A Double Knot Part 67

"Oh, no, no!" whispered Marie, whose face betrayed her mortification.

"It would look so particular.--Clotilde saw him coming to me," she added to herself, "and it was done in spite."

"Perhaps it would," said Lord Henry quietly. "I like Captain Glen. He is very manly and handsome. The _beau ideal_, to me, of a soldier. I must know more of him, and of his amusing little friend yonder, who is pointing his moustaches and looking daggers in my direction. He is another admirer of yours, is he not, Marie?"

"Oh, poor boy: it is ridiculous!" exclaimed Marie, half scornfully.

"There is something very likeable about him, too, except when he is in his foolish fit."

"His foolish fit?" said Lord Henry inquiringly.

"Yes, and tries to talk nonsense. I was compelled to dismiss him, and forbid his coming near me unless he could talk sensibly."

Fresh announcements were made from time to time, and then a servant approached Clotilde, who immediately began to pair off her guests for the supper.

"Take in Marie, dear Lord Henry," she said as she came to where they were standing; and soon after, in pa.s.sing, she said softly to Glen. "I shall reserve myself for you."

Glen bowed, and waited patiently as the guests went down to the banquet spread in a large marquee set up in the garden, where beneath the red and white striped awnings the brilliant swinging gasaliers turned the gla.s.s and l.u.s.trous plate upon the long tables into a blaze of scintillations, which illumined with fresh tints the abundant flowers.

Elbraham had given Edgington and Gunter orders to "do the thing handsome," and they had unmistakably carried out his wishes, even to his own satisfaction; while, to give an additional charm to the supper, the strains of an excellent band, concealed behind a great bank of flowers and plants of the gayest foliage, suddenly began to float through the great marquee.

"It is like a scene in fairyland," said Clotilde, as Glen took his seat beside her, and after she had glanced down the table to see that the little squat figure of Elbraham was hidden from her gaze by a line of epergnes and jardinieres.

"Yes, it is magnificent," replied Glen gravely and with his eyes fixed upon Marie, seated some little distance below them in company with Lord Henry Moorpark, the former gazing at him in a half-reproachful way.

"I made Elbraham invite you," whispered Clotilde, sipping the champagne that had just been poured into her gla.s.s.

"Indeed!"

"Yes; of course, I shall have all my old friends here as much as I please."

"I suppose so," said Glen rather dreamily. "Of course, you are very happy?"

She darted a quick look at him, one that he did not meet, for he bent over his plate and appeared to be busy with his supper.

"How dare you say that to me!" she said in a low voice. "Oh, it is too cruel--and from you!"

Glen shuddered, for he half expected that his hostess's words would be heard.

"I beg pardon," he said hastily. "I will take more care."

"No, no," she said, in the same deep, earnest tones: "scold me, say cutting, contemptuous things to me. I am a wretched creature, and deserve all."

Glen seized and emptied his champagne-gla.s.s at a draught, and as he set it down he glanced towards the opening in the marquee, as if seeking a way to escape.

An awkward pause followed, and, judging that his companion was self-angry at her slip of words, Glen was magnanimous enough to try and pa.s.s them over, changing the conversation, or rather trying, by a dexterous movement, to draw it into another channel.

"Where did you go?" he asked.

"When? During my wedding trip?" she asked, with a curious tone of bitterness in her voice.

It was a badly-planned question, Glen felt, but he must go on with it now.

"Yes. Paris, of course?"

"Oh yes, we went to Paris and Berlin, and then through Switzerland, I believe; but it was all one miserable dream."

She had spoken almost loudly, and the blood mounted to the young officer's cheeks as he again wondered whether her words had been heard.

But he need not have been uneasy, for those nearest were intent upon their plates or upon each other.

"You are very angry with me," said Clotilde suddenly; and for a moment he caught her eye, and asked himself directly after whether Marie had seen that glance, which she had, and suffered a raging pang.

"Angry? No," said Glen lightly, "why should I be angry, Mrs Elbraham?

Surely a lady has a right to make her own choice. I was a compet.i.tor; and an unfortunate one."

"Do you think you were unfortunate?" asked Clotilde eagerly.

"As unfortunate as you were favoured; why, my dear Mrs Elbraham, you are here the mistress of a palace. Had I had my way, you would have been condemned to share some shabby barrack-lodging. Hence I congratulate you."

"Ah!"

Glen's face flushed more and more. It might have been from the long-drawn, half-despairing sigh on his left; or the champagne, of which he pretty freely partook in his excitement, might have been answerable for his heightened colour, but certainly he did not go the way to diminish it, for he drained the gla.s.s at his side again and again, dashing off into a hurried conversation and talking brightly and well, till he heard a fresh sigh upon his left, and encountered another glance from his hostess's large dark eyes--a look full of reproach and appeal.

This time Glen smiled. The wine was working, and he saw matters from another point of view.

Throwing off, then, the consciousness that had troubled him, he laughed and chatted with her till his words or the wine brought a warm flush into her creamy skin, and again and again he received a languishing look from the large dark eyes--a look that would have made some men turn giddy, but which only made Glen smile.

The party at last arose and began to file back into the brilliantly-lit saloons, the band having now been stationed in the flower-filled hall, and an improvised dance commenced, a couple beginning to turn to the strains of one of Gungl's waltzes, and a dozen more following suit, agitating the perfumed air, and filling it with the scintillations of jewels.

They pa.s.sed from the great marquee into the hall, the strains of the waltz making Glen long to go to Marie and ask her to be his partner for that dance.

He was thinking this when he was brought back to himself by the low, sweet voice of Clotilde.

"You are _distrait_," she said half reproachfully.

"Yes. I was thinking of the music," he said. "I want a waltz."

"No, no," she said hurriedly; and she pressed his arm. "I must not dance to-night. Take me in this way."

She pointed to a door and they pa.s.sed through into the great conservatory, softly lit up by tinted globes placed amidst the flowers and foliage of the rich exotics that filled the place. There was a delicious calm there, and the air was fragrant with the cloying scents of flowers; musical with the tinkle of falling water as a jet flashed in many-tinted drops and sparkled back into a fern-hung basin; while as if from a distance came the softened strains of the voluptuous waltz.

It was a place and a time to stir the pulses of an anchorite, and yet Glen hardly seemed to heed the beautiful woman who hung heavily and more heavily upon his arm, till he said suddenly--

"Is not this the way?"

"No, along here; let us go through this door."

"This door" was one at quite the end, leading into a kind of boudoir; but ere they reached it, and as they were nearly hidden by the rich leaves and flowers, Clotilde turned to her companion with a low, piteous sigh--gazing wildly in his eyes. "Oh, Marcus, why did I marry that man?"

Volume 3, Chapter IV.