Part 64 (2/2)
Her eyes wandered over the magnificent face and figure, over the faultless lines and graceful curves, over the artistic dress, and the beautiful, picturesque head.
”You have done well,” said the countess. ”Years ago you thought me hard, unfeeling, prejudiced, cruel, but it was kindness in the end. You have achieved for yourself fame, which no one could have won for you. Better to be as you are, queen of song, and so queen of half the world of fas.h.i.+on, than the wife of a man whose family and friends would never have received you, and who would soon have looked on you as an inc.u.mbrance.”
”Pray pardon me, Lady Lanswell, if I say that I have no wish whatever to hear your views on the subject.”
My lady's face flushed.
”I meant no offense,” she said, ”I merely wished to show you that I have not been so much your enemy as you perhaps have thought me,” and by the sudden softening of my lady's face, and the sudden tremor of her voice, Leone knew that she had some favor to ask.
”I think,” she said, after a pause, ”that in all truth, Madame Vanira, you ought to be grateful to me. You would never have known the extent of your own genius and power if you had not gone on the stage.”
”The happiness of the stage resembles the happiness of real life about as much as the tinsel crown of the mock queen resembles the regalia of the sovereign,” replied Leone. ”It would be far better if your ladys.h.i.+p would not mention the past.”
”I only mention it because I wish you to see that I am not so much your enemy as you have thought me to be.”
”Nothing can ever change my opinion on that point,” said Leone.
”You think I was your enemy?” said the countess, blandly.
”The most cruel and the most relentless enemy any young girl could have,” said Leone.
”I am sorry you think that,” said my lady, kindly. ”The more so as I find you so happy and so prosperous.”
”You cannot answer for my happiness,” said Leone, briefly.
”I acted for the best,” said the countess, with more meekness than Leone had ever seen in her before.
”It was a miserable best,” said Leone, her indignation fast rising, despite her self-control. ”A wretched best, and the results have not been in any way so grand that you can boast of them.”
”So far as you are concerned, Madame Vanira, I have nothing to repent of,” said my lady.
Leone's dark eyes flashed fire.
”I am but one,” she said, ”your cruelty made two people miserable. What of your son? Have you made him so happy that you can come here and boast of what you have done?”
My lady's head fell on her breast. Ah, no, Heaven knew her son was not a happy man.
”Leone,” she said, in a low, hurried voice, ”it is of my son I wish to speak to you. It is for my son's sake I am here--it is because I believe you to be his true friend and a n.o.ble woman that I am here, Leone--it is the first time I have called you by your name--I humble myself to you--will you listen to me?”
CHAPTER LVIII.
”BEHOLD MY REVENGE!”
Even as she spoke the words Lady Lanswell's heart sunk within her. No softening came to the beautiful face, no tenderness, no kindliness; it seemed rather as though her last words had turned Leone to stone. She grew pale even to her lips, she folded her hands with a hard clasp, her beautiful figure grew more erect and dignified--the words dropped slowly, each one seeming to cut the air as it fell.
”You call me n.o.ble, Lady Lanswell! you, who did your best to sully my fair name; you call me your son's best friend, when you flung me aside from him as though I had been of no more worth than the dust underneath his feet!”
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