Theodora was sitting rather on the outskirts of the party in thebosquet, her two devoted admirers still on either side of her. All the chairs were arranged informally, and hers was against the opening, so that it proved easy for Lord Bracondale to come up behind her unperceived.
She believed he had gone. She could not see distinctly from where she was, but she had thought she saw the automobile whizzing by. She recognized Mrs. Ellerwood's hat. An unconscious feeling of blankness came over her. She grew more silent.
A lady beyond the Prince spoke to him, and at that moment Mr. Hoggenwater rose to put down her coffee-cup, and in this second of loneliness a deep voice said in her ear:
"I could not go—I wanted to say good-night to you!"
Then Theodora experienced a new emotion; she could not have told herself what it was, but suddenly a gladness spread through her spirit; the moon looked more softly bright, and her sweet eyes dilated andglowed, while that voice, gentle as a dove's, trembled a little as she said:
"Lord Bracondale! Oh, you startled me!"
He drew a chair and sat down behind her.
"How shall we get rid of your Hogginheimer millionaire?" he whispered. "I feel as if I wanted to kill every one who speaks to you to-night."
The half light, the moon, Paris, and the spring-time! Theodora spent the next hour in a dream—a dream of bliss.
Mrs. McBride, with her all-seeing eye, perceived the turn events had taken. She was full of enjoyment herself; she had quite—almost quite—decided to listen to the addresses of Captain Fitzgerald, therefore her heart, not her common-sense, was uppermost this night.
It could not hurt Theodora to have one evening of agreeable conversation, and it would doHerryman Hoggenwater a great deal of good to be obstacled; thus she expressed it to herself. That last success with Princess Waldersheim had turned his empty head. So she called him and planted him in a safe place by an American girl, who would know how to keep him, and then turned to her own affairs again.
The Prince was a man of the world, and understood life. So Theodora and Lord Bracondale were left in peace.
The latter soon moved his chair to a position where he could see her face, rather behind her still, which entailed a slightly leaning over attitude. They were beyond the radius of the lights in thebosquet.
Lord Bracondale was perfectly conversant with all moves in the game; he knew how to talk to a woman so that she alone could feel the strength of his devotion, while his demeanor to the world seemed the least compromising.
Theodora had not spoken for a moment after his first speech. It made her heart beat too fast.
"I have been watching you all through dinner," he continued, with only a little pause. "You look immensely beautiful to-night, and those two told you so, I suppose."
"Perhaps they did!" she said. This was her first gentle essay at fencing. She would try to be as the rest were, gay and full of badinage.
"And you liked it?" with resentment.
"Of course I did; you see, I never have heard any of these nice things much. Josiahhas always been too ill to go out, and when I was a girl I never saw any people who knew how to say them."
She had turned to look at him as she said this, and his eyes spoke a number of things to her. They were passionate, and resentful, and jealous, and full of something disturbing. Thrills ran through poor Theodora.
His eyes had been capable of looking most of these things before to other women, when he had not meant any of them, but she did not know that.
"Well," he said, "they had better not return or recommence their compliments, because I am not in the mood to be polite to them to-night."
"What is your mood?" asked Theodora, and then felt a little frightened at her own daring.
"My mood is one of unrest—I would like to be away alone with you, where we could talk in peace," and he leaned over her so that his lips were fairly close to her ear. "These people jar upon me. I would like to be sitting in the garden at Amalfi, or in a gondola in Venice, and I want to talk about all your beautiful thoughts. You are a new white flower for me, as different as an angel from the other women in the world."
"Am I?" said she, in her tender tones. "I would wish that you should always keep that good thought of me. We shall soon go our different ways. Josiah has decided to leave next week, and we are not likely to meet in England."
"Yes, we are likely to meet—I will arrange it," he said.
There was nothing hesitating about Hector Bracondale—his way with women had always been masterful—and this quality, when mixed with a sudden bending to their desires, was peculiarly attractive. To-night he was drifting—drifting into a current which might carry him beyond his control.
It was now several years since he had been in love even slightly. His position, his appearance, his personal charm, had all combined to spoil a nature capable of great things. Life had always been too smooth. His mother adored him. He had an ample fortune. Every marriageable girl in his world almost had been flung at his head. Women of all classes with one consent had done their best to turn him into a coxcomb and a beast. But he continued to be a man for all that, and went his own way; only as no one can remain stationary, the crust of selfishness and cynicism was perhaps thickening with years, and his soul was growing hidden still deeper beneath it all. From the beginning something in Theodora had spoken to the best in him. He was conscious of feelings of dissatisfaction with himself when he left her, of disgust with the days of unmeaning aims.
He had begun out of idle admiration; he had continued from inclination; but to-night it wasplus fort que lui, and he knew he was in love.
The habit of indulging any emotion which gave him pleasure was still strong upon him; it was not yet he would begin to analyze where this passion might lead him—might lead them both.
It was too deliciously sweet to sit there and whisper to her sophistries and reasonings, to take her sensitive fancy into new worlds, to play upon her feelings—those feelings which he realized were as fine and as full of tone as the sounds which could be drawn from a Stradivarius violin.
It was a night of new worlds for them both, for if Theodora had never looked into any world at all, he also had never even imagined one which could be so quite divine as this—this shared with her in the moonlight, with the magic of the Tzigane music and the soft spring night.
He had just sufficient mastery over himself left not to overstep the bounds of respectful and deep interest in her. He did not speak a word of love. There was no actual sentence which Theodora felt obliged to resent—and yet through it all was the subtle insinuation that they were more than friends—or would be more than friends.
And when it was all over, and Theodora's pulses were calmer as she lay alone on her pillow, she had a sudden thrill of fear. But she put it aside—it was not her nature to think herself the object of passions. "I would be a very silly woman to flatter myself so," she said to herself, and then she went to sleep.
Lord Bracondale stayed awake for hours, but he did not sup with Esclarmonde de Chartres or Marion de Beauvoison. And the Café de Paris—and Maxims—and the afterwards—saw him no more.
Once again these houris asked each other, "Mais qu'est-ce qu'il a! Ce bel Hector? Oú se cache-t-il?"
Before she went to bed in her hotel in the Rue de Rivoli, Monica Ellerwood wrote to her aunt.
Paris,May 15th.
"My dear Aunt Milly,—We have had a delicious little week, Jack and I, quite like an old honeymoon pair—and to-day we ran across Hector, who has remained hidden until now. He is looking splendid, just as handsome and full of life as ever, so it does not tell upon his constitution, that is one mercy! Not like poor Ernest Bretherton, who, if you remember, was quite broken up by her last year. And I have one good piece of news for you, dear Aunt Milly. I do not believe he is so frantically wrapped up in this Esclarmonde de Chartres woman after all—in spite of that diamond chain at Monte Carlo. For to-night he took us to dine at Armenonville—although Jack particularly wanted to go to the Madrid—and when we got there we saw at once why! There was a most beautiful woman dining there with a party, and Hector never took his eyes off her the whole of dinner, Jack says—I had my back that way—and he got rid of us as soon as he could and went and joined them. Very young she looked, but I suppose married, from her pearls and clothes—American probably, as she was perhaps too well dressed for one of us; but quite a lady and awfully pretty. Hector was so snappish about it, and would not tell her name, that it makes me sure he is very much in love with her, and Jack thinks so too. So, dear Aunt Milly, you need have no more anxieties about him, as she can't have been married long, she looks so young, and so must be quite safe. Jack says Hector is thoroughly able to take care of himself, anyway, but I know how all these things worry you. If I can find out her name before I go I will, though perhaps you think it is out of the frying-pan into the fire, as it makes him no more in the mood to marry Morella Winmarleigh than before. Unless, of course, this new one is unkind to him. We shall be home on Saturday, dear Aunt Milly, and I will come round to lunch on Sunday and give you all my news.
"Your affectionate niece,
"Monica Ellerwood".
Which epistle jarred upon Hector's mother when she read it over coffee at her solitary dinner onthe following night.
"Poor dear Monica!" she said to herself. "I wonder where she got this strain from—her father's family, I suppose—I wish she would not be so—bald."
Then she sat down and wrote to her son—she was not even going to the opera that night. And if she had looked up in the tall mirror opposite, she would have seen a beautiful, stately lady with a puckered, plaintive frown on her face.
If a woman absolutely worships a man, even if she is only his mother, she is bound to spend many moments of unhappiness, and Lady Bracondale was no exception to the general rule. Hector had always gone his own way, and there were several aspects of his life she disapproved of. These visits to Paris—his antipathy to matrimony—his boredom with girls—such nice girls she knew, too, and had often thrown him with!—his delight in big-game shooting in alarming and impossible countries—and, above all, his absolute indifference to Morella Winmarleigh, the only woman who really and truly in her heart of hearts Lady Bracondale thought worthy of him, although she would have accepted several other girls as choosing the lesser evil to bachelorhood. But Morella Winmarleigh was perfection! She owned the enormous property adjoining Bracondale; she was twenty-six years old, of unblemished reputation, nice looking, and not—not one of those modern women who are bound to cause anxieties. Under any circumstances one could count upon Morella Winmarleigh behaving with absolute propriety. A girl born to be a mother-in-law's joy.
But Hector persistently remained at large. It was not that he openly defied his mother—he simply made love to her whenever they were together, twisted her round his finger, and was off again.
"To see mother with Hector," Lady Annigford said, "is a wonderful sight. Although I adore him myself, I am not at the stage she is! She sits there beaming on him exactly like an exceedingly proud and fond cat with new kittens. He treats her as if she were a young and beautiful woman, caresses her, pets her, pays not the least attention to anything she says, and does absolutely what he pleases!"
Hector and Lady Bracondale together had often made the women who were in love with him jealous.
When she had finished her letter the stately lady read it over carefully—she had a certain tact, and Hector must be cajoled to return, not irritated. Monica's epistle, in spite of that touch of vulgarity which she had deplored, had held out some grains of comfort. She had been getting really anxious over this affair with the—French person. Even to herself Lady Bracondale would not use any of the terms which usually designate ladies of the type of Esclarmonde de Chartres.
Since her brother-in-law Evermond had returned from Monte Carlo bringing that disturbing story of the diamond chain, she had been on thorns—of such a light mind and always so full of worldly gossip, Evermond!
Hector had gone from Monte Carlo to Venice, and then to Paris, where he had been for more than a month, and she had heard that men could become quite infatuated and absolutely ruined by these creatures. So for him to have taken a fancy to a married American was considerably better than that. She had met several members of this nation herself in England, and were they not always very discreet, with well-balanced heads! So altogether the puckered frown soon left her smooth brow, and she was able to resume the knitting of a tie she was doing for her son, with a spirit more or less at rest, though she sighed now and then as she remembered Morella Winmarleigh could not be expected to wait forever—and her cherished vision of perfectly behaved, vigorously healthy grandchildren was still a long way from being realized. For with such a mother what perfect children they would be! This was always her final reflection.
At twelve o'clock punctually Lord Bracondale was ushered into Mrs. McBride's sitting-room at the Ritz, the day after her dinner-party at Armenonville. He expected she would not be ready to receive him for at least half an hour; having said twelve he might have known she meant half-past, but he was in a mood of impatience, and felt obliged to be punctual.
He was suffering more or less from a reaction. He had begun towards morning to realize the manner in which he had spent the evening was not altogether wise. Not that he had the least intention of not repeating his folly—indeed, he was where he was at this hour for no other purpose than to enlist the widow's sympathy, and her co-operation in arranging as many opportunities for similar evenings as together they could devise.
After all, she only kept him waiting twenty minutes, and he had been rather amused looking at the piles of bric-à-brac obsequious art dealers had left for this rich lady's inspection.
A number of spurious bronzes warranted pure antique, clocks, brocades, what not, lying about on all the available space.
"And I wonder what it will look like in her marble palace halls," he thought, as he passed from one article to another.
"I am just too sorry to keep you, mon cher Bracondale," Mrs. McBride said, presently, suddenly opening the adjoining door a few inches, "but it is a quite exasperating hat which has delayed me. I can't get the thing on at the angle I want. I—"
"Mayn't I come and help, dear lady?" interrupted Hector. "I know all about the subject. I had to buy forty-seven at Monte Carlo, and see them all tried on, too—and only lately! Do ask Marie to open that door a little wider; I will decide in a minute how it should be."
"Insolent!" said the widow, who spoke French with perfect fluency and a quite marvellously pure American accent. But she permitted the giggling and beaming Marie to open the door wide, and let Hector advance and kiss her hand.
He then took a chair by the dressing-table and inspected the situation.
Seven or eight dainty bandboxes strewed the floor, some of their contents peeping from them—feathers, aigrettes, flowers, impossible birds—all had their place, and on the sofa were threechef d'œuvresruthlessly tossed aside. While in the widow's fair hands was a gem of gray tulle and the most expensive feather heart of woman could desire.
"You see," she said, plaintively, "it is meant to go just so," and she placed it once more upon her head, a handsome head of forty-five, fresh and well preserved and comely. "But the vile-tempered thing refuses to stay there once I let go, and no pin will correct it."
"Base ingratitude," said Lord Bracondale, with feeling; "but couldn't you stuff these in the hiatus," and he tenderly lifted a bunch of nut-brown curls from the dressing-table. "They would fill up the gap and keep the fractious thing steady."
"Of course they would," said Mrs. McBride; "but I have a rooted objection to auxiliary nature trimmings. That bunch was sent with the hat, and Marie has been trying to persuade me to wear it ever since we began this struggle. But I won't! My hair's my own, and I don't mean to have any one else's alongside of it. There is my trouble."
"If milor were to hold madame's 'at one side, while I de other, madame might force her emerald parrot pin through him," suggested Marie, which advice was followed, and the widow beamed with satisfaction at the gratifying result.
"There!" she exclaimed, with a sigh of relief, "that will do; and I am just ready.Gloves, handkerchief—oh! and my purse, Marie." And in five minutes more she was leading the way back into her sitting-room.
"I have not ordered lunch until one o'clock," she said, "so we have oceans of time to talk and tell each other secrets. Sit down, jeune homme, and confess to me." She pointed to abergère, but it was filled with Italian embroideries. "Marie, take this rubbish away!" she called, and presently some chairs were made clear.
"And what must I confess?" asked Hector, when they were seated. "That I am frantically in love with you, and your coldness is driving me wild?"
"Certainly not!" said the widow, while she rose again and began to arrange some giant roses in a wonderful basket which looked as if it had just arrived—her shrewd eye had seen the card, "From Captain Fitzgerald, with his best bonjour." "Certainly not! We are going to talk truth, or, to punish you, I shall not ask you to meet her again, and I shall warn her father of your strictly dishonorable intentions."
"You would not be so cruel!"
"Yes I would. And it is what I ought to do, anyway. She is as innocent as a woolly lamb, and unsophisticated and guileless, and will probably be falling in love with you. You take the wind out of the sails of that husband of hers, you see!"
"Do I?" said Hector, with overdone incredulity.
She looked at him. His long, lithe limbs stretched out, every line indicative of breeding and strength. She noted the shape of his head, the perfect grooming, his lazy, insolent grace, his whimsical smile. Englishmen of this class were certainly the most provokingly beautiful creatures in the world.
"It is because they have done nothing but order men, kill beasts, and subjugate women for generations," she said to herself. "Lazy, naughty darlings! If they came to our country and worked their brains a little, they would soon lose that look. But it would be a pity," she added—"yes, a pity."
"What are you thinking of?" asked Lord Bracondale, while she gazed at him.
"I was thinking you are a beautiful, useless creature. Just like all your nation. You think the world is made for you; in any case, all the women and animals to kill are."
"What an abominable libel! But I am fond of both things—women and animals to kill."
"And you class them equally—or perhaps the animals are ahead."
"Indeed not always," said Hector, reassuringly. "Some women have quite the first place."
"You are too flattering!" retorted the widow. "Those sentiments are all very well for your own poor-spirited, down-trodden women, but they won't do for Americans! A man has to learn a number of lessons before he is fitted to cope with them."
"Oh, tell me," said Hector.
"He has got to learn to wait, for one thing, to wait about for hours if necessary, and not to lose his temper, because the woman can't make up her mind to be in time for things, or to change it often as to where she will dine. Then he has to learn to give up any pleasure of his own for hers—and travel when she wants to travel, or stay home when she wants to go alone. If he is an Englishman he don't have brains enough to make the money, but he must let her spend what he has got how she likes, and not interfere with her own."
"And in return he gets?"
"The woman he happens to want, I suppose." And the widow laughed, showing her wonderfully preserved brilliant white teeth.
"You enunciate great truths, belle dame!" said Hector, "and your last sentence is the greatest of all—'The woman he happens to want.'"
"Which brings us back to our muttons—in this case only a defenceless baby lamb. Now tell me what you are here for, trying to cajole me with your good looks and mock humility."
"I am here to ask you to help me to see her again, then," said Hector, who knew when to be direct. "I have only met her three times, as you know, but I have fallen in love, and she is going away next week, and there is only one Paris in the world."
"You can do a great deal of mischief in a week," Mrs. McBride said, looking at him again critically. "I ought not to help you, but I can't resist you—there! What can we devise?"
It is possible the probability of Theodora's father making a fourth may have had something thing to do with her complaisance. Anyway, it was decided that if feasible thefour should spend a day at Versailles.
They should go in their two automobiles in time for breakfast at the Réservoirs. They would start, Theodora in Mrs. McBride's with her, and Captain Fitzgerald with Lord Bracondale, and each couple could spend the afternoon as they pleased, dining again at the Réservoirs and whirling back to Paris in the moonlight. A truly rural and refreshing programme, good for the soul of man.
"And I can rely upon you to get rid of the husband?" said Lord Bracondale, finally. "I do not see the poetry of the affair with his bald head and mutton-chop whiskers as an accessory."
"Leave that to Captain Fitzgerald and myself," Mrs. McBride said, proudly. "I have a scheme that Mr. Brown shall spend the day with Clutterbuck R. Tubbs, examining some new machinery they are both interested in. Leave it to me!" The part ofDeus ex machinawas always a rôle the widow loved.
Then they descended to an agreeable lunch in the restaurant, with a numerous party of her friends as usual, and Lord Bracondale felt afterwards full of joy and hope, to continue his sinful path unrepenting.
The days that intervened before Theodora saw him again were uneventful and full of blankness. The walks in the Bois appeared more tedious than ever in the morning, the drives in theAcacias more exasperating. It was a continual alertness to see if she caught sight of a familiar face, but she never did. Fate was against them, as she sometimes is when she means to compensate soon after by some glorious day of the gods. And although Lord Bracondale called at her hotel and walked where he thought he should see her, and even drove in the Acacias, they had no meeting.
Josiah did not feel himself sufficiently strong to stand the air of theatres, and they went nowhere in the evenings. He was keeping himself for his own dinner-party, which was to take place at the Madrid on the Monday.
Captain Fitzgerald had arranged it, and besides Mrs. McBride several of his friends were coming, and a special band of wonderfully talented Tziganes, who were delighting Paris that year, had been engaged to play to them. If only the weather should remain fine all would be well.
A surprise awaited Theodora on Saturday morning. A friendly note from Mrs. McBride arrived, asking her if she would spend the day with her at Versailles, as she had asked her husband to do her a favor and lunch with Mr. Clutterbuck R. Tubbs.
Theodora awaited Josiah's presence at thepremier déjeuner, which they took in their salon, with absolute excitement. He came in, a pompous smile on his face.
"Good-day, my love," he said, blandly. "That charming widow writes me this morning, asking if I will do her a favor, and take her friend, Mr. Clutterbuck Tubbs, to examine that machinery for the separation of fats we both have an interest in, and he suggests I should lunch with him, as he is very anxious to have my opinion upon the merits of it."
"Yes," said Theodora.
"She also says," referring to the letter in his hand, "she will take charge of you for the day, and take you to Versailles, which I know you wish to go to. She wants an answer at once, as she will call for you at twelve o'clock if we accept."
"I have heard from her, too," said Theodora. "What shall you answer, Josiah?" and she looked out of the window.
"Oh, I may as well go, I think. There is money in the invention, or that old gimlet-eye would not be so keen about it; I talked the matter over with him at Armenonville the other night."
"Then shall you write or shall I?" said Theodora, as evenly as she could. "Her servant is waiting."
Theodora hummed to herself a glad littlechansonnetteas she changed her breakfast negligee for the freshest and loveliest of her spring frocks. She did not know why she was so happy. There had been no word of any one else being of the party, only she and Mrs. McBride, but Versailles would be exquisite on such a day, and something whispered to her that she might not yawn.
The most radiant vision awaited the widow, when, with unusual punctuality, her automobile stopped at the hotel door. She came in. She was voluble, she flattered Josiah. So good of him to take Mr. Tubbs—and she hoped it would not tire him. Theodora should be well looked after. They might be late and even dine at Versailles, she said, and Mr. Brown was not to be anxious—shewould be responsible for the safe return of his beautiful little wife. (Theodora was five foot seven at least, but her small head and extreme slenderness gave people the feeling she was little—something to be protected and guarded always.)
Josiah was affable. Mrs. McBride's words were so smooth and so many, he had no time to feel Theodora was going to dine out without him, or that anything had been arranged for ultimate ends.
The automobile had almost reached Suresnes before the widow said to her guest:
"Your father and Lord Bracondale have promised to meet us at the Réservoirs. Captain Fitzgerald told me how you wanted to go to Versailles, and how your husband is not strong enough to take these excursions, so I thought we might have this little day out there, while he is engaged with Mr. Clutterbuck Tubbs."
"How sweet of you!" said Theodora.
As they rushed through the smiling country, both women's spirits rose, and Mrs. McBride's were the spirits of experience and did not mount without due cause. Since she had been a girl in Dakota and passionately in love with her first husband—the defunct McBride was a second venture—she had not met a man who could quicken her pulse like Captain Fitzgerald. It was a curious coincidence that they both had already two partners to regret. It was an extra link between them, and Jane McBride, who was superstitious, read the omen to mean that this time each had met his true mate.
"If he is irresistible to-day, I think I shall clinch matters," she was saying to herself.
While Theodora's musings ran:
"How beautiful Versailles will look, and I dare say he will know all about its history, and be able to tell me interesting things; and oh! I am so glad I put on this frock, and oh! I am so happy."
And aloud they spoke of paradise plumes and the new gray, and the merits and demerits of Callot and Doucet and Jeanne Valez. And the widow said some bright American things about husbands and the world in general that conveyed crisp truths.
The drive seemed all too short, and there were their two cavaliers in the court-yard awaiting them at the Réservoirs, having arrived just before them.
To the end of her life Theodora will remember that glorious May day. Its even minutest detail, the color of the chestnut-trees, the tint of the sky, the scent in the air, every line of his figure and turn of his head, every look in his eyes—and they were many and varied—and also and alas! every growing emotion in her own heart. But at the moment all was gladness, and exquisite, young, irresponsible joy.Sans arrière-penséeor disquieting reflection.
She wondered which of the two men was the handsomer as she got out of the automobile—dear, darling papa or Lord Bracondale; both were quite show creatures of their age, and both were of the same class and knowledge ofsavoir-vivre. Every one said such polite and gracious things, it was all so smooth and gay, and it seemed so natural that they should take a turn up towards the château while breakfast was being prepared.
Half-past one o'clock was time enough to eat, the widow said.
"I want to show you a number of spots I love," Hector announced, choosing a different path to the other pair. "And it is a day we can be happy in, can't we?"
"I want to be happy," said Theodora.
"Then we shall go no farther now; we shall sit on this seat and admire the view. See, we are quite alone and undisturbed; all the world has gone home to breakfast."
Then he looked at her, and though he really did try at this stage to be reasonable, something of the intense attraction he feltfor her blazed in his eyes.
She was sufficiently delectable a picture to turn the sagest head. There was something so absolutely pure white about that skin, it seemed good to eat, flawless, unlined, unblemished, under this brilliant light.
The way her silvery blond hair grew was just the right way a woman's hair ought to grow, he thought; low on a high, broad brow, rippling and soft, and quantities of it. What could it be like to caress it, to run one's fingers through it, to bury one's face in it? Ah! and then there were her tender eyes, dewy and shadowed with dark lashes, and so intensely blue. His glance wandered farther afield. Such a figure! slender and graceful and fine.There was something almost childish about it all; the innocent look of a very young girl, with the polish of the woman, garbed by an artist. It seemed the great pearls in her ears were not more milkily white than her throat, and he was sure were also her little slender hands, that did not fidget, but lay idly in her lap, holding her blue parasol. He would like to have taken off her gloves to see.
Passionate devotion was surging up in his breast.
And he was an Englishman, and it was still the morning. There was no moon now and he had not even breakfasted! This shows sufficiently to what state he had come.
"I want you to tell me all about Versailles," she said, looking to the left and the gray wing beyond the chapel. "Its histories and its meanings. I used to read about it all after Sarah brought me here once for our treat, but you probably are learned upon the subject, and I want to know."
"I would much rather hear what you did when Sarah brought you here for your treat," he said.
"Oh! it was a very simple day," and she leaned back and laughed softly at the recollection. "Papa was very hard up at that time, you know, and we were rather poor, so we came as cheaply as we could, Sarah, Clementine, and I, andI remember there were some very snuffy men in the train—we could not go first-class, you see—and one of them rather frightened me."
"The brute!" said Hector.
"I think I was about fourteen."
"And even then perfectly beautiful, I expect," he commented to himself.
"We walked up from the station, and oh! we saw all the galleries and we ran all over the park, but we missed the way to Trianon somehow and never saw that, and when we got back here we were too tired to start again. We had only had sandwiches, you see, that we brought with us, and some funny little drinks at a café down there," and she pointed vaguely towards the lake, "because we found we had only one franc fifty between us all. But we were so happy, and Clementine knows a great deal, and told us many things which were quite different from what was in the guide-books—but it seems so long, long ago. Do you know it must be six years." And she looked at him seriously.
"Half a lifetime!" agreed Hector, with a whimsical smile.
"Oh! you are laughing at me!" she said, and there was a cloud in the blue stars which looked up at him.
He made a movement nearer her—while his deep voice took every tone of tenderness.
"Indeed, indeed I am not—you dear little girl! I love to hear of your day. I was only smiling to think that six years ago you were a baby child, and I was then an old man in feeling—let me see, I was twenty-five, and I was in Russia."
He stopped suddenly; there were some circumstances which, sitting there beside her, he would rather not remember connected with Russia.
This was one of the peculiarities of Theodora. There was something about her which seemed to wither up all low or vicious things. It was not that she filled people with ascetic thoughts of saints and angels and their mother in heaven, only she seemed suddenly to enhance simple joys with beauty and charm.
They talked on for half an hour, and with every moment he discovered fresh qualities of sweetness and light in her gentle heart.
She was not ill educated either, butshe had never speculated upon things, she took them for granted just as they were, andJean d'Agrèvewas probably the only awakening book she had ever read.
Hector all at once seemed to realize his mother's vision, and to understand for the first time what marriage might mean. That to possess this exquisite bit of God's finished work for his very own, to live with her in the country, at old Bracondale, to see her honored and adored, surrounded by little children—his children—would be a dream of bliss far, far beyond any dream he had ever known. A domestic, tender dream of sweetness that he had always laughed at before as a final thing when life's other joys should be over, and now it seemed suddenly to be the only heaven and completion of his soul's desire.
Then he remembered Josiah Brown with a hideous pang of pain and bitterness—and they went in to lunch.
Theodora was so gay! Captain Fitzgerald and Mrs. McBride were already seated when they joined them in the restaurant. Most of the other visitors had finished—it was almost two o'clock.
There was a good deal of black middle in the widow's eyes, Theodora noticed, and wondered to herself if she had had a happy and exciting hour too. Papa looked complacent and handsomer than ever, she thought. She did hope it was going well. And she wondered how they were to dispose of their afternoon.
The widow soon settled this. She had, she said, a wild desire to rush through the air for a little—shemusthave her chauffeur go at full speed—somewhere—anywhere—her nerves needed calming! And Captain Fitzgerald had agreed to accompany her. Their destination was unknown, and they might not be back for tea, so Lord Bracondale must take the greatest care of Theodora and give her some if they did not turn up. They certainly would for dinner, but eight o'clock would be time enough for that.
When your destination is unknown you can never say how many hours it will take to get there and back, she pointed out. And no one felt inclined to argue with her about this obvious truth!
Now if Theodora had been a free unmarried girl, or a freer widow, it is highly probable fate would not have arranged this long afternoon in blissful surroundings undisturbed by any one. As it was, who knows if the goddess settled it with a smile on her lip or a tear in her eye? It was settled, at all events, and looked as if it were going to contain some moments worth remembering.
"And what is your pleasure, fair queen?" Hector said, as they listened to the diminishing noise of the widow's Mercédès. "We are alone, and we have the world before us. Issue your commands."
"No," said Theodora, and she pouted her red lips. "I want you to settle that. I want you to arrange for whatever you think would give me the greatest pleasure. Then I shall know if you understand me and guess what I would like."
This was the most daring speech she had ever made, and she was surprised at her own temerity.
"Very well," he said. "That means you belong to me until they return," and a thrill ran through him. "Has not your father, has not your hostess, given you into my charge? And, now you yourself have sealed the compact, we shall see if I can make you happy."
As he said the words "you belong to me," Theodora thrilled too—a sensation as of an electric shock almost quivered through her. Belonged to him—ah!—what would that mean?
He called his chauffeur, who started the automobile and drove under the coveredporte cochèrewhere they stood.
Lord Bracondale had not spoken all the time he was helping her in and arranging rugs with the tenderest solicitude, but when they were settled and started—it was a coupé with a great deal of glass about it, so that they got plenty of air—he turned to her.
"Now, do you know what I am going to do with you, madame? I shall only unfold my plans bit by bit, and watch your face to see if I have chosen well. I am going to take you first to the Petit Trianon, and we are going to walk leisurely through the rooms. I am not going to worry you with much sight-seeing and tourists and lessons of history, but I want you to glance at this setting of the life picture of poor Marie Antoinette, because it is full of sentiment and it will make you appreciate more thehameauand her playground afterwards. Something tells me you would rather see these things than all the fine pictures and salons of the stiff château."
"Oh yes," said Theodora; "you have guessed well this time."
"Then here we are, almost arrived," he said, presently.
They had been going very fast, and could see the square, white house in front of them, and when they alighted at the gates she found the guardian was an old friend of Lord Bracondale's, and they were left free to wander alone in the rooms between the batches of tourists.
But every one knows the Petit Trianon, and can surmise how its beauties appealed to Theodora.
"Oh, the poor, poor queen!" she said, with a sad ring in her expressive voice, when they came to the large salon; "and she sat here and played on her harpsichord—and I wonder if she and Fersen were ever alone—and I wonder if she really loved him—"
Then she stopped suddenly; she had told herself she must never talk about love to any one. It was a subject that she must have nothing to do with. It could never come her way, now she was married to Josiah Brown, and it would be unwise to discuss it, even in the abstract.
The same beautiful, wild-rose tint tinged the white velvet as once before when she had spoken ofJean d'Agrève, and again Lord Bracondale experienced a sensation of satisfaction.
But this time he would not let her talk about the weather. The subject of love interested him, too.
"Yes, I am sure she did," he said, "and I always shall believe Fersen was her lover; no life, even a queen's, can escape one love."
"I suppose not," said Theodora, very low, and she looked out of the window.
"Love is not a passion which asks our leave if he may come or no, you see," Hector continued, trying to control his voice to sounddispassionate and discursive—he knew he must not frighten her. "Love comes in a thousand unknown, undreamed-of ways. And then he gilds the world and makes it into heaven."
"Does he?" almost whispered Theodora.
"And think what it must have been to a queen, married to a tiresome, unattractive Bourbon—and Fersen was young and gallant and thoughtful for her slightest good, and, from what one hears and has read, he must have understood her, and been her friend as well—and sometimes she must have forgotten about being a queen for a few moments—in his arms—"
Theodora drew a long, long breath, but she did not speak.
"And perhaps, if we knew, the remembrance of those moments may have been her glory and consolation in the last dark hours."
"Oh! I hope so!" said Theodora.
Then she walked on quickly into the quaint, little, low-ceilinged bedroom. Oh, she must get out into the air—or she must talk of furniture, or curtain stuffs, or where the bath had been!
Love, love, love! And did it mean life after all?—since even this far-off love of this poor dead queen had such power to move her. And perhaps Fersen was like—but this last thought caused her heart to beat too wildly.
There were no roses now, she was very pale as she said: "It saddens me, this. Let us go out into the sun."
They descended the staircase again almost in silence, and on through the little door in the court-yard wall into the beautiful garden beyond.
"Show me where she was happy, where you know she was happy before any troubles came. I want to be gay again," said Theodora.
So they walked down the path towards thehameau.
"What have I done?" Lord Bracondale wondered. "Her adorable face went quite white. Her soul is no longer the open book I have found it. There are depths and depths, but I must fathom them all."
"Oh, how I love the spring-time!" exclaimed Theodora, and her voice was full of relief. "Look at those greens, so tender and young, and that peep of the sky! Oh, and those dear, pretty little dolls' houses! Let us hasten; I want to go and play there, and make butter, too! Don't you?"
"Ah, this is good," he said; "and I want just what you want."
Her face was all sweet and joyous as she turned it to him.
"Let's pretend we lived then," she said, "and I am the miller's daughter of this dear little mill, and you are the bailiff's son who lives opposite, and you have come with your cornto be ground. Oh, and I shall make a bargain, and charge you dear!" and she laughed and swung her parasol back, while the sun glorified her hair into burnished silver.
"What bargain could you make that I would not agree to willingly?" he asked.
"Perhaps some day I shall make one with you—or want to—that you will not like," she said, "and then I shall remind you of this day and your gallant speech."
"And I shall say then as I say now. I will make any bargain with you, so long as it is a bargain which benefits us both."
"Ah, you are a Normand, you hedge!" she laughed, but he was serious.
They walked all around thelaiterie, and all the time she was gay and whimsical, and to herself she was saying, "I am unutterably happy, but we must not talk of love."
"Now you have had enough of this," Lord Bracondale said, when they were again in view of the house, "and I am going to take you into a forest like the babes in the woods, and we shall go and lose ourselves and forget the world altogether. The very sight of these harmless tourists in the distance jars upon me to-day. I want you alone and no one else. Come."
And she went.
"I have never been here before," said Theodora, as they turned into the Forest of Marly. "And you have been wise in your choice so far. I love trees."
"You see how I study and care for the things which belong to me," said Hector. It gave him ridiculous pleasure to announce that sentence again—ridiculous, unwarrantable pleasure.
Theodora turned her head away a little. She would like to have continued the subject, but she did not dare.
Presently they came to a sideallée, and after going up it about a mile the automobile stopped, and they got out and walked down a green glade to the right.
Oh, and I wonder if any of you who read know the Forest of Marly, and this one green glade that leads down to the centre of a star where five avenues meet? It is all soft grass and splendid trees, and may have been arendezvous de chassein the good old days, when life—for the great—was fair in France.
It is very lonely now, and if you want to spend some hours in peace you can almost count upon solitude there.
"Now, is not this beautiful?" he asked her, as they neared the centre, "and soon you will see why I carry this rug over my arm. I am going to take you right to the middle of the star until you see five paths for you to choose from, all green and full of glancing sunlight, and when you have selected one we will penetrate down it and sit under a tree. Is it good—my idea?"
"Very good," said Theodora. Then she was silent until they reached therond-point.
There was that wonderful sense of aloofness and silence—hardly even the noise of a bird. Only the green, green trees, and here and there a shaft of sunlight turning them into the shade of a lizard's back.
An ideal spot for—poets and dreamers—and lovers—Theodora thought.
"Now we are here! Look this way and that! Five paths for us to choose from!"
Then something made Theodora say, "Oh, let us stay in the centre, in this one round place, where we can see them all and their possibilities."
"And do you think uncertain possibilities are more agreeable perhaps than certain ends?" he asked.
"I never speculate," said Theodora.
"As you will, then," he said, while he looked into her eyes, and he placed the rug up against a giant tree between two avenues, so that their view really only extended down three others now.
"We have turned our backs on the road we came," he said, "and on another road that leads in a roundabout way to the Grande Avenue again. So now we must look into the unknown and the future."
"It seems all very green and fair," said Theodora, and she leaned back against the tree and half closed her eyes.
He lay on the grass at her feet, his hat thrown off beside him, and in a desert island they could not have been more alone and undisturbed.
The greatest temptation that Hector Bracondale had ever yet had in his life came to him then.To make love to her, to tell her of all the new thoughts she had planted in his soul, of the windows she had opened wide to the sunlight. To tell her that he loved her, that he longed to touch even the tips of her fingers, that the thought of caressing her lips and her eyes and her hair drove the blood coursing madly through his veins. That to dream of what life could be like, if she were really his own, was a dream of intoxicating bliss.
And something of all this gleamed in his eyes as he gazed up at her—and Theodora, all unused to the turbulence of emotion, was troubled and moved and yet wildly happy. She looked away down the centre avenue, and she began to speak fast with a little catch in her breath, and Hector clinched his hands together and gazed at a beetle in the grass, or otherwise he would have taken her in his arms.
"Tell me the story of all these avenues," she said; "tell me a fairy story suitable to the day."
And he fell in with her mood. So he began: