Kyrle turned, full of anger, which changed in a moment by some
miraculous process into satisfaction, for who should stand before
him, with wondering eyes and faintly flushing cheeks, but the
lovely lady of the balcony!
And she was lovelier even than he had imagined, with a face in
which all fine issues of thought and feeling seemed to meet. She
looked surprised, yet the gentle, curving lips smiled as it were
irresistibly, while she said, with the composure of a woman of the
world, “I recollect Mr. Kyrle perfectly, though I should not have
known him.”
“Nor I you,” Lennox answered, bowing deeply. “But I have never
forgotten you.”
It did not occur to him until after the words were spoken what
a lover-like sound they might have to any one under that false
impression which he had just resented. But when he lifted his head
it was to meet a pair of eyes which at once enlightened him with
regard to the interpretation of which they were susceptible. These
eyes belonged to the young man whom he had already seen on the
balcony, and whom Mrs. Meredith now introduced as Mr. Joscelyn.
Percy Joscelyn had not forgotten the man whom he found with Aimée
on the momentous occasion when he went to announce the great change
in her fortunes, and he instantly identified this bronzed stranger
as that man, even before hearing the name which he had taken care
to remember. It was therefore natural enough that his eyes should
express suspicion and dislike when Lennox met them.
But this immediate proof of Fanny’s assertion, that he would be
regarded as “Aimée’s former lover,” did not irritate Kyrle as might
have been expected. On the contrary, he was conscious of a sense
of amusement which he would not have believed possible a moment
earlier. It was the appearance of Joscelyn which wrought this
change. A few minutes before he had, unconsciously to himself,
envied this man; now _he_ was transformed into an object if not of
envy, at least of apprehension to the latter. It was impossible not
to feel that the situation had its elements of interest. He looked
at the beautiful girl standing before him, a smile still on her
lips, but her gentle, high-bred composure otherwise unchanged, and
felt that, after all, the suspicion of having been her lover was
one which he could cheerfully support.
Aimée, on her part, regarding him with the deep, soft eyes he
remembered well, was thinking of the sea wall, the star-lighted
tide, and the young lover who had taken his disappointment with
such fiery disdain. There rose before her, too, a memory of the
orange grove at sunset, and the generous anger which had burned
there for her rather than for himself. She knew well that most men
in his place would have given scant thought at such a time to any
one so insignificant as she had been, and therefore, remembering
his deep concern for the false position in which she was placed,
she had held Lennox Kyrle in grateful remembrance during all the
years since their one day of brief acquaintance.
Yet it was characteristic of the woman, as it had been
characteristic of the girl, to forget herself for others; and
so at this moment she was thinking less of herself and her own
singular connection with that past story, than of the two before
her, who had been lovers once and now were strangers. She was
wondering how they felt on meeting again face to face, and how much
or how little the memory of the past thrilled them. Fanny she knew
too well to expect any depth of feeling from her; but how was it
with Lennox Kyrle?
Meanwhile, amid all these memories, it was necessary that some one
should sustain conversation with the usual commonplaces; and of
this Mrs. Meredith was fortunately fully capable.
“I was never more surprised than when I looked up and saw Mr. Kyrle
a few minutes ago,” she said to Aimée. “And yet there was really no
reason to be surprised at all.”
“Not in these days, when everybody goes everywhere,” said Lennox,
“and the acquaintance one parted with in Europe yesterday, one
meets to-morrow in China. Especially a wanderer like myself may be
met anywhere.”
“You are a wanderer, then?” said Aimée.
“Yes,” he answered. “I am a person with whom you are intimately
acquainted--‘our special correspondent,’ and therefore my duties
take me to many places.”
“They have brought you to a very delightful place now,” said she.
“My own inclination has brought me here,” he replied, and as he
uttered the words he saw a quick flash of suspicion in Percy
Joscelyn’s eyes again.
“Have you been here long?” asked Fanny. “_We_ came about a week
ago; and we are doing our sight-seeing so leisurely that we have
hardly as yet seen anything at all, except what can be perceived
from a gondola.”
“I arrived only a day or two ago from Alexandria,” answered Kyrle,
“but I am inclined to think that, for a time, what one perceives
from a gondola--that is, Venice herself--may be best of all.”
“It is,” said Aimée. Upon which the young man beside her, speaking
for the first time, observed:
“It might be, if Venice were better preserved; but one grows tired
of looking at so much decay. In fact, in my opinion, we have been
here quite long enough.”
“Then, my dear Percy,” said Mrs. Meredith, coolly, “I advise you to
take your departure for any place that you like better, for we, who
have come to Venice for a month, mean to stay.”
It was not a very amiable glance which Mr. Joscelyn bestowed upon
the speaker, but he did not answer save by this glance. He turned
instead to Aimée, and said:
“We seem to have lost the rest of our party. Shall we not go and
look for them?”
Before Aimée could reply to this proposal, the entrance of a party
of four made reply unnecessary, for it was at once apparent that
these were the missing persons whom it was proposed to seek. Yet
they had the appearance themselves of seeking, rather than of
needing to be sought, for as they entered they all looked around,
and perceiving the group before the _Paradiso_, eagerly advanced
toward it.
The foremost of these newcomers was a tall, elaborately dressed
young lady--young, at least by courtesy--whose commonplace
prettiness was spoiled by an exceedingly artificial appearance and
manner. With her were a faded, languid, elderly woman, possessing
much natural elegance and traces of great beauty; a man of about
sixty, carefully got up with padding and hair-dye to look not more
than forty; and a rotund, florid, genial man of thirty-five or
thereabouts. As these advanced the young lady spoke:
“I thought we should never find you! Where have you been hiding
yourselves?”
“We have been hiding ourselves where you see us,” replied Mrs.
Meredith. “When I lose people, I always make a rule of quietly
sitting down and letting them find _me_, instead of running about
trying to find _them_. So I have been sitting here for half an hour
in a conspicuous position; and, as a reward, I have been found--not
only by you, but by an old acquaintance who has most unexpectedly
appeared.--Mrs. Joscelyn, let me present Mr. Kyrle.”
Mr. Kyrle bowed to the elderly lady, who at once put up her
eyeglass to examine him, with an alacrity which indicated that
his name was not unknown to her. He was then presented to Major
Joscelyn, to Miss Joscelyn and to Mr. Meredith; and he was aware of
being regarded with more or less active suspicion by all of them
except Miss Joscelyn, who smiled as graciously as women of her
order generally do upon an apparently eligible man.
“I--ah--hum--have heard of Mr. Kyrle,” observed Major Joscelyn, in
a tone which intimated that he had heard no good of Mr. Kyrle. Then
he fixed a pair of prominent eyes upon the young man and inquired
if he had been long in Venice.
“Only a few days,” Lennox answered, carelessly.
“Ah--a few days! And you are leaving soon?”
“That depends altogether upon circumstances,” replied Kyrle, who
in fact intended to leave in a day or two, but had no desire to
gratify Major Joscelyn by telling him so; for already he felt an
_animus_ of dislike against these people, not only because of
their attitude toward himself (for that, being the result of
misconception, only amused him), but from their appearance and
manner. “They are self-seeking and insincere,” was his judgment, as
his glance passed rapidly from face to face; and then, turning to
the lovely, candid countenance of Aimée, he thought, “She is like a
dove among hawks.”
Major Joscelyn giving no other reply to his last remark than a
disapproving “Hem!” Miss Joscelyn took up the conversation, and
remarked that Mr. Kyrle probably found Venice attractive.
“Very attractive--especially within the last half hour,” he
replied, with deliberate malice.
The Joscelyns looked at each other, while Mr. Meredith glanced at
his wife, and the latter said, quickly:
“Of course, it has become more attractive within the last half
hour. What is pleasanter than meeting old friends unexpectedly? Mr.
Kyrle is on his way to America from Egypt,” she added in general
explanation, “and it is the merest chance that we should have met
him.”
No one remarked that it was a fortunate chance. On the contrary,
silence appeared to indicate an altogether different opinion. After
a moment, Major Joscelyn observed that they had probably seen
enough of the Palace of the Doges for one morning, and that it was
time to think of returning to the hotel.
There was a general movement, and it is likely that Lennox would
have taken a final farewell of the party there and then, had not
Aimée turned to him with a smile sweet enough to atone for any
degree of incivility on the part of the others, saying, “And have
you, too, had enough of the Ducal Palace?”
“For the present,” he answered; and availing himself of what seemed
a tacit permission, he walked by her side as the party passed from
the great hall, along corridors and down staircases to the court
below.
Those few minutes completed the impression which she had already
made upon him; and an impression in which her beauty played a
small part in comparison with the gracious simplicity of her
manner and the charm of her voice and glance. There was much in
this voice and glance to remind him of the girl who had carried
Fanny Berrien’s message to him, who had so timidly offered him her
sympathy and compassion, and who had sat by his side under the
orange boughs. Yet, save in the dark sweetness of the eyes and the
gentle cadence of the tones, there was surely little in common
between that frightened child and this stately young lady.
If he had only known it, however, there was the great thing in
common that she was offering him now, the same sympathy that she
had offered then. She was too young, and of too limited experience,
to have learned the power of change which lies in time, and it
seemed to her that he must inevitably be deeply moved by such
an unexpected meeting with the woman he had once loved; and her
gentle kindness was the involuntary form in which she expressed
this feeling. But naturally no one could be aware of this--not even
Kyrle himself. He thought that she simply meant to atone for the
incivility of her friends; the latter cast alarmed glances upon one
another; and Fanny Meredith was no nearer the truth than any one
else, in saying to herself: “Aimée is certainly the best creature
in the world! She is throwing herself into the breach to prevent
Tom from being jealous.”
When they reached the Piazza there was a slight pause of the party,
and Kyrle felt that he was expected to take leave. “Since I have
been so fortunate this morning, I hope to be fortunate again,” he
said to Aimée in clearly audible tones. “I shall trust to have the
pleasure of meeting you again.”
“Oh, no doubt,” answered she, readily. “People who know each other
can not possibly fail to meet in Venice. But will you not come to
see us? We are at the Grand Hotel.--Fanny, surely you mean to ask
Mr. Kyrle to come to see you?”
“Mr. Kyrle knows that I shall be delighted to see him,” replied
Mrs. Meredith, “but really we are at home so seldom that it hardly
seems worth while to ask him to come. As you have just observed,
people _must_ meet when they are in Venice; and their best chance
to meet is away from home, rather than at home. Nevertheless, I
hope you will take the chance of finding us in,” said she, to
Kyrle.
“I shall prefer to take the chance of finding you elsewhere, since
you are more likely to be abroad,” replied he.
“And elsewhere is so much pleasanter than at home,” interposed Miss
Joscelyn. “The Belle Arti, now--have you been to the Belle Arti,
Mr. Kyrle?”
Mr. Kyrle replied that he had not. “I have not been sight-seeing
since my arrival,” he said, “but only lounging.”
“Oh, but you must certainly see the Belle Arti,” said the young
lady with animation. “You can have no idea of the Venetian school
of art until you have studied it there.”
“I have no doubt Mr. Kyrle is aware of that, Lydia,” said Fanny
Meredith, dryly; “but since we have exhaustively done the Belle
Arti--at least I hope we are done with it--he is not likely to meet
us there, and it was of meeting us that he was speaking.”
“It was certainly of meeting you that I was thinking,” said Lennox.
“Hum--ah!” said the major, addressing his party, “shall we move on?”
Kyrle watched them with a smile as they moved away across the
sunshiny square. He was saying to himself that it would go hard
with him if he did not see again the beautiful eyes he had been
looking into, and hear the sweet voice which had just bidden him
such a kindly adieu.