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This text has been proofread but is not guaranteed to be free from errors. Corrections to the original text have been left in place.
Title: A Mayfair Tragedy, volume III, an electronic edition
Author: Fraser, Alexander, Mrs.
Publisher: F. V. White & Co.
Place published: London
Date: 1894
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Front cover of the third volume of Fraser's A Mayfair Tragedy.A MAYFAIR TRAGEDY.A MAYFAIR TRAGEDY.A Novel.BY MRS. ALEXANDER FRASER, AUTHOR OF "THE NEW DUCHESS," "PURPLE AND FINE LINEN," "THE MATCH OF THE SEASON," "DAUGHTERS OF BELGRAVIA," "A LEADER OF SOCIETY," A FATAL PASSION," "A MODERN BRIDEGROOM," ETC., ETC."Alas! the love of woman, it is knownTo be a lovely and a fearful thing!"BYRON.IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. III.LONDONF. V. WHITE & CO.14, BEDFORD STREET, STRAND, W.C.1894.Copyright information for the third volume of Fraser's A Mayfair Tragedy.DEDICATION.TO MY REVIEWERS,
"Satire or sense, can Sporus feel,Who breaks a butterfly on a wheel?"1894.Table of contents for the third volume of Fraser's A Mayfair Tragedy.A MAYFAIR TRAGEDY.
CHAPTER I. "JEALOUSY IS CRUEL AS THE GRAVE.""I had wrung life dry for your lips to drink,Broken it up for your daily bread,Body for body and blood for blood,As the flow of the full sea risen to flood,That yearns and trembles before it sink—I had given and lain down for you—glad and dead!"ALL night long Claire never closes her eyes, never undresses herself or seeks to court sleep. Wrapped in the black shawl that had concealed her so well among the laurustinus, she cowers in a corner of a luxurious lounge, with keen, bright eyes that burn like fire and glitter like steel, her mind full of vengeance and scheming, her hands clenched together as if in a vice, until the dawn, pink and fresh, seems to look down reproachfully on her—a woman with a cruel heart.She rises up, huddles on another shawl, for the room is chilly, and staggers like a drunken woman to her mirror, breathing heavily, as if she had been labouring in a poisonous atmosphere—a poisonous atmosphere it really is, teeming with the worst and meanest feelings to which God's creatures sometimes fall—only sometimes, let us thank Heaven, or the world would be worse than it is, and Satan would run rampant on the earth.Passion, treachery, and falsehood mingle together in Claire's heart, crying loudly and lustily for revenge on the cause of all her suffering.At this time she could kill Cecil, if she had a chance!She stares into the mirror, a bitter, mocking expression on her mouth, haggard lines under her eyes."What a wretch I look," she mutters angrily, "and so beautiful and perfect as my face really is—and yet what is beauty? since I failed to keep one man—the only one I care to keep!"She walks rapidly up and down the room, shivering as she goes, with a world of scorn on her features, that does entirely away with any resemblance to Cecil."To think that a man like him should prefer a milk-and-water thing like that to me! Never mind, I am clever enough to win the game yet. She shall not take him from me. I'll crush her to the earth—I'll humiliate her to the dust before him. To think that he should care to content himself with such mawkish stuff when a draught of sparkling wine is held to his lips. His lips! I can feel them now—I can feel again the thrill his caress sent right through my heart. And Cecil has taken those caresses from me—from me—who hunger and thirst for his love!"She pushes the rich mass of bronze-flecked hair back impatiently from her throbbing temples, and regards her face steadily for a moment."If I could have a little sleep, it would bring my looks back. But the dreams that come when one is wide-awake are the greatest curse of all—evil dreams that one feels one must work out, right or wrong. What was it he said? 'Nothing in the world can part us now!' He shall see!" And Claire laughs shrilly.She does not go down to breakfast till long after the usual hour, and both Mr. Delaval and Melville have gone down to the Home farm—which is the Honourable John's pet folly; for hours he lingers here, admiring his pedigree Jerseys, which have cost fabulous sums, and about which he knows as much as if they were sheep. Cecil is up in her room, wrapt in blissful visions of the future, and Claire has only Bell to keep her company, but Bell is engrossed with a magnificent Persian cat, called Dido, whose long, silky hair she unmercifully combs, while Puss resents the liberty by trying to scratch the mites of hands."Dido, for shame! You don't behave like a lady. You are rude, Dido; your claws are too long—I'll clip them!" and she gets up from the floor to seek for her scissors."What a child you are, Bell," Claire says sharply. "Instead of reading or doing something useful you loll about the floor tormenting Dido. I shall really persuade papa to send you to a finishing school, or you won't be fit to go into Society.""I hate Society!" Bell answers, "and I don't see why you should want me to be packed off to school. I am sure I never interfere with you in any way, Claire!""Interfere with me!—no, I should think not—I never allow anyone to interfere with me! But come and sit down, and let us have an amiable confab together."Bell opens her big eyes wide. The idea of Claire condescending to have a "confab" with her is too astounding. In the daze of the moment, she forgets Dido's claws, and meekly perches on the music-stool."I went to Madame Celestine's yesterday, as you know, and she persuaded me to buy a new gown for Cecil—a charming white one. I thought she wanted something for a change to that awful dress she wears of an afternoon, and I ordered a pale blue frock for you. You see, mamma never refuses me money, so that I can buy what I like, and I liked very much the idea of both you girls looking nice before Lord Melville."Bell opens her eyes even wider than before. Are the stars going to fall? Usually she and Cecil, in spite of the Plumper fortune, have old frocks of Claire's palmed on them.A white dress for Cecil! It suggests all sorts of pleasant visions to loyal Bell—who knows but it may be Cecil's wedding-dress!"I am sure you are very kind, Claire! We shan't even know how to thank you. We do want frocks terribly bad. Cecil will look more than ever like a lily in white—I am so glad she is to have it! Don't you think, Claire, that Cecil reminds one of those beautiful white lilies in the marble fountain?""Very much so," Claire answers drily, "especially if the lilies had souls as white as themselves.""Thank you again very much, Claire," Bell says rather awkwardly."Welcome!" is the curt reply.Then Bell rushes upstairs and into Cecil's room, and throws herself down on the hearthrug at her cousin's feet."Cis, there's mischief brewing," she announces in a sepulchral voice.No answer.Cecil is seated with a handful of marguerites lying on the table before her, and half of them are mutilated."Il m'aime—un peu—beaucoup—passionnément."
"Cis, do you hear? There's mischief brewing!""Pas du tout—Il m'aime—un peu—beau coup—passionnément! Ah!" cries Cecil, dropping the last petal of marguerite she has plucked right on to the top of Bell's little Greek nose. "You see, Bell, he loves me passionnement! What did you say?""I said that mischief is brewing. Claire's affection and Claire's generosity are pitfalls, and something dreadful is going to happen!""When Alan loves me passionnement?" asks Cecil dreamily and reproachfully. "Wait till you love someone as I love Alan, and then you'll never think of mischief or evil so long as he loves you—but what has Claire done to show affection and generosity?""Ordered us both new frocks at Madame Celestine's. She wishes us to look nice before Lord Melville."Cecil colours, and a sharp thrill like a warning goes through her heart."Cis, darling, I wish you did not care for Lord Melville so much. Suppose anything made him like you less——?""It wouldn't matter. I should just break my heart and die," Cis says impetuously. "Oh, Bell, of course I couldn't live without him now—now I have found out what a beautiful, beautiful world it is with him in it—as beautiful as I believe Heaven to be!""Only in Heaven there are no partings, you know.""And on earth there are!" Cecil says, with dimmed eyes. "I know that, Bell, partings that have a far greater pain in them than even death can give. But, Bell, let me be happy while I may. It is the first time in my life. Until Alan came it was one long, dull plodding, and now every moment seems full of interest and pleasure. When I am going to see him, I think of all he will say to me—when he is absent, I think of all he has said. There is not one single instant when he is not filling my heart with his presence or with the memory of him. I feel as if I had known him all my life, for my life only began when I knew him!"Bell does not smile at this rhapsody, in fact her eyes fill with tears to keep Cecil's company."I only ask you to be careful, and not trust in Claire. I know it is very wrong of me to say this, for Claire is my sister, but I love you, Cis—love you so much.""Alan told me last evening that I was his already, to guide and guard from every ill—so what could a hundred Claires do?"Bell shakes her head."Lord Melville is honest and truthful, but honesty and truth don't always overcome cunning and deceit.""Why do you call him 'Lord Melville'?" Cecil remarks irrelevantly, thinking that the Christian name of her lover is so sweet and soft. "He is going to be your cousin—why don't you call him Alan?""I will, when he is my cousin. I wish he was my cousin now," she adds passionately."That you might call him Alan?" asks Cecil laughing."No, because then you would be safe from——"Bell pauses abruptly, for at this moment Claire walks in.She stands looking at the two girls with hard, scrutinising eyes."You look like conspirators," she says. "Mind, conspirators generally get the worst of it," and she sweeps out of the room.CHAPTER II. THE TRAIL OF THE SERPENT."Heat not a furnace for your foe so hotThat it do singe yourself."THE day has turned out chilly and dreary, so Claire elects to put on a black dress for dinner. It is plain as a Quaker's. She has a fancy for a sombre appearance this evening, and she wears no jewels to give even a gleam of brightness. A large bunch of white lilies is her only ornament. Her hair, thick and glittering, is coiled according to the latest mode, and she is pale to pallor, for she has a task before her on the success or failure of which she firmly believes all the joy or grief of her future depends, and, though naturally self-confident and cool, her heart beats faster than it has for many a day.The dinner is as usual a parti carré, and when it is over Mrs. Delaval makes her elaborate good-night with its usual apologies for retiring.
"'Early to bed and early to rise,Makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise,'
you know, my lord! And I always was the 'early bird that picked up the worm,' till Claire told me fashionables are always lie-abeds," she says jocosely, and Lord Melville musters up an appreciative smile, very faint and with a dash of disgust in it."Thank God! she's not going to be my mother-in-law! A woman like that ought to be strangled."It is quite a relief to hear the Honour-able John's soft, gentlemanly voice announce that he is "off to have a pipe," and hopes Melville will join him presently, after he and Claire have had a little music.The windows are pushed wide open, the outer world is lovely, with its sky studded with stars, a balmy air with the scent of a thousand flowers on its wings steals through the lace curtains. The tall lamps are carefully turned down, and the luxurious room looks full of peace and pleasantness, when Claire, knowing they are alone, turns slowly round from the window.Like Cecil, she resembles at this moment a tall slender lily, and struck by the likeness Melville goes towards her with quite a gush of admiration and cordiality in his breast, but no love. There is not a particle of love in his feelings.He smiles as he goes too, a smile that comes right from his heart, for he is so happy now—now that he has made up his mind and is going to marry Cecil as soon as possible.Where is the famous spear of Ithuriel, that he does not shrink back, instead of going forward, warned at once of danger?—danger in so charming a form, that he is not dreaming of its vicinity just now, and falls into the meshes of a human spider like an unwary fly.Claire smiles too, but there is nothing savouring of too much warmth in the smile. It is a quiet, lady-like, pleasing smile, and sets him at his ease at once. Somehow, ever since that night with its music and all the other temptations that made him lose his head, he has felt a certain restraint in her society, but this evening a conviction comes to him that he and she are going to be very good friends!"I have been wanting to see you alone so very much," she begins.It has rather an ominous sound, and he starts a little.She drops languidly on to a velvet fauteuil and motions him to a seat as far as possible from her, which gesture rather restores his confidence, making him think that she has seen the folly of both their ways and is resolved to forget the past.Looking at her he sees her beautiful eyes moist with unshed tears, and her lips slightly tremulous, and on the spur of the moment he jumps up to console her, but she waves him off with a hand so white, so superbly moulded, that Canova would have gone mad over it."I hope you did not wish to see me about anything very grave. Tell me what troubles you, and let me feel myself of some use," he says, in a voice which no intelligent woman could find a shadow of love in, but plenty of friendliness."I wanted to keep the trouble to myself, but it is impossible to do so. Events have occurred to day that have decided me to confide in someone wiser and stronger than myself. It is wrong of her to have driven me to this!" she ejaculates piteously and helplessly."May I ask to whom you allude?""To—Cecil—of course!""Is the trouble about her?" he asks, flushing a little and much annoyed. He feels dreadfully perplexed and uncomfortable as well, for he thinks this girl has found out his engagement to her cousin and is simply jealous.""Yes! Look here, Lord Melville. You are a stranger, an acquaintance of weeks only, yet somehow I cannot look on you as such. I seem to turn naturally to you for advice. I suppose it is because you give one the impression of being strong and trustworthy, of being a man on whom a woman can rely and never find you wanting. You will never understand what I have suffered for months on Cecil's account, for with all her faults, of which deception is the greatest, I have a great affection for her. You see she has been with us for years and her very dependency on us for roof and food, and in fact everything one requires in this world, has endeared her to us all!""I do not understand what she has done to prove ungrateful for so much love!" he says, in a voice as hard and cold as granite."It is not her ingratitude that troubles me, it is anxiety for her well-being," Claire replies in a benign tone. "I will tell you from the beginning. It is a long story, but when it is finished you will be able to judge whether I have not ample cause for anxiety."He does not answer. He is fast arming himself against her, and she sees it. With keen perceptive faculties she reads his feelings like a book.A slow angry fire has crept into his eyes, and he has pulled himself up, sitting as upright and stiff as a stern judge. He remembers all that Bell has said of her sister's dislike to Cecil, and he takes up his darling's cause warmly in his heart of hearts. Claire marks it all with one sharp, covert glance, but she feels neither disheartened nor discomfited, but waits patiently for the ultimate result of the "long story" she has to tell."Cecil and I went to Brussels last year, to have finishing lessons in singing. It was at a big pensionnat, and there were so many pupils that I suppose they could not look after us all as strictly as they ought to have done.""Well?" he says a little impatiently.That he is interested—deeply interested—the most trivial observer can see. And now the feline portion of Claire's character comes out, and it pleases her to play with him as a cat does with a mouse instead of coming to the point at once."A little after our arrival in Brussels, Cecil changed very much, she moped about, seemed absent and listless, and I could not think what was the matter with her. Then one evening I followed her——""Yes!" cries Melville sternly. Ten thousand fiends of jealousy rack his soul, and his face is as white as a sheet."She crept along the quietest thorough-fares like a guilty thing, then she entered the Parc, and sat down on a bench hidden away under some trees. I stood at a little distance concealed by the drooping foliage and the dusk, and presently a man went and sat down beside her——"She pauses, hides her face with her hands—and if Melville could see through those lissome white fingers, he would be edified by the sight of a smile on the perfect mouth."Well, Miss Delaval, the story grows quite interesting, though it puts one in mind rather of a 'penny dreadful.' The man was probably a stranger attracted by the sight of a pretty face, and the hope of making acquaintance with its owner!" he manages to answer in a light, careless voice."A stranger would scarcely be so impertinent as to put his arm round a girl's waist and his lips close to hers!""Ah! so your cousin was in that sentimental position?""Oh, Lord Melville, I am ashamed to tell you all this of a member of my family, but I do so want some counsel in the matter!""And what was the hero of the romance like? A little coarse, rough Belgian, I suppose?""Oh, no! It was our singing-master at the pensionnat. He was an Italian, with a very handsome face, dark eyes, and tall, much taller than you are!"Melville starts as if he was shot—now he knows where he had seen a face so like both Claire's and Cecil's. It was on his evening stroll through the Parc at Brussels. He remembers how the face that rested against the man's heart had struck him by its exquisite beauty—he had seen the caresses laid on the perfect lips—and he had walked on indignant, stranger to him as the girl was, that one of his own countrywomen—he was sure she was that—should be the prey of some rascally foreigner.He knows now! He knows that she whom he has taken to his heart—she for whom he has given up the beautiful woman opposite him—she for whom he was willing to sacrifice the fortune which would bring back the old prestige of the Melvilles and gladden his mother in her last years, is——Great Heavens! he dare not speak the vile epithet which is in his thoughts—Cecil's pure and innocent face rises up before him, and he curses the purity and innocence which are but snares and delusions of the Devil. He curses her for the whited sepulchre she is—he loathes himself for having been the dupe of a cast-off creature, anxious to cover her shame under one of the noblest names in England.All these thoughts flash through his brain in a moment, and regardless of Claire he goes up to a window and leans far out. He feels as if he shall choke with the agony of abused love—with the stings of jealousy—with the knowledge that henceforth the girl he has loved with heart and soul he must now avoid as a pestilence.Far away, in a room of another wing of High Towers, a light twinkles faintly through a window. It is the window of Cecil's room. How often he has looked up at it with a lover's folly and romance, believing it to be his white-souled darling's nest—pure and sacred as the surround-ings of a saint. How often he has murmured with that twinkling light before his loving eyes—" God bless her!"—and now——He turns away and resumes his seat. His deep blue eyes burn with a cruel fire—his lips are set as if moulded in iron—his heart feels like lead."And what has become of the man?""He is in Italy. She wrote to him some little time ago, and I unlocked the bag to take out a letter I had sent with wrong direction to a London shop, and I saw the address.""And has he answered?""Yes. Oh, Lord Melville, do not think badly of me for having read the reply. I found it in Cecil's desk, and I wanted to know if she had broken off this most dreadful entanglement—but—she has only deferred his coming to England for awhile.""I cannot believe all this," Melville says passionately, "nothing but positive proof could make me think Miss Cecil Delaval as black as you paint her!""Here is the proof! Read it, I implore of you—since your doubts of my truth and good intentions kill me!" And Claire holds out a letter.He looks at it. Every feeling in his heart bids him take it and see if it is all true—all horribly true—before he puts Cecil out of his life for ever. But honour forbids him, and clenching his hands together like a vice—he sits motionless as if carved in stone."I will read it to you. It is but justice to me that you should know that I have not maligned or exaggerated!"And she reads the letter quickly through in a low voice—but she has scarcely reached the end before Melville, driven out of all self-control, snatches it from her and reads for himself."His name?""Marco Ferrari.""Ah!"He remembers the opal ring Cecil said she had found—it had "M" on it—the initial of this Ferrari's Christian name.Proof upon proof—damning proofs—pour down on his mind—Cecil's fear lest Claire, who she probably knows is aware of the Brussels episode, should hear of her engagement to him—afraid doubtless that the fatal truth should leak out and spoil her ambition to become a peeress—Bell's extraordinary eagerness for concealment.He can doubt no longer, his cup of misery overflows, and he feels that he can hear nothing worse than he has done if he questions for a century! His darling—his stainless lily, as he had thought her—the little wild flower that he believed had blossomed into life for him!What a fool he has been. All his old cynicism about women comes back to him in redoubled force. There is not a pure woman in the whole wide world since Cecil has proved so utterly worthless and false.There is a deathly whiteness on his features which frightens Claire, and yet she rejoices, for it betokens that love is dying within him—that it is almost dead."I cannot understand why Cecil keeps up this secrecy. If Signor Ferrari is an honest, respectable man, even if he is forced to earn his living, Papa would not spoil her happiness for any prejudices of his own. True, the Delavals are very severe on the subject of mésalliances!" she says with hauteur.Melville thinks of the Honourable Mrs. Delaval, and smiles bitterly."True. Why does she keep up a mystery? But you, in spite of your inexperience and your unripe years, must have found out that your sex are sphinxes and paradoxes—that if there are two ways, a straight and a crooked one, a woman always chooses the last! I suppose there is less romance and sensation about an open, honest attachment, than in a low, vulgar intrigue."He rises and goes towards the door. He would have walked out of the house in a sort of maze if Claire's wistful voice had not stopped him."Have you nothing to say—no advice to give? I have done very wrong perhaps in making you my confidant!""Wrong? Miss Delaval! Who says you are wrong? I have been deeply interested in this story, but it is too delicate a matter for any but a member of your own family to advise on. Why not ask your father? I am sure he is the right person to give you counsel!""No! no! Papa is goodness itself if things are right, but he has no mercy for people who do wrong. He would send poor Cecil out of the house at once, to prevent Bell and me from associating with her—but of course you could not blame him, for naturally he is very particular about us two!""I am afraid I am not in a position to give you comfort or put you on the right course to pursue. I should think the best thing for your cousin to do is to get Mr. Delaval's consent to her seeing this Signor Ferrari, and having a happy arrangement of matters," he says."I think so too—will you forgive my having bothered you with all this?""Do not apologise for troubling me, but I beg of you to keep this business from other ears, excepting your father's. Remember, disgrace to Miss Cecil Delaval is disgrace to her family!""Yes, that is just what I feel!"She catches his hand and is lifting it to her lips, but Melville draws it away almost roughly, and a shudder passes over him as he looks down on her.Claire strikes him at this moment as a living embodiment of the famous painting of Laus Veneris—sad, languid-orbed, passion-tossed, her eyes like two stars seeking a home in some distant sky, a nimbus of bright hair—the lilies showing at her throat, the apricot-hued curtains as a background, the toned-down lamps giving a dim, mysterious light. She is a gorgeous woman, but Melville, as he looks at her, knows he is adamant.It is too early days for his heart to be caught in the rebound, and Claire divines it."I must leave you to-morrow, I regret to say. My mother wishes my presence in Town on some business. Thank you so much for helping to make my visit so enjoyable. I trust we shall meet again soon!""We shall all be so sorry to lose you, papa especially! But you will come again, won't you?" she pleads, lifting up great deprecating grey eyes to him."Some day!—will you wish Mrs. Delaval good-bye for me? I shall be off too early to hope for the pleasure of seeing her.""But I shall see you to-morrow. I won't say good-bye now!""Good-night, then!" and he smiles as he just touches her hand and no more.CHAPTER III. BLUEBELL'S SONG."All jealousy Must be strangled in its birth, or time Will soon conspire to make it strong enoughTo overcome the truth!"MELVILLE, reaching his own room, sits down, dazed and more miserable than he has ever been in his life. The latter happy days rise up vividly before him, and yet he scorns and hates himself for the mad fool he has been.What the real motive Cecil has had in engaging herself to him, while she was loving another man, he cannot understand. Is it simply, he wonders, because it is a woman's nature to plot, and beguile, and betray?He cannot help thinking whatever her past feeling may have been for the Italian singing-master, that now she really cares for him. Every look and glance tells him so, and he must fain believe these, or he must live for the rest of his natural existence in a state of suspicion and scepticism.Cecil had fallen into the snare laid by an adventurer caught by her fair face, an unprincipled scoundrel, who meant to ruin her life and leave her to die like a dog in a ditch.It is quite possible to believe this, for she is little more than a child in years and experience, and just a facile prey for a ravening wolf.Melville cannot fling her memory from his heart. He hates the man who has made her the thing she is, and could crush him under his heel, but Cecil——! She is so lovely, and soft, and fair, so loving in her little ways.He jumps up from his chair, full of wrath with himself. Surely the creature is not worth thinking about. Yet, if by a miracle she should prove innocent, how he would abhor himself for hasty condemnation. How he would remember his doubts of her with undying remorse and regret.Still Claire could have no motive for deceiving him, not even the motive of jealousy, for she does not know of his meetings with Cecil, or of his engagement to her.And this reminds him that Cecil's wish for secrecy—which he had put down to a girl's love of romance—had been deliberate and artful through all. Even the child Bell had made him a laughing stock, playing into Cecil's hands, systematically leaving them by themselves, and running away on pretence of finding violets and ferns—the mockery of it all!So at last the whole thing condenses itself into one dreadful word. It has been a "plant"—a shameful plant—and he is well out of it, and still, but for that fatal letter from Ferrari, he would defy Claire's accusations, and take Cecil to his arms again. In these thoughts he passes the night. Sleep never comes near him, and when dawn breaks, he goes out into the grounds. The fresh morning air cools his throbbing temples and hot cheeks—and he has something to do. He has to watch for Bluebell, who is in the habit of rising with the lark, and rambling among the flowers, while the rest of the world is asleep.He has not long to wait.Bell comes along the lawn, singing in a soft musical voice a quaint old ditty."I loved a lass—a fair one,As fair as e'er was seen,She was indeed a rare one,Another Sheba Queen.But fond fool as then I was,I thought she loved me too,But now, alas! she's left me,Falero—lero—loo!"To woman's vows and swearingHenceforth no credit give.You may give them a hearing,But never them believe.They are as false as fair,Inconstant—frail—untrue,For mine, alas! hath left me,Falero—lero—loo!"She gathers the flowers in the border as she walks slowly along, looking, in her fresh morning toilette and her big straw hat, the embodiment of a Greuze.When she sees Melville she stops short, and smiling, holds out her
hand, but looking up in his face, she starts.His face is as white as her dress, and his eyes burn like a flame."That is not a pretty song, Miss Bluebell," he says coldly, "but it is a very true one:
'To woman's vows and swearingHenceforth no credit give.'
But never mind about that. I am leaving High Towers in the course of an hour, and I want you to give your cousin this——"He pulls out a letter from his pocket with a trembling hand, and now a dark flush stains his cheeks. "Will you be sure to give it to her?"Bell takes it, and turns it round and round in her palm, touching it as tenderly as if it were a living thing."Cecil's first love letter!" she murmurs softly.It is too much—Melville loses control and catches her arm roughly."Child! how have you learnt to trick and deceive like this? You look good—but I for one have learnt by bitter proof that, young in years, you are yet old in falsehood—tell your cousin that I am awakened in time—thank God, it is before marriage—after marriage I should have shot myself!"He walks hurriedly away, and Bell, frightened, pale as death, runs back to the house."Here is a letter for you," she says with a half sob, but Cecil never notices it. She has seen Melville's writing in a leaf of a book he has lent her—and falling on her knees beside her bed, she kisses it a dozen times before she breaks the seal.In another moment, Bell, who has turned away, hears a short, sharp cry.Cecil lies in a dead faint, and the fatal letter lies on the floor beside her.What can it be? she wonders, that has called forth that cry. She picks up the missive and reads only this:"Never speak to me again—circumstances have occurred which render us strangers for evermore. Good-bye.""Cecil, Cecil, darling, won't you speak to me?" wails poor little Bluebell, and she kisses the pale still face and the cold fingers, but it is all in vain.Cecil lies motionless—happily for herself quite dead for a while to what has befallen her.Bell gets so frightened at last that she calls out loudly:"Will no one come? Oh, will nobody come?"In answer, Claire walks in. She has just seen Melville drive off, and her heart is harder than ever to the girl whose supposed inconstancy has really been the reason of his leaving High Towers in this sudden fashion. She stands on the threshold of the bedroom—the bedroom at the window of which with its faint twinkling light Melville has looked so often, with "God bless her!" on his lips and in his heart—and her face wears a cruel sneer."She has only fainted. Don't make such a noise, Bell—you'll bring the house down. Call the maid to look after her. Throw some water on her face," Claire orders imperiously. "What a fuss about nothing!" and she turns away contemptuously."Bell!"Such a low piteous voice it is! A voice that seems to come from a broken heart.Bell goes and kneels down beside her, and throws her arm round Cecil's neck, while the tears run down her cheeks like rain and fall on Cecil's golden hair."Where is my letter, Bell? my first love-letter!" she whispers faintly."Here—shall I put it on your heart, Cecil?""No! No! it would kill me!" and she pushes it away and falls back into another swoon.When she awakes from it, it is to that wild unconsciousness that heralds the first state of brain fever. Her organization is very delicate, and the awful shock she has received to a first and all-absorbing love strikes down her physical and mental strength at a blow.The next fortnight is torture to the Honourable John and
Bell—then Cecil grows better and stronger, though she never
smiles or takes interest in aught surrounding her. One day she writes
a letter, which Bell posts carefully herself, and when the reply comes Cecil, with her few belongings, goes quietly out of the house at dusk, and none of the inmates know where she has gone to. It is a secret she has entrusted to Bell—aware that nothing will make Bell reveal it, till bidden to do so by herself.CHAPTER IV. A SINFUL WISH FULFILLED."Gold! Gold! Gold!Bright and yellow—hard and cold."IT is very quiet at High Towers now—Claire rides and walks by herself, and, excepting at meals, when she scarcely eats, drinks or speaks, she spends her time locked up in her own room.Bell, lonely and miserable without the companionship of Cecil, wanders like a disturbed little spirit over the place, her only happiness an occasional walk with her father, but so many farming occupations take up his time, that the frequent outings of the old days at Brambledene seem to be gone for ever. Poor little Bluebell is let to lie on the grass beneath the trees at her will, she can gaze at the stars or listen to the nightingales to her full bent; but somehow, what she has seen lately of real life and its joys and sorrows has driven her romantic fancies away to a great extent, and made her, if less happy, far more sensible and practical.One subject engrosses her thoughts, a subject she can never forget. What can have Claire said to have made Lord Melville so hard and cruel to Cecil? "Truth will come out some day! Truth always comes out, and Claire will suffer all she has made Cecil suffer—I know it," she says to herself in a positive tone, "but when?"Yes! when?It is early morning on the last day of April, when Claire, after a sleepless night, goes out. Those who are early risers know the delights of early morning. The soft light gleaming in the east, the trace of Aurora's rosy fingers in the sky, the little feathery white cloudlets sailing along, chasing one another, as if in child's play, the twitter of the waking birds on the boughs, in full enjoyment of the amber sunshine, the diamond beads of dew that glisten on each leaf and bud and blossom, the heavy fragrance that arises from flowers after their sweet sleep, the hum of the insect world, the thorough charm of Nature which is greater at dawn than at any other hour. The mystic break from darkness to light. Like a caged panther, Claire paces the broad walk, fringed by thick laurustinus and shaded from the house. Sometimes, she walks slowly with a measured tread as though she is lost in thought, and sometimes with the impetuous steps of a queen whose empire is threatened.A tide of passionate feeling sweeps over her as she recalls the preceding weeks when Lord Melville was a guest. So far as love is passion—so far as love savours little of the divine—Claire, young as she is, feels it deeply, with that frantic impulse which would overmaster any obstacle.Melville has fairly captivated her fancy, and she is one of those who filter all their feelings through the medium of their imagination.She knows she has committed the sin of perjury, but she only repents of it when she thinks that her machinations may be futile, and that Cecil, the maligned, may win the day after all.Where has Cecil gone? This is the question that racks her brain hourly. Can she, by any chance, be in London—in the same place as he is in? The thought that Melville may meet her—that love may overcome doubt and jealousy—drives her wild.That Melville cares for Cecil, she is assured, she saw it in his face when the story of her deceit met his ears—she saw him wince from every word hostile to Cecil's fame—she saw unutterable pain dash his deep blue eyes, and his resolute lips quiver. When, at last—at last—the damning proof of the letter left no loophole of doubt, only for one instant he lost self-control, only for one instant torture of heart made his hands so nerveless that the fatal letter dropped on the floor. Then his manhood asserted itself, and he was calm and cool, but in those few instants Claire read his soul like a book, read that though Cecil, the maligned, was thrust from his heart, that Claire, the maligner, found no nearer place in it!She recalls with bitter feeling his last "Good-bye," the utter indifference and coldness of it cuts her now like a knife. He had smiled as he said it, but in his eyes there had been almost—aversion!But even on Claire, hard and cold as she is, the external influences of the hour have some effect. The intense stillness and quiet around strike her in strange contrast to her feelings and calm her down. She stands still on the lawn, her face uplifted to meet the cool ambient air that comes with the dawn in faint, low gushes, and she looks beautiful as she stands here, a study for an artist, a picture that, faithfully delineated, would make the fortune of an R.A.Her figure, tall and erect as a young poplar, her dainty head, crowned with glorious bronze - flecked tresses, poised proudly on a slender, white throat, her magnificent bust and shoulders well defined by the closely - fitting peignoir of white, fastened round her small and supple waist by a silken cord, and at the neck by freshly-gathered roses with blood-red hearts; her grey eyes languid with the look that long vigils always bring, and her cheek paler than is its wont.Claire is lovely at this moment—lovelier than ever, with the shadow of longing and regret falling on and softening her almost too vivid beauty."A beautiful place," she says half-audibly, as she glances round the charming grounds—the swell of glade and slope, the green dells and hollows, the imperial oaks and elms, the bright bloom that blushes beneath the fond caress of the sun-god. "A place that would be a paradise if it belonged to me—belonged to me absolutely—mine to keep as long as I live, or to give to—him! How he would rejoice to have his old home back again! How grateful he would be to the donor! But now, with my mother's life between me and its possession—my mother, who is strong and robust, who will live to be as old as Mount Horeb. I hate High Towers! I would turn my back on it without a sigh—I want to forget about Cecil—to blot out the wrong I have done from my memory. Somehow, I feel quite cowardly, nervous, unable to cope with the voice of conscience. How hard it hits sometimes, how one shrinks away from mental thongs, how one's blood grows chill when something we would fain thrust into oblivion rises up all of a sudden like a horrible phantom, dashing away all enjoyment in life!"Claire turns away with an impatient gesture, and walks listlessly down the lawn, great lines cross her brow, a cloud rests on her eyes, and her mouth is hard and set."Thank Heaven, we go to London tomorrow! I am sick of this place—sick of doing fine lady before the flowers and trees, and I shall see him again in town. If I were but the owner of High Towers now!—if I had all the wealth now, there would be no lack of followers in my train, and he would see me courted, he would hear me called the queen of beauty, he would be a witness to my triumph over other women. He would recognize the beauty he has put aside for Cecil's milk - and - water face. Men are like a flock of sheep—all race after the leader—and goaded on by the desire to rival all others, Melville would be mine again! I wish to-morrow were here, that I might feel that I was already on my way to win him back!"She stands still again, and falls into a reverie. At the thought of Lord Melville her face changes, grows transfigured, as it were—a soft, sweet love-light creeps into her glorious grey eyes, filling them with unutterable languor, her brow grows smooth, the curves round her mouth relax, and the gleam of a tender smile hovers on her red lips.She walks back to the house, no one is astir, there is not a sound, except the tapping of a branch of crimson passionflower against a window pane, and the low, sweet trill of a wood-bird's song as it comes wafted from a distant tree. Claire sinks down on a couch in her own room, and folds her hands together—a smile still hovers on her mouth."Now I know what love is!" she murmurs, "real love, that will overleap everything to reach its goal—love, delicious, life-giving, yet terrible in its intensity! The thought that I may see him again sets my heart beating, my pulses throbbing. Surely such love as this cannot be all in vain!"The thirtieth day of April is nearing its close and Claire, who has manifold things to do on the eve of the visit to London, waxes impatient as the dinner hour is delayed far beyond the usual time, awaiting the advent of the mistress of the house. The Honourable John, who has been riding all the afternoon, feels that he wants the inner man refreshed, but, with the exception of a slight shrug of his shoulders, and a decided yawn, he says nothing. Bell, pale and dispirited, sits on the window-ledge with a book on her lap which she does not even pretend to study. Only Claire paces the long room, with a frown on her face."Where on earth can she be, papa?" she asks at last in a peevish tone.But he only shakes his head, and says nothing."I believe she is lost in the wood, she goes out so seldom, and besides I don't believe she has the bump of locality at all," Claire mutters crossly. "I have a heap of things to do, and we leave so early to-morrow.""Why don't you go upstairs and do them?" he adds quietly. "We cannot sit down to dinner without your mother, you know."She knows. She knows what a fuss there would be if the rest of the family fed while the suzeraine of High Towers was not at the table to preside."I must go," she says. "I shall starve to-night because mamma chooses to be late!"And Claire opens the door impatiently, just as the sound of heavy feet approach.Her heart stands still, and she staggers up against the wall, pale and terror-stricken.Even in this moment, her desire of the morning to own High Towers and the wealth which her mother's life keeps from her, recurs to her."My mother is so strong and robust. She will live to be as old as Mount Horeb."This is what she had said to herself with an unspoken wish in her soul.And now!—as if in answer to that wicked wish, Mrs. Delaval's form, borne in by the servants, is laid in the ante-room, and her husband and daughters realise that she is—dead.A horrible death it is too—her throat is gashed from ear to ear, leaving an awful gaping wound. Her coarse black hair is all dishevelled, her features, unattractive in life, are hideous in death, the skin is ghastly, her eyes—wide open—have an unearthly glare, and in her clenched hands is a tuft of human hair!She has had a deadly fight for life, but her murderer gained the day, and here she lies, rigid, appalling, before them. The laces at her throat are torn into rags, the brooch of rare brilliants is gone, her fingers are lacerated and torn, and all the costly rings that adorned them have been wrested from them.Claire hides her eyes from the gruesome sight, Bell cowers, white as ashes, in a distant corner, and the husband whose one cross in life the woman has been, stoops over the lifeless form, and lifting the fast stiffening hand, kisses it. There is even a tear in his eye as he looks down on all that is left of the mother of the children whom he adores.The first of May breaks darkly. The rain, falling heavily, patters monotonously on the ground, the wind shrieks and howls through the tree boughs. The sky is leaden, but patches of the black cloud hang over High Towers like a pall, when Claire, who has nerves of iron, goes into her mother's room. What a mockery it seems—the glitter of silver and crystal, the gorgeous carpet, the gaudy hangings, and the lifeless form on the bed.Mrs. Delaval's two hands have been placed meekly on her breast, and there is less of pain on the features, when Claire lays her head down on the heart.It is enough, not a throb.Claire is sure now that her mother is really dead—murdered! And in the very midst of the horror of it, a voice like a devil's bids her be glad, for now she is mistress of High Towers—now she owns the long coveted riches that are to bring Lord Melville nearer to her. Hating herself for it, Claire cannot repress a feeling of satisfaction as she stands here, gazing on the mother whose arms had been her first resting place, whose kisses had soothed her child-hood's griefs, who with all her faults and follies had been the kindest, truest friend.One good impulse moves her to pass a caressing hand over the face, then she leaves the room as noiselessly as she had come, while the crimson passion flowers still tap monotonously against the casements, and the sweet shrill notes of the wood-birds still come wafted on the morning air.It is a known fact before mid-day that a tramp had been seen near the South Wood, in which the murdered woman was found by a gamekeeper belonging to the estate. The gashes on her throat had been made by a common clasp knife, and the marks of strong fingers, as if strangling the victim had been the first intention of the murderer, still show well in livid lines on the flesh.Mrs. Delaval is a thing of the past. The usual business under such circumstances has been properly gone through and the murderer is still at large.After all this High Towers is quiet, even quieter than before. The house in Curzon Street, Mayfair, has been given up. The London season, with all the triumphs in its train that Claire had pictured, is abandoned, and above all, her hope of meeting Lord Melville is gone! She grows pale and thin, all bloom and brightness leave her, and the Honourable John waxes miserable and anxious.Bell is his pet, but Claire is his beauty, his incarnation of loveliness, and he cannot see her pining and fading away without solicitude."I'll ask Melville down, a little later; he will bring back the health and beauty she has lost. It is love for him that is breaking my girl's heart."CHAPTER V. "SHE HAS SPOILED MY LIFE FOR ME.""But you!If you saw with your soul, what man am I, You would praise me at least that my soul all throughClove to you—loathing the lives that lie,The souls and lips that are bought and sold,The smiles of silver, and the kisses of gold."THE year is waning fast, the autumn has come and the tall elms and oaks stand up, gaunt-armed, shorn of their summer glory, while the leaves drift down and down and die in their splendid cerements of crimson and brown and amber, the star-faced jessamine and the roses with the blood-red hearts that Claire loves beyond all other flowers, have grown perfumeless and withered. And the pale beauty of the floating lilies in the marble fountain of High Towers are things of the past.Melville lingers on and on in Town, though the season is over and scarcely one of his acquaintances left. He cannot bear the idea of his usual migration abroad. Nice, Monte Carlo, all seem detestable in his eyes, since they would take him away from England, which holds Cecil.Cecil is nothing to him now—nothing. This is a truth he reiterates to himself again and again. But though "'tis madness to remember, and wiser to forget," he cannot drive her memory from him.A longing, desperate, uncontrollable, possesses him to look just once more on the sweetest, fairest face to his thinking that God ever made, and he goes down to Exeter, prowling like a thief in the gloaming round the place in which his heart's treasure lives and breathes, and has her being.The dusk trails down in long slanting shadows, the quiet stars begin to peep out shyly in the purple sky, when one evening, wan and haggard, a ghost of himself, he comes across Bluebell hurrying home with a basket in her hand, in which she had carried down all manner of comforting things to a pet old cottager.Melville risks frightening her, and steps forward from the laurustinus path that leads to the little waterfall where he and Cecil first told their love. Bluebell, in spite of the change in him, recognises him at once.She stands before him very white and spirit-like. The excessive fragility of her appearance pains him, and forgetting everything for the moment but the impression she has made, he puts out his hand with the cordiality of the olden days.But she turns away.She is a great deal too loyal to Cecil to touch the cruel hand that had smitten her to the dust. Red and pale by turns, she hesitates as to whether she should stay or run away as if ten thousand demons were in pursuit."Won't you shake hands, Miss Bluebell?"Melville asks it wistfully, humbly, he longs for one word of kindness from the girl who had been his lost love's very shadow.Bell colours deeply, and her eyes fill with tears."I can't shake hands with you," she whispers piteously. "I can't—I dare not. You were so cruel to her!""She was cruel to me!" Melville answers impetuously. "She has spoiled my life for me! Oh, little one, do not you follow in her steps, or some man who may love you will learn to curse you!"Bell draws up her slender figure with the dignity of a queen, and a queer reproving look shines out of her great eyes."If you are speaking of Cecil, Lord Melville, I would rather not listen to you. Cecil is an angel, and you nearly broke her heart.""Not before she broke mine," he retorts bitterly. "How dared she pretend a liking she never felt, when, God knows, I gave her a love as honest and true as man ever gave to woman! But you know quite well, you know how shamefully she rewarded me!"A puzzled expression creeps into the little face."I don't understand what you mean!"But Melville, looking into her open, candid eyes with the perverted mind that a horrible jealousy has brought him, shrugs his shoulders and wonders how the most innocent of women learn to deceive."Never mind!" he says, "the past is dead, and we will bury it, but you may tell me how she is.""She was better, when I heard.""Heard? Is she not at High Towers?""No, she went away long ago.""And where is she?" he questions feverishly, the dreadful thought that Cecil is gone to that other man stabbing him like a knife."That I have promised not to tell anyone, only one other knows, and that other has promised Cecil never to reveal where she is. Oh, Lord Melville, how could you behave as you did? You made poor Cis so unhappy that she nearly died. Leave her alone now, and perhaps she will be able to forget everything, and be happy once more. She could not help loving so much. It was wrong of her perhaps to conceal things, but she was afraid to speak, for Claire would have punished her by never letting her see——""Who?" Melville asks hoarsely, grip-ping her slender arm in the excitement of his feelings.Bluebell shrinks away from him, frightened."Let me go, please. I swore to Cecil I would not say one word. And I won't. You may kill me, but I'll keep her secret."And she is flying over the lawn before he can make out the gist of her words.So Cecil had gone. Gone of course to the vile foreigner, who by this time has probably thrown her aside like a faded flower."Thank Heaven," he murmurs sadly, as he wends his way through the wood—the same wood in which Mrs. Delaval found her terrible death. "No one but Bell knows of my love for Cecil—knows nothing of the sweet idyll which my life was crowned with for a little while. It seems like an oasis in the desert—the fleeting past that held her, and now it is gone, and the future is nothing but a dream! Yes, the little drama at High Towers is ended, and I know that I have to begin life again with the past thrust into oblivion."The same evening he goes back to Town. Even his old home has grown distasteful to him, since she is no more an inmate of it.CHAPTER VI. "MELVILLE WILL AMUSE CLAIRE.""Though matches are all made in Heaven they say,Yet Hymen, who mischief oft hatches,Sometimes deals with the house t'other side of the way,And there they make Lucifer matches!"CHRISTMAS has come and gone, and the New Year is heralded in by almost spring sunshine. The sky is clear and blue, though the snow lies white over glade and dell. The Honourable John is in his glory as he gallops across country after the hounds—as good a Nimrod as Devonshire owns. Early out and late back, he scarcely notices the alteration in Claire till Bell mentions the subject in her little frank way."Claire looks very ill, Papa. I wonder what ails her. She walks about like a ghost in the evening—her face so white—so white—and such a big dark line under her eyes—I think she is sorry she used to be unkind to Cecil—and she wants her back—don't you?"He shakes his head dubiously—he has never understood what was the cause of Cecil's sudden departure, but so long as he knows she is safe and well, he does not trouble about her. One thing he knows, that Claire and Cecil never got on well together, and common sense tells him that as High Towers belongs to Claire now, and she is absolute mistress of it, that it would be imprudent to bring Cecil back to be an unwelcome guest."No!" he says reflectively. "I don't think Claire is fretting after Cecil—she needs society—she is listless and miserable, and society would pull her up. I think I'll ask someone down to cheer her spirits and give her something to think of.""Why don't you take her up to London, Papa?—that would be a nice change—she would have the theatres and concerts and all sorts of things to dress for and make herself beautiful to look at," Bell says like a wise woman of fifty."No!—I can't go up to Town just now. You see there's the hunting—of course if a frost sets in, I would just as soon run up to London for a little while, but the glass is falling, and I really can't go at present. It promises to be just the weather for capital runs. I know what I'll do, I'll ask Melville down again. He likes ladies' society, and singing, and making himself agreeable.""He won't come!" Bell asserts positively."Won't come—why not? Anyway, I'll try him. I'll write at once."And suiting the action to the word, he sends off an unlimited invitation."Melville will amuse Claire. I don't like to be selfish and not give up the hunting for a trip to Town, but Claire likes Melville, you know! She'll soon pick up her roses and her spirits, poor darling, when he comes!"Bluebell listens and says nothing, but she thinks to herself that in this wicked world bad people always flourish and get everything they want, while angels stay out in the cold!"Melville is coining," her father tells her a few days after, with a satisfied rub of his hands, "coming next week.""Is he?" she says quietly. Then she goes up to her own room, and locking the door, sits down and cries like a child."Poor Cecil! darling Cecil!" she sobs, "there's no hope now!—not a bit—Claire will never let him go again, and you have lost him for ever and ever!"In a small house in Kensington—a shabbily-furnished house—the old Countess of Melville passes her life. She is a curious contrast to her surroundings. A tall woman over whom nearly fourscore years have rolled, leaving her figure straight and dignified, and her patrician face unmarred by a wrinkle; the only thing about her that denotes age is the snow-white hair, but even this is thick, and her brows and lashes are still as brown as they were in her young days.She has been a gloriously beautiful woman, and she is still well worth looking at as she sits on a hard horsehair chair, with a rosary in her hand and a rapt expression in her eyes, when her son walks in."I have come to say good-bye, Mother. They have asked me down to High Towers again, and I am going," he tells her in rather a weary voice."I wish I was!" she says quietly, "this house is so small and this chair is so hard and uncomfortable.""Poor mother! " he says, taking up the white hand that holds the rosary and kissing it fondly, "what wouldn't I give to have you mistress of some grand place? —you look as if you ought to be that. You and this house are certainly very incongruous things! Shall I go and buy you a nice easy chair?""Oh no!—we cannot afford luxuries, my boy, and my only comfort is that we do not owe a shilling. So you are going down to dear High Towers! Is not the parvenue mother dead, and the daughter come in for the fortune?""Yes! Mrs. Delaval is gone over to the majority, and the peerless Claire reigns in her stead," he answers with the shadow of a sneer on his lips."What is the girl like, Alan?—is she really very rich?""Very rich, somewhere about thirty thousand a year, I fancy, and she is very beautiful.""Never mind beauty, my son, it is always a snare of the Devil," and she crosses herself devoutly. "Is the girl a good girl, God-fearing, indifferent to the pomps and vanities, and sinful lusts of the flesh?""Ahem!" he pulls at his long moustache and smiles. "I don't quite know about her religious sentiments. She sings well, dresses well, and—well, I think I may say that she loves pomps and vanities. We'll draw a line at the sinful lusts of the flesh.""Don't be ribald, Alan! All the Melville women have been famous for their chastity and good renown. Much as I should like you to marry the owner of High Towers, I should be loth to receive a daughter-in-law whose heart was far from Heaven, and who had not renounced the Devil and all his works!""My dear, good, innocent mother, you live so out of the world, live so much in yourself, that you don't know anything about other women. They are generally about as bad as they can make them, and as for one who has her heart in Heaven, and has renounced the Devil and all his works, that is a rara avis that I have not had the luck to meet with! The sweeter and purer they look, the more black they are within!" he says, with a cynicism which is painful in its intensity. "But I am not thinking of marrying Miss Delaval. I do not love her," he adds huskily."I pray of you to put all other feelings aside and endeavour to secure wealth, by which you may perhaps regain the home of your forefathers. I shall never rest peacefully in my grave if aliens and parvenus are always to own High Towers! Alan! I love the place with every inch of my heart, I pine to be back there once more, and Father Jerome says it is not a sinful love, but a natural one—that repining at my lot will not condemn me to everlasting lire!" she says, with such infinite faith and confidence in the wisdom of her spiritual adviser, that Melville feels a still stronger dislike to bigotry than he has always had."Don't buoy yourself up with the hope, mother, that you will ever be mistress of High Towers again! Even if I married Claire Delaval, she is not of the sort to yield her place to anyone else. I should dearly love to have you in my home, but my wife——"He pauses. The two words seem to choke him, and the thought of Cecil drives the blood to his heart, leaving him deadly pale."But Miss Delaval is not of the clinging, affectionate sort to other women," he says with a short laugh.The old countess looks up with a startled expression."Surely, Alan, she is not a lover of—men?"Melville laughs outright now."Perhaps! One must not mind a few imperfections if one gets thirty thousand a year with them! If ever I marry Miss Delaval it will be for £ s. d.""Don't say that, Alan! Father Jerome would grieve so much if he heard you. You cannot serve God and Mammon. No, my son, much as I hanker after our beloved old home, I would not have you do one thing that would prevent your entering the Kingdom of Heaven. Ask Father Jerome to pray for you, and put you in the right way of action! I have entrusted my soul to his care and found happiness and solace in the blessed truths that fall from his lips. Oh, my boy, I would that you too would take him into your counsel, and let him lead you in the paths of peace and wisdom!""That would not be to Miss Delaval's feet, I am afraid, mother! But che sara sara. Which of us knows, even Father Jerome, what is laid up for us in the womb of time? For my part, I confess life seems a mockery, death a panacea for all ill. Why, then, should one not choose death?" he asks bitterly enough.She shudders as she listens to what she thinks treason to Heaven."The life that God gave, surely he alone must take away! I have noticed, Alan, a great change in you lately. You speak bitterly, you think morbidly, your very face has lost the frank look of yore. What has happened to you, my son? If you cannot confide in me, confide in Father Jerome. He will bring back a healthy soul, he will disperse the darkness that envelopes it, and make you look on life as it is, and not as morbid fancies picture it. And, Alan, I pray you, besiege the great Heaven with earnest prayers that your steps may be kept from pitfalls, and that your faith may never be placed in unworthy objects!""Strange she should say that," Melville thinks, as he goes downstairs. "One would almost credit her with clairvoyance and think she means—Cecil!"Claire has come out on the lawn in front of the house to meet him.Claire in a smart frock, the latest effort of Swaebe's artistic brain. It is the colour of an autumn leaf in its richest and most vivid tint, a mellow brown, that the pale gleam of an early spring day sun flecks into gold here and there."She loves the pomps and vanities with a vengeance," Melville thinks as he looks at the costly attire, and marks that gems of the purest water adorn her white fingers.A black lace scarf is thrown carelessly over her hair and.is crossed on her bosom, and a pair of exquisite though small solitaires gleam in her ears. Wistful, heavy-eyed, with passion tossed features, a coronal of bronze-flecked tresses gleaming through the lace, an amber sky, well dashed with cobalt as a background—she reminds him of the famous picture of Laus Veneris, just as she had reminded him that fatal day, when her words had spoilt his life and his faith in womankind.To some men, especially those men who live country lives, she would be an incarnation of beauty. To Melville, who has seen a good deal of the world, and whose tastes are not material, the vivid flesh tints, the languor of the eyes, the startling contrasts of colour in her dress, make her simply meretricious.Claire holds out her hand, and—just touching it, and no more—he stands silent and a little stern for a moment or two."I hope you have good accounts of your cousin," he contrives to articulate tolerably calmty."Cecil is all right again, I hope—the man whose influence I dreaded may perhaps have had a hand in curing her, for she improved directly after a letter she received from him. Then she had another relapse and raved of him incessantly, but directly she was better, she went away, leaving no address, and I have fretted about the miserable business more than I can say. If Bluebell knows where Cecil is, she will not open her lips. She is a strange, perverse child, obstinate, I fear, and nothing will induce her to speak if she does not wish it—so we must wait and hope."He listens to her, and a strange misgiving as to her love of truth comes into his mind, together with a feeling of repulsion which he struggles with manfully, and in the course of a few days he and she fall into the old tête-à-têtes unconsciously. The Honourable John pursues his beloved hunting, and Bell is never to be seen. And so it happens that Melville and Claire are perpetually thrown on one another's society.Claire, yet not Claire, for a curious change has crept over her, which makes her a lovelier, softer, purer edition of her old self.Frank as a child, with her manner and words tinged with a little shyness and a good deal of naïvetè, she presents quite a refreshing feature to a man who is very heart-sore, and weary of the guile and falsehood of women.Melville sees her again and again in every phase of her undeniable beauty, now bright and beaming as sunshine, now quiet and soft as moonlight, and each mood, to use an Irishism, becomes her best. Whether her large grey eyes droop or sparkle, or grow languid or passionful, whether her lips quiver or smile, she is always beautiful, entraînante, a creature to fascinate, a creature to be shunned. Melville is easily captured now, there is not a struggle in his breast—in fact, he is a willing captive, for he longs to find oblivion, he wants to chase away all haunting memories of Cecil in the presence of this girl, and above all, he desires to reach wealth, so that he may surround the mother he dearly loves with all the luxuries that befit her age and rank.He would be more than man, however, if he could rest impassive and indifferent to Claire, though maybe she does not touch his heart. If uncertain of his own feelings, he soon grows conscious of hers, for with the coarse blood of the Plumpers running in her veins, she never tries to hide the absorbing love that she feels. She had found her master passion when she first saw Lord Melville. Scarce the need to describe the courtship—the same tête-à-têtes, the same glances and words, that the drawing-room at High Towers has seen before. And as the weeks fly by, the best houses in London and Paris work hard at the magnificent trousseau, and Claire looks the picture of a radiant bride elect. Now that the eleventh hour is approaching—is Melville equally joyful? The world—great autocrat—would say " Yes "—for it sees him bend assiduously over the charming face of his betrothed, and it sees his glances and words bring a flush to her cheek; but at night, when he is alone, when none are by save the mellow moonbeams, or the holy watchful stars hanging in the sky, one face is always before him—a face as sweet, and white, and pure as a lily, a little girl-face with great tender grey eyes—and in these moments, her fair arms go round his neck once more, a pair of red child-like lips are lifted to his own, and the tender grey eyes promise him a Heaven."Oh, my love, my little lost love," he cries, "would to God you had been true to me, that none had come between you and me."But as the yellow moonbeams fade and the stars grow faint and dim, Cecil recedes from his memory and Claire fills her place.Melville is resolved to go through it all bravely, to take the goods the gods offer him meekly as a lamb led to the slaughter and a sheep before its shearers is dumb. And luckily for his resolve, High Towers, with the familiar scenes in which Cecil lived, are deserted, for Claire has persuaded her father to take the very same house in Curzon Street that her mother's death had prevented them occupying the last season, and Melville plunges headlong into a vortex of Town gaiety and drinks the cup of dissipation to the dregs.CHAPTER VII. "HE IS NOT WORTH REGRET.""I hold it true, whate'er befall,I feel it when I sorrow most,'Tis better to have loved and lostThan never to have loved at all!""Vive la Bagatelle!"Melville cries morning after morning when he rises and counts the hours that have gone by without a thought of Cecil having come to him.Messalinas and Delilahs are plentiful in Town, and surely, in a little while he will learn utterly to forget—and all the time he loathes himself. Never in his life has he been what is called a dissipated man, much less a rouè—but now!Meanwhile at High Towers there is not a bit of shadow anywhere. Everything external is bright and gay, the birds twitter and flutter, and hop from twig to twig in the elm tree boughs, the butterflies, with jewelled wings, hover from flower to flower, much after the fashion of Lord Melville himself! Grey squirrels with long bushy tails, play at hide-and-seek in the woods, the waters of the little waterfall dance and sparkle like diamonds, and the lovely dark roses with blood-red hearts, for which High Towers is famous, blush under the hot May sunshine.All the rest being in Town, Bluebell has allowed herself a real good pleasant outing, but now she stands on the lawn impervious to heat and sun—her little brow knitted—a decided cloud on her eyes, the large tears shining on her lashes, and the old housekeeper facing her."I won't believe it, Mrs. Godfrey," she cries impetuously, and she grinds her heel on an unoffending pebble that has been left lying on the turf."It is true, Miss Bluebell—I have had a letter from Miss Delaval, ordering several things, and saying that her marriage with Lord Melville will take place in about a fortnight at St. Peter's, Eaton Square.""I should like to go away from here," says Bell. "I must go—I could not stop here and see——"She pauses.She is infringing her promise to Cecil, to keep the secret of hers and Melville's love from everyone."Go away? Why, where can you go, Miss—you have no money yet, and how could you live?""I can work," Bell says, stoutly, wiping her eyes and growing calm."Work!"Mrs. Godfrey eyes the slip of a girl, who looks as fragile as a leaf, rather contemptuously"Why, you could not hem a pocket-handkerchief without being done up, I am sure. Beg pardon, Miss, for speaking my mind so freely!""I did not mean that sort of work, I meant work by the sweat of my brow.""Oh, Miss Bluebell, to think of the likes of you saying such things! You have a big brave heart, Miss, in that slender little body of yours. I know you are as faithful to poor Miss Cecil as a cat is to its old hearth, but you cannot help her, you know, leastways till you are older.""Is that all my sister says in her letter to you, Mrs. Godfrey?""There are a few words written across— see for yourself," and she hands the missive to Bell, who holds it between the tips of two fingers, as if there was infection in the paper."Your master and I have decided that Miss Bluebell is to come up to London next week, as she will be rather in the way when the house is being cleaned up and got ready. Lord Melville and I wish to spend our honeymoon at High Towers."Bell lets the letter drop as if a snake had stung her, and bites her lips to keep herself silent."May I have the letter?" she asks pleadingly, after a moment. "I want it so very much," and she picks it up, loathing it all the while."Of course, Miss, I have got my orders, and I never want a reminder, so the letter is no use to me.""Try to cry, just a few tears will make your heart easier, Cecil darling, and then write at once and say I haven't killed you quite. Cast him from your memory—he is cruel, dishonourable, wicked, and interested. He is not worth regret! ""Don't write again like this," answers poor Cecil, her paper drenched and blotted with tears, "he is good, and noble, and true, but everything was against our love. She set him against me and crushed the life from my heart. Some day, perhaps, he will learn the truth, but if ignorance of it will keep him happier, I pray God he may never know it!"CHAPTER VIII. INTERVIEWING A PERVERT."Oh, that deceit should steal such gentle shapes,And with a virtuous visor hide deep vice!"IN dull black, with crape on her headgear, and crape swathing her all over, and with a skilful touch of blanc de perle making her look pale and interesting, Claire goes to be interviewed by her future mother-in-law. The old countess is seated as usual in the shabby drawing-room of the little house in Kensington, but instead of sitting bolt upright on the spindle-legged chair covered in hard horsehair, she is comfortably installed in an expensive crimson velvet fauteuil, which is rather incongruous with the rest of the furniture, and is quite a recent addition, being the gift of her son, whose only extravagance has been its purchase since he became the prospective owner of thirty thousand a year.She is aware of the visit in store for her, and much as she rejoices in her son's good fortune in securing one of the largest heiresses in England, and on becoming once more master of High Towers, she shrinks from contact with a "parvenue." She shrinks from the intense vulgarity which she knows characterized the girl's mother, and naturally supposes has descended to the daughter, and feels a good deal of trepidation as a knock comes to the door.She rises, however, in her stately fashion, and stands quiet and dignified to receive—what? A tall, slender girl in deepest mourning, a girl with an exquisite face, a girl who might be the "daughter of a hundred earls," with her perfect patrician features, her pure white skin, the air of refinement that hangs over her.In her amazement and pleasure at so agreeable a disappointment, the countess makes a gesture to embrace the bride elect of her beloved Alan, but Claire, quietly and gracefully, sinking on the footstool, presses her charming red lips to the hands that, even at four-score, preserve their aristocratic whiteness, and shell-like nails.Then she lifts up her great grey eyes full of child-like candour, and says simply:"Do like me—for Alan's sake!""And for your own, my dear child," the old lady says effusively, moved out of her usual rather severity of tone by the pathos in the girl's voice. "I feel sure my dear son has been led by Providence into the step he has taken! I have prayed for him and so has Father Jerome. We have prayed together on our bended knees that his marriage might be hallowed by Heaven's blessing, that he might find a wife whose price was far above rubies. Oh, my dear, tell me, is your heart in the right place—there?" and she points upwards. "Are you of our faith?"Claire is posed. She does not hesitate much at a little perversion of the truth, but on such a subject she feels an uncomfortable sensation about telling a falsehood."Not yet, but soon, I trust," she murmurs, devoutly, "with yours and the holy Father Jerome's guidance, my steps will, I trust, be led into the right path. I have no mother to counsel me," and she passes her handkerchief across her eyes, "but you will be my mother—my dear honoured mother—you will counsel me, will you not?""I will! I will! with Father Jerome's help! Shall I tell him that Heaven has brought us another convert to our blessed faith, that the future Countess of Melville sees the error of her ways and, strengthened by his prayers, will at once enter the Holy Church of Rome?""Yes! yes! I am ready. It is Alan's faith, and it must be the true one, it seems to me. I would not have even a difference in religion between us! I would be one with him in everything!" Claire says fervently."Yes, but it must not be for Alan's sake, or for the sake of any earthly thing. You must come to us with open heart and eager spirit. The blessed Church of Rome requires heart and soul, unshadowed by any earthly motive, in its converts. Are you prepared to give yourself to it, freely, unreservedly, whatever betide?""Freely, unreservedly! I am in your hands to do with as you will, and in Father Jerome's hands," she adds, marking at once that he is the weak point of the old lady. "I feel that I can never do wrong so long as you both aid me to walk through life. I shall never fear death with the solace of your blessed belief in my ear. Do you think Father Jerome will interest himself in my welfare? Alan has talked of him to me so often that I long to know him. It seems to me that even a few moments' converse with so holy a man must do one good!""You shall see him at once, and may Heaven open your heart wide to receive his blessed influence," the old Countess says, touching a bell that stands beside her."Ask the holy Father to come up," she orders.Claire, who has been kneeling on the footstool during this conversation, and feels cramped, thankfully resumes a perpendicular position.She stands with the full light of the window falling on her, a dreamy look in her grey eyes, her mouth a little grave, her hands loosely clasped together, but so lovely —so lovely, that the holy Father may be forgiven for just one little start of admiration which he gives to a thing of earth, but in the twinkling of an eye, he is himself again—serious, slow of movement, and with an absorbed expression as if he lived and breathed and ate and drank, but always with one hope in view—the hope of Heaven.He is black-browed, swarthy of cheek, with a cynical mouth, and as Claire looks at him, she wishes that her Heavenly guide was pleasanter in aspect."My dear future daughter," the old Countess announces, and Claire bends her head lowly, then suddenly lifts her grey eyes fully at him."She has an earnest desire to become a convert to our faith, holy Father, and I have told her that we will both use our best endeavours to lead her to that beautiful land where the 'wicked cease from troubling and the weary are at rest!'""We will, with divine help, we will!" he answers, in a precise voice, but with his black eyes full of gratification. "And I feel sure that Rome will welcome her with outstretched arms!""I am sure of it," the Countess says warmly. "My son has secured a pearl of price, my dear daughter looks pure and good and innocent, and I cannot but believe that her heart matches her looks.""I am sure of it," Father Jerome reechoes, "so candid a brow, such guileless eyes show a child-like nature, a heart of gold!""My mother is delighted with you, Claire," Melville tells her later on."Was she?—dear old thing!"The words emanate from a leaven of Plumper vulgarity, and jar on Melville's ears, he has often detected a soupçon of it, and not wondered very much after knowing Mrs. Delaval."She and Father Jerome intend to convert you?""Yes. I should hate to be of a different religion to you, Alan.""What have your people always been?""On papa's side, Protestants, not very strict ones. On mamma's side—well, I don't know. Nothing, I think," she answers carelessly."It won't go much against your feelings to turn Roman Catholic then?""Not a bit. I want to please your mother, and besides, Roman Catholics must be the nicest since you are one!" she says lovingly.But he either does not hear or does not notice the tenderness of her voice."By the way, Claire, you never told me who left you your money.""Grandpapa Plumper.""Plumper!—Plumper. I don't recollect ever having heard that name before.""Not in England. In America there's heaps of them. Grandpapa was
the godson of Washington and called after him.""And what was his profession?""Profession! Why, Alan, you have turned grand Inquisitor to-day. Grandpapa was a senator.""How on earth did he accumulate so much wealth? I should like to know the secret!""Well, you see, he was a sharp man of business, he started a company for a railroad to the Blue Mountains, and it paid—I forget what my mother told me it paid, but it was something wonderful—and then he was a great piscatorial genius, and invented all sorts of tanks and things for fish, which brought him in lots of money and—well, I don't remember what else he did—I only remember, and am thankful for, that he left his riches to mamma and to me, on her death—quite absolutely, to do with as I liked.""Don't your father and Bell benefit by her will?""No, not a penny—but papa has money of his own, left by a cousin, and of course Bell will have that by-and-bye.""And that other poor girl—your cousin—what has she?" Melville brings himself to ask with a steady voice."Only what the singing-master earns I fancy, by this time," Claire replies indifferently. "What a pity it is when women have low tastes and marry beneath them."He winces at the words, and says nothing further, but his heart goes out to Cecil in her possible poverty and privation yearningly.CHAPTER IX. "IS IT IRREVOCABLE?""Oh! the love of woman!—how high will it not rise and to
what lowly depths will it not stoop—how many injuries will it
not forgive—what obstacles will it not overcome—and what
sacrifices will it not make rather than give up the object upon which
it is fixed!"BREAKFAST is going on in Curzon Street, but Bluebell, who arrived to order yesterday, a forlorn, miserable, drooping Bluebell, silent herself and apparently quite uninterested in the family talk—has betaken herself to an adjoining room, where, if she cannot enjoy herself, she may yet avoid seeing and hearing Claire, whom she looks upon as the ruin of Cecil's happiness and life. She never dreams of going to the window to watch the crowds and traffic outside, sights in which most country-bred girls take infinite delight.Bell remembers London as she knew it in the dreadful old days, when her father and mother, Claire, herself and some little brothers and sisters who are now dead, used to be cooped up in small dingy lodgings, with very indifferent fare, and an immense deal of discomfort. She hates London with as violent a hate as a sweet, gentle-natured girl can  hate anything, and she sits behind a magnificent yellow brocaded curtain, the picture of a discontented little mortal, as she broods over something that hurt her to the very core of her loyal little heart—something that Claire said to her this morning, and she corks her ears with her fingers to try and keep out the sound of Claire's words, but it is of no avail, the words keep ringing through her brain, and she clenches her little fist in impotent wrath against her sister."You are to be one of my bridesmaids, Bell," Claire told her, in the short, despotic way she had at times of speaking."I cannot be your bridesmaid. I am still in mourning for mamma," Bell flashed hastily."No such words as 'cannot' or 'will not' allowed while I am mistress of the house, my good child! I am surprised you have not learned that yet! You have got your awful obstinacy and perversity from your amiable cousin—Cecil beats Balaam's ass in those charming qualities.""Cecil is an angel," Bell cried in a shrill, angry voice that Claire had never heard from her before."She may be to your thinking, but she isn't to mine! However, we are departing from the principal subject I wish to speak on. Understand, Bell, I never put up with anyone's tantrums. You are to be one of my bridesmaids. If you are not—being my sister—people will wonder and gossip. Mourning must be discarded on the 20th of May, and your frock is ordered—a very smart frock it is, too, all white silk and chiffon and lace—lovely lace, three guineas a yard—I wouldn't have anything shabby at my wedding for the world. First of all, because I want everything to be worthy of the—bridegroom. This is the second of May, and I have only eighteen more days to wait—oh! how happy I am!" And Claire clasps her hands together ecstatically."I hope you will be happy, Claire, but I do not think you will be!" Bell announced in a solemn, sepulchral tone, her great eyes flashing angrily in her small white face, and vouchsafing no further congratulation, she walked into the breakfast-room, where the Honourable John had started operations by a couple of devilled kidneys.Bell went up to him, looking like a ghost and her eyes still flashing as they had never flashed before."Papa! do you think a woman will be happy if she gains a desire she has—by killing another woman?""Certainly not, pet," he said, looking up at her in surprise. "What woman is going to be killed?""Papa! Papa! " the girl cried, passionately, seizing his hands in utter indifference to the knife and fork they hold. "Don't you know that the bells that ring for Claire's wedding will be Cecil's death knell? Don't you know that Cecil loves him so, and he loves her, and he does not love Claire—I have seen it in his eyes!""Whose eyes?""Lord Melville's!""God bless my soul, is that so? But no, you must be mistaken, my Bluebell. You are only a child and, of course, you can't read people's characters. Melville adores Claire, or he would not marry her. He is not a man to do so!""Claire has caught him by backbiting Cecil, Papa! I may be a child, but I know a lot, and I am certain that if preparations for this dreadful marriage go on, something awful will happen—you see if it doesn't! Can't you stop it, for all our sakes? You are Claire's father, and it is in your power to stop it if you like!""Claire came of age the day before yesterday, Bell. She is quite independent of me now. I could not prevent her marrying a chimney-sweep if she wished it. The marriage is inevitable—the date fixed—the guests invited; so make up your mind to it, little woman!""Make up her mind to what?" Claire asked, entering noiselessly."To wear my bridesmaid's dress—I wish it was my shroud," Bell said in a choking voice, and she left the room breakfastless."I am afraid you will have some trouble with Bell, Papa," Claire remarks after a little, during which time she has been busily engaged with the delicacies of the table, for she has an appetite that matches her splendid physique. "I really advise you to lose no time in sending her to a good strict finishing school—she has no manners, and as to her temper, it is too awful. She nearly snapped my head off just now because I wished her to be one of my bridesmaids.""Bell has the sweetest temper in the world," he replies as quietly as he can, though his feelings are considerably ruffled by Claire's remarks, "and as for her manners—well, I don't care about her manners being like most of the girls one meets nowadays. When is Melville coming? I rather want to speak to him about a horse I have spotted as the certain Derby winner.""Don't encourage him to bet, for goodness' sake, his mother would have a fit at her model son going in for any of the vices of mankind! Not but that Alan is different to any other man I have met. He is so good—so unselfish—so everything that's loveable, you know. Papa, dear, you haven't ever really congratulated me on the prize I have won—won't you kiss me now and wish me all the happiness that I know will be mine when I am Lady Melville?" Claire says, lingering a little over her two last words.The Honourable John deserts a couple of tempting plovers' eggs reposing on their mossy nest, and—quite moved by Claire's ebullition of filial feeling—he kisses her heartily."God bless you, my dear girl," he says huskily, "you must be happy with such a good fellow as Melville. He is a model man, though he has nothing of a prig or saint about him; years hence, I feel sure that you'll tell me the same tale as you tell me now—that you have drawn a prize in the great lottery. Oh, my dear Claire, how dreadful it is to be linked to one you cannot care for!—at least, so I have heard," he corrects himself hastily; "of course, I don't speak from experience," he adds with a serious countenance and an hypocrisy of which he is ashamed.Claire bursts out laughing.And for the life of him he cannot help the muscles round his mouth relaxing a little."Of course mamma nagged at you awfully," she says. "I used to wonder how you ever kept your temper, but you did—I dare say it is a comfort to you now to think that you did, now that she's dead and gone.""Yes, it's a comfort," he answers truthfully. "You see, I ought to have borne with her few little mistakes of speech better than I did, but somehow those little things irritate more than big ones. She would call Mr. Plumper 'Boss,' and it used to jar on my ears dreadfully, you know.""I should think so! Englishmen who are really swell cannot bear that sort of talk. It is from poor mamma that I caught words that Alan dislikes, but I keep quite a guard over my speech now, and once I am Lady Melville people won't notice mistakes.""But Melville will! It is him you have to please, Claire, not the world!""Oh, I shall please him, you may be sure—he loves me more and more every day.""Pray that he may go on doing so; a man can't love his wife too much. There are so many things in married life to bear and forbear that it requires a deal of love to make existence comfortable and pleasant.""I don't suppose you will ever think of marrying again, Papa, will you?""I! not for Joseph—I have too much regard for myself to risk such a thing. Marry again! Claire, what on earth do you see in my face to make you ask such a question?" he says nervously. "I have Bell to look after, that will give me enough occupation.""But suppose she marries, or leaves you to go to Cecil—where is Cecil, Papa?"She springs the question on him so suddenly that he almost lets out the secret he has kept rigidly for months."That I cannot tell you," he answers quietly. "Bell says she is comfortable and happy and well cared for.""By her husband?""By whom?" he asks, starting and flushing deeply."By her husband, Signor Ferrari! Didn't you know that she married the singing-master we had at Madame de Bernard's?" she asks in a surprised tone."No, I did not know it, Claire, and I don't believe it! Tell me—mind, I put you on your oath—have you ever mentioned this thing to Melville?""Of course I have! I tell him everything—why not? What does it matter to him if Cecil is married or single?" she cries angrily.Her father looks at her steadily for a moment—the colour surges over her lovely face, then dying away leaves her pale almost to ghastliness, her lips tremble in spite of her, and altogether she looks the picture of what she is—an untruthful, unscrupulous woman."Claire, I am your father; you can speak to me frankly and without fear—if you do not believe in your heart that it matters to Lord Melville whether Cecil is married or single, then I have no more to say, but if you believe it does, break off this marriage at the eleventh hour—no good ever came out of evil!"They are Melville's words, she has heard him say them often, and she shivers as she listens."Claire! for God's sake reflect. If things are as I now believe they are, this marriage will bring a curse with it—the curse that surely falls on those who unscrupulously gain their desire.""Curse! what a word to breathe into the ear of a bride elect!" she says with a short, bitter laugh. "I never saw you in heroics before, Papa, and I trust I may never see it again. I am your daughter, but that is no reason you should lose your sense of manhood and insult me. I have told you that Lord Melville loves me—I tell you so again. He loves me and no other woman—I glory in his love, and I return it tenfold, and not for a thousand fathers—not for the whole, whole world—would I give up the man who wants me for his wife. Papa, you were ill-advised to say such things, but I forgive you. Let the name of Cecil be a dead-letter between us—she has never liked me, and I have no faith in her—and let you and I forget what has passed between us to-day! I have made an appointment with Mr. Jeffreys for twelve o'clock, and it is a quarter to twelve now. Is he a first-rate solicitor?""He is one of a well-known firm, and seems a very intelligent fellow. I don't fancy you could do better.""By the way, Papa, I want to ask you a few questions about my money. It will look very silly to the solicitor if I am not well coached up in the matter. First of all, does grandpapa Plumper's will give me all he left, and are there any conditions with it?""His will is to the effect that everything was to be yours at your mother's death.""Absolutely my own—to do with as I like?""Absolutely your own, to throw out of the window if you choose.""Oh, then there won't be much occasion to take up Mr. Jeffreys' time. The whole thing seems to lie in a nutshell.""In a nutshell—you have thirty thou sand pounds a year while you live, and if you don't get rid of the capital by undue extravagance, you will have thirty thousand pounds a year to bequeath to anyone you like at your death, and no one can say nay!""And how about High Towers?""Well, that was purchased with money left by Mr. Plumper and goes naturally to you.""Have you a life interest in it?""Oh, no, and I don't want it. I shall take a snug little hunting box near Newmarket when you are married. Bell can keep house for me, and we shall get on swimmingly. She won't be a pauper either with a few thousand per annum of her own, when I go over to the majority. Yes, my dear Claire, High Towers is your property absolutely, and I advise you to make it your 'pied de terre.' Country life is more conducive to happy marriages than Town life, where a man's clubs are formidable rivals to his wife. Melville likes farming, and you can do the Lady Bountiful, and while you love one another as you do now you will be the happiest couple alive!"Claire laughs a bright ringing laugh, full of bliss, and so loud that it reaches the adjoining room, where Bell still sits, and makes her brows pucker up until they meet above her small Greek nose.Claire's face is radiant, her eyes beam, and her step is lighter and more elastic than usual as she goes to her appointment with the solicitor.She is closeted with him for two hours, and when he is gone, an expression of intense satisfaction is on her features.Three days afterwards Mr. Jeffreys comes again."Is it all right—quite right?" she demands eagerly. "Is the deed of settlement ready?""I have it here for your signature, Miss Delaval.""Is it quite—quite irrevocable?""Quite irrevocable—but, my dear young lady, it is my duty to point out to you that you are doing an unwise thing; you must remember that if you do sign this document, you will have assigned the whole of your fortune as well as your property High Towers to the Earl of Melville, before you are his wife, and that if anything should happen to prevent the marriage taking place, he will still have everything, and you will be left dependent on what your father may feel inclined to allow you.""Nothing can prevent the marriage taking place, except death," she asserts positively. "I can sign the deed with the greatest confidence in my words. Let me sign now," she goes on eagerly."We must have two witnesses.""My father has gone out, and there is no one but the servants.""Servants—stay! I'll telegraph for a couple of my clerks, or one would be better, if you could find some one else?"At this moment a knock comes at the door, and the servant announces Lord Barrington."His lordship will not detain you a moment, ma'am."Claire jumps up."How fortunate! He will do, Mr. Jeffreys. He is to be best man, as he is Lord Melville's greatest friend. He need not know the contents of the deed?""Certainly not."Claire brings him into the room when Mr. Jeffreys' clerk arrives, and she signs the deed, duly witnessed, that transforms the man she loves with a mad passion from comparative poverty to a wealthy peer.All the rest of the day she is as happy as a queen. Her beautiful face is infinitely more beautiful from the beatific expression her eyes and lips wear, and from the intense satisfaction she experiences at having given her all to him who has certainly called up in her nature every good feeling she possesses. She moves about the house like a superb butterfly, restless, brilliant, full of pleasure. Her eyes shine like diamonds, and her exquisite voice every now and then breaks, with a pathos and passion that it has scarcely known before, into—"Si tu savais comme je t'aime,Bien sûr—bien sûr—tu m'aimerais!"But when night is far spent, when everything is still, Claire sits in her room alone, with locked doors. She has thrown off her pale blue dress veiled with rich filmy lace, and it lies unheeded on the floor. She has flung her jewels on the toilette table, where they form a glittering heap.She is no longer the restless, brilliant butterfly of the day, steeping its gorgeous wings in the sunshine of life—but she is a picture as she sits, of Magdalen, repentant yet sinful—a snow-white peignoir wraps her magnificent form, her long hair falls below her waist in a heavy bronze-flecked mass, her face is deadly pale, whiter than the garment she wears, even in her lips there is no colour, her grey eyes have a hungry haggard look, and her hands clasp tightly on her knee, as she sits here alone, with her thoughts. The fiend memory is at work racking her brain and lacerating her heart. She is a woman torn by the conflicting feelings of a giant love, unnatural hate, and above all, desperate fear. She has played a bold game to win the man she adores. She has staked her heart and soul, and all she has in the world, to win. Surely—surely she will not lose now—but the shiver that passes over her frame, the trembling of her lips, the sudden clenching of her hands, show that bold, unscrupulous though she be, she is not confident of success. Suppose!—suppose!—Ferrari should find her—before her wedding day—but no! Fate could not be so hard, so cruel, as to wrest her cup of joy just as it was lifted to her longing lips.Claire knows that Melville does not love her as he loved Cecil—the knowledge of this has come to her often lately as, with a desperate hopelessness in her heart, she has marked the coldness of his glance—the careless ring in his voice. If by any chance her father or Bell should let him know where Cecil is, where would she, Claire, be then? But no! He has bound himself to her and the Melvilles never break their word!When the clock strikes the half hour after midnight, she rises slowly, and taking a match, lights the fire. The May night is soft and warm, but she feels horribly cold, and as the red flame flickers up, she kneels down before it, and stretching out her hands, tries to bring warmth to them—more than ever like Magdalen she looks, kneeling here, the lambent flame touching her wonderful hair with a ruddier hue, and against its richness the pallor of her face is like that of a human face turned to stone.Suddenly she starts up—she has work to do before she can seek oblivion in sleep. Unlocking a little ivory box, she takes out a small bundle of letters written in flowing Italian characters. Her eyes grow so hard, that they look like the eyes of the Sphinx, as she glances at the passionate words of the man whose wife she really believes herself to be—her lips writhe in self-scorn as she reads the words, "Your loving husband." They seem like an insult from him, a common singing-master to the bride elect of a peer of the realm! How dared he, canaille as he was, to entrap her into marriage with him, when he knew he was so far beneath her in birth, in everything? Her hands crush the letters with an intensified wrath and repulsion that startles herself—good God! surely there is not murder in her heart? She has still sufficient womanliness left to make her shudder at this thought. Shutting her eyes, so that she may not look upon Ferrari's writing again, she tears up the letters and throws the fragments into the fire. Then she takes from the box a little square packet—and smiles—a ghastly smile—as she opens it. There is only a small quantity of white powder within."I bought you on the most accursed day of my life," she mutters, "the day after I found out that she—Cecil—had won his love! If he had married her, I should not be alive now—I won't part with you yet—not till the blessed hour that makes me Alan's wife is past—then I'll throw you away, and begin a new life, a life so pure, so good, that Heaven will surely forgive all my sins of the past, in my blameless future!"As she says this, warmth comes back to her limbs, and colour to her face. Her eyes soften, and her mouth relaxes into a happy smile. She drops the little packet into the box, locks it, and in a few minutes is asleep, with a locket containing Melville's picture, glittering on her breast.CHAPTER X. "THE FUTURE WILL BE YOURS—THE PAST BELONGS TO ME.""By Castor! LoveHath both its gall and honey in abundance.Sweet to the taste, but in it we swallow bitterEven till we loathe!"THE May evening is warm and dreamy, and the sky is as soft and clear as a sky of the south.Just a baby breeze steals in, moving the filmy curtains and no more, but bringing on its tiny wings a most delicious fragrance from the flower - decked balcony. The perfume of mignonette and heliotrope pervades the drawing-room in Curzon Street, and the heralds of the gloaming—Rembrandt shadows—gather around.In the recess of the large bay window stands Lord Melville.His arm is round Claire's lissome waist, and her head with its wealth of bronze-flecked tresses rests against his shoulder.A charming pair of lovers they make—quite Idyllic.But his eyes are fixed on vacancy and he has been wondering how by some miraculous means he may yet free himself from the chain that galls him sorely, though the fetters be of gold, and his fellow captive as beautiful as a houri.Even now his thoughts are far away, down by the monotonous musical ripple of the little waterfall, down by the emerald lawn of High Towers. In his mind's eye, he can see a fair young face uplifted to his own, he can hear in the evening stillness a young heart beat against his, he can feel a hand like a tiny snowflake nestle in his palm, while within his reach are lips so soft, so sweet—lips that he would fain——"What are you thinking of, Alan?" Claire questions jealously.From a dream of Cecil, from a dream nearer to Heaven than he has ever had in his life, she brings him back to earth and bondage.He starts, breaks into a short laugh that has no mirth in it, and clasping his bride elect closer—kisses her."Of what should I think but you—the loveliest girl that ever lived!"And as he glances down on the perfect face, rendered more perfect still by the tender evening light, he for a moment believes his own words."Darling!" she says, putting up her hand and pushing his hair off his temples, "do you really—really think that? Oh, Alan! I could fall down on my knees and thank God for having made me beautiful if my face has found favour in your sight. You don't know how I love you! Do you remember that lovely song in La Favorita?'Pour tant d'amour—ne soyez pas ingrate!'And you would be ungrateful if you did not care for me, since—since I love you dearer than my life!"He feels that she is speaking the truth, and his heart leaps towards her for the first time.For a little while, in the fast dying light of day with the shadows trailing on the earth, with the faint warm wind touching him and the subtle perfume of flowers floating past, a feeling that he thinks is "love " steals over him."And you really love me so much, Claire?""Love! Alan, if I had not won you, I believe I should have grown wicked, or—died.""Better to have died, dear! The girl who is to be my wife must not have even one thought of wickedness. She must be good as gold, as pure as——"He pauses abruptly, a deep flush sweeps over his cheek—a pang shoots through him."As a lily," he was going to say, but he remembers Cecil. Pure as a lily, he had always called her to himself."As undriven snow," he adds hastily."But suppose the wickedness was wrought by love of you?" she persists, "that by evil means alone I could have reached you?""No good ever came of evil, Claire!" he says, with his grave blue eyes looking steadily into her own.She starts and pales, these words again, from him, and from her father's lips but yesterday! They seem like the cry of Nemesis, and her heart quakes for a moment"Do not cherish such a fallacious belief, Claire, as that, but why talk of such things? In a few days we shall be man and wife, and your very secrets will belong to me.  It would kill my affection for you at one blow to find that you had even one secret that all the world could not know!"She shivers inwardly as she hearkens and draws closer to him, clinging to his arm as if afraid that somebody or something may take him from her."Alan, none of us are really good, even Cecil—Saint Cecil, as they called her at school, fell from her high estate and all through love!"A faint sickening sensation creeps over him as she says this. He has not learned yet to hear the name of his lost love with calmness, but he pulls himself together quickly."Hush, Claire, do not mar this hour by speaking of other women," he says with an imperceptible shake in his voice. "It is sacred to love and—you, and above all, do not credit that a man can really care for a woman whom he cannot respect!""Respect is a cold word," she answers in a mortified tone. "I want no word like that between us two. Ah, Alan, after all,-your love for me is as milk-and-water compared to mine for you.""Which is like champagne, and as effervescing perhaps," he replies with the gleam of a careless smile. "But the shadows are falling fast, so let us have lights and some music. I want to hear—
'Si tu savais comme je t'aime,Bien sûr—bien sûr—tu m'aimerais.'
once more before we are—married!"
He brings out the last word with a sort of jerk as if it did not come easily to his tongue."Tell me, do you remember the night I sang it first? I do believe it made you like me a little.""It made me like you a good deal, judging by——""Don't say a word about that," she cries, feigning shyness, "but go and light those candles."He does as he is bidden, and opens her portfolio."Shall I find the song,my queen?""My queen."The last time she heard those words they fell from Marco Ferrari's lips. Above all things she does not want to remember him now."Do not call me ' my queen,' Alan, I hate it!" she cries hastily.He turns from the piano and faces her. When he is grave, his face looks almost stern, and frightens her."Has anyone ever called you by that term, Claire?" he questions, sharply, for this girl is going to be Countess of Melville, and he wants no reminiscence of old lovers brought up."Many people. It was my nickname in the nursery, and poor mamma always called me by it," she murmurs pathetically. "Don't let us have music to-night. I want to talk.""Talk away," he says carelessly, flinging himself on a sofa, and she sits down beside him.He does not look well pleased, he cannot help doubting her a little, though he would give a good deal to have faith at any rate in his future wife.He is not jealous, one must love to be jealous, but he has a horror of fastness in women, and the suspicion that she has not answered him quite frankly about the matter of "My Queen," makes him forget to slip an arm round her waist or to notice her proximity at all, in fact.She watches him for a moment or two, furtively.That she loves him with every fibre of her being is the truth, which can be read in the pained lines on her face at even a temporary coolness on his part."Any woman could take him from me," she thinks with a thrill in her heart, "but it would kill me to lose him! I never thought I could love like this! Alan!""Well?""Would it bore you very much to tell me just once again, if you really do love me?"She asks it so desperately in earnest, that he looks at her surprised."What makes you doubt it?""Suppose I was poor, would you love me then?"He colours, and draws himself up haughtily."I am sorry you believe me to be so mercenary, Claire!""No, oh no!" she cries impetuously. "I believe you to be all—all—that is noble, and good, and magnanimous. I believe you never thought or did anything unworthy of you in your life, but I have a great—great—wish for you to answer my question. Darling, do humour me in this whim of mine, and tell me if you would love me if I was poor, and came to you empty-handed?""I don't pretend to be a Paladin, Heaven knows, but I hope I am not bad at the core. I am a comparative pauper. I want money terribly, and your fortune would be a god-send; but if by any chance you lost it—now—at the eleventh hour, when you are about to become my wife, of course it would not alter my feelings for you, I would marry you all the same, Claire!""You would, Alan? Oh, how happy you make me," and she flings her white arms round him, and lays her face radiant and beautiful on his breast."One more question, Alan!" she says, suddenly rising and standing before him."Well!""Have you loved any one, besides me, very much in your life?"She asks it facing him, her grey eyes fixed upon him, and under their steady glance he feels the colour waver in his cheek, but he is master of the situation in a moment."Answer me first. Am I the first man you have loved?""I swear it!"And she swears it with hands clasped and uplifted, yet—he doubts her."It is well," he answers quietly, "a woman is not of much worth if she has spent her heart once—but we men are different. Many loves come to us in our changing lives, loves that live sometimes a year, sometimes a month, sometimes only a day, but which do not destroy the power of loving in a man's soul, loving wholly and utterly, when the woman calls it forth. I—but you are going to be my wife, and not my father-confessor, Claire?""I thought you said there should be no secrets between us?""No more there should. I promise you on the sacred word of honour of a Melville, that once I become your husband, my life will be an open book to you. The future will be yours, Claire, the past belongs to me!"
His voice is low and a little tremulous, and under the light of the waxen tapers, she sees a white wave cross his cheek, she sees him bite his nether lip."He is thinking of Cecil, I am sure of it," she says to herself, "but he is good and loyal, and once he is really mine, his thoughts will be mine also."Her arms go round him once more, but though they are wondrously soft and fair, and so exquisitely moulded that a sculptor would go mad over them, they seem to hurt him like cruel chains, and quietly releasing himself from them, he rises and takes a cigar from an adjoining table."May I smoke?" he asks."May you smoke! of course. I wish you would not ever ask my permission in anything!" she flashes impatiently.He lights the cigar, and flinging himself into a huge fauteuil, seems in a few minutes to be lost in cloud-land."I had a funny dream the other night, Alan," Claire says presently. "I dreamt that you suddenly became very rich, and did not require fortune—with your wife.""Dreams always come by contraries," he answers absently, while he thinks if such wonderful luck could only come to him!"They don't always. Sometimes they come quite, quite true. I want to tell you something, Alan, which will go to prove my words. At this present moment you possess thirty thousand a year, and High Towers. I know you'll be glad to have your dear old home back again, and I have nothing but what my father likes to leave me."He stares at her. Is she gone mad or is she trying to make a fool of him? Claire sits on the sofa, her big grey eyes like a couple of luminous stars looking into his, a smile full of happiness on her ripe red lips, her whole face beaming with satisfaction."What on earth do you mean, Claire?""What do I mean?—only what I say! You must ask Mr. Jeffreys to corroborate."He starts, as a sudden light breaks upon him, and he knows now that this girl does indeed love him—that with infinite trust in him, with an enormous faith in his honour and in his word—a faith that few women have in men—she has laid her all at his feet, and left herself dependent on her father.Good Heavens! such a gigantic sacrifice on anyone's part would be strange—from a woman whom, he is ashamed to confess to himself, he has looked upon as a little selfish and calculating, it seems simply too astounding."Claire!"She looks up, her eyes aflame, a bright colour surging over her face and neck."Come here!"She approaches him slowly. He has risen, and stands before her—stately, handsome, adorable.Her pulses throb, her heart beats fast, a mist is before her eyes.In another moment his arms are round her."My faith was strong—my instinct true!" she whispers. "The Melvilles never break their word!""Never! so long as a woman is good and true like you!"Claire shivers even in his firm, strong clasp, as she listens. Is it prescience? But she flings memory to the four winds and smiles brightly."I have won him at last!" she reiterates again and again, after he has left her, "but will Heaven let me keep him? 'CHAPTER XI. AT NO. 50A, CURZON STREET."I wonder when we two shall meet,I wonder if old love still lives,If years must pass ere one forgets,Or life must end ere one forgives!"THE eighteenth of May, and in another two days Claire will be the Countess of Melville. To-day, she has no time to waste in doubt and misgivings—she has the final arrangements to attend to for her wedding. It is her taste that has to alter and improve the splendid floral decorations of the room in which a dćjeûner à la fourcheite, comprised of every delicacy that can be purchased, is to be laid for over two hundred guests. Everything must be done first-rate, expense must be no object she ordains, for the invited are, with the exception of two or three old club acquaintances of the Honourable John's, friends of the bridegroom elect, and nearly all titled folks.That portion of Claire that has a strong leaven of "Plumper" about it is in a tumult of delight at the notion of being the cynosure of so many aristocratic eyes, and her first task this morning has been to write out the list of handled names for the Society papers. Now she has the bridal gifts to arrange on the big table in the library, and they are numerous, for Melville is a general favourite amongst the Upper Ten—the men like him because he is such a good fellow, the women because he is so handsome—so that between the two he comes in for a large share of costly articles.The bride elect has not made many friends in Town—somehow, in spite of her beauty and her smart gowns, ladies don't care for her, and at this particular time, while Melville is engrossing her thoughts, she has not even tried to gain the admiration and liking of men, so that between the two, she has fallen to the ground as regards wedding presents.She has nearly accomplished her task when Melville, on his usual matutinal visit to Curzon Street, looks in.Claire strikes him as being very sweet and pretty as she stands by the table in her white frock with just a simple knot of violet ribbon at the throat and wrists.Her colouring is always perfect, her grey eyes always lovely, and she makes a charming picture as she turns towards him with a large vase in her arms.It is a magnificent china vase, a gift from Royalty, and it holds the first place in her estimation."I want to put this right in the centre of the other things, Alan!" she says excitedly. "Wasn't it awfully nice to. send it?""Very," he answers, rather indifferently. "Why, when did this come?" he asks, his voice gaining in interest."This " is a pistol, so small that it looks like a toy. The costly silver mounting is rare and exquisite, the workmanship Indian, and on it in large gold letters is inlaid:"Melville from D. F. Good luck.""From Derrick Faulkner—dear old Derrick! What a lot of trouble he has taken over this!" Melville says, examining it. "This work is one of his own designs—he always had a fad for designing things. I wonder if it is as good as it's handsome?""Why don't you try it at the shooting gallery in Trafalgar Square, Alan?—I know you are dying to!" Claire says laughing."I should like to—I have a mind to run back to my rooms and load it, on the chance of trying it somewhere.""You can load it in papa's sanctum. He has a lot of deadly weapons and things there, but bring it back until you have time to go to the gallery, as Mrs. Wilde said she might come in this afternoon to take a quiet view of the presents, and I don't want one to be missing.""All right," he replies, and taking up the pistol he is at the door when Claire stops him."Don't you know that sins of omission are as bad as sins of commission, Alan? Do you forget that you have not kissed me to-day?" she cries, nearly smashing the royal offering in her anxiety for the caress which he drops lightly on her forehead as a rule when he says good-morning or good-night.He stoops now and makes for the white brow as usual, but she pushes his face rather petulantly away."I don't like cold kisses!"Melville hesitates.It is in his mind to turn away and leave her to her petulance, but after all, it is his duty, that she asks of him.So once more he stoops and kisses her on the lips " properly,"as she calls it."I'll teach you what ' love ' is when we are married, Alan, and then you won't want lessons in kissing—it will come naturally, you know."He makes no answer. The words are rather distasteful to him, for they certainly smack of fastness. Cecil would not have said such a thing, he thinks.Half-an-hour later he returns, and placing the pistol on the table—deadly, but lovely—among the other gifts, is rushing off to an appointment at his club, when he pauses a minute."Don't for goodness' sake touch that in your impatience, Claire—remember it's loaded!""I am not afraid of it," she says laughing. "I am a splendid shot, you know. I practised in the gallery at High Towers."Claire takes a coup d'œil of the table, and, satisfied with the result of her labours, goes upstairs."Miss Bluebell's gown, ma'am. Madame Coralie is sorry yours will not be ready to try on till to-morrow.""Very well. Say I shall expect her at four o'clock punctually to-morrow afternoon, and ask Miss Bluebell to come up to me."Presently a very mild knock at Claire's door, and enter Bluebell. Her eyes are swollen out of her head with crying, her pretty little Greek nose is red to match, and her hair is like a bird's nest, all tossed and tumbled with digging her face into the cushions in her desperate grief."My gracious, I guess you are a sight, child! Why, you look like a scarecrow anyhow! What are you crying about?""About having to be bridesmaid. I hate weddings, especially——"Bell stops short, judging it more prudent to keep her hatreds to herself."Especially mine, that's what you were going to say. You are remarkably amiable in your feelings towards me. Here I am going to give you a charming brother, one you ought to be mighty proud of, and yet I do believe you have the impertinence to dislike him!""No, I don't," Bell flashes. "I hate him!""Pray why?"The little face opposite is set into obstinacy. There is not the quiver of a lash, or a quiver on the lips.Claire knows these signs as well as she knows her A B C.They mean that Bluebell has decided on silence, that she is not going to say why she hates Lord Melville."Your future brother-in-law will know how to manage you. He will break you of your obstinacy when he is in the house, that is, if he considers it worth his while to trouble at all about you," Claire says wrathfully."He won't have to trouble about me, for I shall never live in the same house as he does. I would rather die! I have said good-bye to High Towers for ever and ever," and Bell's eyes begin to overflow again.Claire beats a tattoo on the floor with the toe of her embroidered shoe. In her supreme anger she would dearly love to shake the girl."I sent for you to try on that frock," she says, pointing to a garment that looks like gossamer woven by fairy fingers. It is so white and pure and pretty that with the instinctive liking for such things in woman-kind, Bell's eyes rest admiringly on it, but only for a moment.She stands in the centre of the room as if rooted to the floor, and as dumb as a sheep before its shearers."Now, Bell, hurry up and slip it on. I have no time to lose, and the modiste is waiting to see it on.""I shall never put it on.""Never!" cries Claire, losing all self-control, and to say the truth, Bell is very aggravating at this moment. "We'll see—please undress."Bell quietly takes off her morning attire."Now then!" and Claire quickly slips the bridesmaid's dress over her. Bell is strangely quiet and obedient. The modiste comes in, and after a careful investigation as to fit, etc., pronounces it perfect, and Claire gushes warmly over the beauty of the flowers that adorn it."The lilies look as if they were just plucked," she says admiringly.Bell looks down on them. They are white garden lilies, those that grow tall and slender and graceful, with pure, innocent faces.They are the very lilies that she heard Lord Melville liken Cecil to!It is too much.The girl's devotion and loyalty to her cousin get the better of her discretion. She drags the fragile garb off her, tearing the chiffon and the white lace recklessly in her hot haste. Then she stamps her tiny foot violently on the poor lilies, till they look like a mass of pulp.It is the work of an instant, and before Claire has breath to speak in her anger and amazement, Bell is double-locked in her own little bedroom on the top floor."There," she sobs, "now I can't be a witness of this cruel marriage."Claire is considerably impressed and upset by this ebullition of Bluebell's temper. The child is usually so gentle and so easily led—but since Cecil left she is curiously changed—any word of kindness given to Claire or Melville would be, she considers, an infringement of her love for her cousin, and she keeps up an aggressive attitude to both, which Melville respects and really likes her for, divining the cause of it, for in spite of himself he still adores his lost love with an adoration he will never give to any other woman.Claire recovers her serenity later on, and by the time dinner is over she is in high feather and beauty, ready to drive off to Covent Garden with her betrothed and her chaperone Mrs. Wylde, a demure-looking little widow, whose demureness Melville inwardly doubts, and determines to knock her off his future countess's visiting list.The opera to-night is Faust, and as Jean de Reszke sings the title rôle, the house is packed from floor to ceiling. His delicious voice has never been heard to greater advantage than when he gives the "Salve dimora" to an audience so silent and absorbed that one could hear a pin drop in the vast audience.Claire herself, in spite of her utter infatuation for the man who sits beside her, holds her breath and flushes with excitement as the magnificent tenor voice rises and falls and thrills her ear. The memory of Marco Ferrari comes in strange vividness to her as she listens—in fancy she sees his handsome eyes, dark as midnight, soft as velvet, bent on her with the whole passion of a passionate heart, and for a moment she forgets Melville and wanders back to those tender love trysts in the Brussels Parc, but only for one moment, then she thrusts memory aside with an inward shudder.When the curtain falls on the second act she bends forward in the box, and is at once the cynosure of all eyes, especially in the stalls. Old, middle-aged and young men regard her warm, bewildering beauty with intense admiration, and envy Lord Melville the prize he has won, while Melville himself, leaning back in his chair, looks wonderfully wan and weary.Claire has outshone herself in her toilette to-night. A rich white silk, heavily embroidered in pearls, fits her like a glove, a silver snake with jewelled eyes clasps her supple waist, tiny stars of brilliants gleam in her bronze - flecked hair and twinkle fitfully among the soft laces that veil, but do not hide, the pure whiteness of her lovely neck and arms.Never perhaps has she looked more beautiful than she does now, under the ordeal of numberless lights, as she lifts up her great grey eyes full of adoration to Melville's handsome face.And two men who have come late to an opposite box are attracted by her at once. One of them takes his seat in front beside his hostess, but continually in the intervals of conversation he levels his glass at Claire—with a strange cynical smile on his mouth, which the lady beside him notices."What do you think of her, Prince?" she says. "I cannot make out by the expression of your lips if you admire her or not.""I admire her beauty, Lady Brentwood, but I hate her face—if you can understand that! She has the fatal attraction that few men can resist, but which brings loathing in its train. I can see the horns and cloven foot distinctly! Is that her husband?""No—but he will be!""Poor fellow!"Meanwhile the other man sits far back in the box, in the shadow of the curtain, gazing passion-drunk at Claire. His eyes never swerve from her face, his lips quiver as though palsy had smitten them, and his hands clutch tightly round his opera-glass with the tension of his nerves. Only once he bends forward to address Lady Brentwood, taking care to do so while the lights are turned down."Who is that opposite—the girl in the white dress, I mean?" he asks in a low voice that trembles a little."Oh, that is one of our big heiresses—her name is Delaval—of course all the men are mad about her, and envy Lord Melville."The man starts, but pulls himself together at once. For an instant he does not speak, then he asks quietly:"And why should they envy Melville, Lady Brentwood? I suppose he is only one of many admirers, though he does not seem very épris!"
"No, he doesn't, but all the same she is going to marry him the day after tomorrow. It will be a grand affair. I'll take you, if you like, to the wedding breakfast.""I should like it immensely," he says slowly, like a man in a dream. "Where is it to be given?""At 50A, Curzon Street—don't forget—the day after to-morrow, at three o'clock.""Thanks. I'll be there. I knew Melville a year or two ago in Rome, and liked him much, so that I naturally take interest in his bride to be. Is it a marriage of ambition for a title on her part?""Oh, no; love—desperate love, everyone says. She has had an enormous fortune left her, and has shoals of admirers in the upper ten, but Lord Melville, poor as a rat, is her fancy. He does not seem to appreciate his good fortune much, does he?""Perhaps he cares for something better than mere flesh and blood, beautiful though it be," he answers with a short, unpleasant laugh, then he touches his friend on the shoulder."I am not very well and am going back to the hotel. Good night, Lady Brent-wood.""How pale he looks," she remarks, "but what a handsome man he is. I wonder some woman has not caught him. I expect many would gladly do so.""He is handsome and the best fellow in the world, but he is a—fool.""Why?""Because he believes in women," Maurice Spagnoletti says with a cynical laugh."Oh, that is rather a crushing remark to make to a woman! I ought to resent your want of politeness!""There are women and women, you know," he answers, smiling, with an admiring look at her fair, patrician face.And Lady Brentwood, who would not mind an incipient flirtation with the good-looking Prince, blushes prettily and forgives him.CHAPTER XII. DEVIL'S WORK."Alas! the love of woman is knownTo be a lovely and a fearful thing!"MADAME CORALIE has come herself to see if the bridal gown fits to perfection; to her thinking she has never had a lovelier subject to call forth her artistic taste and most strenuous efforts, and she feels that this bridal gown, to which the future Countess of Melville's magnificent figure will lend tenfold attraction, will be her best advertisement for the season.Claire has elected to don the whole of her wedding paraphernalia, just to judge how she will look in two hundred pairs of aristocratic eyes, so that when she is fully attired, Madame Coralie gazes at her in breathless wonder."Beautiful as one rêve," she ejaculates.Excitement has lent Claire's cheeks a flush of delicate roses. Her grey eyes shine like southern stars, and the burnished waves of her hair look like the aureole of a saint.Creamy satin falls in thick soft folds round her tall, slender figure, and trails its long length on the carpet, veiled with exquisite filmy lace caught up by clusters of myrtle and orange blossom; costly brilliants scintillate in her ears and on her neck and arms, and flash from all parts of her bodice, and on her left shoulder she wears the beautiful and only gift of her future husband, the Melville crest in diamonds and rubies.And as she stands before her mirror she grows fascinated by her own beauty."I wish Alan could see me now!—now, when he would have time to take in each attractive point. I wonder if I shall satisfy his eye. He promised to be back by five o'clock," she thinks as she turns away from the charming reflection of herself, but directly she is alone she goes back to have a last, long, lingering look, and grows so absorbed in it that she starts as a knock comes to the door."A gentleman to see you, ma'am, on urgent business," the maid announces."The manager from Gunter's, I suppose, with some new and original device for the breakfast.""John told me to say the gentleman was in a great hurry.""Then I must run down as I am. Where has he been shown to?""The library.""Good gracious! I hope he is honest, with all those presents there! I wonder what the creature will think of me! I don't fancy he has looked on anything like me in his life!" she soliloquises with a complacent smile, as she sweeps down the stairs.She flings open the door of the library, and crosses the threshold with complacency still on her face.Here she pauses.The blood leaves her cheeks, the blood curdles like ice in her veins. What she looks on seems to dance and leap before her terror-stricken eyes, while ten thousand devils rise up and scream and mock at her for the fool she has been to believe that "happiness" exists! for her mad credence that a petty, miserable, sinful mortal's will can make vice run riot and rampant, un-rebuked and unarrested by the Heaven that is above all! Claire neither cries nor faints. She is made of different stuff to most women—an awful dread seizes her, she feels sick unto death, but she advances into the room a step or so, and, leaning against the table that is decked out with the wedding presents, looks like a statue of marble, save for the fire that burns in her eyes."So you have come!"This is all her welcome to the visitor, and none would recognise her face as the face of the woman who stood before her mirror not ten minutes back, charming, beautiful, with the love-light in her grey eyes and the smile of intense happiness on her red lips.Her face now is hard as granite, as cruel as a panther's, while her brain and heart are both heavy and hot with the diabolism of passion.How she hates him as he stands before her, this man, with his superb physique, his perfect features, his tender eyes! This man, who had caught her fancy for a little while.How she longs to crush him under foot, to draggle his dark hair—with which her fingers had loved to toy—in the dust.He listens to her greeting in silence. Just an ashy wave sweeps over his face, and his tall figure sways slightly, but he quickly recovers himself, and his eyes regard, as if fascinated by a serpent, the clusters of orange and myrtle blossom on her dress."Why are you here?" she demands as imperiously as if born to the purple.He gazes at her still, in a dazed sort of fashion, gazes at the satin sheen, the gleaming gems, and, above all, at the peerless face and form they adorn.Her beauty dazzles him even now—now, even as she stands before him with the treachery of her heart unveiled—and forgetting her infidelity, her falsehood, forgetting everything but—herself—he reaches out his hands, yearningly."Why am I here? To claim my wife! Did you not bid me come, Claire?" he asks brokenly.No word passes her lips."Will you not speak to me?" he questions with quivering lips. "Do you forget I am your—husband?""Not really!—not really! You know it! You told me yourself the marriage was informal. The marriage was a mockery, nothing but a farce, to bind a foolish, ignorant girl, superior in birth and position to your lowly lot. How dared you do it? Do you think that a few words muttered by a priest make a marriage valid? Where are the proofs that such a disgraceful ceremony took place? Where are the witnesses? I am not your wife!" she flashes scornfully.He shakes his head and is silent for a moment. When he speaks again forbearance is in his accents, a forbearance which would not fail to appeal to her, if she were otherwise than she is."For your sake I wish your words were true, so that you might be freed from bonds which you now loathe—Claire! But you are my wife!""It is false—false! Oh, surely Heaven cannot condemn me to such a fate!"A strong shiver passes over him from head to foot as he listens. Her love for him is indeed—dead The love which has been meat and drink to him, for the sake of which he has lived the life of a hermit since they two parted, so that each hour of the day her beautiful image should be before him, so that his whole soul might be filled with only her! And this is the girl—the simple, artless school-girl, who, under the trees of the Brussels Pare had wound her fair arms around his neck, and drawing down his lips till they rested on her own, had suggested to him, ay, sorely tempted him—against his own better judgment—to the deed of a clandestine marriage. This girl, who is surely his wife in the eyes of Heaven!"Oh, God! Can such things be?" he cries passionately. "Is fidelity only a matter of time? Are love and faith but mockeries? Is life nothing but a dream, women but cheats? Claire! Claire! I cannot believe it! My darling! My wife! Come and put your head on my heart, the heart that beats madly for you alone, and tell me that all this is but a hideons nightmare, that you are only trying me, that I am mad to think you faithless—or worse! Have mercy on me, Claire, torture me no more! Since we two parted every thought of my heart has been yours, every pulse in my frame has throbbed for you, and I have only lived to count each day and hour that brought me nearer to you. Surely! Surely! I shall have my reward for fidelity such as few men give to a woman. Come to me—love—my love!—I implore you!"She answers by a short laugh that cuts him like a thong."Listen! romance and rhapsody must die a natural death between us two, Marco Ferrari! Prose, sound practical prose is what we want. You are here to-day without waiting for my bidding, but no one knows you, and you can go away without any comment. Since we parted, I have grown rich—I am ready to come to terms if you will swear that you will leave London to-day. I will give you a thousand pounds, if you will swear that I shall never look upon your face again!"He stares at her bewildered, her coolness, her audacity, take away his breath, he reels back a little, and she cannot but mark the anguish in his eyes, in every line of his face, but the sight of it fails to touch her.At this moment she is past womanliness."Make up your mind at once. There is no proof of our marriage—no one will believe that a girl in my position in life can have been so utterly crazy as to link her lot with a singing-master. The disgraceful secret lies between you and me, and I, for one, should be ashamed to reveal it!"He steps forward a pace or two and looks at her keenly. The scales are fast falling from his own vision now."And how about your solemn oath, Claire?""Oath? did I take an oath? I forget!" she answers carelessly."Have you never loved me, Claire? Have you forgotten all—all the past?""There was nothing in the past, but supreme folly, of which I bitterly repent!""Claire! look into your heart, and tell me for pity's sake, whether you loved me or not?""If you will have it, I never did love you. I know it by my feelings, now!""And I loved you—so!"It breaks from him like the refrain of a melody, so low, so soft, so unutterably sad, but it never touches her one whit."Accept my offer. It will be best for both of us," she goes on recklessly, "but if you are fool enough to refuse it, if you persist in calling me your—wife—and in claiming me, I shall simply deny the whole thing. I shall simply state that it is a case of blackmailing! Thank Heaven, you have no proof, and it is not likely that people will believe the assertion of a poor and unknown foreigner, before the word of Miss Delaval of High Towers."Upon this, beside himself, goaded on by her insolence, her effrontery, he seizes her arm."I bid you go no further for your own sake!" he says sternly. "My brain whirls, and my hands seem to creep closer to your throat. For less than I have borne to-day men have killed women, and I don't want the sin of murder on my soul! I reject your offer, money is no object to me! But—I swear that I will not permit the sin and dishonour that you meditate against another man. Tell me, I beseech of you, that you have not the smallest intention of marrying him, or by the Heaven above us, I will stick to you, I will not let you leave my side!""Let me go," she cries breathlessly, wrenching herself from his grasp, and leaning back heavily against the table, her hands, clenched as in a vice, behind her. She looks at him defiantly, her heart beating fast, and her face almost livid."Is your love for Lord Melville the same cruel love you gave to me? Would you tear up his heart by the roots as you have done mine? Is he to be flung aside when your fancy is satiated? I knew him years ago, and he is too good, too honourable for such a woman as you are!"He flings the words at her fiercely, but she cares nothing for the scorn in his voice; all she wants is to be rid of him—rid of him for ever and ever—she would gladly see him lying dead at her feet."I love him!" she cries in a shrill, exultant voice. "And he loves me. I love him with all my heart and soul—love him so that I cannot—will not live without him. He and life!—without him—death! You want the plain, unvarnished truth, you have it! To-morrow I shall be Lord Melville's wife. I have won him through good report and evil report. I have done everything—would do anything—wade through rivers of blood—to reach him, and now—now, at the eleventh hour, when the cup of happiness is at my lips—no power on earth shall wrest it from me.""My power will! I swear it—I'll go to Lord Melville now, and when he has heard my story he will spurn you from him, as a man spurns a woman whom he knows to be worthless and sinful.""Coward!" she cries. The veins are swollen on her temples, a lurid glare is in her eyes, and desperation in her heart. " Coward! Ruin my life, dash away my only hope of happiness, take from me my only chance of becoming a better woman—a woman worthy of his love—and may the measure you mete be meted to you! May remorse for your vile work pursue you through life like your shadow. I have erred, and I am sorely punished. When a woman forgets her high estate and falls to the level of a man like you, there is no hope of nobility or generosity; your class do not know the meaning of the words!"A faint smile flits across his lips."I am sorry for you! " he says, but his voice is stern and resolute. There is no more pleading, no more love in it. He sees her as she is, fair without and foul within—he recognises the blackness of the heart he had believed to be of gold. " But I have no alternative. I tell you that if even you desired to come to me, I would have none of you; the passionate love I bore you has turned to dislike and repulsion. I am glad that I know you in your true colours—you are the sort of woman that sends a man to perdition; while you caress him with sweet, soft lips, you have the cruel claws of a cat, ready to tear his heart to pieces! But I forgive you, for you have done me good service in taking yourself out of my life. A few more words and I have done with you for ever. If you will at once stop by any means you choose the iniquitous ceremony of tomorrow and promise that you'll never look on Lord Melville's face again, I will keep our secret, and spare you in the eyes of the man you love. But if you persist in your course, I shall not by silence allow Lord Melville to suffer as I have done. You shall not bring shame and dishonour on his name. You shall not go to him the chaste and holy thing which you are—not. Will you stop this marriage or not? If not, I swear—and I will keep my oath—on the honour of a gentleman, that before another hour passes Lord Melville shall know you for what you are. He shall thank me for saving him from a pitfall—from a hideous fate."Claire starts, and sways back as she listens, and something cold touches her clenched hand. Surely it is devil's work that has placed this cold thing there. It is a devil's thought that flashes across her."Well," he says, "what is your answer?"Silence, a horrible oppressive silence, which is broken by the clock striking five. Claire remembers that Melville will be back by five."One more chance! What is your answer?"He looks at her steadily, her lips are set as if wrought in iron—no word issues from them.Then he turns towards the door, but a sharp click—a flash, and he lies prone on the floor. Dead!Claire stands erect, almost rigid, her face ashy white, her eyes wild and dazed, her right arm hangs nervelessly down, a pistol is at her feet, and "Good Luck" in large golden letters stare up from it.A few paces further lies a man of splendid physique, and with wide-open dark eyes that seem to gaze steadfastly at his murderess.This is the sight that Melville sees as, hearing a shot, he rushes in, with the white scared face of a servant behind him."Good God!—Prince Marco Colonna!"Then his arm is gripped."Who did you say?" Claire asks hoarsely, through her chattering teeth."Prince Marco Colonna!"And she is gone.When they tell Maurice Spagnoletti of Marco's death, he dashes away the mist that rises before his eyes."Another victim to belief in women," he says, with his usual cynicism. " If she had known he was a prince instead of a singing-master she would have stuck to him—but no! he wanted her to be disinterested—to love him for himself. Bah! as if any of our women do that sort of thing now-a-days!"CHAPTER XIII. NEMESIS."One of those terrible moments when the whirl of passion stands suddenly still."THEY find Claire kneeling with her face bowed on a table upon which stands a large portrait of Melville.She has placed at its base the clusters of orange and myrtle blossom off her bridal attire, and the diamond and ruby crest of the Melvilles rests in the centre of them, bearing an inscription:"Give this to Cecil!"The soft shining satin train of her wedding gown sweeps its long length on the floor, and the brilliants in her hair and on her white neck and arms gleam and scintillate in a ray of bright, warm sunshine that falls over the kneeling figure and makes a nimbus of glory round the bowed head.A paper addressed to her father in almost illegible characters, has fallen to the ground."When you get this, papa, I shall be dead! It is best for all! I have been a bad daughter and a  bad wife! I married an Italian singing-master calling himself Marco Ferrari—I thought I loved him—but I didn't know what love was—till I met Alan! I am such a pitiful wretch I dare hardly write his name."My husband came to-day to claim me, and I knew that before another hour had passed all my falsehood and sin and treachery would be known to the man I was going to marry to-morrow—the man whose love and good opinion are dearer to me than life—oh, the horror of it!"I shot my husband to still his tongue! It was not deliberate murder—on my dying oath it was not!"I felt mad—desperate—and life seemed so dreadful with Alan gone out of it—and the pistol lying close at hand tempted me—it was Devil's work, and I could not resist!"Papa, dear—a long, long good-bye!>"CLAIRE."CHAPTER XIV. UNDER THE HARVEST MOON."But all that I care forAnd all that I knowIs that—without whereforeI worship thee so!"A BRILLIANT harvest moon, full and round, like a monster ball, sails majestically over the greystone walls and quaint, gabled roof of Calthorpe Friars.Sails on and on, over the gaunt pines, tipping their sombre boughs with silver, and through the fretted foliage of the chestnuts, mottling the ground with queer arabesques of light and shade.It is a glorious September night.Down near the purling waters of Cal-thorpe Lake, the long grass nods its lazyhead backwards and forwards in the faint west wind, while upon the eddying ripples the moonbeams dance and play. Pale stars like delicate clustering gems, hang with soft sparkle in the purple sky, shedding a chastened radiance down. The air is laden with the fragrant breath of a myriad flowers, the rich drooping foliage casts cool shadows here and there—all is calm and still, and all the world seems steeped in light, when a man and a woman stand together beneath the arches of the lime trees.The silvery moonlight lends an inexpressible tenderness to his haughty, resolute face and his deep blue eyes, as he looks down on her. She feels strangely shy, and to hide it she breaks off a tiny branch, with just one scented bud nestling in a glossy leaf, and, reaching up, fastens it in his coat."Is it not sweet?" she asks."Sweet and symbolical! " he answers with one of his rare smiles, imprisoning both her hands and making her face him. "Cecil, do you know that it is over twelve months since Claire died?""Yes," she says, and her voice trembles a little."How long is my probation to last, Cecil?"She starts perceptibly."Oh, do not speak of that yet!''"Why not? " he questions gravely."Because I dare not listen. The very thought of marriage when my memories are still so full of death is painful—dreadful."Melville fixes his eyes upon her face steadily for a moment."You have forgotten me! You do not love me now," he says, releasing her and turning away.Just where the moonlight touches his brow, she can see a shadow creep up, she can see his under-lip twitch. The sight is too much for her.She would not be womanly if she were stoical enough to withstand it and give no sign. Beside, not love him! He, who is her life, her Bayard, at whose feet she has laid all her heart and soul, to do with as he wills!"I love you! " she whispers softly."Prove it then," he answers quickly, "prove it by at once casting aside the morbid feelings about Claire that stand between me and my happiness, prove it by putting your hands into mine and saying:"'Take me, Alan. I am ready!'"She forgets everything but him as he speaks. She holds out her hands to him yearningly, and without a falter in her tone, says:"Take me, Alan. I am ready!"Kisses, warm, passionate kisses, fall on her brow and cheeks and hands.The harvest moon grows fuller and brighter as she sails above with her court of glittering satellites. The silver light athwart the interlacing branches forms a carpet of diamonds for their feet. All is quiet around. Not a sound save the soft lilting of the wind, the shiver of a leaf on the lime boughs, or the low twitter of some sleepy bird, not a breath save that of some perfumed flower.""And so it was quite true, that you had never loved any other man but me?" he says, his pulses beating fast as he waits for her reply."Never in my life!"He knows that she is speaking the truth, and draws her closer in his arms."Was it to Calthorpe Friars you came when you left High Towers, my own?""Yes, I have been here ever since. My aunt, Lady Lyonsdale, is so good, sogood, and Lord Lyonsdale too. If I had not loved and lost you, Alan, I should have been quite happy here, but——""Life was nothing without me, Cecil, is that it?""Yes! I thought I should have died when your letter came," and he sees her grow white as a lily and feels her tremble in his clasp."Forget it, dear love. The fates have brought us together never to part again," he says fervently."How did you find me? " she asks, after a moment."By this," and he takes a scrap of paper and shows it to her."Cecil Delaval,"Calthorpe Friars,"Hants.""Why, it is Bluebell's writing!" she exclaims. "Dear little Bell, who was almost as miserable as myself at losing you!""How is she? Dreaming away life as usual?""Oh, no. She has given up dreaming since life grew so real and so hard for me!" she answers, with a quiver on her mouth.The moon, full orbed, breaks suddenly from behind a cloud. The stars grow brighter, the whole air whitens into a boundless tide of silver radiance.Melville's eyes look into hers, and they burn with an infinite tenderness that finds its response in her throbbing heart."Will my love suffice you, Cecil? t Will you never tire of me?"For all answer her arms creep round his neck."Alan!""My darling!""Shehas given you fortune, your dear old home, everything, while I have nothing to give.""You have given me the best gift I ask from Heaven—yourself! What could I want more, while I hold my whole world within the circle of my arms?" he asks, clasping her passionately.And Cecil, Saint Cecil as she has been called, sends up a little prayer of gratitude to God, for the infinite happiness that has crowned her life.