Reprise Part 4

"Very true," Dammler answered unfazed. "Pope Alexander would turn in his grave to know what base use his desk is to be put to."

"Oh, your verses ain't that bad, Nevvie. I like them excessively. I hadn't heard they had run so short of cash in Rome they were auctioning their pieces off."

"Shall we go on out before we have the whole throng in here?" Dammler asked as he heard Hettie's group approach.

"They are at my heels, are they?" Clarence asked, not at all annoyed with the persistence of his fans. "We had better run along then. I see the crowd is thinning. I'll take you home, Prudence. It is after three, and you will be getting sleepy." It was himself who was having trouble keeping his eyes open. He was sorry to have to pull himself away, but with the euphoria of having patched up things between the lovers, he did it.

Dammler accompanied them to the front door, thanking them for coming, and a.s.suring them he would go to them the next day. Prudence clutched his book, resigned to leave only because she was so anxious to begin reading it. Tomorrow when he came she would tell him about her own awful book, andmake him understand.

Chapter 6.

Dammler's party was not overbefore four. He went into his study for a last look around to see what it was that had annoyed Prudence when first she entered. It wasn't the lady's desk, after all. She still loved him, so it should have pleased her, but it hadn't. Really it seemed to be his own desk that bothered her. Did she want a private study; was that it? His mind ran over possible rooms that could be turned into one, though he particularly wanted to share this room with her. He went to give a last good night to Alexander Pope's desk, with a lingering smile at Uncle's nonsense. The man was better than a joke book.

Absentmindedly he picked up the book,Babe in the Woods, and carried it with him upstairs. He always read half an hour before sleeping. As he felt his reading would be little attended this night, he didn't much care what he read. Glancing at the t.i.tle, he made himself a bet the t.i.tle was wrongly interpreted. The female author would take it to mean a child lost in the woods, or some more civilized symbol, probably a girl out of her element in society, whereas the true origin of the phrase referred to a person set in the stocks. He read two pages, enough to realize he had won his bet with himself, but as he rather enjoyed the author's style, he read on a little further. A phrase here and there reminded him of Prudence, enough to keep him going. By the end of the first chapter, he had concluded someone was copying her style, using her trick of saying one thing and letting it be known by the circ.u.mstances quite another was meant. But not so well done as Prudence, he decided loyally.

The end of Chapter Two made him think that not only her style but a little something of her own story was creeping in, too. Someone, some jealous cat-really there was a viperish touch here that was not at all like Prue-was writing a parody of the two of them, or so it seemed to him. He read on with the keenest interest now, confirming that it was about them. He was finished with Volume One in an hour, as he was a quick reader, and when he laid it down, there was a question on his face. It wasn't possible Prudence had written this thing. But how very odd that so many of his own ideas were running around in the book, distorted, placed in a new context to make them worse, but still his own ideas-original ones. He hadn't read far into the second volume without realizing that the perpetrator was none other than Prudence Mallow. Certain pa.s.sages left not a single doubt. Ideas he had shared with no one but herself, and here they were, coming back at him, word for word. Hettie too-certainly "Lady Maldire" was Hettie, with an a.s.sortment of rings replacing her customary excess of brooches.

He was so angry the blood thumped in his temples, and so intrigued he had no thought of putting the book down without finishing it that night, which was already nearly morning. The sun was rising when he laid the second volume aside, his face set in a rigid mask of fury. So this was the mystery of her having given Murray a ma.n.u.script and not wishing to tell him about it! This was why she had been distraught in the study- and saying she had neverseen the book! How she must have been laughing up her sleeve! While he had all but idolized her, writing the finest poems he had ever written in her honor, she had been wallowing in this muck. Making him a laughingstock, and herself a saint. She must have thought she had well and truly lost him, to have pulled this stunt. This was her payment for Cybele, and Cybele was in the book to the life, with her platinum curls tarnished to copper. Her sweet smiles, her joy at winning him back-how to explain that? She'd rather have a real live marquess than mere revenge, perhaps. She had used a pseudonym in case he was fool enough to come trotting back to her. There'd be no going back after this. Even a mutt-howdare she call him a mutt!-would not grovel this low.

In his anger he pulled the two books apart and flung them into the cold grate, then fished in after the pieces, reading the loose pages again, with a new shot of anger at every line. He didn't bother with the farce of going to bed. He changed into morning clothes and went to Hettie's a good four hours before she was likely to have her head off the pillow. His message to her dresser was violent enough to insure his being received bright and early this morning. She greeted him from her bed, still wearing her cap and an elegant but garish peach satin jacket, dripping with lace.

"You didn't have to wake me from my sleep to tell me the news. I know you and Prudence are reconciled, love. Just tell me the date of the wedding and let me get back to sleep," she said, rubbing her eyes.

"Wedding be d.a.m.ned! Get into your turban, Het, and you'll be in on the execution!" he said sharply.

She rubbed her eyes again, looking at him with the dawning of a brighter interest. "What has the silly girl done now? Don't tell me she doesn't like the house, after the ten dozen shops you dragged me into to pick out all that stuff."

"It is a matter of the most complete indifference to me whether Miss Mallow cares for my house. After you've scanned this piece of libel you'll see what I mean." He threw the two dismantled books at her, their spines broken, the sheets tumbling out all over the counterpane.

She picked up one of the green covers and read it. "Jane White. Pray, what is a Miss Jane White to us, Allan?"

"Alias Miss Prudence Mallow. Look at it! Look at what she has had the d.a.m.nable gall to publish! Not onlyme, oh, no, she includedyou in her tirade too, Het. 'Lady Maldire'-that is you. A nice touch, don't you think, 'Lady Curse'? Only, of course, with her usual ignorance of French she has got it wrong. It ought to be 'Maudit'

"Has she written about me, the minx?" Hettie asked, s.n.a.t.c.hing up pages at random and scanning them for a "Maldire." Like so many fashionable fribbles, she couldn't have cared less what was said of her or written, so long as something was. She found herself soon enough. "Lady Maldire, whose greatest labor in life was to vary the color of her gowns and the height of her lovers... Oh!" She looked at him, feigning horror, secretly thrilled to death. She was soon rummaging about in the heaps of paper for more "Maldires," and finding a sufficient quant.i.ty of them to keep her happy, reading each aloud to Dammler, who was all but frothing at the mouth.

"What should we do about it?" he asked Hettie, pacing the floor and urging her to get up. "I have a good mind to sue. That would stick Murray with the settlement I expect. Not thathe will escape scot-free, either.He knew what she was up to, well enough, probably urged her on to it. And telling me this was the first work of a new writer! But it's not his fault of course, primarily. This isher doing."

"Listen to this, Allan," Hettie said, t.i.ttering in pleasure. "This must be Cybele-'His current mistress was noted for the metallic l.u.s.ter of her tresses, and the metallic hardness of her heart!' How horrid! What does she say of you? Who are you in this story?"

"'Guelph.' The name won't be hard to find."

She scrabbled around through the sheets till she found it. "'He dabbled in the arts, but his real vocation was lechery.' That is coming it a bit strong. Are you sure 'Guelph' isyou?"

"Of course he's me! And there's worse than that. I'd like to ring her neck, but strangling is too good for her. She should be whipped at the cart's tail."

Hettie meanwhile had settled against the pillows and was reading merrily, quoting a phrase at him from time to time. "Dammit, Hettie, get out of bed. Come with me and prevent me from killing her."

"Why don't you run along and talk to Murray, Allan? Pick me up later. You can't go storming down her door at eight-thirty in the morning. My G.o.d, it's only eight-thirty! I didn't go to bed till three hours ago."

"I should murder him while I'm about it. Not to give me a warning of this, he with my sonnets ready to be distributed:Love sonnets to thatcreature! What a jacka.s.s I'll look! Publicly declaring my undying devotion while she bastes me and serves me up done to a turn, with an apple stuck between my jaws. I've got to stop him. Yes, you're right. I'll see Murray and slap an injunction on him to stop circulation. Glad you thought of it."

Hettie hadn't even heard him. She was reading and chuckling, trying to sort the pages into order for a proper perusal. Dammler made only one stop before going to Murray. When he entered the office, he was accompanied by the sharpest lawyer in town, but was too incensed to allow this expensive minion to speak for him.

"Ah, Dammler," Murray said, rising to greet him.

"I am here on business," Dammler said abruptly. "I have an injunction stopping distribution of my sonnets. I want to serve notice, Mr. Murray, that henceforth you are not my publisher."

Murray, who had been worried for some days, was in no doubt as to what had happened. He had given Dammler the book in a seemingly casual way, hoping to divert his suspicions by this ruse, but clearly it had not worked. "What seems to be..."

"Cut line, Murray. You know what this is all about. I want every one of those copies of my sonnets delivered to my home on Berkeley Square. If I hear of so much asone in circulation, you'll regret it."

"We have a contract!"

"Wehad a contract. If you're wise you'll tear it up, as I have done mine. Go ahead with circulation and you'll have a suit for a hundred thousand pounds damages for that scurrilous piece of trash of Miss' Mallow's you had the ill judgment to publish."

"If I hadn't, someone else would have, Dammler. It's done anonymously. No reason to think anyone will suspect..."

"The whole town will know it's me!You knew it. The book is out, and I won't have my sonnets on the same shelves as that tripe. Do you understand?"

"It might be possible to get the copies of Miss Mallow's book back..."

"Let her have her little joke, but I won't add to it by having the sonnets out for a comparison of our styles."

Murray was not simple enough to think the styles had anything to do with it, and tried once more to talk him around. "Those poems are the best thing you've done, Dammler. The finest poetry I've seen in several years. Surely you're not going to suppress them entirely."

"Come to the bonfire," Dammler said, and stomped from the office, while his lawyer wordlessly laid the injunction on Murray's desk, tipped his hat, and trotted out at his master's heels. He wondered why he had been brought along. It was still only nine-thirty, an unseemly hour to call on a lady, but not too early, Dammler felt, to rouse a vulture. He got rid of the lawyer and went on to Grosvenor Square. He was too impatient to go back for Hettie.

He felt if he had to spar with Mr. Elmtree this morning he might do the innocent old fool an injury. He was relieved on that score at least. Clarence had gone out half an hour since, to tell Sir Alfred about the play and the party afterwards. Sir Alfred had attended both himself, but this didn't save him from the visit. Dammler was admitted to Prudence's study by a servant, and found her sitting over her desk, demure in a dark gown with a white collar, a quill between her fingers, a curl falling over her ear. He had seen her like this dozens of times, hundreds in his mind's eye. It was the main way in which he pictured her, the image a sort of icon. It jarred him, to see her look so sweet, so innocent, and to compare the nunlike appearance with the recent behavior. When she looked up, she smiled and held out her hand to him. He stood a moment looking and shaking his head, as if he would make sense of the senseless.

She observed the strange look on his face, and her smile faded. He had found out, had read it already! "Allan?" she said in a soft, frightened voice.

He felt a weakening stab of love, and fought to control it. "It would be better if you call me Lord Dammler, Miss Mallow," he said, his voice as cold as ice.

"Oh you know," she said simply. "I wanted to tell you myself first. To explain..."

"Why did you not, Miss Mallow? Last night, when I offered you the book and youtold me you had never seen it before, for instance, might have been an opportune moment. Of more interest to me is why you chose to write such a piece of carrion."

She wet her lips, stinging under the 'carrion.' "I don't know. I was angry I suppose, hurt, when you had Cybele at your apartment."

"Surelyyou, of all people, know very well my real vocation is lechery. You didn't think I would pa.s.s a whole night alone!"

"'Guelph' wasn't really you!" she said at once, recognizing her own phrase.

"He was me! You made the portrait quite clear, just prettying up my face a little, like your uncle who so kindly painted out my crooked eyebrow. I must confess I am in some doubt as to whether that saintly female 'Mary,' p.r.o.ne to vapors and hysteria isyou, but about the others there can be no doubt, in our or anyone else's mind."

"'Mary' is not me! You know I don't use real people."

"You used me, Prudence. When I didn't pan out as a husband, you got the next best thing out of me, a character for one of your books."

"I don't know why you always think I am writing about you!" she said, her own anger rising at his sharp attack.

"Do you think I don't recognize my own ideas, my patterns of speech? The best part of that very inferior hack job, if I may say so. I want to thank you. You have managed at one stroke to bring me to my senses. I had you on a pedestal, and I should be eternally grateful you tumbled yourself off before I erected a scaffold and tried to vault to your celestial heights. Tell me, Miss Mallow, for I confess this one point escapes me, if you have such a holy aversion to one of my low principles, why in G.o.d's name did you ever agree to marry me?"

"It was just a book-I only wrote it to pa.s.s the time."

"You gave it to Murray for publication!"

"I needed the money."

"That, my sainted sinner, is known as prost.i.tution. Cybele's sort is better. At least she smears no one in the process. She uses her G.o.d-given talents, such as they are, for man's pleasure. You take a gift-I grant you some slight talent in writing-and use it to persecute your friends. Ex-friends! Now, who is worse, you or Cybele?"

She was on her feet by this time. "Allan, I'm sorry!" she said. "I shouldn't have done it." She reached her hands out towards him in an impulsive gesture.

He just swayed towards her, but his anger firmed his resolve. "Well you might be! That's the difference between us, Prudence. I poured out my heart to you in those poems. I wasn't ashamed to tell the world how I felt about you, and you reciprocate by making me a caricature in a satire on love-do it behind my back for money. Hang on to your copy of the sonnets. You have the only one that will survive. You will be deprived of having society laugh at my slavish devotion, but the fact that it may one day be worth somemoney will comfort you."

"What are you doing with the sonnets?" she asked, aghast.

"I have become uninspired. You'll have to jog along on your laurels fromBabe in the Woods. A misnomer, by the way, but then accuracy is clearly of little account to you."

"If Murray isn't circulatingyour book, maybe he can stop distribution ofmine as well. No one need know."

"I know, Prudence. But then, I begin to understandmy feelings count for nothing. It is less the snickers of the mob that trouble me than the knowledge that you despise me. You felt like that, and were still willing to marry me. Yes, you would have had me last night had I offered for you, and I thank G.o.d I didn't!"

She was battered by so much hate and bad luck. She just looked, wordless, too sunk to explain anything.

"Well?" he asked, in a sharp curt way that was not easy to answer. "Speechless, I see. A pity your communication is limited to the printed word. I shall be looking forward to your next book, to see which victim you choose to perform a vivisection on, and to discover what new virtues you can find to heap on yourself."

He turned to leave and she took a step after him, with some thought of further supplication. He lifted a brow and looked at her with such a sneer her blood ran hot. No more supplicating, like a beggar. "A fine rant, Dammler, worthy of a place in one of your vulgar melodramas, if you haven't purloined it from someone else's."

"I am not often accused ofvulgarity, ma'am. For that particular talent, I direct you to your own latest work."

"I a.s.sumed a linguist like yourself would take the word 'vulgar' at its historical value--'popular,' of the people, but let us not be diverted to a discussion of semantics."

"I expect you mean etymology, and as topurloining speeches, the less said of that the better. Take my words out of 'Guelph's' mouth and your novel would be half empty pages. As you have proclaimed poverty as your reason for publishing that thing, it will be pointless for me to sue for damages, but it's what you deserve."

"You're not half as interesting as 'Guelph,' and don't think it!" she said.

He was gone, and she sank down on her chair, her head in her hands, too bruised to think. She felt as if she had been physically beaten. With his tender poems still fresh in her mind, the evidence of a deep and true love, to have to hear this abuse, and to know nine-tenths of it was justified, was too much. She couldn't think straight. She sat on disconsolate, remembering him at the play, with the crowds cheering him, at his house afterwards, showing her how he had fixed it up for her-he had done it for her, even if he hadn't said so. Oh, why hadn't she told him about her accursed book then, in the study? What had possessed her to infer she had never heard of it? Dammler hated a hypocrite worse than anything, and she had been a hypocrite of the worst sort. She mentally abased herself until the first shock of losing him was over.

Only then could she subject his tirade to a rational scrutiny. He had called her a prost.i.tute, a worse prost.i.tute than Cybele, for debasing herslight writing talent. Surely that was unfair. What would he know, wealthy beyond dreams, of poverty? What would he realize of trying to keep up appearances on the meager allowance she had? He liked her to look well, and with four parties a week, this required many outfits. Of course she had to sell what she wrote, and if she wrote of him in an unflattering way-well, she hadn't said much that wasn't true after all, and had taken some pains not to make anyone think it was he. To have called the book carrion was absurd. Murray liked it excessively. And what had he meant about the t.i.tle being inaccurate?

This slur on her accuracy, her writing, was as hard to forgive as anything. He said himself his own stuff was claptrap. The new sonnets were not-indeed, evenShilla was pretty good, but she had helped. Her words, her speech patterns as he so grandly called them,purloined, half of them, were the best part of it. He had a high opinion of himself to call her book carrion. She went on fueling her anger, to keep despair at bay.

Chapter 7.

Clarence stayed with Sir Alfredfor lunch, which was a wonderful relief. Prudence had the opportunity to tell her mother she had not made it up with Dammler, after all. They had discussed it and decided they did not suit, is what Mrs. Mallow was told, and as she had not yet read the infamous book, she believed it.

"It is for the best," the mother said. "That is not to say you need sink into a spinster, my dear. Plenty of gentlemen will take a second look at you now that you are a little known."

"Yes," Prudence said with an attempt at a smile. But would they? Would anyone take a second look at her once it became known Dammler was through with her-not only through with her, despised her. Never wanted to see her again. He was highly emotional, Dammler. In his present state she wouldn't put it a bit past him to let it be known he did not wish to grace the same party as herself. No question which of them would be dropped. She couldn't stand to think of never going out again among interesting people. She couldn't work when she was so upset. If society, too, was to be denied to her, she would run mad. Even as she made these silent remarks to herself, she knew she hid from the truth. She wanted to go on seeing him. If she couldn't marry him, she wanted at least to be able to see him. If he didn't speak to her, she would hear him speak to others. She didn't want to lose even the sight and sound of him.

They had scarcely put down their forks when the front knocker sounded. She knew it wouldn't be Dammler. He might simmer down some day, some ten light years from now, but he was in too towering a rage to be back so soon. She was surprised to hear Lady Melvine wished to see her. Allan had sent Hettie over to add her insults. So be it. Get it over with once for all, and she wouldn't apologize again, either!

"Hettie, my dear!" she said when she swept into the saloon. Hettie had asked her a dozen times to call her by her name, but the Lady Melvine had a way of coming out. She never really liked Hettie nor felt at ease with her.

"Darling!" Hettie said, arising to embrace her. "What a naughty puss you are!" she gurgled in delight.

It was all right then. Hettie wasn't angry. Certainly Dammler would have told her, so she knew and didn't care. Was thrilled, in fact. "Horrid of me, wasn't it? I quite blush to think what I have done. Dammler is fed up with me," she said brightly. She wouldn't let Hettie run back to him and say she was in despair.

"He is white with rage! I never saw him so deranged. He won't be himself for a week. ButI think you are to be congratulated. Tell me, Prudence, is 'Lady Alabaster' really Lady Malvern?" She laid aside her kid gloves and settled in for a coze.

"You know I don't work from life, Hettie. If people choose to see a resemblance, it is on their own heads."

"It is,you minx! I knew it. You made her too pretty. She doesn't have dimples."

"She hasone," Prudence laughed gaily.

"And who is the mysterious 'Pierre'? It's Peter Sotheby, I know it!"

This was the nature of their talk. The characters all had to be straightened out. Hettie felt in her heart Dammler would overcome his fit of pique and be back with Prudence within the week, and she herself was so pleased with the sly puss she had no thought of cutting her. Before leaving, she said, "You remember you are to come to me tomorrow night? My little rout party? No one will be there, but come, anyway.

There was no question of "remembering" a party to which she had not previously been invited, but this little deception was overlooked. "I suppose Dammler will be there?"

"Hewas to be. I fancy he won't show up till midnight to show us how mad he is with you. Your uncle will bring you, I hope? I am in need of ashort suitor- Gratton is ten feet tall, and I always like to vary their height. Minx! How dare you catch me out at my little stunt?"

"He will be charmed to come," Prudence agreed, knowing there was no fear of Clarence turning down the invitation, and happy to have an escort.

They had all given up on Mrs. Mallow months ago. She had been too long a country lady to feel at ease amidst this new set, and had converted an unwilling heart into an ailing one.

"Good. Now I mean to dash right home and read Volume Two. Allan threw it at me in pieces. I see the shops have it on sale today. I'll pick up a copy on the way home, and you must autograph it for me at the party.Ciao, darling!" She waved her fingers merrily and was off.

Prudence felt it was a bit early yet to confront Allan. He would not remain so very angry forever, but if she refused this invitation, she might receive no more. There was one whole day and night to be got in before she could go to Hettie's rout and gauge his temper. She spent it in the same manner as a good part of society, reading her own book that Murray had sent over. It was more cynical than she liked, but it was not carrion. The word was circulated in the magical way of a juicy piece of scandal, and by nightfall of the second day, it was all read, digested, and being discussed with an avid interest. Prudence hadn't the heart to tell Clarence she had been jilted. Let him go on in his dream world; he would, anyway.

As Hettie had warned, Dammler did not arrive at the party till very late. He hadn't intended coming at all, once Hettie told him Prudence "might" drop in, but decided that was nonsense. Washe to sit home alone becauseshe had acted so badly? Certainly not; he would go, and show her (if she had the temerity to attend) by his indifference that he was unaware of her existence. If Lady Malvern were there, he would take her home. It would please the lady's husband, who liked his wife to be popular with all the rakes. How had that bit escaped the book? Prudence mustn't be aware of it.

His vexation reached a new peak to see Prudence not only there, but the center of attention-and looking lovely, too, in a stylish decollete gown chosen as part of her trousseau. He feared she wasn't noticing how stoically he stayed away from her for the crowd hovering around her. Constance, Lady Malvern, chatting to her like the rest, after being skewered in that book. Was it possible these people liked being paraded publicly as objects of scorn? Were they mad? Was he?