The Courteous Cad

by Catherine Palmer

  “Do they? I brought a great deal of havoc into their lives. The decision to join the ill-fated March of the Blanketeers was a direct result of my futile efforts at reform. Such a catastrophe.”

  “More than you know. I am told most of the aristocracy believes that the poison of the American and French revolutions led to the protest at Manchester. There is great fear that a similar revolution may be afoot in England.”

  “Good heavens. Have I been ill so long as to miss this news?”

  “Have you not been reading Miss Pickworth? She is full of information on the inanities and idiosyncrasies of our artful aristocrats.”

  Laughing, she shook her head. “You certainly alliterate as well as Miss Pickworth. I shall have to begin suspecting she is your nom de plume and spare poor Mary from my accusations. But you are right about my activities of late. I have been unable to muster interest in society’s comings and goings. My chief focus has been the restoration of my health.”

  His eyes warmed to dark pools. “Prudence, I cannot bear to think of your suffering. Please tell me you are greatly improved.”

  “I believe I shall not expire just yet.” She tried to read his expression. “But, William . . . I must ask if you know Bettie Barns. She is a weaver at your mill.”

  “Perhaps you refer to Bettie Walker?”

  Prudence sucked down a breath as this revelation penetrated. So Mr. Walker and Bettie had married at last. It was done now, and she realized she was glad. Very glad for him, for his new wife, for their children, and even for herself. She could close the door on that chapter of her life forever.

  “I know Bettie well,” William was saying. “She has been employed at the mill from the start.”

  “Did you know she is ill? She suffers from mill fever.” Prudence looked away, and her gaze fell on the cat. It had yawned and stretched and was now lying in an impossibly contorted pose beneath the lavender. “I, too, contracted mill fever. The journey to Manchester in the rain hastened its progress. My persistent cough became a trifling cold. My cold grew worse and led to a violent pneumonia that has rendered me little more than a helpless rag doll.”

  Prudence fell silent when William made no response. Rather than listening to her, he seemed to be watching Henry, who had just set the central tent pole into place—only to have the whole thing collapse on his head. Amusing though it was, William did not smile when he turned to Prudence again.

  “Anne wrote that you nearly died. I understood at that moment how much I love you.” He looked away again. “I am sorry if my words of affection distress you. We are not meant for each other. Still, I thought you should know. I have never taken my feelings for you lightly.”

  “As you have for other women?”

  He glanced at her, his eyes flashing. But in an instant his face sobered. “Yes, actually. Very lightly. I have been something of a rounder. A cad. And more. I was a gamer, risking everything to win at cards. I won often. I lost more often. I drank too much—at first to join the revelry, then to numb myself to my own failures. Finally, because I could not stop.”

  Her breath growing shallow as his words poured out, Prudence feared she might swoon. If she collapsed, she could blame it on her poor health. She was stunned—more by William’s brutal honesty than by the facts he related.

  “Midway through my last military mission,” he continued, “we put out to sea. Our ship engaged in several skirmishes with the French. Responsibilities to my men ended my drinking. As you may imagine, there was no choice in the matter. On my return to Plymouth, I was clearheaded enough to comprehend the havoc I had caused there. Far more havoc, dear lady, than your well-intentioned protest march.”

  Prudence set down her fan, praying that William had concluded his declaration of guilt. If he went further, if he spoke of the poor dead woman, she did not know how she might bear it.

  “Why are you telling me this?” she asked. “I cannot absolve you, and thoughts of such behaviors as you describe render me faint. I see now that you have been as licentious and wicked as ever I feared. I cannot imagine how I am to reconcile this information with my former good opinion of you.”

  “You held a good opinion of me?”

  “I loved you, William, and I told you so.”

  “You told me more often how you despised my mill, my treatment of the workers, the very essence of my character. I believed you hated me far more than you loved me.”

  “I tried very hard to dislike you.”

  “Did you succeed?”

  She closed her eyes, willing away any tenderness she felt for him. “I did succeed,” she answered. Then she sighed. “And I also failed.”

  “Upon my word!” Mary’s loud voice cut off William’s response. “I am beyond astonishment. Mr. Sherbourne, such a surprise!”

  He clambered to his feet and bowed. “Mrs. Heathhill, how delighted I am to see you again.”

  “And you are here with my dear sister. . . . How very . . . very unexpected!”

  “I was commissioned by the Royal Art Society of Otley and Thereabouts,” he quipped, “to judge the merits of Miss Watson’s sketch of a . . . a cow.”

  “A cow?” Prudence cried, holding up her notebook. “It is not a cow.”

  “It is a dog,” Mary opined. “One of our sweet corgis.”

  “I am sorry to disagree with you, Mrs. Heathhill,” William said, “but I see it now. It is very clearly an elephant.”

  “An elephant!” Laughing, Prudence struggled to her feet. She pointed to the feline stretched out near the lavender. “It is a cat. That cat, to be exact.”

  “Aha, just as I suspected,” William said, taking the sketch and studying it. “It is an elephant disguised as a cat—exactly the sort of clever artistry most admired by the Royal Art Society of Otley.”

  “And Thereabouts,” Mary added.

  Henry strolled over and took the sketch from William. “Very nice rendering of a fox,” he pronounced. “Though it wants a sharper nose, I think.”

  “Give me that!” Prudence snatched the paper. “Go away, all of you. I must be left in peace, or I shall have no choice but to perish on the spot and make you rue your biting commentaries.”

  “That is a threat not to be taken lightly,” William said, scooping Prudence up in his arms. “We must not allow you to perish, Miss Watson. Rather we must fortify you with the tea and cake that is even now being set out under Lord Delacroix’s fine white tent.”

  “Oh!” Mary cried as William started across the lawn toward the tent. “Put her down! Put down my sister!”

  Prudence’s own exclamation of shock quickly transformed into giggles as she wrapped her arms around William’s neck and laid her head on his shoulder. They entered the cool shade of the tent and he settled her into a chair. But not before brushing a soft kiss on her cheek.

  “I am grateful you ever loved me at all,” he murmured. “It is a treasured gift.”

  “Scones!” Mary squealed as she stepped under the canopy and observed the tea spread out on a table. “Thank heaven for scones. Without them I should simply fall to pieces.”

  “I am in pieces already,” Henry declared. “I have never met a tent more determined to defeat me nor a rosebush more eager to tear me to shreds.”

  As the others chatted back and forth, Prudence quietly sipped her tea. Now and again, she cast a glance at William, who—she soon discovered—was always gazing at her. It was, she decided, the most delightful tea she had enjoyed in many weeks.

  Six, to be exact.

  Seated near an open window, William listened to Mary Heathhill playing the pianoforte while her elder sister sang. Sarah Locke had a high, clear voice so sweet and lulling that it might easily charm a man into peaceful slumber. Henry Carlyle, in fact, had succumbed almost the moment he sat down.

  William was far too restless. Filled with such anxiety that he could hardly endure lyrics about lost love and dashed dreams, he finally got to his feet. The song was in the midst of its second verse, and his unmannered
movement caused Mary to fumble the keys. Yet he could do nothing but pace the carpeted floor.

  Prudence had retired to her room after tea, and William had not seen her since. Her place at the dinner table had been empty. The chatter of her family and friends omitted any mention of the young woman—almost as if they had grown accustomed to her absence. He asked Sarah about her sister once, and she reminded him that Prudence was yet unwell and kept to her room.

  Was that true? William raked a hand through his hair as he paused before the fireplace. Could it be possible that Prudence was so weak she could not come down to the dinner table? Was her health so fragile that anything more than a brief excursion in the garden might overwhelm her?

  He recalled their ride across the moors—how easily her horse had overtaken his, leapt a low rock wall, threaded its way through the woods. How beautiful and vibrant Prudence had been as she sat by the brook and coyly teased him until he was weak with desire. Had that woman vanished? Had Prudence suffered such infirmity that she could never recover her zest for life?

  Not for his own sake did he lament the possibility. True, he had fallen in love with the vivacious golden-haired beauty. But his passion for her had deepened far beyond physical longing. He admired her noble ambitions, enjoyed her wit, took delight in her lively opinions, respected her intellect—

  “I feared you might have grown lonely for the moors and returned to Yorkshire.”

  At the sound of her voice, William swung around and almost caught her up in an embrace. Only the sight of her pale face and tentative steps prevented him.

  “Have I rendered you speechless?” she asked. “If so, I must count it as my greatest achievement.”

  “Prudence, I . . . I thought . . . I feared . . .” He shook his head. “I am glad to see you.”

  “I am gladder to see you,” she countered as she gingerly sank into a chair near the fire. Her sisters continued playing and singing while Henry dozed. She studied them for a moment before returning her attention to William.

  “If you had gone back to Yorkshire,” she said, “I should not be able to share with you my theories regarding the American and French revolutions and their effects on England’s restless working class. I should like to know if my effort at fomenting revolt inside your mill has had a similar far-reaching impact, for I am eager to take the credit for it.”

  Greatly relieved to find Prudence well enough to chirp away with her usual provocative views, William dropped into the chair beside hers.

  “Discuss away, dear lady,” he invited. “I shall neither challenge your declarations nor deny you credit for your successful crusade against injustice. Instead I shall simply gaze at you, thanking God you are alive and praying that He will heal you fully.”

  Her eyebrows rose. “What changes are these? How am I to speak unless I can be sure you will spar with me and dispute all my opinions? And what am I to make of this newfound respect for your Creator?”

  He held his tongue for a moment, studying her beloved face, her green eyes, her sweet lips. “You may wish to speculate on political upheavals, but I have experienced a revolution more far-reaching. Mine is a revolution of the heart. You have the credit for this transformation, Prudence. Had you not dared me to read the Gospel of St. John, I might never have learned of Nicodemus. When Jesus told Nicodemus he must be born anew—not as a child from a womb, but as a man whose spirit is reborn—I began to wish that I might start my own life anew. My past, as you now know, is filled with many regrets.”

  As he finished speaking, William realized that Prudence had gone perfectly still. His concern for her well-being flared again, but she reached out and laid her hand on his.

  “It is possible to be reborn, William,” she said. “One can begin again.”

  “Yet you told me that many of us—certainly a man as vile as I—must endure the earthly consequences of wrongdoing.”

  “Sometimes.”

  “In my case, always.” Unable to meet her unwavering eyes, he looked at the fire. “I accept this. My sin can be forgiven, but it cannot be undone. A revolution of the heart cannot wipe clean the slate.”

  “William . . .” She seemed to hover on the brink of a question she did not know how to ask. He surmised her curiosity had been piqued, and she wanted a more thorough account of his trespasses.

  He leaned back in his chair, took her hand, fondled it gently. “I can speak of the past no longer. Let us talk of the future instead.”

  “You declared we can have none. What is left to say?”

  “I shall speak of what I may. Mr. Walker came to me as I was riding out for London. My blacksmith wanted to report that restlessness still brews at the mill.”

  “Oh, dear.”

  “Walker has heard rumors that Sidmouth, the home secretary, has sent spies and informers to crisscross the land and investigate centers of discontent—among them, my mill. These scouts, Walker says, are paid by results.”

  “That cannot be wise,” she said. “They may be tempted to become agents provocateurs.”

  “Indeed, it now appears these spies have begun fomenting rebellion in order to be rewarded. Walker fears these men have stirred to life the dying embers of the March of the Blanketeers.”

  “He has proof there are spies at your mill? He has seen them and heard them urge the people to mutiny?”

  “He has not. The center of discontent, according to Walker, is at Pentrich.”

  “In Derbyshire!” She let out a breath. “Pentrich is not far from the Delacroix estate. Barely two miles. Sarah went to the market there today in search of oranges. Is it possible the laborers are unaware that the very man who brews trouble among them is a spy who will report their discontent to the authorities?”

  “Possible—I think not. It is probable.”

  “Then we must go into the town tomorrow. The people must be warned. I have to remind them that the Riot Act will doom them to expulsion or worse. They may be hanged.”

  “We shall go nowhere.” William hardly knew whether to rejoice at the sudden color in Prudence’s cheeks or to fear for her life. “You will stay here, and I shall stay with you until I am convinced that you are no longer in danger.”

  “But, William—”

  “Shh!” he declared, laying a finger across her lips. “If you were in good health, I should happily beg you on bended knee to don your clever disguise, wander among the people, and flush out any agitators inciting them to rebel. But such a transgression would stain my newly washed heart with a very large blot. You inspired me to discard my gray world and begin to see it in black and white. I have decided I much prefer the white.”

  “I believed I was correct about the absence of gray,” Prudence said, “and I am very certain gray can never be good. But, William, exposing a troublemaker can only be a noble deed.”

  “For one who is healthy, hale, hearty, and—”

  “You, sir, have been reading far too much Miss Pickworth.”

  “I object!”

  “An argument? A lovers’ spat?” Henry, speaking through a yawn, stepped nearer the fire and bent to warm his hands. “Sherbourne, I hope you know that Miss Watson is quite attached to me. Her sisters prepare our wedding even now— for if you listen carefully, you will notice they are selecting music for the ceremony.”

  “What?” Prudence leapt to her feet. “Upon my word, Mary, I told you I am not going to marry Henry!”

  Striding across the floor toward the pianoforte, she snatched up a sheaf of music that her sister had been following. The ensuing spat was observed with amusement by the two men near the fire.

  “Miss Watson is suddenly quite energetic,” Henry observed. “I believe you have wrought something of a miracle, Sherbourne.”

  “I did cherish the fond hope of restoring her to good health,” William responded. “But I believe you, Delacroix, have the credit for this swift and unexpected display of vigor. The mere thought of uniting with you in the bonds of matrimony produced such horror and revulsion that she
was instantly healed of all her maladies.”

  Henry threw back his head and laughed. “Quite right you are, Sherbourne! Well, you may have her with my blessing. I have set my eye upon another lady whose beauty and virtues trounce the attractions of any other.”

  “Ah,” William said. “Is the fortunate lady someone you know by way of the tea trade? or via your illustrious position in society? Or perhaps she is some exotic creature who lured you whilst you circumnavigated the globe.”

  “The apple of my eye is a lady neither exotic nor particularly elevated in the ton. She is, in fact, quite well-known to you.”

  “To me?”

  “Indeed, for I believe you once rescued her younger sister from a mud puddle.”

  At that, both men looked across the room to where the woman in question was engaged in delivering a stream of eloquent admonitions to both her siblings. And William understood all at once that Henry intended to wed Mary Heathhill.

  Nineteen

  Hesitating, Prudence hung in the silence of the long dark corridor. She should not do this. A hundred reasons had presented themselves—all of them well-founded and sensible. Yet her heart spoke louder, urging and commanding her to act.

  Swallowing hard, she knotted her hand into a fist and knocked. Nothing. She waited for almost a minute. Knocking again, she leaned closer to the door and listened.

  The sounds of a grumbling voice and staggering footfalls made her smile. Relief poured through her as the muttering and thuds approached. The door opened.

  “What?” William looked out, eyes squinting and hair tousled. “Who are you? What do you mean by waking me at this . . . Wait—is something wrong with Miss Watson? Is she ill?”

  “No, I—”

  He grabbed Prudence by the shoulders. “Take me to her. I must be allowed to see her. At once!”

  “William, it is I—Prudence Watson.”

  His grip on her relaxed. “But you . . . ? You look like a maid.”

  “That is good news indeed, for I am going to Pentrich as a scullery maid. Dare you come with me?”

  “No,” he barked. “No, you are not going to Pentrich. Not tonight. Not ever.”