Part 28 (1/2)
”At this hour of the night to be here, alone!”
”Yes. Very imprudent of her, of course, and all that.”
”There must have been some strong inducement to make a girl of her gentle nature undertake so bold, so daring, a step. It was a strictly improper action,” says the old man, in his most stilted style.
”I dare say. Imprudent, however, was the word I used. I am rather glad I was the one to meet her, as she knew me; and, as a rule, people talk so much about nothing, and make such mountains out of mole-hills.”
”It was fortunate, indeed, your meeting her. It might, in fact, almost be termed a curious coincidence, your managing to be on this deserted walk just at the required moment.”
There is something so unpleasant, so sneering, about his tone that Dorian colors hotly.
”I confess I hardly see it in the light you do,” he says, easily enough, but very coldly. ”And I think I should term the coincidence 'lucky,' rather than curious. I see no difference between this walk and half a dozen others. People don't seem to affect any of them much.”
”No,” says Lord Sartoris.
”Any other fellow might have been here as well as me. You, for example.”
”Just so!” says Lord Sartoris.
”Then why bring in the word curious?”
”It merely occurred to me at the moment,” says his lords.h.i.+p, drily.
”Been dancing much?”
”Yes,--no,--pretty well. Are you coming in?”
They are again in front of the house, and near the steps that lead to the conservatory.
”Not just yet, I think.”
”Then I fear I must leave you. I am engaged for this dance.”
So, for the first time, these two part coldly. The old man goes slowly, moodily, up and down the gravelled path beneath the brilliant moon, that--
”From her clouded veil soft gliding, Lifts her silvery lamp on high,”
and thinks of many things in a humor more sad than bitter; while the young man, with angry brow and lips compressed, goes swiftly onward to the house.
As he regains the ball-room, the remembrance of the little partner he has come to claim rushes back upon him pleasantly, and serves to dissipate the gloomy and somewhat indignant thoughts that have been oppressing him. But where is she? He looks anxiously around; and, after five minutes' fruitless search, lo! there are her eyes smiling out at him from the arms of a gay and (doubtless) gallant plunger.
The next instant she is gone; but he follows her slight form with eager glance, and at length crosses the room to where she is now standing with her soldier. As he does so he flings from him all tormenting thoughts, forgetting--as it is his nature to do--the possible misery of the future in the certain happiness of the present.
”The next is ours, is it not?” he says; and she smiles at him, and--can it be?--willingly transfers her hand from the heavy's arm to his; and then they dance; and presently he takes her down to the Peytons' carriage and puts her carefully into it, and presses her hand, I think, ever so slightly, and then drives home, beneath the silent stars, with an odd sensation at his heart--half pain, half pleasure--he has never felt before.
CHAPTER XVIII.
”Known mischiefs have their cure, but doubts have none; And better is despair than friendless hope Mixed with a killing fear.”--MAY.