Prudence and the Romantic Poet (The Three Graces #3)

Chapter 31

31

Prudence was not surprised to receive a note from Mrs Codd-Phelps demanding to know if Prudence meant what she said in her letter—would Mrs Hart really drop her bid for the horse they both wanted, if she agreed to let her young ward marry her poet?

Prudence’s conscience did suffer a twinge over Mrs Codd-Phelp’s blunt wording, which suggested a bribe. She had offered up the horse as a congratulatory gift if Mrs Codd-Phelps would honour her word in agreeing to the betrothal, should Mr Shelbourne prove to be a publishable poet.

Perhaps it was a bribe, she admitted. But Miss Kimpshott was motherless and friendless, and Prudence would do whatever was in her power to help her young friend. So she gave the waiting houseboy a reply in the affirmative, and presumed this correspondence meant that Mr Shelbourne was granted success.

Therefore she was both surprised and dismayed the next day to discover Mr Shelbourne in Hookham’s Library, standing with his forehead pressed against a row of books in the poetry section .

‘Mr Shelbourne?’ she said, touching him lightly on the arm, for he was so lost in thought that he had not heard her first greeting or noticed her approach. He turned as one in a daze. ‘Are you well?’ she enquired, seeing the look of abject misery on his youthful face. ‘Oh dear,’ she murmured, guessing at the cause. ‘Did Mrs Codd-Phelp’s deny you?’

He blinked, but came to himself and repeated, ‘Deny me?’

‘Did she deny her consent? I am so sorry.’

‘But no. She did not deny her consent.’

‘Oh. Then Miss Kimpshott refused you after all?’

He blinked again as though recalling to memory the lady in question. A sad kind of smile gave some animation to his dreamlike state. ‘But no. Regina is promised to me.’

‘But this is happy news. I wonder that you look so… unhappy?’

‘It is a wonder to me. It is like a dream.’

‘Then what ails you, my friend?’

‘I cannot write.’

He put a hand to the books on the shelf where the volumes of Wordsworth and Coleridge, Shelley and Keats were housed. ‘I came to seek some stray spark of inspiration from my fellow poets.’ He gave a little groan. ‘But, alas. I feel nothing. I am a well dried up, a cistern emptied. I am a failed brook, a cracked and parched river. My happiness has cut off my life source of poetry.’ He turned an anguished face to her. ‘What shall I do?’

‘Do you mean,’ said Prudence gently, ‘that you can only write poetry when you are loveless?’

‘You understand.’

‘Cannot you write something other than love poetry? Perhaps, like Wordsworth, you might write of the beauty of nature? ’

He shook his head and hung it. ‘I cannot even finish my narrative poem. If my protagonist has grasped hold of the love that has eluded him, he has no more reason to continue journeying on. He has found what he sought. There is nothing to pursue. Nothing to seek.’

‘I hope you do not make Miss Kimpshott unhappy by being depressed in her presence?’ said Prudence, feeling a pang at having promoted a match that might be a source of pain to her friend.

‘Make my Regina unhappy?’ He looked appalled. ‘Certainly not. That is why I come here. And other places. To mourn in private, that I may return to my angel without shadow.’ He expelled a heavy sigh and let his hand fall from the volume of Lyrical Ballads. ‘I must go. I am to take Regina to Grey’s to choose a ring of engagement.’ He summoned another sad smile.

‘Have you told your cousin?’ Prudence enquired.

‘Of my poetical demise? He will not regard it. He never understood.’

‘I meant, have you told him of your engagement? He is your guardian and should be among the first to know. I am sure he will be pleased for you.’

‘I shall write to him. And I shall take Regina to the cottage later this month to look over it again and begin making arrangements.’

They shook hands, and Mr Shelbourne cast one last look at the books and said a soft farewell to them, as though he were departing their company forever. Prudence watched him exit the library, her thoughts busy.

In little more than a fortnight all of Prudence’s immediate plans were carried out. She announced some of her intentions to her sister and brother-in-law at dinner one evening in the last week of February. She waited until the dessert course was brought in, and the servants departed. She was not entirely sure how her sister would react to her news, and would rather not have the staff listening in.

‘You will pleased to hear, Chari,’ she began, ‘that I have done all I wished to in London for now, and I shall be ready to leave next week.’

‘At last!’ cried Charity. ‘That is famous news, is it not, Leon?’

‘But I will not be returning to Hartley with you,’ said Prudence quickly.

Her sister’s countenance fell, but then recovered. ‘I suppose it has been more than two months since we fetched you from Bath,’ she surmised. ‘You will want to go to Lindford to await Connie’s baby.’

Prudence smiled her acquiescence. That part of her plan was not entirely fixed in her mind. There were other factors to play out before she knew exactly where she was going or what she was doing.

‘We shall drive you to Lindford, of course,’ said Charity, taking another marzipan sweet by way of celebration.

‘I shall not go directly to Lindford from here,’ said Prudence. ‘I have business in Bath to attend to. I wish to see how Amos and Lizzy are getting on, and how the repairs and renovations in Kingsmead and Claverton House are progressing. In short…’ She took a breath. ‘I may be in Bath for some time. I shall certainly re-join Constance before the baby is due, but I will likely lodge in Bath for two or three weeks.’

Charity put down the marzipan. ‘But we cannot leave you in Bath again. Can we?’ She looked to her husband for support.

‘Of course you can,’ said Prudence, making her voice easy and calm. ‘You must recall that I said I would likely make my home in Bath.’

‘But not so soon!’

‘We will take you wherever you wish to go, Prudence,’ said Leon. ‘To Bath it shall be. Name the day.’

‘Bath is not in your way,’ said Prudence. ‘And so I shall travel with Miss Kimpshott and Mr Shelbourne when they journey there next week.’

Charity looked vexed, but Leon squeezed his wife’s hand, giving her a look and a little shake of the head to remind her that she must not try to prohibit her sister from her independence. Charity accepted her husband’s admonishment, but replied a little sulkily, ‘Mrs Codd-Phelp’s carriage is all very well for about town, but I should think it a tight squeeze all the way to Bath.’

‘I shall follow them in my own carriage,’ said Prudence.

Charity stared. ‘But you don’t have a carriage.’

‘I shall by next week. I told you some time ago that I was ordering a carriage.’

‘Well, so you did. But I did not think you had done so yet. How were you able to get one so quickly?’

‘There was an aborted order for a Landau which suited me exactly. So I bought it.’

‘What about horses and a coachman and groom?’

‘That is all taken care of. I will be setting up my own stable in Bath. It is one of the many things I have been organising.’

‘How did you find horses?’ Charity was astonished at her sister’s achievements.

‘Mr O’Gormley was kind enough to assist me. Lady Clementina introduced me to him at her Christmas ball. You recall him? The Irish gentleman who kept Mrs Codd-Phelps entertained. He is something of an expert in horses. And speaking of horses – you shall find a new arrival in your own stable when you get home.’

‘Shall I?’ Charity brightened. ‘Have you bought me a horse?’

‘I said I would do so. It is your belated Christmas gift.’

‘The filly that Lord Tothill was selling?’ Charity asked eagerly.

Prudence shook her head. ‘The chestnut sired by Anticipation . ’

Charity’s eyes widened. ‘You got her! Upon my word – she must have been expensive!’

‘Never mind the cost. She is a gift.’

Charity was cheered by this piece of news, for she loved gifts, and she loved her horses. But her thoughts soon returned to the disagreeableness of her younger sister forging her own way. ’But where shall you stay?’

‘She has at least two houses that I know of in the centre of Bath to choose from,’ Leon reminded her. ‘Not to mention apartments all over town.’

‘You shan’t want to return to that mouldy house in Kingsmead Street,’ protested Charity.

‘The Kingsmead house is all at sixes and sevens while the new kitchen and bathroom are being installed, so I have rented the house in Laura Place. Miss Kimpshott and her cousin will stay with me. They are going to reside in Bath while the banns are read.’

‘You have thought of everything,’ said Charity, a little peevishly.

‘We shall meet at Lindford next month,’ promised Prudence. ‘It is not very long. The weeks will fly past.’

‘You need a maid to wait on you,’ was Charity’s last objection.

‘I met a pleasant young chambermaid at the White Hart when we stayed there. I am going to enquire after her. Her name was Eliza, and she reminded me of Lizzy when first we met her. I may have found my own Lizzy.’

‘I miss Lizzy,’ said Charity. ‘I should like to see how she and Amos are getting on.’

‘I intend to see a good deal of Lizzy when I am living in Bath,’ promised Prudence. ‘We shall not let the connection end by any means. She wants her brother to join her. I hope Constance will not be too disappointed to lose him too.’

‘Poor Constance will have no staff left at this rate,’ said Charity. But she had run out of objections, and comforted herself with another piece of marzipan while Leon enquired with interest into all the details of Prudence’s new carriage and horses.

The sisters made their farewell visits to their godmother and their friends in town. Prudence remained busy up to the last, signing documents and writing letters.

Trunks were packed, and sometimes repacked, as when Hannibal found his way to Charity’s dressing room and decided the large, open trunk of clothes would make a good den to take a nap in. The housekeeper complained that she had never seen gowns more crushed or more covered in dog hair, but Charity sympathised with Hannibal’s disdain for the gowns that he had ruined, for she hated the black gowns she felt obliged to wear in public during the period of national mourning.

Prudence departed for Bath early on the morning of the twenty-seventh of February. Charity was to leave the same day, but the usual cheerful disorganisation of the Hart household delayed their departure. There were hugs and kisses and promises exacted, and the sisters parted.

Charity stood in the doorway watching Prudence’s carriage roll away down the street. Leon put an arm round her, pulling her head to his shoulder while she cried, for she felt that this was no ordinary parting, but that her little sister had grown up and truly flown the nest, and nothing would be the same again.

‘Nothing ever does stay the same,’ said Leon, leading her back inside. ‘It’s only a matter of weeks until you’re all together again.’ A shriek of rage from Cook and a string of unwholesome names aimed at Hannibal forced Charity out of her grief as she ran to rescue the picnic hamper Cook had made up for the journey.