In the drowsy haze of an English village, where the air smelled of damp earth and apple blossoms, young Prudence Whitmore sat peeling potatoes while her mother, Agnes, eyed her with stern affection.
“Prudence, love, its high time you wed. Look at youripe as a summer plum. See that strapping lad, Geoffrey? Arms like oak branches, he could bend a horseshoe without blinking. Hed carry you like a queen!” Agnes mused, wiping flour from her hands.
Prudence snorted. “Aye, and then bend me in half like one of his blasted horseshoes. Id spend my days sniffing the dirt!”
“Dont be daft, girl!” Agnes sighed. “I know where your heart straysalways mooning over that Andrew. But mark my words, hed make a poor husband.”
Prudence whirled around. “And whys that? Hes hardworking! Their cottage is the neatest in the village. Every fence mended, every tile in place. Oursll be just as grand!”
Agnes chuckled. “You think *he* does all that? Thats his elder brother, Gregory. *Hes* the one with magic in his fingers. Your Andrews only got eyes for his accordion and whichever hayloft he can drag a lass into.”
“Mum, youre babbling. Gregorys crooked as a question markhead lolling, back bent, one leg shorter. Hows *he* managing it?”
“Go see for yourself,” Agnes said slyly. “Offer to help Aunt Mabel pick apples. Then youll understand.”
So Prudence went. She found Andrew napping under the thatched awning and poked him awake. “You swore youd mend the roof at dawn!”
He yawned. “Come to nag me, have you? I never promised marriage. Too soon for that.”
“Fine. Ill help your mum with the apples. Join me if youve the spine for it.”
“Not on your life,” he scoffed. “Ill not be the village laughingstock. Off you pop.”
Hurt, Prudence stalked to the orchard. As she plucked fruit, a rhythmic *clink-clink* echoed from behind the cottage.
“Whats Uncle Peter building?” she asked.
Aunt Mabel sighed. “Thats not Peterits Gregory. My mans laid up with a bad back. But Gregory? Cant sit idle. Not like our Andrew, whod rather gad about. Still, we humour himGregoryll never wed. Whod have him? Andrewll give us grandchildren.”
Curious, Prudence followed the sound. There sat Gregory, whittling a block of wood.
“Hello,” she ventured. “May I see?”
He startled but didnt flee. In his rough hands lay a carvingher face, delicate as dawn.
“Is that *me*?” she whispered.
Gregory nodded, then tugged her behind the garden to a tiny shed. Inside, she gaspeddozens of Prudences. Clay, wood, even a smudged pencil sketch.
“Why?”
His voice was gravel. “Youre bonny. Im not.” He turned away, shoulders shaking.
She reached for him. “You love me?”
When he faced her, his eyesblue as the Cornish seaheld such longing she fled in panic.
Back home, Gregory wept at the kitchen table. “Why didnt you drown me at birth? Andrews adored. Im a *monster*! She *ran*! If she weds him, Ill hang myself!”
Agnes soothed him. “Hush, my lamb. Prudence is kind. Shell see your heart. And Andrew? He doesnt love her. Mark me.”
Meanwhile, Prudence couldnt forget Gregorys eyes. No one had ever looked at her like thatnot even Andrew, who now lounged by the gate.
“Come to see me or Mum? Fancy a stroll?”
“No,” she said coolly. “Im here for Gregory. To apologise. Off you goisnt Betsy waiting by the old yew?”
The village reeled when Prudence wed Gregory. They whispered of potions, pitied her. But Agnes knew the truthher daughter was smitten. The pair sat for hours, heads bent, laughing softly.
They married quietly. No need for gawkers.
Andrew, ever the peacock, boasted: “I nearly proposed! And she chose *him*?”
Prudence and Gregory moved to the village edge. With her fathers help, he built a cottage so fine it made folk gasp. They filled it with three children.
As for Andrew? He still roamedno longer chasing maidens, but any hearth thatd have him. Caught tupping a blacksmiths wife, he was tarred and beaten. He shrugged it off.
Years later, when villagers sneered”God gave the beauty a broken man!”Prudence would laugh.
“Look at yourselves! Hunchbacked, groaning with rheumatism. My Gregory? Only his shells bent. Inside, hes the finest man alive.”
And it was true.
