Reprise (17 page)

“What is that gold chain you wear, Uncle?” she asked.

He colored up red as a beet. “It is a lucky charm,” he answered sheepishly.

“May I see it?”

“Just a little locket,” he said, tucking it under the scarf. Clarence was never reluctant to show off a new acquisition. Quite the contrary. It was a wonder she hadn’t been required to aid in the selection, as well as admire the thing.

She glanced quickly to her mother, who was shaking her head unobtrusively from side to side, indicating this line of questioning was not to be pursued. As soon as Clarence left, however--and he left very early these days--it reemerged.

“Mama, what is Uncle Clarence up to?” she demanded.

“I don’t know, Prue, but I think he is involved with a woman. He has taken to using scent--you must have noticed.’’

“He was always very leery of women! He wouldn’t paint one without a chaperone."

“You notice he no longer asks us to chaperone him. His moving into a studio was a bad move. I come to think he did it to avoid our knowing what he is up to.”

Prudence was strongly of a mind to tell her mother what was being said. She desisted for two reasons. The worry of it might be hard on her health, but more importantly, she had taken the notion it was Lord Dammler who was responsible for the awful state of affairs. She would go to the studio. It had to be done, to see for herself just what sort of an ass Clarence was making of himself. She would go that very day.

Before she did it, however, she was the recipient of a call that put everything else out of her head. Lady Malvern came in person at eleven o’clock to give her an invitation to her literary house party at Finefields.

Constance was ravishing, as usual. Her black hair grew in a widow’s peak and her face was exquisite, with those criminally beautiful violet eyes aglow. She was outfitted in a bonnet that surpassed even the expensive creations of Mademoiselle Fancot, and a suit that did justice to the bonnet. It was enough to make one despair to be in the same room with so much elegant good taste and beauty. But when the nature of the visit was outlined, there was little room for despair.

“Tom Moore tells me you have overcome your aversion to literary lions, Miss Mallow, and I hope you will do me the honor to join a little party I am throwing. You really must come--you have called off on me before, and owe me a visit. Your old friend Miss Burney will be there. Tom Moore, Mr. Rogers, old Sheridan, if he can make it.
Do
say you will come.”

Prudence was enraptured. The Malverns were the apex of
ton.
To be included would return her to high society, where she felt a strong desire to be, not so much for the eminence as for the chance to see Dammler.

Not a single thought of the immorality of the crew occurred to her, though a party that included the likes of Fanny Burney was hardly likely to be dissolute. She longed to hear whether Dammler would be of the party, but disliked to ask outright.

As though reading her mind, Lady Malvern went on to raise the point. “Dammler can’t make it, but then one hears he has lost an interest in literature.”

That she had been speaking to Tom Moore was now evident. That Dammler had some new flirt under his patronage was equally evident, but why in the world was he drawing
Clarence
into the affair? If he wanted his lady’s likeness taken, why not go to a real artist? It looked almost like revenge.

Prudence accepted the invitation, which entailed a busy week of arranging a toilette to do it justice, but she did not quite forget Clarence’s studio in her rush. She cornered him the next morning over breakfast.

“When are you going to take Mama and myself to see your studio, Uncle?” she asked.

“Any time you like.”

"Good, I should like to go today. I shall drop in this afternoon. I have some shopping to do, and shall stop by then.”

“No!” he said at once. Too fast, too loud, too horrified!

She looked at him in alarm. “You said any time.”

“I must have a warning. That is--there are any number of men hanging around watching me work. The place is always cluttered up with young bucks. I will want to clear the riffraff out of my atelier before you come.

“Tomorrow, then.” Not that it would serve the purpose. She wanted to catch him unawares, and was sorry she had given a hint of her plan. That foreign atelier confirmed Dammler’s hand in it.

“No.” Less fast, less loud, less horrified, but very firm. “I have a special model I am working on.”

“Who is that?”

“No one you would know. She is very shy, and doesn’t like to have anyone but her patron watching when I paint her.”

So much for the crowd of wild bucks! “Who is her patron?” Prudence asked.

“You wouldn’t know him either!”

“What sort of a woman has a
patron,
Clarence?” Wilma asked suspiciously.

“A professional woman,” he answered vaguely.

“What is her profession?” Prudence demanded. But she knew the answer. The oldest profession in the world; the woman was a prostitute. She also had strong suspicions as to the identity of the patron.

“She is an actress. A very serious actress, you know, like Mrs. Jordan.”

“You never mean the Duke of Clarence is there in your studio!” Mrs. Mallow asked.

“Damme, I didn’t say it
was
Mrs. Jordan. Someone like her, but prettier.”

This sent the women scanning the great dramatic actresses of the day, but it soon sent Prudence right back to Lord Dammler. It was probably Mrs. Tempest, the woman who played
Shilla
in the play!

They could get no name from him. He became quite testy when they persisted. Prudence by no means gave up on discovering the secret. She could hardly go in person when the atelier was a hang-out for such persons and when she had been told firmly not to, but there was nothing to prevent her taking a stroll past the studio every time she was downtown, and she was there three days in a row with all the items to be bought to wear at Finefields. The studio, unfortunately, was on the second story, so that she couldn’t even peek in the window. She could see without the aid of a window, though, that there was heavy traffic in and out. The model seemed to be shy only of female viewers; all the gayest bucks of the town were there. On the third day, she saw as well that Dammler’s curricle was standing by. It was easily recognizable by the tiger skin coverings on the seats. Prudence made three passes in front of the studio that day, timed at roughly half-hour intervals. The curricle was still there on her last trip. It was either Mrs. Tempest, or the girl he had been buying a bonnet at Mademoiselle Fancot’s. She didn’t think it was the latter. She wasn’t gaudy enough.

Chapter Fourteen

Prudence had become so
intrigued with the goings-on at her uncle’s studio that she was reluctant to leave town, even for a visit to Finefields with the most interesting crew London could throw up. She knew Dammler was not to attend, but that, for once, was not the real sore point. She had given up on reclaiming him. Her aim now was to prevent his ruining Clarence. The mystery of the charm around his neck continued to engross her. The little locket had been seen to fall out of the open neck of his shirt more than once. It was a small, round locket, just as he claimed, but what was in it? Once he even opened it when he sat across the room from her. He had looked at it with a bemused smile, then with an audible sigh closed it up. It had something to do with a woman. Of that she was sure. Men didn’t wear that fatuous, foolish smile for any other purpose. Had Clarence fallen under the spell of a fair charmer? It looked powerfully like it, but then if the woman were Dammler’s flirt, Clarence could hardly hope to compete.

Her mother was drawn in to assist in getting a look at the locket. She hadn’t much better luck than Prudence, for it never left his body, but she had been at his elbow once when it fell open, and she thought there was a lock of hair in it--a curl. A blond curl. Prudence already knew the charm involved a woman. One who was either a blonde, a redhead or a brunette, so this added little knowledge. It did arouse a suspicion, but when she quizzed her mother she could not say that the blond curl was platinum.

“Marjorie, his wife, was a blonde,” Wilma said hopefully.

“Yes,” Prudence said--but so was Cybele a blonde, and Clarence never spoke of his late wife from one year’s end to the next.

The matter was still unresolved when she set out for Finefields in Mr. Moore’s well-sprung chaise. Clarence was not to be parted from his carriage at all these days, nor would the high perch phaeton have done her much good for a long trip, in any case. She was always required to hire a cab, but for the long trip, Mr. Moore had offered to deliver her.

It was an excellent gathering. Finefields offered the optimum in comfort and elegance, and at this particular time, the best of society in Miss Mallow’s view. She renewed acquaintance with Miss Burney in the mornings, discussed books and writing with her. Miss Burney was getting on in years, but a lady who had enjoyed the society of Dr. Johnson, been keeper of the robes to the Queen and been interned by Napoleon of France due to her marriage to a French general must always be an interesting talker. In the afternoons they went for walks and drives about the estate with an assortment of companions. The dinners in the evening were beyond anything Prudence was accustomed to, yet for all this she had no feeling of being above herself. With the single exception of Lady Malvern, there were no dauntingly beautiful or elegant females present. A leftover trousseau served very well, along with the bits of garniture bought to dress it up. Three days passed so pleasantly that Clarence and the locket were slipping to the back of her mind. Not out of it entirely, but to the rear for consideration upon her return to London.

They had arrived on Friday. Tuesday morning the group was at the table taking a leisurely breakfast when the mail was brought in. This was a part of the routine. On this occasion, Prudence was surprised to receive a letter herself, forwarded by her mother. It was not an important document, from an ex-neighbor back home, but it lent a cozy feeling, to be sitting opening and perusing a letter amongst this prestigious crew. Lady Malvern generally received an impressive stack of letters, as she did this day. She flipped through them, lifting out one with some interest to scan over quickly. She looked pleased when she set it down, then glanced to Prudence with a questioning look.

“A note from Dammler. He means to look in on his way to Longbourne. He goes there tomorrow--no, today. Tuesday, he says. He usually stops off on his way by to bait his horses. He says he wants to speak to you, Mr. Moore, about something or other. How nice. We shall ask him to dinner.”

“Good!” Moore answered. “I have been looking him up without success for a week. He has been making himself too scarce of late.”

Prudence waited to hear Mr. Rogers introduce the subject of painting, but he had been prodded to reticence by Moore and the hostess. Not another word was said on the subject. It was to be treated as a matter of no importance then. She must accept it as a social trifle like the others.

"Miss Mallow and I are off to your excellent library, Constance,” Miss Burney said, intimately aware of what Prudence must be feeling. “We are interested in looking up that set of letters by Horace Walpole you have. They are not in circulation, I think you mentioned. I should adore to see them.”

Prudence was grateful for the woman’s tact, and happy to get into the quiet of the library to ponder how she should proceed. She wondered if Dammler knew she was there, or if it was Constance that brought him. That he came to see Moore never so much as entered her head, though it was the truth.

Dammler hadn’t the faintest notion Prudence was at Finefields. Not a word could he get out of Clarence on her doings, and quizzing was difficult with the throng always in the atelier. Nor was he interested in Constance either. For a few confused weeks he had dabbled a bit in physics and the novel, then become interested in Clarence’s studio. He first hoped Prudence would turn up there to see for herself that Miss Penny was her uncle’s model. He realized as the audience grew that there was no likelihood of that, but was too unsettled to write. He often spent an hour in the afternoon with Clarence, watching him daub away and explain all his new techniques. Lately, he spent more than an hour. Cybele had never ceased to attract Clarence. Again and again, he was pestered to arrange for her to pose for Clarence. Ever versatile, he had a million excuses to fob him off. Exxon wouldn’t allow it. Then Clarence learned from some other watchers that Exxon was gone home to his estate in Warwick, and it seemed the ideal time for it, to get it over with. Still disliking to do it, he claimed the Rembrandt style wouldn’t suit her.

“I know that! Obviously she must be done as Venus, in the style of Botticelli. I have thought it all out. There’s no shell in the world large enough for her to stand on, of course, and her hair ain’t long enough to trail around her body--’Birth of Venus,’ of course, will be the picture. Venus floating along the water on her shell, with Miss Penny and another gel from the theater to hold the cape and blow wind on her. I’ll stand her on a chair, and paint up a big picture of a shell, using a small one for a model. No trouble in it. Here, I have the cartoon sketched up in the way I mean to do her.”

A tracing of Botticelli’s “Birth of Venus” was thrust into Dammler’s hands. “I’m afraid Exxon wouldn’t like it,” he insisted, determined to leave it at that.

Cybele, however, heard of the new artist from her sister actresses, and was eager to be painted for posterity. Much she cared for Exxon! She was through with him. A much more dashing buck was ogling her, and besides, Exxon was always pestering her to drop out of the play. She adored that play. To be wearing the pretty chiffon costumes, and a black wig and dancing! It was like a party every night. And they paid her for it, too. With Clarence shouting in one ear and Cybele wheedling in the other, Dammler gave in and brought her to the studio, where Clarence, within the space of three seconds, realized he had finally met the woman to replace his late wife.