Prudence (4 page)

‘Your sister is right,’ Prue broke in, mindful of her duty. ‘It is not becoming, my dear, to speak in such a way.’

‘Pooh!’ scoffed Dodo. ‘Mama don’t mind it. Besides, I did care. But I can’t be forever crying about it.’

‘Very true.’ Prue could sympathise with this point of view, for she had lost both parents. And life, she had discovered early, goes on. ‘Nevertheless, it is important to be careful how you express yourself. Others, you know, may be shocked to hear you.’

The brown eyes looked her over. ‘You don’t look shocked.’

Prue might have responded that she was already too battered by the shocks of the day to feel any more. She refrained, however, merely suggesting that they should proceed to wherever they were taking her.

‘We’re here,’ said Lotty, and threw open the nearest door. ‘This is our playroom.’

‘Everyone calls it the nursery,’ said Dodo, ‘but that’s silly. We’re not babies.’

‘No, indeed,’ agreed Prue, following them into the room.

It was a large apartment, with two big windows that let on to the back of the house. It was furnished in plain style, with a large table, an aged sofa in old red leather set against one wall, and several chairs with worn leather seats which might better have suited a billiard room. Two long oak chests were set either side of one window, into one of which a female was busy tidying a quantity of items that had been amassed beside it.

The woman straightened up. Seeing the twins, she broke into a flood of French, delivered at high speed and with many exclamatory gestures.

Prue stood mumchance, watching this voluble exhibition, amazed that the girls made no attempt to intervene or explain themselves. The creature was diminutive, but looked to be possessed of a wiry strength. She was dressed in black, with an apron tied around her waist and a crisp, starched cap upon her head which tied in a bow under the chin. Her age was indistinct, but out of features a trifle lined, the only one that made an impression was a pair of snapping black eyes.

The rapid cannonade of French was too difficult for Prue to follow, although she had a reasonable knowledge of the language. But she was astonished to find, when the woman at last ceased speaking, that the twins had clearly been able to understand her.

‘
Pardon
, Yvette,’ said Lotty fluently,
‘mais je désire
à vous presenter notre gouvernante, Mademoiselle Hursley.’

Changing the subject by introducing her new governess? The child was adroit, thought Prue, as she perforce moved forward to make the woman’s acquaintance.

‘This is Yvette,’ offered Dodo. ‘She is our nurse.’

The female grunted, and bobbed a curtsy.
‘Mademoiselle.’

‘Bonjour. C’est Madame Yvette?’

‘Ah, you spik my language,’ said the woman in heavily accented English. ‘Zat ees good.’

‘Yes, but I am afraid you were speaking too fast for me to understand earlier.’

‘You, yes-s,’ agreed Yvette, glaring at the twins. ‘But ze
enfants
, zey understand.’ Her eyes came back to Prue, and she gestured into the open chest. ‘Sings everywhere! Zey must tidee, no?’ Her eyes snapped as she answered herself. ‘No!
C’est moi qui peux faire.
I ’ave ze time me, yes-s? I make ze washe, ze iron, ze bedde. I must dresse zem, feede zem. Like bebee zey are.’

Here, a fresh torrent of French broke out, which ceased abruptly as Yvette caught sight of the kitten locked in Lotty’s arms. For a moment, she stared in disbelief.

‘Uh-oh!’ warned Dodo, belatedly concealing the plate of food behind her back.

‘Oh, bother!’ sighed Lotty.

Prue saw the Frenchwoman draw in her breath, evidently ready to unleash a further spate of complaint. Quickly, she stepped in.

‘I’m afraid you must blame me, Yvette. I brought the kitten.’

For a moment, Prue thought she was about to receive the full deluge of the little nurse’s wrath. Yvette clearly struggled with herself. Perhaps the impropriety weighed upon her of expressing herself thus freely to the governess, who was her superior in the hierarchy of the house. Prue could not tell, but she was glad to see the woman’s lips purse together.

‘In zees case,
mam’zelle
, I say nussing. Only I say zat ze
enfants
, zey will clean if ze
petit chat
’ee make ze messe.’ She eyed the twins.
‘Vous comprenez?’

The twins nodded fervently, reassuring her in fluent French.

‘
Comme tu dis
, Yvette.’

‘Il ne sera pas problème.’

Yvette grunted.
‘Je l’espère.’

‘You have no need to concern yourself,’ Prue said, adding her mite, ‘for the cook has kindly promised to send up a box of earth for the kitten. I am sure there will be no mess.’

Yvette made a derisory noise and held her nose. ‘And ze steenk? Zaire weel be no steenk?’

‘No, indeed, for I am sure the maids will empty it out frequently.’

The nurse eyed the kitten with suspicion, as if she was waiting for it to disgrace itself there and then. Dodo having laid down the dish of meat, both twins were intent upon watching their new pet consume a hearty meal.

‘Alors, c’est folle!’

Having delivered herself of this indictment, Yvette left the room, with all the air of washing her hands of the whole business. Prue was left to the uncomfortable reflection that Mr Rookham had been moved to express himself in much the same terms. Perhaps it had been
folly on her part to bring the kitten. Only now that it had been bestowed upon the twins, she doubted that they could be persuaded to give it up.

Bent over the desk which had been provided for her use, with her cloak about her, Prue scratched away at her letter to Nell and Kitty. She had meant faithfully to record all the happenings of her first day, but the hour was already far advanced and the entry into her life of the brown, white and orange kitten had proved so eventful a history that she had only just reached her arrival at Rookham Hall.

She laid down her pen for a moment, and flexed her fingers. Perhaps she should complete the story tomorrow. It was not comfortable to write by the light of a single candle, and the schoolroom was decidedly chilly. She was wrapped in her cloak, with the kitten creating a little splodge of warmth in her lap, but the cold had seeped into her feet and the fingers of her idle left hand.

Concentrating upon her letter, Prue had not noticed that the house was eerily silent. Had everyone gone to bed? Not that she would know. Few members of the household came into this portion of the Hall. The twins had averred that until they arrived, it had been virtually uninhabited, their uncle never having married.

Nothing had been accomplished in the way of education today, for there had been enough to do in becoming acquainted with Dodo and Lotty. She had learned a little of their past, enough to be burningly curious. They appeared to have spent the entirety of their lives abroad, in Italy mostly, and otherwise in Belgium or Austria, so far as Prue could gather. But although they could converse both in French and
Italian, as they willingly demonstrated, English was their mother tongue.

But it was not easy to direct discussion with them, and within a short time, Prue had begun to dread the promised meeting with Mr Rookham. Already he doubted her ability to manage her duties. How was she to convince him that she could succeed when her confidence had suffered a severe battering?

Her fond hopes had proved deluded. The Misses Chillingham were far from the little darlings she had envisaged. Had she known, Prue was half inclined to think she must have jumped out of the coach rather than face the horrors in store.

It had been Kitty, she recalled, who had been sceptical.

‘How can you know they are darlings? They may be sadly ill disciplined.’

‘Like you,’ Nell had pointed out. ‘And unlike the Duck, I cannot think that Prue will confine them in the attic on bread and water.’

A fate that had frequently overtaken Kitty. Knowing her friend, Prue might have guessed. For Kitty was as wilful as she was pretty, with lush locks of ebony, an engaging smile, and a pair of lustrous brown eyes.

In just the same way, despite their angelic features, the Misses Chillingham were, as Kitty had unknowingly predicted, impossibly uncontrolled. They chattered non-stop, and had a habit of breaking in on one another to introduce subjects unconnected with whatever was going forward at the time. Prue could not tell them apart from their looks, but she was already beginning to recognise each from the style of their conversation.

Lotty seemed to be the more mature, if a trifle pa
tronising in her manner, while Dodo’s attention tended to be scattered, and her remarks were the more disconnected. But in the matter of activity, there was nothing to choose between them. Creatures of boundless energy, they were never still. They hopped up and down, raced about, and kept up a constant barrage of small attacks, one upon the other. In short, they were so far from the ideal of ladylike conduct instilled into Prue at the Seminary that the Duck would have thrown up her hands in horror.

How in the world she was to keep them sober enough to sit at lessons, Prue could not imagine. She strongly suspected that the nurse Yvette was the only person with any ability to control the pair. In her presence, Lotty and Dodo were muted, if not precisely quiet. If the nurse was always so ill tempered, it was perhaps not surprising that she could quell them merely with a look.

Not that Yvette contented herself with looks. If she was not attacking them in virulent French, she was muttering under her breath. During dinner, which had been served in the playroom, and which Prue partook of in their company, Yvette had gone about tidying the room, with an eagle eye out for the slightest lapse of table manners. Pouncing like a tiger, she had upbraided one for talking with her mouth full, and the other for leaning her elbows on the table.

Prue had felt sorry for them both, and had redoubled her efforts to make friends. It did not seem to her, however, that the nurse’s strictures had any effect upon the twins outside her sphere of influence. The moment Yvette left the room, they had returned to their normal level of exuberance.

That her rule was absolute, however, had been dem
onstrated when she had come to fetch the twins to bed. Lotty had picked up the kitten, ready to take it with them. Yvette had balked.

‘Mais non! Dans le chambre? Jamais!’

And that had been that. Not a squeak of protest from either! Both had looked so disappointed, however, that Prue had assured them she would take care of the kitten through the night. Which had meant that she must remove the box that had been provided for its use to her own chamber.

But that was the least of the matters exercising Prue’s mind. Would Mr Rookham not expect the governess to exercise a like control? A forlorn hope. Nell would have had no difficulty. Nor Kitty, she suspected, whose temper had often made her fellow Seminary pupils tremble.

Perhaps she ought to beg Nell for advice. Taking up her pen, Prue dipped it into the ink. But before she could set down a word, the schoolroom door opened with a faint squeak of its hinges.

Startled, Prue looked up to find a tall shadowy form entering, candle in hand. A muted growl from her lap caused her to place a restraining hand upon the kitten’s back.

‘What are you doing up so late? And why are you sitting in the cold?’

Prue let her breath go. ‘Mr Rookham! Oh, dear, you gave me such a fright!’

He made no apology for having done so. He came into the room, pausing by the empty fireplace, the candle held low so that his features remained in shadow.

‘You should have asked for a fire to be made up.’

The kitten jumped off her lap, and Prue rose. ‘I did not like to. Besides, I am used to the cold.’

‘But the twins are not.’

He sounded irritated. Prue made haste to explain.

‘We have had no lessons today. For the most part, I have been in their playroom. Getting acquainted, you know.’

The kitten approached his booted feet in a spirit of investigation. Mr Rookham looked down.

‘I thought you had given that thing to the girls.’

‘I have, but their nurse has forbidden them to take it into their bedchamber.’

He leaned his arm along the plain marbled mantel. ‘I am glad to find someone in this house is possessed of common sense.’

Prue picked up the kitten as it returned to the safety of her skirts. ‘Poor Folly.’

Mr Rookham’s features were only faintly visible, but she saw that quirk at his lips. ‘Is that what you’ve christened it? How very apt.’

‘It was what you said,’ Prue pointed out. ‘And since Dodo and Lotty could not agree, the matter was left to me to decide.’

He straightened. ‘Then decide a few other matters, and don’t wait to be told! This is not a prison, nor am I a pauper. You must ask for anything you may need, do you understand me?’

Prue nodded dumbly, dismayed by his manner. If he had before been sarcastic, he was now wholly unapproachable.

His gaze fell to the kitten in her arms. ‘Ah, yes, I had almost forgot.’

He put a hand into an inner pocket of his coat. It was of a dark stuff, the colour unidentifiable in the half-light. The cravat, worn simply tied, gleamed palely at his throat. He laid something on the mantelshelf.

‘You said five shillings, I think.’

Blankly, she gazed at him. ‘I beg your pardon?’

‘For the kitten.’ At the door he turned. ‘You had best go to bed. It cannot be good for you to sit about in this cold.’

The door closed behind him, and Prue felt inexplicably forlorn. She shook off the feeling. She was relieved to see the back of him. What a strange man he was! She must hope that she was not to see much of him, to be subjected to such odd moods.

She recalled what he had said, and an abrupt realisation took her unawares. Five shillings? She crossed to the mantel, and felt along the shelf. The item he had left there was soon retrieved. She examined it at her own candle, and found it to be a crown piece.