“Which is why it amazes me to see that you’ve gotten so close to him,” Prudence went on.
Bridget frowned. “I don’t know if I’d put it like that.”
“Oh, you can’t possibly deny it! I saw the way you were looking at him when we came in!” Prudence said. “I’ve never seen you look at a man that way before. It’s the same as the way I look at Leonard!”
Bridget felt heat rise to her cheeks. “It isn’t the same at all!” she insisted. “All right, I confess I’ve grown tolikeReeves?—”
“And to call him by his name,” Prudence said knowingly.
“Well,yes, but that’s not because there’s anythingromanticbetween the two of us.” Bridget forced herself not to think about what had happened the other day by the lake, about his arms around her and her head on his chest. She was sure Prudence would make a production of that if she knew it had happened. “It’s not like that, Prudence, truly. We’ve grown… all right, I suppose you can call itclose, but it’s only because we share a common goal. We both want to help Emma recover from what has happened to her. That’s all it is. And once that’s done, I’ll bereturning to the orphanage. I expect that to be quite soon, to tell you the truth.”
“You’re going back?” Prudence asked.
“Surely you didn’t think I was going to stay here? You know how much my work means to me, Prudence.”
“I do,” Prudence agreed. “But seeing you with Reeves, I confess I had the idea that he might mean just as much to you. Perhaps even more.”
“I don’t think I’m destined for love,” Bridget told her cousin. “I’ve never believed I was—you know… that. That’s the reason I never tried very hard to find myself a match when I was staying with your family. It didn’t seem like the kind of thing that lay naturally in my future. And now… well, I like Reeves. Of course I do. But I’m in love with my work at the orphanage.” Her resolve steadied as she said the words. “I could never give that up. Not for any man.”
“I know that,” Prudence said. “I know it’s important to you to help children. And I know part of the reason that matters so much is that you want to give them a childhood like you never had. I’ve always respected that about you. I’ve even looked up to you for it, in a way, even though you’re younger than I am. It would have been easy to spend your time being sad about what you didn’t have in your life, but instead, your focus is on improving the lives of others. I think that’s wonderful.”
“It’s very important to me,” Bridget agreed, beaming at her cousin’s pride in her.
“But… Bridget,” Prudence went on. “You don’t mean to do it forever, do you? For the rest of your life?”
“I don’t see why not,” Bridget said. “There will always be more children who need my help.”
“That’s true, but what about your own life? Remember, you admitted yourself that you got into this because of the things you never had,” Prudence said. “You never had a family that truly cared for you. But now that you’ve grown up, that’s something you could build for yourself.”
“Don’t tell me you’re going to be the next in line to advise me to marry,” Bridget groaned. “Do you think I haven’t heard it before?”
“I know you’ve heard it. And that’s just the problem. You’ve heard it so many times that I wonder how long it’s been since you really listened,” Prudence said. “I’ll remind you that I didn’t always want to marry.”
“No, you wanted to dress up as a peasant boy and sneak into nightclubs,” Bridget laughed.
Prudence laughed too, at the reminder of the wayward behavior of her youth. “That was a very long time ago,” she said. “I don’t even keep those clothes anymore.”
“You’re kidding. You haven’t dressed up in your peasant clothes recently?” Bridget wouldn’t honestly have believed her cousin would ever stop doing that. What she’d said was true—freedom had meant a great deal to Prudence, and Prudence had liked to express that by putting on trousers and a shirt and cap and going out to a pub, letting everyone believe she was a young man. It was during one such excursion that she had first encountered Leonard, a tale both of them loved to retell over and over. Once they had married, Leonard had agreed to accompany Prudence when she went out so that she could maintain her freedom but do so in a way that didn’t cause him worry.
“Did Leonard finally make you throw them away?” she asked Prudence now.
“He’d never have made me. But we decided together that it was time to stop doing that,” Prudence said.
“You decided together? I truly thought you would never want to stop. I thought that was so important to you.”
“Well, it was. But this is the point I’m making, Bridget. The things that are important when we’re young aren’t always the same things that matter as we grow older. It wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, would it, if you moved on from the orphanage? If you did decide to marry, and perhaps raise children of your own? You could still fulfill your goal of helping children have a better upbringing than the one you had, but it would be even better, perhaps, because they would be your own children. You would be their mother. Haven’t you ever thought about it?”
Bridget hesitated.
She hadn’t really thought about this in the past. Because of the way she’d grown up, she had never romanticized the idea of being a mother. She had never yearned for children of her own. But lately, spending so much time with Emma, she had begun to think of things differently.
Itwouldbe nice if she could stay here for the long term and see to it, not only that Emma recovered from her ordeal, but that she grew up well. She imagined herself briefly, a decade in the future, helping Emma dress for her first Season.
Not that I know anything about that. I’m the worst possible choice to guide a young lady through a Season, given what failures my own Seasons were.
Before she could answer her cousin’s question, Leonard came into the room. He held a glass of water in his hand. He crossed the room and held it out to Prudence. “Don’t forget to care for yourself,” he said, winking at her. “For both of you.”
Prudence found that odd. “What did he mean?” she asked Prudence.
