing?"

"A little." This was not what he wished to discuss at all, but he took his cue from her. "Perhaps you'll look it over when you are feeling better. It will return you into the hips very likely. Hit it hard with your red pencil. It's dreadful stuff, really. Lugubrious."

"That doesn't sound like you."

He was up from the chair, bending over her. "It was me without you, Prudence," he said, gazing at her intently. "That is a different thing from mewith you. I've missed you so," he said, smiling a smile that was close to tears. "Oh what a poor thing language is! I'm supposed to be a poet, and what do I bleat out? I miss you! A banker would do better. I have been distracted, demented, half crazy,empty without you. When I heard you were ill I panicked. Came galloping down at a pace Clarence would admire, with my heart in my mouth every step of the way, picturing you dead when I got here-and there's so much I want to say to you. It killed me to think I had been so foolish, so proud, so consummate an a.s.s as to let my pride-oh yes, I've managed to corner the market on that one too!-my pride and a fear of rebuff stand in the way of making it up with you."

"No, now you are stealing my sin."

"It was worse than pride. It was vengeance. I wanted tohurt you, Prue, as you hurt me. And I love you better than anything in the world. Here I am, spilling out my soul again, while you lie there silent as a spy. You'll have to brace yourself for one word at least. Yes or no. Can I stay?" He looked at her closely, biting her lower lip, unsure now of his reception.

"Oh Allan! Of course you can stay."

"I don't refer to Cornwall. Pray don't tell me it is a free country, as you did in Bath. Can I stay withyou, always?"

"Yes, if you want to attach your floating meringue to this old organ, feel free."

"You have just bought yourself a most tenacious barnacle, lady," he said smiling, and reaching down he kissed the top of her head.

"Cheap at the price, too! One word."

"That, my dear heart, is but the down payment. I'll pry more words out of you shortly, when you're feeling better." He stopped and looked acutely uncomfortable, not only physically, leaning over her, but at some mental disease as well. He sat gingerly on the side of the bed. "I doubt this is approved behavior for a sickroom. Does it disturb you?"

"No," she answered, disturbed to the marrow of her bones, but in a highly felicitous way.

He grasped her two hands in his. "Prue-how sick are you? Tell me the truth-everything. I mean, even if it's something unthinkable like being bedridden for life, or a year to live..."

She felt foolish indeed to have to confess her malady was no more than a broken heart, that she had, in fact, been malingering, cosseting herself quite shamelessly.

"Oh, no! It's nothing like that. It's more of an-an indisposition. A sort of melancholia, the doctor calls it," she admitted.

"f.a.n.n.y Burney said you had taken a spill from a horse and hurt your back."

"Oh, is that how you heard? Well to tell the truth, Allan, the fall was not serious. It was only a mule, but I took a chill, you see."

"I knew there was something wrong. I knew before I heard. I was uneasy all month. I had an apprehension something dreadful had happened to you. I should have come sooner."

"It was only a bout of melancholia."

"I've had one of those, too. You are going to be de-melancholized very swiftly, you hear? I'll come and tell you amusing stories, do tricks, stand on my head if you like-even on Bond Street, put on my cap and jingle my bells until there isn'tan atomy of melancholy left in you. There's a pun for you to start getting cured with."

"The cure promises to be as bad as the disease."

"And you're too thin, too. I'll stuff you with cream and eggs and champagne and caviar to get you back on your pins in time for a June wedding. All right?"

"It sounds so agreeable I won't be in a hurry to get out of my convalescence. I might just malinger into a big, fat, cosseted, champagne-stuffed cat."

"That you won't! You'll be out of that bed and into your wedding gown we had made up last spring before June. Then you can take to your bed for as long as you like, but you'll take me with you." He laughed. "I guess I haven't changed so much after all, have I? Ever the reprobate. And Ireally thought I was cured!"

"It seems to beme who brings out the worst in you! You were as proper as a judge all the time you were away from me. But a cat and dog-what is to be expected of such a match but that they will fight to the finish. Nothing left but the claws and fur."

"Oh, G.o.d, Prue, I was never so miserable in my life. This past fall and winter have been aneternity long. The only things that stand out with any clarity in my mind are the few times I metyou. At f.a.n.n.y's remember? -where we talked about Rogers, and you said he was always building dungeons in the air? I wanted so much to follow you home that day and tell you we were doing the same, but I was too busy putting locks on all the doors of my dungeon, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g racks and chains into the walls to torture you with. It's so good to be able to talk to you again. A bracingsoul -ar breeze for my tired spirit. That is spelled..."

"Yes, I know, Allan. It does not refer to the sun."

"You always understood me so completely. Words are hardly necessary between us. Yet they are our stock-in-trade with the rest of the world. I like the notion that we are different, closerentre nous deux than to the rest." There was a sound in the hallway, and he stopped. "I think the world is about to intrude, dammit."

Clarence tapped on the door and stepped in. "Well, well, I see you have got the roses back in her cheeks, Nevvie. There is nothing like a little bundling to put the roses in a girl's cheeks, try as we might with berries and a.s.s's milk."

"What you required all along is a jacka.s.s, you see, not a milcher," Dammler replied quizzingly, then a quick flash to Prudence, where no words were necessary to tell each what the other was thinking. There had been a prime jacka.s.s present all along.

"Eh?" Clarence asked frowning. But he was soon diverted from the riddle by more pressing interests. "I suppose you have been wondering just how soon we can get Prudence back on her legs?" he asked, and went on to answer himself. "She will be well in no time. A day or two in the garden, and a day or two to get everything ready."

"Ready for what, Uncle?" she asked with a mischievous smile, knowing well he referred to the all-important wedding that would make him uncle to a marchioness. "Ready for anything," he answered comprehensively. He soon went on to pinpoint it a little more closely. "The dress is as good as new-the white outfit never worn and only wanting pressing. A simple note will get Lady Melvine and any other lords and ladies you'd like to have attend. You'll want a few t.i.tles for the papers."

That it would take longer than this to get a note to London was irrelevant. The nuptials were to be advanced at a speed that allowed of no more misunderstandings, even at the cost of losing a few t.i.tles. "Sat.u.r.day, shall we say?" he asked eagerly.

"Uncle-it is already Tuesday!" Prudence pointed out. "Sounds good to me," Dammler agreed, every jot as eager as the uncle. "Well it does not sound good tome!" Prudence objected. "Don't be so eager," Clarence advised in a perfectly audible aside. "You can wait until Sat.u.r.day." "You mentioned June, Allan. What of my stuffing with champagne and caviar?" "Plenty of time for that when you are a marchioness," her uncle cautioned. "Have all the champagne you want then."

"All you can drink," Dammler promised rashly.

"More," Clarence a.s.sured her. "So, is it to be Sat.u.r.day?"

The two lovers exchanged looks, questioning, hopeful. "Sat.u.r.day it is," Dammler announced, and soon

found himself having his hand nearly wrenched from its wrist, while Clarence thumped his back.

"I'll just get a note off to Sir Alfred and Mrs. Hering and Lady Melvine," he said, and mercifully left them alone.

"Will you be well enough by Sat.u.r.day, do you think?" Dammler asked her.

She felt well enough for it that very minute, and looked remarkably improved too, with her eyes glowing