Only One Love, or Who Was the Heir Part 72

"Where to?" said the cabman, and Jack, half absently, answered:

"Park Lane."

The man had often driven him before, and he drove straight to Lady Bell's.

Jack walked into the drawing-room quite naturally--the room was familiar to him--and sat down before the fire; and Lady Bell came in with outstretched hand.

It was a comfort to have someone left, and Jack greeted her warmly, more warmly than he knew or intended. Lady Bell's face flushed as he held her hand longer than was absolutely necessary.

"Thank Heaven! there is someone left," he said, devoutly. "They have all gone, and Len is out, and----"

"I am left," said Lady Bell. "Well, you are just in time for luncheon. I half expected you, and I have told them to make a curry."

Curry was one of Jack's weaknesses.

"That is very kind of you," he said, gratefully. He felt, very unreasonably, neglected somehow. "You always seem to know what a fellow likes."

"That's because I have a good memory," said Lady Bell, smiling down at him. "I shall take care to have plenty of curries at Earl's Court. And, by the way, will you choose a paper for the smoking-room down there? I have told them that they must do it at once."

Jack rose without a word; he had been choosing papers and decorations for a week past, and it did not seem strange. Luncheon was announced while they were discussing the paper, and Jack gave her his arm. Mrs.

Fellowes was the only other person present, and she sat reading a novel, deaf and blind to all else. Not but what she might have heard every word, for the young people talked of the most commonplace subjects, and Jack was very absent-minded, thinking of Una, and quite unconscious of the light which beamed in Lady Bell's eyes when they rested on him.

Then they rode in the Row; he could do no less than offer to accompany her, and Mrs. Fellowes wanted to see a piece at one of the theaters, and Jack went to book seats, and took one for himself, and sat staring at the stage and thinking of Una; but he sat behind Lady Bell's chair, and spoke to her occasionally, and Lady Bell was content.

Hetley and Arkroyd were in the stalls, and saw him.

"Jack's making the running," said Lord Dalrymple, eying the box through his opera gla.s.s. "He's the winning horse, and we, the field, are nowhere."

And not only those two, but many others, remarked on Jack's close attendance on the great heiress, and not a few who would have gone to the box if he had not been there, kept away.

Meanwhile, Jack, simple, unsuspecting Jack, was bestowing scarcely a thought on the beautiful woman by his side, and thinking of Una miles away.

The theater over, and Lady Bell put into the carriage, he looked in at the club, sauntered into the card-room, smoked a cigar in the smoking-room, and then went home to Spider Court.

Much to his surprise he found Leonard up, not only up, but pacing the room, his face flushed and agitated.

"Hallo!" exclaimed Jack, "what's the matter? And where on earth have you been?"

"Jack, I have found her!"

"That's just what I said some months ago!"

"Yes, I know. I have been thinking how strangely alike our love affairs have been. It is my turn now. I have found her!"

"What, this young lady, Laura Treherne?"

"Yes," said Leonard, with a long breath.

"Tell me all about it," said Jack. "Hold hard a minute, till I get something to drink. Now, fire away."

"Well," said Leonard, still pacing up and down, and seeming scarcely conscious of Jack's presence, "I was walking in the park. You know the place, that quiet walk under the beeches. I was thinking of you and your love affairs, when I saw, sitting under a tree, a figure that I knew at once. For a moment I could not move, and scarcely think; then I wondered how I should get to speak to her; but presently, when I had pulled myself together, I saw that she had dropped her handkerchief, and I went and picked it up and took it to her."

"A fine opening," muttered Jack.

Leonard Dagle evidently did not hear him.

"Well, she started when I approached her, and merely thanked me with a bow, but I was determined not to let her go this time, and I said, 'Pardon me, but we have met before.' 'Where?' said she. 'In a railway carriage,' I said, and she looked at me, and trembled. 'I remember,' she said, and I swear I saw her shudder. 'Since then,' I said, 'I have sought you far and near.' 'Why should you do that?' she asked."

"A very natural question," interjected Jack.

"Then I told her. I told her that from that hour I had been unable to rid my mind of her face, that it had haunted me; that I had followed her and learned her address; and that though I had lost her I had sought her all over London."

"Was she angry?" asked Jack.

"At first she was," said Leonard, "very angry, but something in my voice or my face--Heaven knows I was earnest enough! convinced her that I meant no harm, and she listened."

"Well," said Jack, interested and excited.

"Well," said Leonard, "we sat talking for an hour, perhaps more, and she has promised to meet me again; at least she admitted that she walked in the park every afternoon. I tried to get her address, but she told me plainly that she would not give it to me."

"And is that all you learned?" asked Jack, with something like good-natured contempt.

"No!" replied Leonard. "I learned that she had been injured--oh, not in the way you think--and that she had some purpose to effect--some wrong to right."

"And of course you offered to help her?" said Jack.

"I offered to help her; I laid my services, my whole time and strength, at her disposal; I went so far as to beseech her to tell me what this purpose, this wrong was; but she would not tell me, and so we parted.

But we are to meet again. She is much changed; paler and thinner than when I saw her in the railway carriage, but still more beautiful in my eyes than any other woman in the world."

"It is a strange affair," mused Jack. "Quite a romance in its way. Isn't it funny, Len, that both our love affairs should be romantic, and so much alike!"

"Yes," said Leonard, "very. But mine has scarcely begun, while yours has ended happily, or will do so, if you do not play the fool!"

"What do you mean?" asked Jack, sharply.

"Where have you been to-night?" asked Leonard.

"To the theater with Lady Bell."

"I expected as much," said Leonard, and he fell to at his writing, and would say no more, though Jack stormed and raved.

Meanwhile the Davenant party had, thanks to Stephen, made a comfortable journey. They found a carriage and pair waiting for them at the station; not the ramshackle vehicle of the old squire's time, but a new carriage from the best man in Long Acre, and they were rolled along the country lanes in a style Ralph Davenant would have marveled at.

Presently they came in sight of the Hurst, and Mrs. Davenant uttered an exclamation.

"Why, Stephen, it is altered!" she said.

Stephen smiled proudly.