The Man and the Moment Part 23

"I know nothing of pa.s.sions, Moravia," she cried, and threw out her arms. "I have only dreamed of them--imagined them. I am afraid of them--afraid to feel too much. Henry will be a haven of rest--the moment--can never come to me."

The Princess laughed a little bitterly.

"Then let us dress, darling, and go down and outshine all these dear, dowdy Englishwomen; and while you are sipping courtesy and gentleness with Lord Fordyce, I shall try to quaff gloriously attractive, aboriginal force with Mr. Arranstoun--but it would have been more suitable to our characters could we have changed partners. Now, run along!"

CHAPTER XVI

Rose Forster had felt she must not lure Mr. Arranstoun over to Ebbsworth on false pretences; he was a very much sought after young man, and since his return from the wilds had been very difficult to secure, and therefore it was her duty to give him one of her beautiful Americans at dinner. The Princess was obviously the destiny of her husband with her brother Henry upon the other side, so Michael must take in Mrs. Howard.

Mr. Arranstoun was one of the last two guests to a.s.semble in the great drawing-room where the party were collected, and did not hear of his good fortune until one minute before dinner was announced.

Sabine had perhaps never looked so well in her life. She had not her father's nation's love of splendid jewels, and wore none of any kind.

Her French mother may have transmitted to her some wonderful strain of tastes which from earliest youth had seemed to guide her into selecting the most beautiful and becoming things without great knowledge. Her ugly frocks at the Convent had been a penance, and ever since she had been free and rich her clothes and all her belongings had been marvels of distinction and simplicity.

Moravia was, strictly speaking, far more beautiful, but Sabine, as Henry had once said, had "it."

Her manner was just what it ought to have been, as she placed her hand upon her husband's arm--perfectly indifferent and gracious, and so they went in to dinner.

Michael had hardly hoped to have this chance and meant to make the most of it. At dinner before a ball was not the place to have a serious discussion about divorce, but was for lighter and more frivolous conversation, and he felt his partner would be no unskilled adversary with the foils.

"So you have got this far north, Mrs. Howard," he began by saying, making a slight pause over the name. "I wish I could persuade you to come over the border to Arranstoun; it is only thirty-five miles from here, and really merits your attention."

"I have heard it is a most interesting place," Sabine returned, suddenly experiencing the same wild delight in the game as she had done in the garden at Heronac. "Have you ghosts there? We do not have such things in France."

"Yes, there are a number of ghosts--but the most persistent and disconcerting one is a very young girl who nightly falls through a secret door into my room."

"How romantic! What is she like?" Two violet eyes looked up at him full of that mischief which lies in the orbs of a kitten when it contemplates some fearsome crime, and has to appear especially innocent.

Michael thrilled. If she had that expression he was quite ready to follow the lead.

"She is perfectly enchanting--shall I tell you exactly what she wears--and her every feature and the color of her eyes? The wraith so materializes that I can describe it as accurately as I could describe you sitting next me."

"Please do."

"She is about five foot seven tall--I mean she has grown as tall as that--when she first appeared she could not have been taller than five foot five."

"How strange!"

"Yes, isn't it--well, she has the most divine figure, quite slight and yet not scraggy--you know the kind, I loathe them scraggy!"

"I hate fat people."

"But she isn't fat. I tell you she is too sweet. She has a round baby face with the loveliest violet eyes in the world and such a skin!--like a velvet rose petal!" His unabashed regard penetrated Sabine who smiled slyly.

"You don't mean to say you can see all these material things in a ghost!" she cried with an enchanting air of incredulity.

"Perfectly--I have not half finished yet. I have not told you about her mouth--it is very curved and full and awfully red--and there is the most adorable dimple up at one side of it, I am sure the people in the ghost world that she meets must awfully want to kiss it."

Sabine frowned. This was rather too intimate a description, but bashfulness or diffidence she knew were not among Mr. Arranstoun's qualities--or defects.

"I think I am tired of hearing what this ghost looks like, I want to know what does she do? Aren't you petrified with fright?"

"Not in the least," Michael told her, "but you will just have to hear about her hair--when it comes down it is like lovely bronze waves--and her little feet, too--they are exquisite enough in shoes and stockings, but without----!"

Here he had the grace to look at his fish which was just being handed.

A flush as pink as the pinkest rose came into Sabine's cheeks--he was perfectly disgraceful and this was of course in shocking taste--but when he glanced up again his attractive blue eyes had her late look of an innocent kitten's in them and he said in an angelic tone:

"She has not a fault, you may believe me, and she jumps up after the fall into the room, and sits in one of my big chairs!"

"Does she scold you for your sins as denizens of another sphere ought to do?" Mrs. Howard was constrained to ask.

"No--she is a little angel and always tells me that sins are forgiven."

"Does she come often?"

"Every single evening when I am alone--and--sometimes, she melts into my arms and stays with me all night. Binko--Ah!--you remember Binko!"--for Sabine's face had suddenly lit up--and at this pa.s.sionate joy and emotion flooded Michael's and they both stopped dead short in their talk and Sabine took a quick breath that was almost a gasp.

"I remember--nothing," she said very fast, "how should I? The girl whose ghost you are speaking of ceased to exist five years ago--but I--recognize the portrait--I knew her in life--and she told me about the dog--he had fat paws and quant.i.ties of wrinkles, I think she said."

"Yes, that is Binko!" and his master beamed rapturously. "He is the most beautifully ugly bulldog in the world, but the poor old boy is getting on, he is seven years old now. Would not you like to see him--again--I mean from what you have heard!"

"I love animals, especially dogs--but tell me, is he not afraid of the ghost?"

Michael drank some champagne, even under all his unhappiness he was greatly enjoying himself. "Not at all, he loves her to come as much as I do. She haunts--both my rooms--and the chapel, too--she wears a white dress and has some stephanotis in her hair--and I am somehow compelled to enact a whole scene with her--there before the altar with all the candles blazing--and it seems as if I put a ring upon her hand--like the one you are wearing there--she has lovely hands."

The color began to die out of Sabine's cheeks and a strange look grew in her eyes. The footmen were removing the fish plates, but she was oblivious of that. Then the tones of Michael's voice changed and grew deeper.

"Soon all the vision fades into gloom, and the only thing I can see is that she is tearing my ring off and throwing it away into the darkness."

"And do you try to prevent her from doing this?" Sabine hardly spoke above a whisper, while she absently refused an entree which was being handed. To talk of ghosts and such like things had been easy enough, but she had not bargained for him turning the conversation into one of serious meaning. She could not, however, prevent herself from continuing it, she had never been so interested in her life.

"No--I cannot do that--there is an archangel standing between."

At this moment Mrs. Howard's other neighbor claimed her attention; he was a man to whom she had been talking at tea, and who was already filled with admiration for her.

Michael had time for breathing s.p.a.ce, and to consider whether the course he was pursuing was wisdom or not. That it was madly exciting, he knew--but where was it leading to? What did she mean? Did she feel at all? or was she one of the clever coquettes of her nation, a more refined Daisy Van der Horn--just going to lead him on into showing his emotion for her, and then going to punish and humiliate him? He must put a firmer guard over himself, for propinquity and the night were exciting influence, and the cruel fact remained that it was too late in any case.

Henry's words this afternoon had cast the die forever; he--Michael--could not for any personal happiness be so hideously cruel to his old friend. Better put a bullet through his own brain than that.

Whatever should develop on this night, and he meant to continue the conversation as it should seem best to him, and if she fenced too daringly with him to take the b.u.t.ton off the foils--but whatever should come of it it should not be allowed to alter his intention of to-morrow instructing his lawyers in Edinburgh to begin divorce proceedings at once. He was like a gambler who has lost his last stake, and who still means to take what joy of life he can before the black to-morrow dawns.

So, in the ten minutes or so while Sabine had turned from him, he laid his plans. He would see how much he could make her feel. He would dance with her later and then say a final farewell. If she were hurt, too, he must not care--she had made the barrier of her own free will. The person who was blameless and should not suffer was Henry. Then he began to look at Sabine furtively, and caught the outline of her sweet, averted head. How irresistibly attractive she was! The exact type he admired; not too intellectual-looking, just soft and round and babyish; there was one little curl on her snowy _nuque_ that he longed to kiss there and then. What a time she was talking to the other man! He would not bear it!

And Sabine, while she apparently listened to her neighbor, had not the remotest idea of what he said. The whole of her being was thrilling with some strange and powerful emotion, which almost made her feel faint--she could not have swallowed a morsel of food, and simply played with her fork.

At the first possible pause, Michael addressed her again: