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  Mrs. Mallow’s brother Clarence had for several years provided the two ladies a roof over their heads free of cost, and his wishes were always deferred to in these little matters.

  “Certainly I’ll ask him,” Prudence said happily. It was one of life’s little mysteries to her that Clarence rubbed along so well with all Dammler’s relatives. Truth to tell, she had been half ashamed to produce him for inspection, but from the first he had made a hit. It was his lack of any sense of inferiority in himself that put him over. He was as undaunted by public opinion as those exalted personages who considered themselves well above public censure. He cared for approval, but never once was bothered by the idea that he might not attain it.

  Her breakfast finished, Prudence went to the saloon to find Clarence already dressed for the street, with his hat in his hand, his gloves on and malacca walking stick at the ready.

  “Good morning, Lady Melvine. Are you coming with us to Berkeley Square?” she asked.

  “Indeed I am. What time is Dammler calling for you?”

  “No hour was set actually. He expected to be up late after the bachelor party.”

  “He said early!” Hettie advised her.

  “We’ll go and wake him up,” Clarence said at once, very eager to be into Lady Melvine’s carriage. More eager for this treat than to see the house, actually.

  “I wouldn’t like to do that, Uncle,” Prudence said, hoping to restrain him.

  "I’ll take the responsibility,” Hettie said. “He told me early, the wretch, and I had myself called at the ungodly hour of eight-thirty on purpose.”

  Clarence, who never arose later than eight, said “Eight-thirty! You are an early riser!”

  “Not usually, but as the villain got me up at the crack of dawn, I’ll haul him out by the ear. See if I don’t.”

  After a few more attempts at stalling, Prudence was talked into going by the others, and they all three set off to Dammler’s rooms at Albany. When the carriage pulled up to the door, Clarence alit to open the door for the ladies, but said he would “just wait outside,” for he had high hopes that some friend would chance by and see him lounging at his ease inside a crested carriage, and he would be able to tell him he awaited his nevvie, Lord Dammler, the poet.

  Prudence and Hettie went inside, their eyes accustomed from a few visits to the eastern decor of the place. Ottomans and leather hassocks stood in lieu of sofas and chairs. The tables, too, were brought back from Persia, short tables with nacre inlays, and one trivet table made entirely of brass. It was odd and interesting rather than beautiful. “The brothel,” Hettie called it quite bluntly.

  The butler appeared not only surprised but acutely uncomfortable to see them in, and asked them to await his lordship in the saloon. They accepted this, but had not been seated a minute until Hettie arose saying, “I’ll go and hurry him along. He’s probably sound asleep.” Prudence nodded and remained where she was, but after a few minutes she decided to continue her wait in Dammler’s library, always a place of interest to her.

  The library took her next door to Dammler’s bedroom, and as the door stood partially open, she could hear very distinctly what was being said.

  “How did you come to do such a thing!” Hettie exclaimed, in a very shocked voice, and she was not a lady who was easily shocked.

  “It just happened. I can’t explain now. For God’s sake get rid of her, Hettie. Get Prudence out of here.”

  “What excuse can I use?”

  “Say I’m sick--say what you like, but get her out of here!”

  Prudence stood listening, thinking she must have misheard, misunderstood. Dammler was furious that she had come. Why should he be?

  He spoke again. “I’ll meet you at Berkeley Square in half an hour. Now go, before she comes in and catches me like this.” His voice sounded deranged.

  She didn’t know what to think. Within the space of seconds she envisaged him ill, wounded, suffering from some disfiguring disease or accident. She took a step towards the door, her heart in her mouth, prepared, she thought, for anything. She found she was mistaken. She certainly was not prepared to see him standing hale and hearty in a flamboyant dressing gown with a cup of coffee in his hand and a voluptuous blond lady in his bed, with a table set for two beside it. The female wore next to nothing--some scanty bit of white diaphanous material, possibly an undergarment.

  Prudence took one step into the room and two back. Then she advanced again, slowly, looking around at the disorder of the chamber--an evening gown thrown over a table, silk stockings on the floor, Dammler’s coat hanging on a door knob. Then she looked at the female. She was exquisite. A cloud of platinum curls, a pair of large green eyes, a heart-shaped face. The girl opened red lips and laughed inanely, revealing perfect teeth. “Who are you?” she asked in a sweet, childish voice.

  Prudence didn’t answer the question, nor was it necessary for her to return it. She knew well enough who this vision was. Cybele. Dammler’s former mistress, still current mistress, as well. She had seen them together before at the opera. Cybele was not the sort of apparition one could forget, hard as she might try. Prudence stood a long minute staring at her, longer than she wanted to. While she kept her eyes riveted on Cybele, she didn’t have to look at Dammler. She couldn’t bear to look at him, but as though her eyes had a will of their own, they turned to him, pulling her head with them. He looked awful--sick and frightened, the way she felt. Her lips moved but no words came out.

  “Prudence,” he said. It was hardly even a whisper-- just a low sigh of regret.

  “Why?” she asked him, the one word all she could utter.

  He couldn’t manage an answer. He just stood, looking at her, as guilty as sin. Then he closed his eyes and squeezed them shut hard, as though to block out his vision of her. When he opened them half a minute later, she was gone. With the last vestige of her strength and wits, she had turned and fled the room, fled the apartment and the building. Clarence was still in the carriage. She got in and said, “Take me home.”

  He thought she was ill; she looked so white, her eyes moist and staring. He shouted to Lady Melvine’s groom to “Spring ‘em.” He would have liked to ask her questions, but deemed her too sick to answer. The novelty of this rather pleased him. Dammler would be dashing over in a minute to see how she did. He would send for Knighton, the royal family’s and his own physician. A little notice in the Observer, perhaps, would not go amiss.

  Back at the apartment, Hettie took Dammler in hand. “Go after her. Make up some story,” she advised him.

  “Hettie, I don’t have to lie! It’s not what you think.”

  “My dear, it is not in the least necessary to sham it with me. I recognize your ladybird.” She smiled quite cordially at Cybele, who smiled back, then hopped out of bed, revealing her gorgeous body, only nominally covered by the wisp of chiffon.

  “Get back in there!” Dammler shouted. She pouted, but obeyed him on the instant.

  Hettie fairly swooned with delight. She hadn’t had such fun in months, and it cheered her to discover Miss Mallow didn’t have such a tight line on Dammler as she had thought. Really it was a shame for him to go getting married so soon. While these thoughts flitted through her mind, Dammler was pulling off his dressing gown, tossing it to the floor, grabbing up a jacket, all in a state of terrible distraction.

  “Stay here!” he called to Cybele, then flew out the door with his black hair falling across his forehead. The carriage was gone. He rushed into the street, hailing a passing cab. He hopped in and directed it to Clarence Elmtree’s address, assuming Prudence had gone home, as indeed she had, arriving there five minutes before him. She hadn’t said a word to Clarence, who thus ushered Nevvie straight into his best saloon, where she had succumbed to shock on the sofa.

  “Nevvie is come to see how you go on. I have sent a boy off for Knighton. He will have her up and about in no time,” he said aside to Dammler. “A very sudden fit came over her. Gave me quite a turn. A weakness--I suppose it
is nerves. She was always nervous,” he rambled on. Then as the two remained rigid, glaring at each other like gladiators about to enter combat, he decided to leave them to it. A little lovers’ tiff. They would patch it up better without an audience.

  Dammler was the first to speak. “I can explain everything, Prudence!”

  “I’m not a moron. When I see your mistress in your bed, I know what to think.”

  “I was drunk,” he said, a desperate note creeping into his voice. “You know I had a bachelor’s party thrown for me last night. It’s part of the ritual to try to drink the groom under the table.”

  “Is it part of the ritual to drink him under the sheets, too?” she asked.

  “There were no girls there, if that’s what you’re implying.”

  “Where was Cybele? At home waiting for you?”

  “No! Well--yes, in a way she was. She came to the apartment while I was out, and my butler let her in. She had run away from her latest patron. He was drunk as a skunk and threatened to beat her. She didn’t know where to go, poor girl, and ran back to me.”

  “She knew where to go, all right! She knew where she’d be welcome.” She suddenly noticed her voice was high, strident. She hadn’t thought she’d be able to say a word, but found she was glad to vent her anger on him. How dare he ruin her life?

  “She wasn’t welcome! Drunk as I was, I knew she shouldn’t stay.”

  “But she did stay, didn’t she, Dammler? She stayed and spent the night with you!”

  “Yes, she stayed. What was I supposed to do--turn her out in the streets at three o’clock in the morning? Have a heart, Prudence.”

  “I have a heart, and I have eyes and a mind too, and my mind doesn’t like what my eyes see. How could you do such a thing? Our wedding only two weeks away!”

  “I don’t know. At three o’clock this morning, it seemed the right, the charitable thing to do, and to hell with convention.”

  “You were never much of a one for convention, but you’ve outdone even yourself this time. I didn’t like the fact that you had a mistress before our engagement. I didn’t like your constantly dashing off to Finefields with Lady Malvern, and quite frankly, I didn’t like many of the things you said to me, an unmarried lady. Too unconventional for my simple tastes. I was right. I should have listened to myself. You’re too far beyond convention for me.”

  “You’re not going to break off our marriage just because I let Cybele stay overnight!” he shouted, in the tone of a command, but the anger in his voice was edged with fear. Already he was regretting not having pushed the wedding ahead in Bath.

  "The very fact that you think it negligible makes me realize how different we are. I think it was a gross, unforgivable, horrible thing for you to do. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw it. I was...“ She stopped, unable to find words to express her disgust.

  “I know you were,” he said, apparently reading her mind. "Prudence, I’d do anything if this could have been prevented.”

  “It could have been, Allan! It was surely not impossible for you to put her into your carriage and send her to an hotel, or go to one yourself.”

  “I didn’t think of that! I wish I had. I told you I’d been drinking. I meant to send her away this morning.”

  “And never tell me a word about it. I’m glad I went. I’m glad I saw you two together. It may be horrible for a while, but I’ll get over it. We would never have suited. I’m not marrying you.”

  She pulled the engagement ring from her finger and handed it to him.

  “You don’t trust me. That’s what you’re saying,” he said, reproachful, but still angry.

  “Yes, that is exactly what I am saying. I no more trust you with Cybele than I’d trust a dog with a roast.”

  “I didn’t sleep with her.”

  “I think you did.”

  “I tell you I didn’t!” he shouted, the pulse in his temple throbbing. He looked at her, waiting, but he saw no signs of wavering, of backing down. “Well?”

  “That’s your story, and you’re welcome to stick to it. In that case I expect I shall be indicted as the villain of the piece, turning you off for no good reason. A flirt--a jilt! A new role for me. As well some of the bloom has been brushed off my innocence by association with you. Three months ago no one would have believed it of me, but a lady who managed to get herself engaged to you will be considered up to anything. Your gilded reputation will escape untarnished--this time.”

  “You know I don’t give a damn about that.”

  “You don’t give a damn about anything except chasing girls. Go on--go back to her. Give her the diamond ring. You had her dripping with gems from ears to wrists, but you neglected to give her a diamond ring you once told me.”

  His nostrils flared dangerously. She expected some searing tirade, but he just turned and strode out of the room. She sat on alone with dry eyes, her shoulders sagging, listening as he banged his way down the hall, out the front door. Then she went up to her room and cried on the bed.

  Chapter Three

  Clarence had a busy day. He realized there was some little altercation between the lovebirds, but was too much the optimist to consider it serious. Prudence’s mother, Wilma, shook her head sadly and told him he’d better send in the notice to the papers canceling the wedding, but he pooh-poohed this as nonsense. “A lovers’ quarrel. The course of true love never runs smooth. My wife and I had a dozen fallings out. You don’t go turning off a marquess just for that.”

  “It is more serious than that, Clarence. The fact is, he had a woman in his apartment.”

  “What of that? He’s a poet. Some lady or other calling on him. They are a trifle unconventional.”

  “It wasn’t a lady,” she said discreetly, hoping she would have to say no more.

  “By gad... You mean...“ He cocked an eyebrow and gave a sly little smile. She nodded her head.

  “The rascal! He is up to all the rigs. And the wedding not two weeks off. I should think he could have waited... Well, well. So that is why she is in the boughs! I thought it was something serious.”

  “It is serious,” Wilma pointed out gently. “I always felt his character to be unsteady. He is a jolly fellow, very easy to like, but I confess I was always worried by his reputation.”

  “Pooh! What is one more woman to the likes of Dammler? They are all running after him. Prudence is lucky to have a look-in at all. She knew he wasn’t a saint.”

  Wilma rolled an uncomprehending eye at him, and was glad when the door knocker sounded to interrupt them. Not so glad when Dr. Knighton was admitted, and she had the unwelcome chore of telling the foremost physician in London her daughter did not wish to see him.

  “I hurried away from Princess Marie to come here!” Knighton said, astonished at such a reception.

  Clarence smiled benignly, storing up this lovely morsel for relaying to his crones. “Run back to her,” he advised the doctor. “It doesn’t do to offend the royal family. They might take it amiss and hire another doctor. Just leave a few drops of something for my niece."

  “Your note said it was urgent--most urgent!”

  “It is. She’s too sick to see you,” Clarence explained happily. Knighton looked to Mrs. Mallow for guidance, rather wondering whether it wasn’t the gentleman before him who was ill of a brain fever.

  He was finally gotten rid of, and made a silent vow that he would come no more to Grosvenor Square. Prudence stayed in her room, not melodramatically barring the door and refusing food and drink, but trying manfully to sip and nibble a little something. Her mother spent some time with her, giving her what she felt in her heart was good advice, though it was not the advice the daughter wished to hear. Mrs. Mallow had always had reservations regarding Dammler. Certainly he was handsome, rich, talented, titled, personable and all the rest, but he was too high a flyer for her Little Prudence. He was known in several countries as a famous flirt. What had good, simple people like themselves to do with such a man?

  “Bette
r you find out what he’s like now than later,” she consoled. “It will be hard at first, but there was that nice Mr. Springer at Bath who liked you, Prue, and Mr. Seville--you remember he wanted to marry you a month ago--so very eligible.”

  But Mr. Seville was already married to another, and Mr. Springer only a country gentleman with none of Dammler’s charm. There was only one Dammler in the world. She had won him, and she had lost him--to the muslin company. It was for the best, as Mama said, but why must the best seem so dreadfully like the very worst thing imaginable? She couldn’t bear to think of life without him. The happy dream of going to Longbourne Abbey, of helping him set up his hostel for unmarried mothers, of working and writing side-by-side with him both there and in London, of being included in the opening of his play, Shilla and the Mogul--all of it. Every single act of her future life had held the promise of bliss, and now it was reduced to this nothingness. To continue living with Uncle Clarence and Mama, doing the same dull things she had been doing forever, seeing Dammler no more. Or worse-- could it possibly be worse?--seeing him with someone else, some other girl, and eventually a wife.

  It was her own fault. She should never have allowed herself to fall in love with such a man, a notorious womanizer, really. His first fame was based on a public disclosure of his international affairs. Disguised of course, but based on fact. She knew all that, and idiot that she was, had thought she could reform him. Thought she had reformed him. He was not capable of reform, and this proved it. The thing to do was to put him out of her mind, forget she had ever known him. She had not been miserable before knowing him. She had been content, even happy when Murray had taken a couple of books. She would be happy again. Her eyes fell on her wedding gown, a beautiful white crepe de chine, an extravagant thing that Allan had insisted on, and paid for, incidentally. More lack of convention. More weakness on her part, to have let him. She had let him change her too much, too easily. Broad-minded they called it, to smile at their friends’ lovers and affairs, but before knowing him she would have called it sinful, and so it was. This was what came of it. Now she was expected to be broad-minded about her groom, but she hadn’t changed that much, and she thanked God for it.