Kyrle turned, full of anger, which changed in a moment by some miraculous process into satisfaction, for who should stand before him, with wondering eyes and faintly flushing cheeks, but the lovely lady of the balcony!
And she was lovelier even than he had imagined, with a face in which all fine issues of thought and feeling seemed to meet. She looked surprised, yet the gentle, curving lips smiled as it were irresistibly, while she said, with the composure of a woman of the world, “I recollect Mr. Kyrle perfectly, though I should not have known him.”
“Nor I you,” Lennox answered, bowing deeply. “But I have never forgotten you.”
It did not occur to him until after the words were spoken what a lover-like sound they might have to any one under that false impression which he had just resented. But when he lifted his head it was to meet a pair of eyes which at once enlightened him with regard to the interpretation of which theywere susceptible. These eyes belonged to the young man whom he had already seen on the balcony, and whom Mrs. Meredith now introduced as Mr. Joscelyn.
Percy Joscelyn had not forgotten the man whom he found with Aimée on the momentous occasion when he went to announce the great change in her fortunes, and he instantly identified this bronzed stranger as that man, even before hearing the name which he had taken care to remember. It was therefore natural enough that his eyes should express suspicion and dislike when Lennox met them.
But this immediate proof of Fanny’s assertion, that he would be regarded as “Aimée’s former lover,” did not irritate Kyrle as might have been expected. On the contrary, he was conscious of a sense of amusement which he would not have believed possible a moment earlier. It was the appearance of Joscelyn which wrought this change. A few minutes before he had, unconsciously to himself, envied this man; nowhewas transformed into an object if not of envy, at least of apprehension to the latter. It was impossible not to feel thatthe situation had its elements of interest. He looked at the beautiful girl standing before him, a smile still on her lips, but her gentle, high-bred composure otherwise unchanged, and felt that, after all, the suspicion of having been her lover was one which he could cheerfully support.
Aimée, on her part, regarding him with the deep, soft eyes he remembered well, was thinking of the sea wall, the star-lighted tide, and the young lover who had taken his disappointment with such fiery disdain. There rose before her, too, a memory of the orange grove at sunset, and the generous anger which had burned there for her rather than for himself. She knew well that most men in his place would have given scant thought at such a time to any one so insignificant as she had been, and therefore, remembering his deep concern for the false position in which she was placed, she had held Lennox Kyrle in grateful remembrance during all the years since their one day of brief acquaintance.
Yet it was characteristic of the woman, as it had been characteristic of the girl, to forgetherself for others; and so at this moment she was thinking less of herself and her own singular connection with that past story, than of the two before her, who had been lovers once and now were strangers. She was wondering how they felt on meeting again face to face, and how much or how little the memory of the past thrilled them. Fanny she knew too well to expect any depth of feeling from her; but how was it with Lennox Kyrle?
Meanwhile, amid all these memories, it was necessary that some one should sustain conversation with the usual commonplaces; and of this Mrs. Meredith was fortunately fully capable.
“I was never more surprised than when I looked up and saw Mr. Kyrle a few minutes ago,” she said to Aimée. “And yet there was really no reason to be surprised at all.”
“Not in these days, when everybody goes everywhere,” said Lennox, “and the acquaintance one parted with in Europe yesterday, one meets to-morrow in China. Especially a wanderer like myself may be met anywhere.”
“You are a wanderer, then?” said Aimée.
“Yes,” he answered. “I am a person with whom you are intimately acquainted—‘our special correspondent,’ and therefore my duties take me to many places.”
“They have brought you to a very delightful place now,” said she.
“My own inclination has brought me here,” he replied, and as he uttered the words he saw a quick flash of suspicion in Percy Joscelyn’s eyes again.
“Have you been here long?” asked Fanny. “Wecame about a week ago; and we are doing our sight-seeing so leisurely that we have hardly as yet seen anything at all, except what can be perceived from a gondola.”
“I arrived only a day or two ago from Alexandria,” answered Kyrle, “but I am inclined to think that, for a time, what one perceives from a gondola—that is, Venice herself—may be best of all.”
“It is,” said Aimée. Upon which the young man beside her, speaking for the first time, observed:
“It might be, if Venice were better preserved; but one grows tired of looking at somuch decay. In fact, in my opinion, we have been here quite long enough.”
“Then, my dear Percy,” said Mrs. Meredith, coolly, “I advise you to take your departure for any place that you like better, for we, who have come to Venice for a month, mean to stay.”
It was not a very amiable glance which Mr. Joscelyn bestowed upon the speaker, but he did not answer save by this glance. He turned instead to Aimée, and said:
“We seem to have lost the rest of our party. Shall we not go and look for them?”
Before Aimée could reply to this proposal, the entrance of a party of four made reply unnecessary, for it was at once apparent that these were the missing persons whom it was proposed to seek. Yet they had the appearance themselves of seeking, rather than of needing to be sought, for as they entered they all looked around, and perceiving the group before theParadiso, eagerly advanced toward it.
The foremost of these newcomers was a tall, elaborately dressed young lady—young, atleast by courtesy—whose commonplace prettiness was spoiled by an exceedingly artificial appearance and manner. With her were a faded, languid, elderly woman, possessing much natural elegance and traces of great beauty; a man of about sixty, carefully got up with padding and hair-dye to look not more than forty; and a rotund, florid, genial man of thirty-five or thereabouts. As these advanced the young lady spoke:
“I thought we should never find you! Where have you been hiding yourselves?”
“We have been hiding ourselves where you see us,” replied Mrs. Meredith. “When I lose people, I always make a rule of quietly sitting down and letting them findme, instead of running about trying to findthem. So I have been sitting here for half an hour in a conspicuous position; and, as a reward, I have been found—not only by you, but by an old acquaintance who has most unexpectedly appeared.—Mrs. Joscelyn, let me present Mr. Kyrle.”
Mr. Kyrle bowed to the elderly lady, who at once put up her eyeglass to examine him,with an alacrity which indicated that his name was not unknown to her. He was then presented to Major Joscelyn, to Miss Joscelyn and to Mr. Meredith; and he was aware of being regarded with more or less active suspicion by all of them except Miss Joscelyn, who smiled as graciously as women of her order generally do upon an apparently eligible man.
“I—ah—hum—have heard of Mr. Kyrle,” observed Major Joscelyn, in a tone which intimated that he had heard no good of Mr. Kyrle. Then he fixed a pair of prominent eyes upon the young man and inquired if he had been long in Venice.
“Only a few days,” Lennox answered, carelessly.
“Ah—a few days! And you are leaving soon?”
“That depends altogether upon circumstances,” replied Kyrle, who in fact intended to leave in a day or two, but had no desire to gratify Major Joscelyn by telling him so; for already he felt ananimusof dislike against these people, not only because of their attitudetoward himself (for that, being the result of misconception, only amused him), but from their appearance and manner. “They are self-seeking and insincere,” was his judgment, as his glance passed rapidly from face to face; and then, turning to the lovely, candid countenance of Aimée, he thought, “She is like a dove among hawks.”
Major Joscelyn giving no other reply to his last remark than a disapproving “Hem!” Miss Joscelyn took up the conversation, and remarked that Mr. Kyrle probably found Venice attractive.
“Very attractive—especially within the last half hour,” he replied, with deliberate malice.
TheJoscelynslooked at each other, while Mr. Meredith glanced at his wife, and the latter said, quickly:
“Of course, it has become more attractive within the last half hour. What is pleasanter than meeting old friends unexpectedly? Mr. Kyrle is on his way to America from Egypt,” she added in general explanation, “and it is the merest chance that we should have met him.”
No one remarked that it was a fortunate chance. On the contrary, silence appeared to indicate an altogether different opinion. After a moment, Major Joscelyn observed that they had probably seen enough of the Palace of the Doges for one morning, and that it was time to think of returning to the hotel.
There was a general movement, and it is likely that Lennox would have taken a final farewell of the party there and then, had not Aimée turned to him with a smile sweet enough to atone for any degree of incivility on the part of the others, saying, “And have you, too, had enough of the Ducal Palace?”
“For the present,” he answered; and availing himself of what seemed a tacit permission, he walked by her side as the party passed from the great hall, along corridors and down staircases to the court below.
Those few minutes completed the impression which she had already made upon him; and an impression in which her beauty played a small part in comparison with the gracious simplicity of her manner and the charm of her voice and glance. There was much in thisvoice and glance to remind him of the girl who had carried Fanny Berrien’s message to him, who had so timidly offered him her sympathy and compassion, and who had sat by his side under the orange boughs. Yet, save in the dark sweetness of the eyes and the gentle cadence of the tones, there was surely little in common between that frightened child and this stately young lady.
If he had only known it, however, there was the great thing in common that she was offering him now, the same sympathy that she had offered then. She was too young, and of too limited experience, to have learned the power of change which lies in time, and it seemed to her that he must inevitably be deeply moved by such an unexpected meeting with the woman he had once loved; and her gentle kindness was the involuntary form in which she expressed this feeling. But naturally no one could be aware of this—not even Kyrle himself. He thought that she simply meant to atone for the incivility of her friends; the latter cast alarmed glances upon one another; and Fanny Meredith was no nearerthe truth than any one else, in saying to herself: “Aimée is certainly the best creature in the world! She is throwing herself into the breach to prevent Tom from being jealous.”
When they reached the Piazza there was a slight pause of the party, and Kyrle felt that he was expected to take leave. “Since I have been so fortunate this morning, I hope to be fortunate again,” he said to Aimée in clearly audible tones. “I shall trust to have the pleasure of meeting you again.”
“Oh, no doubt,” answered she, readily. “People who know each other can not possibly fail to meet in Venice. But will you not come to see us? We are at the Grand Hotel.—Fanny, surely you mean to ask Mr. Kyrle to come to see you?”
“Mr. Kyrle knows that I shall be delighted to see him,” replied Mrs. Meredith, “but really we are at home so seldom that it hardly seems worth while to ask him to come. As you have just observed, peoplemustmeet when they are in Venice; and their best chance to meet is away from home, rather than at home. Nevertheless, I hope you willtake the chance of finding us in,” said she, to Kyrle.
“I shall prefer to take the chance of finding you elsewhere, since you are more likely to be abroad,” replied he.
“And elsewhere is so much pleasanter than at home,” interposed Miss Joscelyn. “The Belle Arti, now—have you been to the Belle Arti, Mr. Kyrle?”
Mr. Kyrle replied that he had not. “I have not been sight-seeing since my arrival,” he said, “but only lounging.”
“Oh, but you must certainly see the Belle Arti,” said the young lady with animation. “You can have no idea of the Venetian school of art until you have studied it there.”
“I have no doubt Mr. Kyrle is aware of that, Lydia,” said Fanny Meredith, dryly; “but since we have exhaustively done the Belle Arti—at least I hope we are done with it—he is not likely to meet us there, and it was of meeting us that he was speaking.”
“It was certainly of meeting you that I was thinking,” said Lennox.
“Hum—ah!” said the major, addressing his party, “shall we move on?”
Kyrle watched them with a smile as they moved away across the sunshiny square. He was saying to himself that it would go hard with him if he did not see again the beautiful eyes he had been looking into, and hear the sweet voice which had just bidden him such a kindly adieu.