Alone in her rooms in Paris, Lady Jean sits perplexing herself over
ways and means. She is awfully in debt, even though she has let the
country-house, and supplemented her income by another five hundred a
year. She is angry with herself for having refused Sir Francis'
assistance and too proud to call him to her side. She can think of
no scheme by which to baffle Lauraine, and though she knows her rival
is condemned to a species of exile, and that she is as unhappy as a
woman can well be, that in no way comforts her for the fact of her
own defeat.
Her position is full of peril and uncertainty. She can no longer
float on the smooth waters of Society, for Society is shocked and
outraged by her husband's misdeeds, and an ill odour clings to her
name. The people she gathers round her now are not at all the class
of people she prefers. Needy foreigners, second-rate celebrities;
Englishmen with shady reputations and tarnished titles; French
Bohemians who have known and admired her in the days of her
success--all these congregate together at her little rooms in the Rue
Victoire; and among them all she looks for some willing tool who will
lend himself to her hand and work out her schemes.
But for long she looks in vain.
The winter passes on. The cool, fresh days of early spring are
heralded by bursts of sunshine, by the tender budding leafage of the
Boulevards, by the scents and hues of flowers that are piled up in
the baskets of the market women, and fill the windows of the
_fleuristes_ with brilliance and beauty once again. And in the
springtime, suddenly and without warning, Lady Jean's scheme of
vengeance comes to her as a vision of possibility at last, for who
should come to Paris but Keith Athelstone.
He has been wintering in the south of France. He comes to the gay
city with no set purpose, or desire. He is alone, and melancholy,
and depressed. He thinks he will have a fortnight in Paris, and then
start for that long-projected American tour, and the first person he
sees and greets in Paris is the Lady Jean.
She has never been a favourite of his, and he is inclined to be curt
and avoid her. But she had other schemes in her head, and, unless a
man is absolutely discourteous, it is not easy for him to baffle a
woman who has set her mind upon deluding him, especially a woman
clever and keen as the Lady Jean.
She is very quiet, very subdued. All the fastness and wildness seem
to have evaporated. She tells him of her bereavement, her troubles.
She speaks sympathizingly of his own, and brings in Lauraine's name
so gently and gradually that he cannot take alarm at it. In the end
he accepts an invitation to her house. And finds everything so
subdued, so decorous, in such perfect good taste, that he thinks Lady
Jean's widowhood has produced most salutary effects.
In his present mood gaiety and fastness would have jarred upon, and
disgusted him. As it is, all is toned down, chastened, soothing, and
in perfect taste. He comes again, and yet again. Lady Jean keeps
the foreigners, and shady adventurers, and the Bohemian element
carefully out of his sight, and she herself treats him with that
consideration and deference always flattering to a young man's
feeling when displayed by a woman older than himself, and still
beautiful. She mentions the Vavasours casually, Lauraine as being
immersed in worldly gaieties. Sir Francis as being abroad at Monte
Carlo. The latter fact is true, he having proceeded there in disgust
at her obstinacy and coldness, and yet not liking to break with her
entirely, because she happens to be the only woman of whom he has
never tired.
The fortnight passes, and Keith still lingers. Life has no special
object for him at present. The spring has turned cold and bleak, and
the American tour may await his own convenience.
One evening he comes to Lady Jean by special invitation. There are a
few people there; there is a little music, and a little "play," not
very high, not very alarming; but Keith refuses it for a reason that
no one there guesses. Play had been a passion with him once. Its
dangerous excitement had lured him into the most terrible scrape of
that "wild youth" to which Mrs. Douglas is so fond of alluding. Once
free of that early trouble, he had solemnly promised Lauraine never
to touch card or dice again, and he has kept his word. Lady Jean
does not press him, though she looks surprised at his refusal. She
sits with him in a dim corner of the room, and lures him on to talk
to her as he has done of late.
Watching them with anger and suspicion are two fierce eyes, the eyes
of a certain Count Karolyski, of whom no one knows anything except
that he is a Hungarian, an expert card player, and a deadly shot.
The count is a devoted admirer of the Lady Jean's. The Count has
been first in favour with her for months past, and the Count looks
with extreme wrath on this young stripling who appears to have
supplanted him, and who is so serenely unconscious of the fact.
The refusal to play irritates him still more. He knows Keith is very
rich, and had hoped to revenge his wounded feelings by fleecing him
with ease. Keith has frustrated this agreeable project and that fact
rankles in the Count's breast, beneath the expanse of white linen and
glittering orders that adorn it so lavishly. The evening goes on.
Wine is handed round and freely drunk. A little more noise and
freedom than usual pervade the pretty, gilded rooms. Lady Jean gets
somewhat uneasy. She contrives to get rid of Keith; it does not suit
her purpose that he should think of her as anything but highly
decorous. When he leaves and she comes back, Count Karolyski throws
down his cards, declaring he is tired of play, and comes over to her
side.
"You are cruel, madame," he says in French. "You have deserted us
the whole evening."
She throws herself back in her chair with a little laugh. "Cruel!
You had better amusement than my company."
"Amusement! It is not that," he says, with an ardent glance from his
dark, flashing eyes. "You are cold--fickle. You are breaking my
heart for the sake of that American boy."
She interrupts him with pretended indignation. "Count, you forget
yourself! I permit no one to arraign my actions."
"Far be it from me to do that. I would not offend you for worlds,
madame; but I cannot refrain from expressing my feelings when I see
your old friends thrust aside and forgotten, for sake of a beardless
youth to whom Fortune has been kinder than to us."
"I do not forget my friends," says Lady Jean, with a quick glance;
"and I am only civil to this boy because he is friendless and alone,
and I took pity on his solitude."
"Your pity, madame, may be a dangerous favour. To those whom you
really compassionate, exclusion would be the greater mercy."
"Every one is not as foolish as yourself, Count," she says with a
soft glance.
It is pleasant to hear she is still beautiful--still can play the
part of an "apple of discord" to men.
"Because, perhaps, 'every one' has not found your presence what I
have found it."
"Hush!" she says softly; "you are talking folly, and you know it.
The days are over when I believed in compliments."
"You do not suppose I am insulting you by anything so commonplace?
Compliment is the language of fools and flatterers. I am speaking
the plain unvarnished truth."
"Truth!" and she laughs lightly; "who speaks the truth now? It is as
old-fashioned a virtue as honesty."
"Unless one finds it impossible to act indifference."
"Come, Count," she says good-humouredly, "we know each other too well
to talk in this strain. We are all _bons camarades_ here; no
sentiment, and no seriousness. I gave you credit for more sense than
to fear you would break through the rule."
His brows contract with a sudden angry frown.
"You do not mean what you say! A woman like yourself cannot set
bounds to a man's admiration, or check his feelings by ridicule. I
have scoffed at sentiment all my life as a thing fit only for boys
and women. But all that I have hitherto disdained has amply revenged
my past indifference. And you--you have not discouraged me, madame?"
Her heart beats high. A sudden warm colour comes into her face
beneath its delicate rouge; but not from any gratification at the
homage--not for any reason that makes him interpret these signs as
flattering to himself. Only because she sees herself a step further
on the road of her vengeance--only because triumph whispers to her
that the end is not far off.
She rises after those last words, laughing still. "I do not believe
in love, monsieur, any more than yourself. No one has been able to
convert me. To parody an old saying, with me it is only a case of
'_La reine s'amuse_.'"
"And is this boy only a plaything also?" he says, with an angry sneer.
"Of course. Is he not a charming one?" she says with sudden gravity.
"So earnest and credulous; quite refreshing. We have so long passed
that stage of life, _nous autres_."
"With women like yourself for teachers is that a matter of wonder,
madame?"
"Now you are sarcastic, and that is horrid. Why, Count, I do believe
you are jealous of my pretty boy! I thought you were wiser than
that."
And laughing her soft, amused laughter, she passes on into the
card-room, leaving him standing there with the mellow lamplight on
his dark, passionate face, and shining in the lurid depths of his
eyes. At that moment he hates her and himself, and hates tenfold
more the man he has chosen to consider as his rival.
It had been true, as he had said, that he had deemed himself above
all such weaknesses, until the fascination of this woman had entered
into his life and fired his soul with a passion, sudden, wild,
fierce, and absorbing even as it was revengeful. To win her he would
have done much. He was not a poor man, though far from being rich,
as Lady Jean counted riches. Still he was of good birth, and boasted
of pure Magyar descent, and had noble and ancient estates in Hungary,
and thought himself no ill match for the daughter of a poor Irish
Earl. But that Lady Jean should encourage his homage and then
ridicule it, filled him with fierce anger.
He leaves her room that night with a cold farewell, and for two days
does not approach her at all.
Lady Jean is amused. It is what she expected, and she does not
resent it. She sees Keith daily now--in fact, takes care that she
shall see him, for she is not desirous that he should escape her
toils.
Against his judgment, against his better reason, Keith Athelstone
submits to her caprices and permits her to draw him to her presence.
He is unfortunately in that state of mind in which a man is easily
influenced by a woman if she is sympathetic, friendly, and appears
interested in him. At present nothing seems of much consequence or
account. The fierce suffering of the last two years has been lulled
into a sort of quiescence. The good resolutions formed during that
period of languor and convalescence have taken just sufficient root
to strengthen him as far as Lauraine is concerned, and with that
self-sacrifice they end.
Life looks very monotonous, very dreary at present, and there is just
a little fillip given to its monotony by Lady Jean. It is not that
he likes her--it is not that he respects her, but he drifts into a
sort of intimacy before he really knows it, and she is always at hand
to sustain her influence. And it so happens that all this comes to
the ears of Lauraine, filtered through the letters of mutual friends,
put in as spice to various gossip detailed to her from Paris.
At first she cannot believe it. It seems too horrible; but
unfortunately a letter comes from Lady Etwynde, radiant in the flush
and glory of her matronly honours, and revelling in Paris delights
with her handsome husband; and that letter mentions casually the same
thing. "Keith Athelstone has been driving in the Bois with Lady
Jean;" "I have met Keith, and asked him to dinner, but he excused
himself on the plea of a previous engagement with Lady Jean," etc.,
etc.
Lady Etwynde tells her this, thinking it may really keep her from
brooding over the idea that she has ruined her young lover's life;
but had she known the torture it would have inflicted, she would have
been silent on the subject.
Lady Etwynde's idea of Keith Athelstone has always been that he is
selfish and inconsiderate, and that Lauraine is quite thrown away
upon him; she feels convinced now of her own sagacity when she sees
how foolish is his conduct. She herself takes no notice of Lady
Jean, and when Keith excuses himself to her on the plea before
mentioned, she feels disgusted and annoyed, and tells her husband she
will have nothing more to say to the young man. She would have been
civil to him for Lauraine's sake, but if he prefers Lady Jean, why to
Lady Jean let him go.
"I knew he would never be constant," she says complainingly.
"Really, men are too horrible."
"With one exception," smiles Colonel Carlisle, looking proudly at the
bright, petulant face, that seems to have regained all its old
sparkling witchery and youthfulness with the "old" happiness.
"Ah, Cyril, there is no one like you!" she answers.
"My darling," he says. "Every woman says that of the man she loves,
and every man of the woman. I think you are hard upon poor Keith.
Fancy, to love a woman with all one's heart and soul, and know she
can be nothing to one. Ah heaven! how fatal a thing is marriage
sometimes--how _sure_ one ought to be of oneself before entering into
a life-long union."
"_We_ are sure!" she murmurs, softly nestling closer in his arms, as
they stand side by side in the twilight shadows.
"Thank God, we are!" he says, with passionate earnestness. "But
often and often I think, if it had not been for the sins and follies
of the past--for the wrong and the suffering--our love would never
have been as deep and intense a thing as it is. I shall never forget
those years, and how hopelessly our lives seemed severed--with what
reluctance I came home to England--how I dreaded to hear you were
another's--and then----"
"After all I was your own," she whispers.
"And we are so happy," he resumes presently. "Are we not, my queen
of æsthetes?"
She laughs a little tremulously. "Indeed, yes; but I fear, dearest,
the queen has sadly neglected her subjects. Women's missions are all
very well until men interfere with them. Then there is a lamentable
failure of all the grand schemes and projects."
"A woman's first mission is to love her husband and make his home a
paradise," answers Colonel Carlisle. "I am not great at poetry, as
you know, but I own to an admiration of those lines of Tennyson in
'The Princess.' You know them:
For woman is not undevelopt man,
But diverse; could we make her as the man
Sweet Love were slain; his dearest bond is this,
Not like to like, but like in difference.
Yet in the long years liker must they grow--
The man be more of woman, she of man.
* * * * *
Till at the last she sets herself to man,
Like perfect music unto noble words."
"Yes," she says. "They are very true, although a man wrote them."
"Don't you believe our sex understands yours, then?" he asks
teasingly.
"No; I do not," she says decidedly. "I think no man yet ever quite
comprehended a woman's nature, any more, perhaps, than we comprehend
a man's. I think that is how we so often mistake and misjudge each
other. We expect a man to act as we would act, and he expects us to
act as he would; and that can never be. Another thing: we have such
quick instincts, and are governed so often by sympathy or antipathy;
you are slow in your judgment, and _reason_ where we act."
"Yes," he answers thoughtfully; "but contrast is the salt of life, my
darling. We should not find any attraction in each other if we were
quite alike, and regulated our lives and actions on the same
principles. But to return to our subject. I am certain Lady Jean is
up to some mischief, and I would give anything in the world to get
Keith Athelstone away from her influence. What _can_ possess him to
be always there?"
"Not always, dear," says his wife rebukingly. "Three times within a
fortnight. I cannot understand it myself. I should like to give him
a hint, but I am afraid. He might take offence, and I know what men
are. Warn them against a woman, and they immediately run after her;
try to turn them from a purpose, and they throw themselves heart and
soul into it."
"You should treat them as the Irishman did his pigs--drive them one
way and turn their heads another," laughs Colonel Carlisle. "But you
surely don't imagine he cares about Lady Jean?"
"No; I give him credit for better sense. But she is a dangerous
woman, and I am certain has some purpose in view. I know she hates
Lauraine; I am equally certain that she knows of Keith's infatuation
for her, and I feel convinced she is trying to work some mischief.
You remember her plot about getting him to Falcon's Chase?"
"Yes. That was a piece of devilry, and no mistake. I have thought
more of the young fellow since his refusal than ever I did before."
"Keith is a strange character," says Lady Etwynde; "so headstrong and
passionate, yet so loving and true; so wild, and yet so easily
controlled; so selfish, and yet so weak. Lauraine has a great
influence over him--more than any one else has, I think. I believe
when once she made him see things in their true light, once she
showed him that the love that would dishonour a woman is the last
love worthy of her acceptance, he would turn from what even seemed
her own tempting. But he must have known it could not be that."
"Lauraine is a good, true woman, though she has made a fatal mistake
in life, and now it is too late to remedy it," says the Colonel
regretfully. "What sad words those are, 'too late!' Just to have
missed all that makes life desirable, just to meet and love, and find
that Fate has placed an impassable barrier between you and that love.
Ah, me!"
"Don't sigh!" whispers his wife tenderly. "Our 'too late' was just
in time after all."
"Thank God for that!"
"I do," she answers fervently. "But how my own happiness makes me
regret her loss! I never thought I could love any woman so dearly as
I love Lauraine; and I feel, oh! so sorry for her now!"
"So do I--for Keith."
"And you think we can do nothing?"
"I fear not. It is a delicate matter. He may be only striving for
forgetfulness after all. Men do foolish and desperate things
sometimes for love's sake."
"That is one of the things we women who love you can't understand,"
says Lady Etwynde. "To us those excesses to which we are accused of
driving you seem degrading and contemptible. We can only excuse sins
that are not against ourselves, I suppose."
"Doubtless it looks cowardly," says her husband, "to fling away our
self-respect because something has not been as we wished it; but then
that something is worth everything else in the world, or we think so,
and losing it, all else seems of no account."
"In that respect we set you an example, do we not?" laughs his wife.
"We don't go to perdition because we are disappointed in love."
"Because your natures are so different. The same rule cannot apply
to a man and a woman. I thought we had agreed on that before," says
Colonel Carlisle.
"So we had. Instance Keith and Lauraine."
"And my lady and--myself."
And he bends down and kisses the sweet red lips.
That closes the argument. They forget all about Keith and Lauraine;
they talk now of their own love, and of each other.