A PERFECTLY HAPPY WOMAN.
"They would never dare do it," Lord Chandos repeated to himself with a
laugh of contempt. Set his marriage aside. They were mad to think of
such a thing.
From time to time strange-looking documents came to him; he thrust them
aside without even looking at them. He only laughed at the notion. Part
him from Leone. It was not in the power of any one on earth to do it. He
never mentioned the matter to Leone at all; it was not worth while to
disturb her.
They had been to Richmond, and had found there a villa so beautiful it
seemed to have been built for them--a quaint, picturesque, old English
house, full of pretty nooks and corners, with large latticed windows,
over which roses and jasmine hung in abundance; a smooth, green lawn on
which stood a superb cedar-tree; beautiful grounds that reached down to
the river. The views from the windows were superb. It was worth anything
to stand on that green lawn and watch the sunset on the Thames.
Leone was delighted with it; she had never dreamed of a home so
beautiful. Lord Chandos furnished it with the utmost luxury, and there
the first few happy months of their life was spent. Lord Chandos did not
wish exactly that his marriage should be kept secret, but he did not
want it known to the world in general until his mother was willing to
introduce and receive his wife.
To Leone that life that opened to her was like a heaven on earth; her
husband surrounded her with "kind observances;" he purchased for her a
wardrobe that was a marvel of beauty and elegance; he found a French
lady's-maid, who understood all the duties of the toilet. What was more,
he had the best masters in London to instruct her. Her voice was one of
the finest ever heard, her taste for music so great that she was soon
proficient.
He taught her himself to ride. There was one thing singular, every
master who attended her was aware of a great hidden power within her,
they said among each other that she was something wonderful--that the
world would hear of her some day. There was an innate sense of power, a
grand dramatic instinct, a keen sense of everything beautiful, noble and
great. There were times when an electric flash of genius made them
marvel.
"It is a thousand pities," said the music-master to himself, "that she
has married a nobleman. If she had been dependent on her own exertions,
I could have made her one of the finest singers in the world."
Again, the drawing-master said:
"If I had the training of Lady Chandos I would make her the finest
artist in England."
None of them had discovered the real secret of her genius, or what was
the true fire that every now and then seemed to brighten them all as it
flashed over them.
A few weeks completely changed her; she had that keen, quick insight
into everything, that wondrous tact and intelligence which make some
women seem as though they were magicians.
When she went first to River View, she had some traces of her rustic
training. Before six weeks had passed over it had all disappeared. Lord
Chandos himself had taught her; her intonation and accent were clear and
refined, her words well chosen, her expressions always poetical and full
of grace; no one meeting her then could have told that she had spent her
life in the rural shades of Rashleigh.
New beauty came to her with this development of mind; new, spiritual,
poetical loveliness; and Lord Chandos, looking at his peerless young
wife, felt always quite confident that when his mother saw her all would
be well--she would be proud of her.
While Leone seemed to have gone straight to heaven, she could not
realize that this was the same life she rebelled against with such
fierce rebellion. Now the days were not long enough to hold in them all
the happiness that fell to her share. The birds woke her with their
singing; the sun with its shining; another beautiful day had dawned for
her--a day that was full of beauty and love. They passed like a dream.
She took breakfast always with her husband; perhaps the happiest hour of
the day was that. The windows of the pretty breakfast-room looked over a
wilderness of flowers; the windows were always open. The soft, sweet
summer air came in, parting the long, white curtains, bringing with it
the breath of roses and the odor of a hundred flowers.
She looked as fresh and fair as the morning itself. Lord Chandos
wondered more and more at her radiant loveliness. Her soul was awake
now, and looked out of her dark eyes into the world she found so
beautiful.
Then Lord Chandos went up to town for a few hours, while Leone took her
different lessons and studied. They met again at lunch, and they spent
the afternoon out-of-doors. An ideal life--an idyl in itself. Leone,
while she lived, retained a vivid remembrance of those afternoons, of
the shade of the deep woods, of the ripple of the river through the
green banks, of the valleys where flowers and ferns grew, of the long
alleys where the pleasant shade made a perfect paradise. She remembered
them--the golden glow, the fragrance, the music of them, remained with
her until she died. All the most pleasant times of our lives are dreams.
Then they dined together; and in the evening Lord Chandos took his
beautiful young wife to the opera or the play, to concert or lecture.
"As soon as I am of age," he would say, "I shall take you on the
Continent; there is no education we get like that we get by traveling
one year on the Continent; and you will be at home on every subject,
Leone," he would say; and Leone longed for the time to come.
"When I am of age," was his universal cry.
When Leone expressed any anxiety or sorrow over his separation from his
parents, he would laugh and answer:
"Never mind, my darling, it will be all right when I am of age. Never
mind, darling, you will have my mother asking for the pleasure of
knowing you then--the tables will be turned; let the great world once
see you, and you will be worshiped for your beauty, your grace, and your
talent."
She looked wistfully at him.
"Do they love beauty so much in your world, Lance?" she asked.
"Yes, as a rule, a beautiful face has a wonderful influence. I have
known women without a tithe of your beauty, Leone, rise from quite
third-rate society to find a place among the most exclusive and noblest
people in the land. Your face would win for you, darling, an entrance
anywhere."
"The only thing I want my face to do," she said, "is to please your
mother."
"And that, when she sees it, it is quite sure to do," replied the
lover-husband.
"Lance," said Lady Chandos, "what shall we do if your parents will
neither forgive us nor see us?"
"It will be very uncomfortable," said Lord Chandos; "but we shall have
to bear it. It will not much matter so far as worldly matters are
concerned; when I am of age I shall have a separate and very handsome
fortune of my own. My mother will soon want to know you when you become
the fashion--as you will, Leone."
So she dismissed the future from her mind. She would not think of it.
She had blind reliance, blind confidence in her husband; he seemed so
carelessly happy and indifferent she could not think there was anything
vitally wrong. She was so unutterably happy, so wonderfully, thoroughly
happy. Her life was a poem, the sweetest love-story ever written or
sung.
"Why am I so happy?" she would ask herself at times; "why has Heaven
given me so much? all I ever asked for--love and happiness?"
She did not know how to be grateful enough.
One morning in autumn, a warm, beautiful morning, when the sun shone on
the rich red and brown foliage--they were out together on the fair
river--the tide was rising and the boat floated lazily on the stream.
Lady Chandos wore a beautiful dress of amber and black that suited her
dark, brilliant beauty to perfection. She lay back among the velvet
cushions, smiling as her eyes lingered on the sky, the trees, the
stream.
"You look very happy, Leone," said Lord Chandos.
"I am very happy," she replied. "I wrote to my uncle yesterday, Lance. I
should like to send him a box filled with everything he likes best."
"You shall, if it pleases you, my darling," he answered.
She leaned over the side of the boat watching the water, drawing her
hand through the clear stream.
"Happy," she repeated, rather to herself than to him; "I can safely say
this, that I have had so much happiness since I have been here that if I
were wretched all my life afterward I should still have had far more
happiness than falls to the lot of many people."
She remembered those words in after years; and she owned to herself that
they had been most perfectly true.
The few months passed at River View had been most perfectly happy--no
shade of care had come over her, no doubt, no fear--nothing that chilled
the warmth of her love, nothing that marred its perfect trust. In some
lives there comes a pause of silent, intense bliss just before the
storm, even as the wind rests before the hurricane.
"You make me very proud, Leone," said Lord Chandos, "when you tell me of
your happiness; I can only say may it be like the light of heaven,
eternal."