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“Perhaps it's better after all that you stop writing to him. You seem rather fixed on him. I hope you have no thought that Christopher would ever..." She paused delicately. "Never mind."
"I know what you were going to say," Beatrix had said in a matter-of-fact manner. "Of course I have no illusions about that. I haven't forgotten that he once compared me to a horse."
"He did not compare you to a horse," Prudence said. "He merely said you belonged in the stables. However, he is a sophisticated man, and he would never be happy with a girl who spends most of her time with animals."
"I much prefer the company of animals to that of any person I know," Beatrix shot back. Instantly she regretted the tactless statement, especially as she saw that Prudence had taken it as a personal affront. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean-"
"Perhaps you had better leave, then, and go to your pets," Prudence had said in a frosty tone. "You'll be happier conversing with someone who can't talk back to you."
Chastened and vexed, Beatrix had left Mercer House. But not before Prudence had said, "For all our sakes, Bea, you must promise me never to tell Captain Phelan that you wrote the letters. There would be no point in it. Even if you told him, he wouldn't want you. It would only be an embarrassment, and a source of resentment. A man like that would never forgive such a deception.”