I am not going to apologize for our hero, nor am I going to gloss over his faults with any specious special pleading. No man is either wholly good or wholly bad; certainly Jack was not wholly good; he was human, very human, and blessed, or cursed, with a hot, passionate blood, which made him more liable to trip than most men. But, at the same time, this in justice must be said of him, that he very rarely sinned in this way.
Tonight his blood was at full heat; the love which had sprung up like a tongue of flame in his heart burned and maddened him, and to this newly-born love was added the disappointment and bewilderment of Una’s sudden disappearance. Add, too, that he had been overstrained and upset, and—well, there are the excuses and apologies, after all.
Somewhere about two o’clock, when the club was full with men who had dropped in from theater and ball-room, and amidst the popping of corks and click of pool balls, a certain feeling came over poor Jack that he had taken quite as much, and more, of the sparkling juice than was good for him; and with that consciousness came the resolution to go home.
The game was just over, and without a word he put up his cue, motioned to a footman to bring him his hat, and, scarcely noticed in the crowd and bustle, slowly descended the broad and indeed magnificent staircase for which and its palatial hall the club was famous.
He descended very slowly, with his hand on the balustrade, and having reached the bottom, he filled a glass with water from the crystal filter that stood on a side table in the porter’s box, and sallied out.
The night air struck upon his hot brow in a cool and welcome fashion, and Jack stood for a moment or two, fighting with the hazy and stupefying effects of the night’s work.
“I won’t go home yet,” he muttered. “Len will be cut up; he always is. He’s as bad as a father—almost as bad as a mother-in-law. Well, I didn’t touch the cards, anyhow. And if it had not been for those two idiots, Ark and Dally, I shouldn’t have got so far into the champagne. How bright the stars shine—an unaccountable number of them tonight.” Poor Jack! “Never saw such a quantity! No, I won’t go home yet. I’ll walk it off if I have to walk till tomorrow morning. Where am I? Ah! where isshe?Thank Heaven, she isn’t near me now! I’m glad she’s gone; I’m glad I shall never see her any more. I’m not fit to see her; not worthy to touch her hand. But I did touch it,” and, with a kind of wonder at his audacity, he stretched out his hand and stared at it under the gas-lamp.
Then he walked on perfectly indifferent to the direction, perfectly indifferent to the weariness which was gradually—no, rapidly—coming on him.
Just at this time, while he was walking off the drowsy dream that had got possession of him, a stream of carriages was slowly moving down Park Lane, taking up from one of the best known houses in town—Lady Merivale’s.
Lady Merivale was one of the leaders oftonand had been one as long as most middle-aged people could remember. To be seen at Lady Merivale’s was to be acknowledged as one of that small but powerful portion of humanity known as “the upper ten.”
It was one of her ladyship’s grand balls, and not only were the ball and drawing-rooms full, but the staircase also, and any one wishing to enter or exit had to make his way down a narrow line flanked on either side by the youth and nobility of the best kind of society.
That it had been a great success no one who knows the world—and Lady Merivale—needs to be told. It had, perhaps, been one of her greatest, for in addition to two princes of the blood royal, she had secured the great sensationof the day, the young millionairess, Lady Isabel Earlsley.
And this was no slight achievement, for Lady Bell, as she was generally called, was a wilful, uncertain young personage, from whom it was very hard to procure a promise, and who, not seldom, was given to breaking it when made, at least, so far as acceptation of invitations went.
But she was there tonight; as the next issue of theMorning Postwould testify.
Jack had been really too careless and scornful in his indifference. Lady Bell was not only beautiful, she was—what was more rare than beauty—charming. She was rather short than tall; but not too short. She had a beautiful figure; not a wasp waist by any means, but a natural figure, full of power and grace. Her skin was, well, colonial; delicately tinted and creamy; and her eyes—it is difficult to catalogue her eyes, because their lights were always changing—but the expression which generally predominated was one of half-amused, half-mocking light.
With both expressions she met the open admiration of the gilded youths who thronged round her, amused at their foppery, mocking at their protestations of devotion.
Tonight she was dressed neither magnificently nor superbly, but with, what seemed to the women who gazed at her with barely concealed envy, artful simplicity.
Her dress was of Indian muslin, priceless for all its simplicity; and she wore glittering in her hair, on her arms, and on her cream-white bosom, pearls, that, in quantity and quality would have made the fortune of any enterprising burglar.
By her side stood—for they were moving toward the door, on their way to an exit—an elderly woman, with an expressionless face, simply and plainly dressed. She was generally spoken of as the watch dog; but she scarcely deserved that name, for Lady Bell was quite capable of watching over herself; and Mrs. Fellowes, the widow of the Indian colonel, was too mild to represent any sort of dog whatever.
Surrounded by a crowd of devoted courtiers, the great heiress and her companion moved toward the door where the hostess stood receiving the farewells and thanks ofher guests; and when one thinks of the many hundred times Lady Merivale had stood by that door, and undergone that terrible ordeal, one is filled with amazement and awe at her courage and physical strength.
For forty years she had been standing at doors, receiving and meeting guests; yet she stood tonight as smiling and courageous as ever.
At last Lady Bell reached her hostess, and Lady Merivale, tired and done up as she was, gave her special recognition.
“Must you go, Lady Bell? Well, good-night. And thank you for making my poor little dance a success. Thank you very much.”
Lady Bell said nothing, but she smiled “in her old colonial” way, as they called it, and threaded through the lane of human beings on the stairs.
“Lady Earlsley’s carriage!” shouted the footman in the gorgeous Merivale livery, and a little brougham drove up.
Lady Bell hated show and magnificence.
Her stables and coach-houses were crowded with horses and carriages, her wardrobes filled to repletion with Worth’s costumes and Elise’s “confections,” as bonnets are called now-a-days, but a plain little brougham was her favorite vehicle, and the simplest of costumes pleased her best.
All the way down the stairs she had to nod and smile and exchange farewells, and at the bottom, in the hall, on the stone steps themselves, she was surrounded by men eager to secure the privilege of putting her into her little brougham.
But she avoided them all, and sprang in as if she had not been dancing for four hours, and throwing herself back into the corner, exclaimed:
“Thank goodness, that is over. Poor old Fellowes! you are worn out. Confess it.”
“I am rather tired, my dear,” said Mrs. Fellowes, who had been sitting against a wall all the evening.
“Tired! of course you are; it’s ever so much more tiring looking on than dancing, and joining in the giddy round. I don’t feel a bit tired; I’m a little bored.”
“Bored! what a word, my dear Bell,” murmured Mrs. Fellowes, sleepily.
“It’s a good word—it’s an expressive word—and it just means really what I feel.”
“And yet you received more attention than any woman—any girl—in the room, my dear,” murmured Mrs. Fellowes.
“My money-bags may have done so,” said Lady Bell, scornfully; “not I. Do you think that if I were as penniless as one of Lady Southerly’s daughters, I should receive as much attention? Fellowes, don’t you take to flattering me. I couldn’t stand that.”
“I don’t want to flatter you, my dear Bell; but when the prince himself dances twice with you——”
“Of course he did. I am a celebrity. I am the richest young woman in the kingdom, and he would have done it if I had been as ugly as sin—which isn’t ugly, by the way.”
“What strange things you say,” murmured Mrs. Fellowes, with mild rebuke. “I’m sure no girl received more attention than you have tonight. I sat and watched you, my dear, and a spectator sees more of the game than a player.”
“You are right, it is all a game, a gamble,” retorted Lady Bell. “All those nice young men were playing pitch and toss who should make the hardest running with the great heiress. Do you think I am blind? I can see through them all, and I despise them. There isn’t a man among them but would pay me the same court if I were as plain as Lucifer——”
“My dear Bell——”
“But it is true,” said Lady Bell. “I can read them all. And if they knew how I despised them, even while I smile upon them, they would keep at arm’s length for very shame. I wish I hadn’t a penny in the world.”
“My dear Bell!” ejaculated Mrs. Fellowes, really and truly shocked at such a fearfully profane wish.
“I do! I do! I should then find out if any one of them cared for me—for myself. You say I am beautiful, but you are so partial; do you think I am beautiful enough to cause any man to risk his all in life for my sake?”
“I don’t know. I don’t just follow you,” said poor Mrs. Fellowes.
“No, you are half asleep,” retorted Lady Bell. “There, curl yourself up and snooze. I shan’t talk any more.”
Lady Bell leaned forward, and looked up at the stars—the same stars that seemed so numerous to poor Jack—and pondered over the events of the evening.
It was true that a prince of the blood had danced there with her; it was true that, all through the evening, she had been surrounded by a court of the best men in London; it was true that she had sent one half the women home burning with envy and malice and all uncharitableness; but still she was not happy.
“No,” she murmured, unheard by the sleeping companion; “the dream of my life has not yet been fulfilled. I have not yet met the man to whom I could say, ‘I am yours, take me!’ Perhaps I never shall; and until I do, I will remain Lady Bell, though they buzz round my money-bags till I am deaf with their hum.”
The brougham was going at a great pace, simply because the coachman very reasonably desired to get home and to bed; and Lady Bell saw the houses flit past as if they had been part of a panorama got up for her special amusement.
But suddenly the brougham swerved, and, indeed, nearly upset, and the stillness of the night was broken by what seemed remarkably like an oath by the coachman.
Lady Bell felt that something was wrong; but she neither turned color nor lost her presence of mind.
Putting her head, with a thousand pounds of jewels on it, through the window, she said, in clear tones:
“What is the matter, Jackson?”
“I—whoa! I don’t quite know, my lady; I think it is a man. Something came right across the road. Yes, it is a man.”
Lady Bell opened the brougham door, stepped into the road—the light from the lamp flashing on her pearls—and went toward the horse.
“Keep away from her hind legs, for goodness’ sake, my lady,” ejaculated Jackson. “Keep still, will you!” this was of course addressed to the horse.
“What is it? what is it?” asked Lady Bell, peering about.
“Here, my lady, on the near side—on the left. It’s down in the road, whatever it is.”
Lady Bell went behind the brougham to the near side—she was too well acquainted with horses and their moods to cross in front of the horse’s eyes—and looked about her. For a moment she could see nothing, but presently, when her eyes had become used to the darkness, she saw a man lying, as it seemed, right under the horse’s body.
Her impulse—and she always acted on that impulse—was to pull him out. But to pull a man even an inch is a difficult task even for the strongest girl, and after a moment’s tug she was about to tell Jackson to alight while she stood at the horse’s head, when suddenly the prostrate man staggered to his feet, and leaned against the brougham as if it had been specially built and brought there for that purpose.
Lady Bell went up to him and laid her hand upon his arm.
“What has happened?” she said, anxiously. “Were you run over—are you hurt?”
Jack—for it was Jack—opened his eyes and stared at her with the gravity of a man suddenly sobered.
“No,” he said, “I am not hurt. Don’t blame the man, it was my fault. Not hurt at all. Good-night.”
And he feels for his hat, which at that moment was lying under the carriage a shapeless mass.
As he spoke Lady Bell saw something drop on to his hand, and looking at it saw that it was a drop of blood.
With a shudder—for she could not bear the sight of blood—she said:
“Not hurt! Why, you are bleeding.”
“Am I?” said Jack, gravely and curtly. “It will do me good. Don’t you be alarmed, miss. I am used to being upset, and my bones are too hard to break. Good-night.”
And he made for the pavement pretty steadily. But a hand, soft and warm, and strong also, stayed him.
“Stop,” said Lady Bell; “I am sure you are hurt. How did you come to be run over?”
“Got in the way of the horse, I suppose,” said Jack, quietly. “That is the usual way.”
“But—but,” said Lady Bell; and she looked at the handsome face scrutinizingly.
Then she stopped, for her scrutiny had discovered two facts; first, that the individual who had been run over was a gentleman; secondly, that he had been drinking.
“Wait,” she said, still keeping her hand on his arm; “you are not fit to go alone without some assistance, and I am sure you are hurt. Look, you are bleeding.”
“A mere nothing,” said Jack; “don’t trouble. Allow me to put you in—I shall get home all right.”
Lady Bell, still keeping her eyes fixed on his face, shook her head.
“I couldn’t leave you like this,” she said. “Where do you live?”
“Where do I—live?” repeated Jack. “Spider Court, Temple. It’s no distance from here.”
“The Temple!” exclaimed Lady Bell. “It must be miles away.”
“A hansom,” smiled Jack.
“But there are no cabs here, not one. I cannot leave you like this—you must get into the brougham.”
“Not for worlds! I have given you quite enough trouble,” he said. “I shall find my way home somehow.”
“No,” she said; “I cannot let you go without seeing you safe into a cab. There are none here. You do not know—I do not know—how much you are hurt. You must let me take you to your home.”
“I assure you I am all right,” he said.
“And I refuse to accept your assurance,” said Lady Bell, with a little shudder at the streak of blood which oozed from his forehead. “Come, you will not refuse to obey a lady. I wish you to enter my brougham.”
“No, I can’t refuse to obey a lady,” he said.
“Then come with me,” said Lady Bell.
“Where to, my lady?” asked Jackson, who was used to her ladyship’s willfulness, and sat, patient as Job, waiting for the issue of this strange adventure.
“To—where did you say?” asked Lady Bell.
“Spider Court,” said Jack; “but I wish you’d let me go out and walk. It must be right out of your way.”
“Spider Court, Temple,” said Lady Bell, and the brougham rolled on.
Through it all Mrs. Fellowes had remained in the deep sleep which the gods vouchsafe to good women of her age, and the two—Lady Bell and Jack—were, to all intents and purposes, alone.
Lady Bell looked at him as he sat in his corner, the thin, red stream trickling down from his forehead, and shuddered; not at him, but at the blood.
“How did you come to be run over?” she asked. “Did you fall?”
“Must have done,” he said, coolly; “anyway I’ll swear it wasn’t the coachman’s fault.”
“I am not going to blame the coachman,” said Lady Bell, with the shadow of a smile.
“That’s right,” said Jack. “It was all my fault. I’d been—been to see a favorite aunt.”
“You had been to your club,” said Lady Bell.
“How did you know that?” he said.
Lady Bell smiled again, and Jack, his eyes fixed upon her, thought the smile wonderfully fascinating.
“A little bird told me,” she said.
“The little bird was right,” said Jack, shaking his head, with penitence and remorse written on every feature. “I have been dining at my club. Perhaps the little bird told you everything else?”
“Yes; the little bird also whispered that you had——”
“Drank too much champagne? Confound those fellows! Wonderful little bird!” muttered Jack.
“It is very wicked of you,” said Lady Bell, gravely, her eyes fixed on his face, that, notwithstanding its streak of red, looked wonderfully handsome.
While she looked, she almost convinced herself that she had never seen such a handsome face, nor such frank eyes.
“It was very wicked of you,” she repeated, in a voice pitched in a low key, no doubt out of consideration for the sleeping watch dog.
“Yes,” he said, “I am a bad lot; I am not fit to be here with you. I have been dining at my club; but how you knew it, I can’t conceive. And—and——”
“Don’t tell me any more,” said Lady Bell. “I am sorrythat you should have been run over, and I hope you are not hurt. That—that is blood running down your face. Why do you not wipe it off? I can’t bear it.”
“I beg your pardon,” said Jack, and he fumbled for his pocket-handkerchief, which at that moment was lying under the seat in the billiard-room.
“Here, take this,” said Lady Bell, and she put her own delicate lace-edged one in his hand.
Jack mopped his forehead diligently.
“Is it all off?” he asked.
“No, it keeps running,” replied Lady Bell, with a little thrill of horror. “I believe you are much hurt.”
“I’m not; I give you my word,” said Jack. “There—no, I’ll keep it until it’s washed.” And he thrust the delicate cobweb into his pocket.
Lady Bell leaned back, but her eyes wandered now and then to the handsome face, pale through all its tan.
Presently, wonderfully soon, as it seemed to her, the brougham came to a stop, and Jackson, bending down to the window, said:
“Spider Court, my lady.”
“Spider Court,” said Jack. “Then I’m home. I’m very much obliged to you, and I wish I didn’t feel so much ashamed of myself. Hark! who’s that?” for someone had come to the carriage door.
“It is I—Leonard. Is that you, Jack?”
“Yes,” said Jack, and he got out and closed the door. “This lady——”
Lady Bell leaned out and looked at Leonard Dagle’s anxious face earnestly.
“Your friend has met with an accident,” she said, “and I have brought him home.”
“Thank you, thank you,” sighed Leonard.
“I hope he is not much hurt,” said Lady Bell. “His forehead is cut. Will you—will you be so kind as to let me know if it is anything serious?”
“Anything serious! A mere scratch,” ejaculated Jack, carelessly.
But Lady Bell did not look at him.
“Here is my card,” she said, taking a card-case fromthe carriage basket. “Will you please let me know? Good-night.”
And she held out her hand.
Leonard did not see it, and merely raised his hat. But Jack, who was nearest, took the hand and held it for a moment.
“Good-night, good-night,” he said. “I shall never forgive myself for causing you trouble.”
And in his earnestness his hand, quite unconsciously, closed tightly on her white, warm palm.
Lady Bell dropped back into her seat, a warm flush spreading over her face; and Mrs. Fellowes, awakened by the stopping of the brougham, exclaimed, with a yawn:
“Home at last!”
“No, miles away,” said Lady Bell. “Go to sleep again, my dear.”
Leonard took Jack’s arm within his, though there was no occasion for it, for Jack was sober enough now, and led him upstairs.
“My dear Jack,” he exclaimed, reproachfully, “what have you been doing?”
“Falling under a cab,” said Jack, gravely.
“A cab!” retorted Leonard; “a lady’s brougham, you mean!”
And he took the card to the light.
“Why!” he exclaimed, with an expression of amazement. “Lady Isabel Earlsley! Good Heaven! that’s the heiress.”
“Eh?” said Jack, indifferently. “What’s her name? She’s a brick, if ever there was one. Oh, Jupiter, I wish I was in bed!”
It was Una’s first night in London. Weary as she was she could not find sleep; the dull roar of the great city—which those who are used to take no heed of—rang in her ears and kept her awake. Her brain was busy, too; and even as she closed her eyes the endless questions, which the strange events of the day had given birth to, pursued and tormented her. She could scarcely realize that she had left Warden Forest, that she was here in London, theplace of her most ardent dreams! And then how singular, how mysterious was that coincidence which had brought it about.
Until Jack Newcombe, the young stranger, had come to Warden, she had never heard the name of Davenant, and now she was actually living under the roof of Stephen Davenant’s mother.
With half-closed eyes she recalled all that Jack had said about Stephen Davenant, and it did not require much effort to recall anything Jack had said, for every word was graven on her heart, and it had seemed to her as if he had spoken disparagingly of this Stephen, and had implied that he was not as good as he was supposed to be.
She herself, as she lay, her beautiful head pillowed on her round white arm, was conscious of a strange feeling which had taken possession of her in Stephen’s presence—not of dislike, but something of doubt, something also of a vague fear.
And yet he could not but be good and generous, for was it not to him that she owed all that had happened to her? And did not his mother, the timid, gentle woman who had already won Una’s heart, speak of him as great and good?
Alas! and a faint flush stole over her cheek, and a long sigh stole from her lips—alas! it was that other—Jack Newcombe—who was bad; it was he whom she was to avoid.
And so, notwithstanding that she was in the very city of her dreams, she fell asleep with a vague sadness in her heart.
Quiet as Walmington Square is, the noise of the market carts passing to Covent Garden awoke her soon after dawn.
She looked round with a stare of amazement as her eyes fell upon the dainty room, with its costly furniture and rich hangings, and listened for a moment, as if expecting to hear the rustle of the great oaks which surrounded the cottage at Warden; then she remembered the change that had befallen her, and springing out of bed, ran to the window.
All the square was asleep; the blinds were closely drawnin all the houses, and only the birds on the trees seemed thoroughly awake.
She could hear the market carts rumbling in the great thoroughfare beyond, and as she had gone asleep with the rattle of wheels in her ears, she asked herself, wonderingly:
“Does London never rest?”
She remembered that Mrs. Davenant had showed her a bathroom communicating by a door from her own room, and then—with her cold water was as necessary as air—went and had her bath; then she dressed herself, and, opening her door, went downstairs.
To her amazement, all the house seemed wrapped in slumber.
At home, at the cottage at Warden, Gideon and all of them were up with the lark, and life began with the morning sun.
She stole into the drawing-room, and, unfastening the shutters with some little difficulty, opened the window and leaned out to breathe the fresh air; but it seemed as if the air was asleep, too, or, in its journey from the country, had lost itself in the maze of houses, and failed to reach Walmington Square.
Una looked out dreamily, wondering who and what sort of people lived in the huge blocks of dwellings that surrounded her, and wondered, faintly, whether she could be looking at the spot where Jack Newcombe dwelt.
She could not guess that Jack had not come back from Hurst Leigh yet, but was waiting for the squire’s funeral.
Instinctively she turned to the table and took up the album and went back to the window with the book open at the page which contained Jack’s portrait.
How beautiful the face was! And yet, she thought, with a warm glow in her eyes, that she had seen it look still more beautiful, as she had looked down at it the morning he lay sleeping at her feet.
Presently a servant came into the room, and startled at the sight of the white figure by the window, uttered an exclamation.
“Good-morning,” said Una.
Closing the book she came forward and held up her face to be kissed, as she had always done to Mrs. Rolfe.
The maid—a pretty young girl, fresh from Devonshire—stared at her and looked half-frightened, while a crimson flush of embarrassment came into her face.
“Good-morning, miss,” she said, nervously, and hastily turned and fled.
Una looked after her a moment, and pondered; and she would have made a superb study for a painter at that moment.
How had she frightened the pretty girl, and why had she declined to kiss her?
Una could not understand it. Hitherto she had lived only with equals, and could not be expected to guess that it was a breach of the proprieties to kiss this pretty, daintily-dressed little hand-maiden.
As for Mary, the maid, she flew into the kitchen and sank into a chair, gasped at the cook, speechless for a moment.
“What do you think, cook?” she exclaimed, “that young lady—Una, as the mistress calls her—is up already. I found her in the drawing-room, and—and she said ‘Good-morning,’ and came up to me as if she—she wanted me to kiss her.”
“You must be out of your mind, Mary,” said the cook, sternly.
But Mary stuck to her assertion, and at last it was decided that Una was either out ofhermind, or that she was no lady.
“And that I am sure she is,” exclaimed Mary, and the other servants assented heartily. “If there ever was a true lady, this one is, whoever or whatever she may be. Perhaps she’s just come from boarding-school.”
But the cook scoffed at the idea.
“Boarding-school!” she exclaimed incredulously. “Do you think they don’t know the difference between mistress and servants there? It’s the first thing that is taught them.”
Meanwhile, quite unconscious of the discussion which her ingenuous conduct had caused, Una wandered about the room, examining, with unstinted curiosity, the exquisitechina and valuable paintings, the Collard and Collard grand piano, and the handsomely-bound books.
An hour or two passed in this way; then she heard a bell ring and Mary entered, and, eying her shyly, said:
“Mistress says will you be kind enough to step up to her room, miss.”
Una went upstairs and knocked at Mrs. Davenant’s door, and in answer to the “come in,” entered, and found Mrs. Davenant in the hands of her maid Jane.
Una crossed the room with her swift, light step, and kissed the face turned up to her with a timid, questioning smile on it.
“My child,” exclaimed Mrs. Davenant, “have you been up all night? I sent Jane to your room to help you dress.”
Una started, and a smile broke over her face.
“To help me dress?” she repeated, Jane regarding her with wide open eyes the while. “Why should she do that? I have always dressed myself ever since I can remember.”
Mrs. Davenant flushed nervously.
“I—meant to brush your hair and tie your ribbons—as she does mine; but it does not matter if you would rather not have her.”
“I should not like to trouble her,” said Una.
“And how long have you been up, my dear?”
“Since five,” said Una, quietly.
Mrs. Davenant stared aghast, and Jane nearly dropped the hair-brush.
“Since five! My dear child! Ah! I see, you—you have been used to rising early. I am afraid you will soon lose that good habit. We Londoners don’t rise with the lark.”
“I don’t think there are any larks here,” remarked Una, gravely; “and at this time of the year the lark begins to sing at four. I have often watched him rise from his nest in the grass.”
“My poor child, you will miss the country so much.”
“No,” said Una; “I am so anxious to see the world, you know.”
“Well, we will begin today.”
“Una, you know I wish you to be quite—to be very happy with me. And—and I hope if there is anything that you want you will ask for it without hesitation.”
“Anything I want?” repeated Una, with a smile. “Is it possible that any one could want anything more than is here? There seems to be everything. I was thinking, as you spoke, of what my father would say if he saw this table, with all the things to eat, and the silver and glass.”
“My dear child, this is nothing. I live very simply. If you saw, as you will see, some of the homes of the wealthy, some of the homes of the aristocracy, you would discover that what you deem luxury is merely comfort.”
“I was never uncomfortable at the cottage,” said Una, gravely.
“That is because you were unused to anything better, and—and—you must not speak of the past life too much, Una. I mean to strangers. Strangers are so curious, and—and my son, Stephen, does not wish everyone to know where you come from and how you lived.”
“Does he not? Well, I will not speak of it; but I do not understand—quite——”
“Neither do I. I am afraid I do not always understand Stephen; but—but I always do as he tells me.”
And she looked up with the anxious, questioning expression which Una noticed was always present when Stephen Davenant was mentioned. Was Mrs. Davenant afraid of her son?
Una mused for a minute in silence; then she looked up and said:
“I ought to do what Mr. Stephen wishes. Do you know what he wants me to do?”
“You are to be companion to me, my dear.”
“I am very fond of fairy tales,” she said; “but I have never read one more strange and beautiful than this.”
“Let me show you how to put on your gloves, dear,” she said. “Yes, you have got a small hand, and a beautifully-shaped one, too. Strange, small hands are a sure sign of high birth.”
“Perhaps I am a princess in disguise. No! I am a woodman’s daughter in the disguise of a princess, that is it.”
Mrs. Davenant looked at her curiously.
“You are not ashamed of being a woodman’s daughter, Una,” she said; “but yet—perhaps the time will come when you will——”
Una’s opened-eyed surprise stopped her.
“Ashamed?” she echoed, with mild astonishment. “Why?”
“I—I don’t know. Never mind, my dear,” said Mrs. Davenant, as the brougham stopped.
“You are a strange child, and—and you say such strange things so naturally that I am puzzled to know how to speak to you.”
As the days passed on, Mrs. Davenant grew to understand more fully the innocent but frank and brave nature of the beautiful girl whom her son Stephen had so strangely committed to her charge; grew to understand and to love her, and, bit by bit, her nervousness and timidity wore off in Una’s presence. Insensibly she grew to lean and rely on the girl, who, with all her innocence and ignorance of the world, was so gently calm and self-possessed, and Una, in return, lavished her love upon the timid, shrinking woman.
Mrs. Davenant had heard no word from Stephen; she was accustomed to such silence, and almost dreaded to hear, lest it should be a message tearing Una from her side. She did not know that Stephen was master of Hurst Leigh and all the immense wealth of Ralph Davenant.
Una did not know that Jack Newcombe was back here in London, almost within half an hour of her. When she thought of her father and mother there in Warden, it was always with the confident trust that they were well, for she felt that if it were otherwise, Gideon would somehow let her know. She was quite ignorant that the cottage was empty and deserted.
Indeed, there was not much time for thought. Day after day brought its succession of wonderful sights and experiences, as the little green brougham bore them abouttown, and Mrs. Davenant showed her all the marvels of the great city.
Una was dazzled, bewildered sometimes: but her instinctive good taste helped her to keep back all extravagant expressions of surprise on her voyage through Fairyland.
One day, however, an exclamation of delight escaped her, as she came in sight of a jeweler’s window, opposite which the brougham had stopped.
To her who had only read of precious stones, and regarded them as objects almost fabulous, the window looked as if it contained the wealth of the Indies and of Aladdin’s palace combined.
They entered and Mrs. Davenant asked to see some ladies’ watches, selected one and a handsome albert, and, with a smile, arranged them at Una’s waist, in which, to her equal amazement, she found a pocket already provided.
Pale with emotion, she could not utter a word, and to hide the tears that sprang into her eyes, turned aside to look at a case containing a magnificent set of brilliants. The jeweler politely unlocked the case, and placed the bracelet in her hand.
“A really magnificent set. It is sold. They were purchased by Lady Isabel Earlsley.”
“Lady Earlsley,” said Mrs. Davenant. “Ah, yes; she is fond of diamonds, is she not?”
“Yes, and of other precious stones, too, madam. She has excellent taste and discrimination. Perhaps you have seen her set of sapphires?”
“No,” said Mrs. Davenant, in her quiet way, “I have met Lady Earlsley, but I have not seen them.”
The jeweler opened an iron safe, and took out a case containing a superb, a unique set of sapphires, and handed them to her.
“This is it—I have it to alter. They are the purest in the world—finer even than her ladyship’s rubies, which are considered, but wrongly, matchless.”
Una stared open-eyed, and the jeweler, pleased by her enthusiasm and admiration, took the set from its case and laid it in her hands.
As Una was bending over them fascinated, a handsomecarriage drew up, and the shop door was opened by a footman in rich livery.
Una looked up, and saw a beautiful girl who, pausing in the doorway, stood regarding her.
The eyes of the two girls met, Una’s with an instant frank admiration in her calm depths—a curious, half-amazed, but also admiring stare in the bright, dark eyes of the other.
The jeweler glanced from the new-comer to the gems in Una’s lap, and changed color. Mrs. Davenant started nervously, and turned pale.
With a quick, bird-like, but thoroughly graceful movement, the richly-dressed lady turned, and with a smile of recognition, bowed.
“Mrs.——” she said, and hesitated.
“Davenant,” said Mrs. Davenant. “How do you do, Lady Earlsley?”
Lady Isabel Earlsley, the great heiress and queen of fashion, held out her hand in her quick, impulsive way, but turned her quick glance on Una, whose eyes had never left the dark, bewitching face.
“Your daughter, Mrs. Davenant?”
Poor Mrs. Davenant trembled with nervous agitation.
“No—no—a young friend, Miss Rolfe,” she answered, tremulously.
Lady Bell went straight up to Una and held out her hand, her eyes fixed on the now flushed face.
“How do you do?” she said, in the almost blunt fashion which her admirers declared so charming, and which, though envious tongues declared an affectation, was a perfectly natural consequence of her early life.
Una put her hand in the delicate white gloved one, and the two women looked at each other for a moment in silence.
Was it possible at that moment that some prophetic instinct whispered to the heart of each that the threads of both their lives were doomed to be entangled together?
Then Una suddenly remembered that she had in her hand the jewels belonging to this young lady, and with a grave smile she put them back in their case.
“You are looking at my sapphires, I see,” said LadyBell, in a tone which set the soul of the alarmed jeweler at rest. “Do you admire them? Are they fine, do you think?”
Una smiled.
“I do not know. They are very beautiful. I have never seen anything like them before.”
“Really,” said Lady Bell, with a nod; “I don’t care for them. They don’t suit me; there is not enough color in them.” Then, turning to the jeweler, she said, in that quiet tone of command which for the first time fell upon Una’s ears: “Give me the rubies, please.”
The man hastened to hand her a case from the safe, and Lady Bell placed the contents in Una’s lap.
“Ah!” she said, with a smile, as Una’s eyes opened wide with admiration, at once childish and yet dignified, “you are of my opinion, too. But the sapphires would suit you best. I wish I were your husband.”
Una looked up with a smile of grave astonishment; and Lady Bell turned with a light laugh to Mrs. Davenant.
“How puzzled she looks! I mean,” she went on to Una, “that if I were your husband I would give you the sapphire set; though a lover would be more suitable, would it not?”
Then seeing Una’s grave, open-eyed wonder, Lady Bell turned to Mrs. Davenant, and in a low tone, said:
“Who is she, Mrs. Davenant?—has she just come out of a convent? She is simply lovely; her eyes haunt me—who is she?”
Mrs. Davenant stammered, and fidgeted speechlessly.
“Ah!” said Lady Bell, quickly, in the same low tone. “You think I’m rude and ill-bred. They all do when I ask a simple question, or show the slightest interest in anything.” She glanced at Una lingeringly: “I mustn’t ask, I suppose?”
“I—I—she is new to London,” said Mrs. Davenant. “It is her first day——”
“Her first day!” echoed Lady Bell, her eyes twinkling. “Do you mean that she was never in London before? How I envy her; I who am sick and weary of it! Yes, the glamour is on her; I can see it in her eyes—on her face. She is like some beautiful wild bird who has settled on an inhabited island for the first time, and is marveling at thestrange sights and faces—look at her!” and she touched Mrs. Davenant’s arm.
Una, quite unconscious of their scrutiny, was sitting looking dreamily into the street with its ceaseless throng of carriages and people. Lady Bell had hit upon a happy simile; she looked like some beautiful bird, half stupefied by the strange life moving around her.
Mrs. Davenant rose; but Lady Bell, with a gentle pressure, forced her back into her seat.
“Not this minute; leave her for a minute. See what a beautiful picture she makes! New to London! Do you know what will happen when London finds that she is in its midst?”
Mrs. Davenant looked up helplessly. She, too, looked like a bird—like some frightened pigeon in the clutch of a glittering hawk.
“You can’t guess,” went on Lady Bell, with a smile. “Well, it will make a queen of her—all London will be at her feet within a month, and I—I shall be dethroned.”
The last few words were spoken—- murmured—almost inaudible, and in a tone that was half sad, half mocking. But suddenly her mood changed; and with a smile that lit up her face, and seemed to dance like a flash of sunlight from eyes to lips and back again, she said:
“At any rate be mine the credit of discovering her. I am the first at the shrine of the new goddess!” and touching Una’s hand with the top of her gloved finger, she said: “Miss Rolfe, Mrs. Davenant has been kind enough to promise to come and see me tomorrow night. Are you fond of dancing?”
“I don’t know,” said Una, with a smile. “I do not know how to dance——”
“Heavens!” murmured Lady Bell.
“You forget, Lady Bell,” murmured poor Mrs. Davenant.
“Ah, yes, yes; I remember,” said Lady Bell, hastily. “Well, you will come and see how you like it, won’t you?”
Una looked at Mrs. Davenant inquiringly, and Lady Bell looked from one to the other impatiently.
“Do not say ‘No,’ pray, Mrs. Davenant,” she said, with her dark, bright eyes. “I have set my heart upon it, and adisappointment is intolerable. Besides, why should you say ‘No?’ You would like to come?”
“Yes, I should like to come,” said Una gravely.
Lady Bell looked at her as if fascinated.
“From a convent, certainly,” she murmured.
“Then it’s settled. Remember! I shall look for you—shall wait for you with impatience. Mrs. Davenant, I count upon you.”
“But—but I cannot go out, Lady Earlsley—I am in mourning.”
Lady Bell sighed impatiently.
“I am so sorry! I have never set my heart upon anything so much in my life,” she said. “Something tells me that we shall be great friends! Are you fond of jewels, lace, books?—what are you specially fond of?” And she seemed to dazzle Una with her smile. “You shall see them all—everything. Yes, let her come, and I will take such care of her as if she were something too precious to be touched; she shall not leave my side all the evening. Let her come, Mrs. Davenant!”
Mrs. Davenant paled and flushed in turn. What would Stephen say—would he be displeased or gratified? What should she do? She could not resist the half-imploring, half-commanding eyes which Lady Bell flashed upon her, and at last murmured a frightened “Yes.”
With a smile that seemed to set the diamonds scintillating, Lady Bell shook hands with Mrs. Davenant, and taking Una’s, held it for a moment in silence, then, with a sudden gravity, she said:
“Good-bye. I will take care of you. I will be yourchaperon. We shall meet again,” and was gone.
So interested and absorbed had she been in Una that she had quite forgotten her purpose in entering the shop, and had gone without another word to the jeweler.
He showed no surprise, however, but smiled complacently as he put the jewels back into their cases, being quite used to Lady Bell’s vagaries, and he bowed Mrs. Davenant and Una out with increased respect and deference.
Lady Bell, attended by the two footmen, entered her carriage, and Mrs. Fellowes, her friend and companion,who had been sleeping peacefully, awoke with a little start.
“Well, my dear, have you got the rubies?”
“The rubies?” said Lady Bell. “No, I quite forgot them.”
“Forgot them!” said Mrs. Fellowes.
“Yes. What are stupid rubies compared with an angel?”
“My dear Lady Bell!” exclaimed Mrs. Fellowes, “what are you talking about?”
Lady Bell leaned back with her hands folded in her lap, and her eyes musingly staring at nothing.
“Yes, an angel,” she repeated. “I never believed in them until today, but I have seen one this morning—in a jeweler’s shop.”
“Lady Bell, how strangely you talk. I am getting alarmed.”
“You always are,” said Lady Bell, coolly. “I repeat, I have seen an angel. You are always trying to flatter me by talking of my beauty and such nonsense; but I have seen today a real beauty. Not a mere pretty pet mortal like myself, but one of the celestials! With eyes like a wild bird’s, and a lady, too, I’ll be sworn!”
“My dear Bell, what language!” murmured Mrs. Fellowes.
“A perfect lady; her hands, her voice would vouch for that. Her voice is like a harp. If I had been a man I should have fallen in love with her on the spot.”
“Fallen in love,” said Mrs. Fellowes. “My dear Bell,” with a politely suppressed yawn, “I am half inclined to think you have taken leave of your senses, and you will drive me out of mine. One night it is a young man whom we nearly run over; a—I must say—a tipsy young man.”
“No; he had only taken too much wine.”
“Well, if that isn’t being tipsy——”
“Don’t, don’t,” said Lady Bell, pleadingly; “we might have killed him.”
“I don’t know that he would have been much loss to the world at large,” said Mrs. Fellowes.
“Home!” said Lady Bell to the footman; and she sank back with a brilliant flush on her face.
Mrs. Davenant drove home also, and in considerable perturbation. What had she done? What would Stephen say?
Fortunately for that young man’s peace of mind, he was resting at ease at Hurst Leigh, little dreaming that Lady Bell, or any one else, would meet Una, and coax her out of his mother’s nerveless hands.
Una, with quick sympathy, saw that her companion was distressed, and with a gentle touch of her hand, said:
“You do not like me to go to this lady’s house. I will not go. No; I will not go.”
“My dear,” she replied, with a sigh, “it isn’t in our hands now. You don’t know Lady Bell—nor do I very well; but I know enough of her to be convinced that if you do not go tomorrow night, she would come and fetch you, though she left all her guests to do so.”
“Is she then so—so accustomed to having her own way?”
“Always; she always has her own way. She is rich—very, very rich—and petted; and she is even more than that; she—she—I don’t know how to explain myself. Well, my dear, she is a sort of queen of society, and more powerful than many real queens.”
“So that when she commands such as I am I must obey,” said Una, with her low, musical laugh.
“Just so,” said Mrs. Davenant, with a sigh. “But you will be careful, my dear. I mean, don’t—don’t let her put you forward, remind her of her promise to keep you at her side.”
“I think I would rather not go.”
“Don’t be frightened, my dear,” said Mrs. Davenant, kindly; but Una’s calm, steady look of response showed her that there was no fear in the young, innocent heart.
“No, I am not frightened,” she said. “I do not know what I am to fear.”
Having consented to Una’s going, Mrs. Davenant lost no time in making the few necessary preparations. She selected a plain but rich evening dress, set her own maid to make the required alterations, selected from her own store a sort of old Honiton, and gave orders that some white flowers should be bought at Covent Garden the next morning.
“White flowers, my dear,” she said, nervously. “BecauseI—I am not sure that Stephen would not consider that your being in the house with me you are not in mourning. But, then, you are no relation, my dear.”
“I wish I were,” said Una, kissing her.
At nine o’clock the next evening the quiet-looking green brougham came round to the door, and took them rapidly to Park Lane.
Una had already grown almost weary of staring out of the carriage window, but her wonder and interest revived as she saw in the dusky twilight the green trees and flowers in the most beautiful park in the world, and amazed at the magnificent buildings past which they rolled.
Presently the brougham drew up at a corner house facing the park; an awning was suspended from the gateway to the pavement, and three footmen in splendid liveries, which she recognized as those she had seen worn by the servants attending Lady Bell’s carriage, were standing to receive the guests; one of them opened the brougham door and escorted them into the hall, which seemed to Una, with its flowers and mirrors, its rich hangings and statues, a fairy palace, and was about to usher them into the drawing-room, when, upon hearing Mrs. Davenant’s name, he bowed, and took them into a small room at the side, which was Lady Bell’s boudoir.
“I will tell her ladyship,” he said.
Una had scarcely time to take in the exquisite beauty of the room, with its antique furniture and costly knicknacks, when the door opened and Lady Bell entered. She was exquisitely dressed; diamonds—the diamonds Una had seen at the jeweler’s—glittering in her hair and on her neck and on her arms, and seemed to Una like some vision which at a breath would vanish and leave the room to its subdued twilight again.
With outstretched hands she came toward them, with her eyes dancing and her cheeks flushed.
“You have kept your word and brought my wild bird! I knew you would come,” and she took a hand of each, but suddenly reached up and kissed Una. “Yes, I felt that youwould come, but it is good of you all the same, and to show you that I am grateful, I will let you go at once, this minute, dear Mrs. Davenant!”
Mrs. Davenant looked relieved.
“Thank you! thank you, Lady Bell!” she said. “You—you——”
“Will take care of your bird? Yes, that I will. You may trust her to me; not a feather shall be ruffled.”
Mrs. Davenant murmured something about the time she would come for her, and then with a timid look from one to the other was gone.
“And now,” said Lady Bell, “let me look at you,” as if she had not been doing so ever since she entered the room. “My dear, my dear, you are——” she stopped short. “No, I’ll not be the first to teach you vanity. But tell me, do you ever look in your glass, Miss Rolfe—Miss Rolfe, I don’t like that name, I mean between you and me. My name is Bell, and yours is——”
“Mine is Una.”
“Una! That is delightful! And have you your lion? Where is he?”
Una had never read the story of “Una and the Lion,” and looked calmly puzzled.
“Well, if you have not one already, you soon will have. You don’t understand me. I am glad of that. But will you come now? This is a very, very quiet little party, but you may be amused. And I will keep you by my side all the evening. Come,” and she drew Una’s arm through her own white one and led her through the corridor into the ball-room.
It was not a large room. Lady Bell detested huge and crowded assemblies too much to permit them at her own house, but it was, as a ball-room, perfect. There was light, and just enough light, to show the tasteful magnificence of the decorations, and nothing of that fearful glare from innumerable lights, and their reflections in huge mirrors, which make most ball-rooms so trying and unbearable. The band had just commenced as they entered, and the whole scene, the beautiful room with its soft draperies of Persian damask, the Venetian mirrors, the rich dresses of the ladies, and the soul-moving strains of the best band inLondon, for the moment overawed and startled the girl fresh from the primeval forest.
For a moment her eyes dilated almost with fear, and she unconsciously drew back, but Lady Bell, with a gentle pressure of the arm, drew her forward, and skillfully avoiding the dancers, took her to the further end of the room, where, in a recess lined with ferns and tropical plants, were arranged some seats so placed as to be almost hidden from the room, while they allowed the sitter a full view of it.
Lady Bell drew a fauteuil still further into the recess, and playfully forced Una into it.
“There, my wild bird, is your cage. You can see all the world without being seen, and here you and I will take a peep at it. Now, don’t you want to know all their names and all about them?”
Una smiled. She was a little pale and was trembling slightly.
“No; I am too surprised and astonished at present. How beautiful it is, and how lovely they are.”
“The women?” said Lady Bell, with a laugh, and a glance at the unconscious face beside her, which she knew outshone all others there. “You think so! Well, there are some pretty women here. There is Lady Clarence—the one in light blue and swansdown—and Mrs. Cantrip—she was the beauty last season. You don’t understand?”
“Last season!” said Una. “Who is the beauty this?”
Lady Bell laughed and flushed a little.
“Never mind, child,” she said. “One who doesn’t care a farthing about it, at any rate. But look, do you see that tall lady there, dancing with the short man with whiskers? She is the Countess of Pierrepoint, and he is the Duke of Garnum——”
“A duke?” said Una, surprised.
“You expected to see a man seven feet high in his ducal robes?” she said. “See those two men who have just come in? The dark one is Sir Arkroyd Hetley, the other, the boy—the baby they call him—is a marquis, the Marquis of Dalrymple. They are always together. They are coming to shake hands with me.”
Una drew further into the shade as the two men, after hunting about the room, came up to the recess, and listenedas they paid their compliments and seemed anxious to remain, but Lady Bell sent them off quite plainly and distinctly, and sat looking toward the door, and presently she ceased talking, and her bright, beautiful face grew quiet and almost sad, certainly wistful, and at last she sighed and murmured:
“No, he will not come.”
“Who will not come?” said Una. “Are you expecting any one?”
“Did I speak?” she said. “Yes, I am expecting someone, but he will not come. People one expects and wants never do—never do. You will find that out in time, wild bird; you will find—ah!” and she started and turned pale, and her hand, which had been laid on Una’s arm, closed over it with a sudden grip and flutter.
Una looked up, and her face went deadly white.
The room seemed to spin round with her, and the lights to flood her brain and paralyze her, for there, towering above the throng, stood Jack Newcombe.
Jack Newcombe—not in his rough tweed suit, but in evening dress; Jack, not with the frank, tender, pleasant smile which always rested upon his face as it appeared in her dreams, but with a cold, half-irritable, and wholly bored expression.
Slowly she rose and glided into the shadow of the recess and hid herself, her heart beating wildly, her whole form trembling with a strange ecstasy of mingled fear and delight.
At last she saw him again.