Prince Fortunatus Part 33

"n.o.ble?--trash!" he said; and he hurried these young people along to the disrobing-room and left them there. Then he went to the manager, who was still in the hall.

"I say," he began, without more ado, "there's a young friend of mine in this hotel whom I wish you'd invite to dine with us."

The manager looked rather startled--then hesitated--then stroked his waxed moustache.

"I--I presume a gentleman friend?"

"Yes, of course," said Lionel, angrily. "It's a Percival Miles--why, you must have heard of Sir Barrington Miles, and this is his eldest son, though he's quite a young fellow--"

"Oh, very well; oh, yes, certainly!" said Mr. Lehmann, apparently very much relieved. "Will you ask him?"

"Well, no, I can't exactly," Lionel said. "But I will send him a formal note in your name--'Mr. Lehmann presents his compliments'--may I?"

"All right; but dinner will be served almost directly. Would you mind telling the waiters to lay another cover?"

About five minutes thereafter, when the company had swarmed into the dining-room--most of them chatting and laughing, but the more business-like looking for their allotted places at table--Mr. Percival Miles put in an appearance, very shy and perhaps a little bewildered, for he knew not to whom he owed this invitation. Lionel had got a seat for him between Mlle. Girond and Mr. Carey, the musical conductor; if he could, and if he had dared, he would have placed him next Miss Burgoyne; but Miss Burgoyne was at the head of the table, between Lord Denysfort and Mr. Lehmann--besides, that fiery young lady might have taken sudden cause of offence. As it was, the young gentleman could gaze upon her from afar; and she had bowed to him--with some surprise clearly showing in her face--just as their eyes had met on his coming into the room.

Lionel was next to Nina; he had arranged that.

It was a protracted banquet, and a merry one withal; there was a perfect Babel of noise; and the excellent old custom of drinking healths with distant friends was freely adopted. Miss Girond did her best to amuse the good-looking boy whom she had been instrumental in rescuing from his solitary dinner in the coffee-room; but he did not respond as he ought to have done; from time to time he glanced wistfully towards the head of the table, where Miss Burgoyne was gayly chatting with Lord Denysfort.

As for Nina, Nina was very quiet, but very much interested, as her dark, expressive eyes eloquently showed.

"It is so beautiful, Leo," she said. "Every one looks so well; is it the light reflected from the table?" And then she said, in a lower tone, "Do you see Miss Burgoyne, Leo? She is acting all the time. She is acting to the whole table."

"That Albanian jacket of hers is gorgeous enough, anyway," Lionel responded; he was not much interested apparently in the question of Miss Burgoyne's behavior.

When dinner had been some little time over, the women-folk went away and got wraps and shawls, and the whole company pa.s.sed outside, the men lighting their cigars at the top of the steps. The heavens overhead were now perfectly clear; the moonlight shone full on the long terrace, with its parapets and pedestals and plaster figures, while all the world below was shut away in a dense fog. Indeed, as the various groups idly walked about or stood and talked--their shadows sharply cut as out of ebony on the white stone--the whole scene was most extraordinary; for it appeared as though these people were the sole occupants of some region in cloud-land--a clear-shining region raised high above the forgotten earth.

"Lehmann is lucky," Lionel said to Nina. "I thought his moonlight effect was going to be a failure."

Miss Girond came up, in an eager and excited fashion.

"Nina!"

"What is it, Estelle?"

"Monsieur of the pretty face," she said, in a whisper, "oh, so sad he was all dinner!--regarding Miss Burgoyne, and she coquetting, oh, frightful, frightful!--but it is all right now--he was at the door when we come out--he takes her hand--'How you do, Miss Burgoyne?'--'Oh, how you do, Mr. Miles?'--and he leads her away before she can go to any one else. And there--away down there--do you see them? He has compensation, do you think?"

She drew Nina a little aside, and sang into her ear--

"--Ce soir, as-tu vu La fille a notre maitre, D'un air resolu Guettant a sa fenetre?

Eh bien! qu'en dis tu?

--Je dis que j'ai tout vu, Mais je n'ai rien cru; Je l'aime, je l'aime, Je l'aime quand meme!"

and then she broke into a malicious laugh.

"What are you two conspiring about, now?" Lionel asked--from the bench on which he had carelessly seated himself, the better to enjoy his cigar.

"You must know the consequence of doing a good action, Leo," Nina said to him. "Do you see the black bushes--yonder--and the two figures?

Estelle says it is Miss Burgoyne and the young gentleman who would have been all alone but that you intercede. Is he not owing a great deal to you?"

"Well, Nina, if there is any grat.i.tude in woman's bosom, Miss Burgoyne ought to be indebted to me too. She has got her pretty dear. I dare say he would have managed to procure a little interview with her, in some surrept.i.tious way, in any case--I dare say that was his intention in coming down; but now that he is one of the party, one of the guests, she can talk to him before every one. And since I have been the means of bringing the pair of turtle-doves together, I hope they're happy."

"Ah, Leo, you do not understand," Nina said to him--for Miss Girond was now talking to Mr. Carey, who had come up.

"I don't understand what?"

"You do not understand Miss Burgoyne," said Nina.

"What don't I understand about her, then?"

Nina shook her head.

"Why should I say? You will not believe. Perhaps she is grateful to you for bringing in that young man--yes, perhaps--but if she would rather have yourself to go and talk with her and be her companion before all those people? Oh, you do not believe? No, you are too modest--as she is vain and jealous. All during the dinner she was playing coquette, openly, for every one to see; Estelle says it was to pique the young man who came from the other room; no, Leo, it was not--it was meant for you!"

"Oh, nonsense, Nina!--I wasn't thinking anything about her!"

"Does she think that, Leo?" Nina said to him, gently. "Ah, you do not know that woman. She is clever; she is cunning; she wishes to have the fame of being a.s.sociated with you--even in a photograph for the shop-windows; and you are so blind! The duel?--yes, she would have liked that, too, for the newspapers to speak about it, and the public to talk, and her name and yours together; but then she says, 'No, he will owe more to me if I interfere and get an apology for him,' It is one way or the other way--anything to win your attention--that you should care for her--and that you should show it to the world--"

"Nina, Nina," said he, "you want to make me outrageously vain. Do you imagine she had a single thought for me when she had Lord Denysfort to carry on with--he hasn't much in his head, poor devil! but a t.i.tle goes a long way in the theatrical world--and when she could practise on the susceptibilities of her humble adorer who was further down the table?

Oh, I fancy Miss Burgoyne had enough to occupy herself with this evening without thinking of me. She was quite busy."

"Ah, you do not understand, Leo," Nina said. "But some day you may understand--if Miss Burgoyne still finds you indifferent, and becomes angry. But before that, she will try much--"

"Nina!"

"You will see, Leo!" Nina said; and that was all she could say just then, for Mr. Lehmann came up to take the general vote as to whether they would rather have tea out there in the moonlight or return to the dining-room.

But any doubt as to the manner in which Miss Burgoyne regarded his intercession on behalf of Mr. Percival Miles was removed, and that in a most summary fashion, by the young lady herself. As they were about to leave the hotel, the men were standing about in the hall, chatting at haphazard or lighting a fresh cigar, while they waited for the women-folk to get ready. Lionel saw Miss Burgoyne coming along the corridor, and was glad of the chance of saying good-night to her before she got on to the front of Lord Denysfort's drag. But it was not good-night that Miss Burgoyne had in her mind.

"Mr. Moore," she said, when she came up, and she spoke in a low, clear, incisive voice that considerably startled him. "I am told it was through you that that boy was invited to the dinner to-night."

He looked at her in amazement.

"Well, what then?" he exclaimed. "What was the objection? I thought he was a friend of yours. That boy?--that boy is a sufficiently important person, surely--heir to the Petmansworth estates--why I should have thought--"

She interrupted him.

"I consider it a gross piece of impertinence," she said, haughtily. "I suppose you thought you were conferring a favor on _me_! How dared you a.s.sume that any one--that any one--wished him to be present in that room?"

She turned proudly away from him, without waiting for his reply.

"Lord Denysfort, here I am," said she; and the chinless young man with the large ears gave her his arm and conducted her down the steps. Lionel looked after her--bewildered.

CHAPTER XV.