CHAPTER XLIX.
Lord Stuart could hardly understand the strange interest he took in Norman de Vere’s lovely young wife. She was beautiful, but he had seen many beautiful women without feeling much interest in them. He was past sixty now, and the interest he took in women was cynical rather than romantic. Since the time when Camille de Vere’s charms had made him a captive for a brief space of time, he had felt no touch of the tender passion.
But the lovely face and dark-blue eyes of Norman de Vere’s girl-bride haunted him with strange persistency, and he caught himself longing to know her, wondering if Norman would present him when Thea came on deck again. He did not dare to ask the favor, remembering that he had not been quite guiltless in the affair with Camille, but had actuallywished to part her from her boy-husband, and marry her himself.
It was no such impulse that stirred him now in thinking of the fair young girl who had taken the place of fair but faulty Camille in Norman’s heart. If he had had a daughter, Lord Stuart would have felt much the same toward her as he did toward Thea.
When she came on deck again, her beautiful face a little pale from her experience of seasickness, he was standing near her steamer-chair, and Norman, after a moment’s hesitation, presented him to his wife.
Lord Stuart felt an odd thrill of pleasure when Thea allowed him to touch her dimpled white hand. He pressed it gently, and murmured his pride and pleasure at knowing her, while she responded in shy yet gracious terms.
In truth, the young girl was somehow as much attracted by the old nobleman as he had been by her. There was something so kind and friendly in his glance and smile, and his manners were so genial, that she liked him at once. The two immediately became friends, and whether Norman liked it or not, he gave no sign of displeasure, and resolved not to dampen his darling’s pleasure by telling her of that long-past time when he and Lord Stuart had been the most bitter foes. He murmured to himself:
“The past is in the eternal past,Our heads will soon lie low, Lorena,Life’s tide is ebbing out so fast.”
“The past is in the eternal past,Our heads will soon lie low, Lorena,Life’s tide is ebbing out so fast.”
“The past is in the eternal past,Our heads will soon lie low, Lorena,Life’s tide is ebbing out so fast.”
“The past is in the eternal past,
Our heads will soon lie low, Lorena,
Life’s tide is ebbing out so fast.”
Lord Stuart had been too wise to confess all his folly. Not even Norman would ever know that for a brief while he had adored Camille and hated her boy-husband. Enough to own that they had amused themselves by a flirtation that, while harmless in the eyes of theblaséworld, had seemed culpable in the eyes of the hot-headed boy. It was all so long ago that Norman could not refuse to look at it more leniently now—could not throw the shadow of that past across the sunshine of Thea’s present.
Ah, how happy the young bride was in those golden honeymoon days when the blue of the sky was mirrored in the blue of the sea by day, and by night the stars. Although it was February the weather was balmy as May. Nature seemed to smile on Thea. People said afterward that it was a charming voyage, there were so many pleasant people on board, and such a fair young bride, whose handsome husband, the celebrated author, seemed to worship her. Nothing unpleasantoccurred during the whole week. The young people were sociable, the elders complaisant. They enlivened the trip by amateur theatricals and Mrs. Jarley’s wax-works. On Sunday they had a sermon in the cabin from an eminent preacher who was bound for the Holy Land, and every day the kindly friendship between the De Veres and Lord Stuart grew more genial. He was determined that they should like him—determined to drive away the bitter memories of the past by more agreeable impressions, and he knew that it was all for the sake of the charming girl in whose voice and smile lurked such a spell of subtle fascination.
“Mrs. de Vere, I want you to know my sister, Lady Moreland,” he said to her on the last day of the voyage. “I think you will like her very much. She is a widow, and she lives with me at my home in Devonshire. When the season in London begins she comes up and occupies my town house and entertains for me.”
“So you have no wife?” Thea said, almost pityingly.
“No; and Edith has no husband. She has been a widow eighteen years.”
“Has she any children?”
“None. We have only each other. We are the last of our family, and, poor girl! she is often lonely, for I am somewhat of a wanderer, and I have been away from her now six months. I wish she would marry again.”
“Do you think she will?” Thea asked him.
“No,” he answered, and a faint sigh escaped him. “Her heart is buried in her husband’s grave.”
Norman came up at that moment, and Lord Stuart said:
“I have been telling Mrs. de Vere about my sister, trying to awaken such an interest in my relative that she will accept an invitation to visit her in May, when she comes up to our London house for the season.”
Norman smiled, and glanced at Thea, whose blue eyes were full of tender interest.
“She is a widow, and her heart is buried in her husband’s grave. Is it not sad?” she said, sweetly.
“You would think so if you knew her,” said Lord Stuart. “She is not forty yet, though she has been a widow eighteen years, and she is lovely still. It is her own fault that she has never married a second time, for she has had many suitors. But she is romantic enough to suit even you, Mrs. de Vere, and I want you to promise me you will visit us in London.”
“I shall be glad,” she answered.