Prude & Prejudice (6 page)

“I’m Prue,” she said, and saw no flicker of recognition in his eyes. “Prudence.”
Still nothing.
“Prudence
Higginbottom
.”

“
Oh yes, from the cafe
. I hardly recognized you. You’ve either lost a lot of weight or my eyes were playing tricks on me
the other day
.”

“It was my jacket. It was too big.”
What a nerve he had to sit there and act so friendly
and charming
after the insulting comments he had made about her
.

“
How is your
lovely
mother?” Was that lau
ghter she detected in his eyes?

“She’s fine. Thank you for asking.”
There was an awkward silence
. Cate and Bradley were involved in
a conversation that was clearly
meant for two
so she could not hope for any relief from that quarter
.

“
H
ow long have you been in the catering business?”

“You mean how long have I been
working as
the hired help?”

“Well, yes, if
that’s how you want to put
it.”

“We brought the café three years ago.
” She
squinted
as if she
was trying
to see someone
in the distance
and then waved. “
Oh look
,
there’s my friend Sam. Ni
ce talking to you
.”
Without another word s
he jumped up from the table and pushed her way through to the
bar. She did not even have a friend called Sam
, but she needed an excuse to
get away
, and
this was the best she co
uld come up with on the spot
. A
fter
spend
ing
even
that brief
a
mount of time in William
Darling
’s
company
she
also needed a drink, but to her frustration
it took ten minutes b
efore she was
served. C
omplete strangers kept pushing in front of her
at the bar
, and w
hen she finally made it to the front of the queue Murray, the usual Saturday nig
ht barman
, was too busy to speak to
her
.
He always made her cockta
il exactly the way she liked it and they
flirted and
shar
ed a joke or two
, but tonight he did
not even acknowledge her.

As if that was not bad enough, someone
put techno music on the jukebox and Prue thought her head was going to explode
with the hideous pounding beat
. After buying her drink she wandered around the pub
for what seemed like hours tr
ying to find a familiar face
, but to no avail. It was like she stuck in some ki
nd of techno-themed nightmare. She
brought
another drink
and had
almost finished it
when she finally ran into her old school
friend
,
Joey.
He was also a bit of an outcast at school and they had stuck together and defended one another through the tough years.

“
Thank god,” she said, grabbing his arm. “
I’
m so glad to see you
. What’s going on here?”

“I know, it’s crazy.
Do you want a
drink?
”
he said.

“Sure, let’s get a bottle of wine to share and go somewhere quiet out the back.”
After buying the wine
and wandering around for a while
t
hey
finally
found some free chairs in a dark
alcove under the
stairs and settled down to catch up.

“That’s so much better. So
,
how have t
hings been with you?” she asked, sinking into the soft chair
with relief
.
“I haven’t seen you for a while.”
Joey
had recently gotten ma
rried and had his first child, and h
e and his wife ran a furniture store in town.

“Everything was fine
up until a couple of weeks ago
, but now I’m starting to get a bit worried about business. There’s a new
furniture
shop ope
ning acr
oss the street
, so it will be in direct competition with us. It’s owned by one of the wives o
f
a manager from Organic
Feasts
. They have a couple of other stores too
around the place
and will probably be able to undercut our prices.”

“I’m sure you’ll be fine, you have really good quality stuff in your shop and everyone around here knows you
.
”

“
I hope so.
W
e’re barely been breaking even so any competition could potentially send us under, but I shouldn’t complain. It’s great for the tow
n, especially after the last year
.”

“I suppose, but
if tonight is anything to go by
I could live without the crowds, the techno music and the rudeness. Just between you and me,
I preferred things the way they were.”

             
They finished the wine and ordered another bottle, and it was a couple of hours later when Prue finally said goodbye to Joey and went in search of her sisters to go home. She had drank much mo
re than she intended to, and in some dim part of h
er brain the realized she was very drunk as she stumbled on the step leading back to the main bar. At that moment someone knocked into her from behind and spilled their
sticky
drink down the back of her
new
shirt, and then, a
s if on
cue
,
the jukebox started up again with
pounding
tech
no music.

Cate was in the sa
me place where she had left her,
chatting with Charles Bradley
, and by the time Prue fought her
way across the room to join them
s
he was in a very bad mood. William
Darling
made the unfortunate mistake of trying to speak with her
at that moment
.

             
“This is really a great pub. I was a bit worried when we moved here that the night life was going to be deadly boring, but so far it’s been great.” She fixed him with what she hoped was a cold stare,
but it was a little difficult when she
couldn’t focus her eyes properly on his face.

             
“Well
,
I’m just so glad that you and all your city friends appreciate our quaint little country pub.
That’s just dandy because you are just so welcome here and so wanted in this town. Thanks for moving in and improving our lives by bringing your sophisticated city ways with you. On behalf of the whole town I would like to say thank you.
”
She threw her arms out melodramatically
to demonstrate her point
, and would have tumbled off the stool if he had not reached out to steady her.

             
“What exactly is your problem?”
he said
, surprised
.
She leaned over so that her face was just inches from his.

             
“
You’re
my problem, y
ou and your kind,” she slurred.
“
You come to this town and think you can just take it over.
You lack even basic manners and have no idea how to behave like civ
ilized human beings. You take the jobs
of
hardworking people, and make it impossible for families to buy
homes. You have no respect
our traditio
ns and our ways of life and you
need to be stopped.
No one would have dared play techno in this pub till you came along.
I am going to take a stand against this madness and I’m sure many others will join me.
”

Her voice must have
risen
a
few decibels because Prue
noticed
through her drunken haze
that everyone left in the pub seemed to
have s
topped talking and
they
were
all
staring at her.
“You have to be stopped,” were her last words before
her vision blurred over completely
and everything went black. T
hat was the last thing she remembered of the evening.

****

“
Aaa
rrrghhhh
,”
moaned
Prue
. Sh
e was lying face down on a
bed
that was not her own
, but she was
too sick to
open her eyes or
even
move her head. She could tell there was someone else in the room with her, but she had no idea who it was. “Where am I? What happened?”

“You had a bit too much to drink last night and I brought you home.” It was a male voice and Prue’s stomach lurched painfully as she
had a flash
back of talking to William
Darling
before everything went black
.
Surely
she had not gone home with the ma
n she despised above all others?
She could not possibly have been that drunk
and her sisters would never have allowed it
. She turned her head ging
erly and was relieved to recognize
the familiar guest bedroom in
Alice
’s house. Standing over her with a glass of water
and an aspirin
was her brother-in-law
,
Scott.

“
T
his might help. I hear you had quit
e an interesting evening
and made a new friend of William Darling.
”

“Please don’t remind me. I can’t
even remembe
r what I said to the man.
All I can see is the shocked look on his face
, so it must have been bad
.”

“Oh, I ca
n tell you exactly what you said to him
,” said Alice, sailing in the door with some tea and toast
on a tray
. “In fact just
about
every
one
in the
pub
can tell you.
Mum is furious.”

Prue sat up
abruptly in bed
then winced
with pain
. “Why did you have to tell Mum? S
he’s going to kill me.”

“I didn’t have to tell her, she already knew. Someone phoned her this morning. She wants you to go straight around there when you leave here.”

“Oh god, this
is the last thin
g I need. I have to get
home to check on the animals so she’ll
just
have to wait.
”

“Don’t worry
about that.
I phoned Bob
and he took care of it all
, so now you’ve got no excuse.
My advice is just
go
and
get it over with.
”

It was almost lunchtime by the time Prue dragged hers
elf out of bed and around to her parents
’
place.
Alice had filled her in on every humiliating detail
of the night before,
and during the drive she felt very
self-conscious and donned her darkest sunglasses
in case she saw anyone she knew.
She had not bothered to shower at
Alice
’s and her makeup from the night before was still smeared across her face
and her hair was matted
. All she wanted was to get home and fall into her own bed, but this had to be endured first.

Fortunately
the café was closed on Sunday
so there were no witnesses to her
walk of
shame
from the car to the house. Her mother was waiting inside
, her arms folded across her
chest and her expression ston
y
.