The Courteous Cad (26 page)

“The horse cart is waiting on the street, and I leave tonight. I have tarried far too long in this wretched city.”

“Then you go alone. I must first bid my sisters farewell and set my affairs in order. Then I shall dress in disguise and take the post coach. None will be the wiser.”

“You suppose he does not know your trickery? William Sherbourne may be a reckless man, but he is not a stupid one. Perhaps your deceit eludes him now, but he will go back to Otley and he will find you out.”

“Meanwhile, I shall have stopped the workers from marching and returned them to their former state.”

“Starving, ignorant, crippled, poor. Well done, Prudence.”

“Chastise me if you wish. I deserve it. But I did what I believed was right. Good evening, sir.”

Afraid Walker would see the anguish in her face, Prudence turned on her heel and strode across the grass.
I am not only silly,
she told herself.
I am bad. I harm those I mean to help.I cause trouble instead of resolving it. Can I do nothing right?Am I destined to fail at everything I try?

Brushing away tears as fast as they tumbled down her cheeks, Prudence snatched the ribbons from her hair and started down the path that led toward the drive. Trenton House was only a short walk across Cranleigh Crescent from Delacroix House. She had not wanted to attend the ball anyway. Sarah and Mary had begged and cajoled her until she could see no way out. At least she had not worn the pink gown!

She would go back to Otley and tell everyone the terrible truth that just like she, they were destined to do what they had always done. They would continue to be who they had been born to be. Nothing would ever change.

Prudence hurried along the path, gravel crunching beneath her slippers and the breeze whipping her hair from its pins. She reflected on her friend Betsy Fry, who had taken blankets into the gaols and workhouses. But Betsy had freed no prisoners. She had changed no laws. Indeed, the Gag Acts had been ratified right under her nose! Just as Betsy had ultimately failed, so must Prudence. William had insisted she was not silly. How little he knew her.

Rounding the gate that opened onto the drive, she nearly walked straight into the man himself. Catching herself, she gasped as he reached to steady her.

“Excuse me,” she breathed out and stepped aside. “So sorry. I did not mean to startle you. I am going home.”

He assessed her, his dark brown eyes depthless. When he spoke, his voice was hard. “You have been in a tussle, I see.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Your hair. You were engaged in a scuffle with someone. Or perhaps the two of you were simply sporting about.”

She reached up to the tangle of wind-whipped curls. “What is your meaning?”

“I speak as I see, madam.”

“But what you see is not what you think. I took down my hair because I am going home, and I should never have gone to the ball but my sisters forced me and I had to dance with everyone—and I hardly even like most of those brainless men! Everyone supposes I enjoy having pink cheeks and green eyes and curls, but they have never had to endure them, for if they did, they soon would learn that no one believes them the least bit sensible! And as for you, I hope you stay in London and find yourself a lady to marry—some straw-headed ninny who does not care that your workers eat water porridge and oatcake and labor from sunrise to sunset and never learn to read or write so that if they want to send a message, they have to engage the lamplighter to write it for them! That is all I have to say to you, because I am very tired and out of sorts and I wish everyone would just leave me alone!”

Before he could answer, she stepped off the curb and started across the great crescent-shaped park fronting the elegant homes. So much for William Sherbourne. He had all but accused her of dallying in the dark with a suitor. As if she had nothing but feathers and fluff for a brain!

“You should know one thing at least.” William caught up to her and now matched her pace. “I did love you, Prudence. I loved you, and I thought you were beautiful and perfect. That was before I knew the depths of your deception.”

“My deception?” She glanced at him askance, wondering if he knew of her clandestine activities in Otley. But perhaps he referred to some imagined lover for whom she might have cast him aside. Either way, she hardly cared, for William Sherbourne’s good opinion could mean nothing to her now.

“You speak your opinions of me most decidedly,” she told him. “Do you presume to understand everything about me?”

“I understand very little about you, but I have observed your behavior. You are more than able and willing to beguile a man. You captivate and then betray your victims.”

“I have victims, do I? Are you one of them? I hope so!” She continued her headlong march across the park. “You make me out to be a spider luring men to their doom. But in the ballroom tonight you claimed to be the spider—hanging by a thread. Perhaps you are the deceitful one, William. Is that possible?”

“It is . . . possible.”

“But difficult to admit. At the least you are fickle, for you claim to love me, then you chide me, then you love me again, then you accuse me of betrayal, and so it goes. Have you ever lied, sir? Or is your every action impeccable and without flaw or blemish?”

“No one is perfect,” he answered.

She stepped onto the gravel path in front of Trenton House. “Then I hope you will allow me some imperfections. I never claimed the labels of goodness and excellence you attached to me. You taught me that the world was gray, William. I disputed that, but for some time now, I have known that you were correct in your assessment. I am nothing but gray from head to toe and inside out. In every way, I have failed—”

“No, Prudence.” He put his fingers to her lips to stop the flow of words. “Say nothing more, I beg you. I have only just learned to accept that
you
were right—that the world is all black-and-white. Gray does not exist. Right and wrong are opposites, and nothing may muddy them. Good cannot be bad. Bad can never be good. Do not tell me now that you have slipped into the sea of gray from which I have just escaped.”

“Oh, William!” She took his fingers and pressed her lips to his hand. “How I wish we had met at another time and in another place. But God set our courses, and He knew how it was to be. I admit my many wrongs, yet I fear there is just enough good left in me to prevent my disputing with the Lord.”

“And there is enough bad left in me to argue against Him. I have asked—and I shall continue to ask—that He will redirect my path and align it with yours. I ask Him to take what is left of me and do something of value with it. Perhaps there are not enough crumbs worth saving. Yet I cannot help but pray.”

At this, she looked up into his face and knew he was the man she loved most in all the world.

“I see the butler has noted your arrival,” he said. “He awaits at the door.”

Prudence glanced behind for a moment. Then she turned back to him. “Good evening, Mr. Sherbourne.”

“Good evening, Miss Watson.” He tipped his hat as she fled toward the house.

“Oh, Pru!” Mary burst into the room where Prudence was packing her trunks. “You must go downstairs at once, for Sarah has come to see us and she will not speak a word to me until she has talked to you! She has brought a letter, a message of great import, and it has given her such a fright that I am tempted to call for smelling salts!”

Prudence glanced to the window, where the morning sun had already begun to slant through the open curtain. A carriage awaited outside—a gift from Anne, who could not bear to think of her dearest friend returning to Otley by the post coach. Farewells to Sarah and Mary had been made already, and Prudence had no patience for extending them.

“Bid Sarah come up to me here,” she told Mary. “I have still to put away my bonnets and gloves. If she is so eager to see me, let her hasten to my side.”

“Wicked girl! She is your elder sister, and you will do as she asks!”

“Very well, Mary, then you shall stay and pack my things.”

“I shall do nothing of the sort! I am as eager to learn Sarah’s news as you are.”

“More eager, I should wager,” Prudence grumbled as she and Mary stepped into the corridor. “I am sure all of London will know Sarah’s news once our dear Miss Pickworth has heard it.”

“Will you stop making these unfounded accusations?” Mary cried. “I cannot possibly be Miss Pickworth!”

“Pretty Prudence persistently presumes Mary is Miss Pickworth,” she teased as she scampered just ahead down the staircase. “Sister Sarah surely supposes the same!”

“Stop it!” Mary swatted Prudence on the arm as they entered the drawing room. “Stop saying such silly—”

“Aha! Aha! You are at it again, Miss Pickworth!” Prudence darted toward the fire but halted at the sight of Sarah’s face. Drawn and pale, the eldest of the three sisters rose.

“What is it?” Prudence asked in a low voice. “Sarah, what has happened?”

“You must sit down, Prudence. You too Mary.” Sarah indicated the settee across from her chair. “I have received some sobering news.”

Anxiety and dread coursing through her, Prudence settled on the edge of the settee. “Tell us at once, Sarah. Has someone died?”

“It is not as bad as that, but nearly so.” Sarah seated herself again and unfolded a letter. The broken seal indicated a correspondent of some prominence, though Prudence could not distinguish whose crest had been imprinted in the wax.

“A letter came to me this morning,” Sarah continued. “It was written by my dear friend, Charlotte Ross, who lives in Plymouth. I once mentioned her to you, Pru, for I felt she might be able to provide us some account of your Mr. Sherbourne.”

“He is not
my
Mr. Sherbourne,” Prudence corrected, though her heart quaked with alarm that anything regarding him might be amiss.

Their parting the night before had left many questions unanswered and the future undecided. Yet she now had no doubt of his attachment to her, and she knew at last the truth of her own feeling for him. She loved William. Loved him deeply and desperately. It was clear to both of them that little could come of their devotion, yet they knew it could not be denied.

“You insist he is not yours,” Sarah was saying, “and I pray you have not confessed your true feelings to him or made him any pledges.”

“No,” Prudence whispered. “We have no formal understanding.”

Sarah nodded. “I am glad, for I fear he is not at all the man we hoped he might be. His character, I regret to report, must be irredeemably bad.”

“Bad?” Prudence recalled William’s revelation to her—that just as she had accepted life’s moral grayness, he had come to believe in its absolute clarity.
“Good cannot be bad,”
he had declared.
“Bad can never be good.”

“But surely no one can be irredeemably bad,” she told Sarah. “Redemption is God’s gift to even the worst of sinners.”

“I cannot imagine anyone worse than Mr. Sherbourne has turned out to be.”

“Has he killed someone?” Mary asked. “Sarah, I beg you to enlighten us at once. This delay is distressing our poor sister no end.”

Sarah looked down at her letter for a moment before speaking. “Charlotte writes that she has made discreet inquiries regarding Mr. Sherbourne’s standing in the Royal Navy and his reputation in Plymouth society. Of the first, she can find nothing amiss. He was, in fact, a respected officer and proved himself valiant in battle on more than one occasion of armed conflict.”

“There!” Mary said. “It is not as dreadful as we feared, Prudence. You may take comfort in his bravery. Mr. Sherbourne is both courageous and gallant.”

“I should not go so far as that,” Sarah said. “Courageous, perhaps, but if gallantry implies anything of chivalry, he is dismally lacking. I believe you described him once, Prudence, as a cad. You could not have been more correct.”

“Oh, dear,” Mary murmured. “I fear we are in for shocking news.”

“While living in Plymouth,” Sarah went on with a sigh, “Mr. Sherbourne displayed behavior that was morally reprehensible. None can dispute the fact that he dallied with every eligible young lady in the town.”

“No!” Mary cried aloud. “Impossible.”

“I thought so myself, but Charlotte has been so kind as to supply names and details that leave no room for doubt.”

“Do you call that kind?” Prudence snapped. She leapt up and snatched the letter from Sarah’s hand. “Your friend is nothing but a gossiping rumormonger! William’s behavior may have been less than prudent, but we must allow that in those years he was very young and his character could not have been fully formed. He is no longer that sort of man!”

She flung the letter into the fire and watched the flames lick at the paper, ignite the wax, and crumple it into ash.

“That is what I think of your dear friend Charlotte and her precious news,” she cried. “I hope I may never see the woman in the whole of my life, for I should not be responsible for what I might say or do! She has maliciously sucked up every salacious tidbit—no doubt mingling truth with falsehood—and conveyed it to you in utter triumph. I hate her, and I do not believe one word of what she has written.”