Eliot was sitting on a low _tête-à-tête_. He moved aside slightly to
allow her room at his side.
But Una did not seem to see her husband's involuntary movement. She
went to the opposite side of the room and sat down by Edith, who, with
her brown hair and brown eyes, looked very pretty in garnet velvet
and cashmere daintily combined into a graceful dinner-dress. Maud was
buried in a book on the other side of her, but she had taken time to
honor the new arrivals by putting on her best black silk with a white
lace fichu to relieve its somber tone.
Vivacious Edith exclaimed instantly:
"Oh, Una, the pretty flowers that Eliot brought you--you have forgotten
to wear them. Shall I run and get them for you?"
"Thank you--but no," as Edith rose. "I don't care for them. I--I have
given them away."
Eliot had heard distinctly the question and answer; but there was no
time for comment. Ida Hayes sailed in--a bisque doll in Nile-green silk
and velvet, with Eliot's roses pinned among the laces of her V-shaped
corsage.
"And to think that I went without cigars two days to buy Ida Hayes a
corsage bouquet!" he said, ruefully, to himself.
But the loss of the cigars was the least part of his mortification.
He had fancied he was winning his way to his girl-bride's heart. This
little incident showed him clearly his mistake.
"She is not learning to love me. Perhaps she never will," he thought,
gloomily.
Ida Hayes, with the best grace in the world, sat down on the
_tête-à-tête_ beside him. She was a belle and a beauty--had been for
seven years, ever since she left the school-room at eighteen--and she
could have been married well long ago, but she had seen no one she
fancied until she met Eliot Van Zandt at her sister's wedding three
years ago. Since then her heart, as well as Sylvie's, had been set on
an alliance with him, and his marriage had been a bitter blow to her
self-love.
But she was a society woman. She did not wear her heart on her sleeve,
and in the clear, pale-blue eyes upraised to his Eliot Van Zandt read
no sign of her disappointed hopes.
"I see you looking at my flowers. That dear little thing, your wife,
gave them to me," she said, carelessly.
He answered as carelessly:
"Yes, and they harmonize well with your dress."
But in his heart he longed to tear them from her breast and trample
them beneath his feet. They had taught him a bitter lesson--one he
would not soon forget.
Dinner was announced, and he took Ida into the dining-room. Bryant gave
Sylvie his arm, and Una followed with her sisters-in-law, hiding with a
smile her pain at the preference Eliot had shown Miss Hayes.
"How he must hate me, for he can not help thinking that but for me he
would not have lost her. It was right to give her the flowers. She had
really the best right to them," she said miserably to herself.
The flowers, the lights, the china and silver of the well-appointed
table flashed confusedly before her eyes. She could see nothing clearly
but the pretty wax-doll face of Miss Hayes as she sat opposite to Eliot
and talked to him incessantly.
Glancing up and down the long table at the fair faces of the five
ladies, she said, gayly:
"Two gentlemen and five ladies! Only two have cavaliers. There are
three of us too many."
Una thought, with keen shame and inexpressible bitterness:
"Only one too many, and that one is poor little me!"
She made a great effort to eat, and swallowed some food, although it
half choked her; but as soon as they rose from the table she slipped
away and went up to the school-room, where Mrs. Wilson, whose impaired
digestion abhorred late dinners, was placidly taking some milk and
oatmeal by way of supper.
"Oh, my dear, have you got a fever? Your eyes shine so brightly, and
your cheeks are quite flushed!" exclaimed the good governess, anxiously.
"I am not sick; I dare say I am excited. There is company, you know,
and I thought I should not be missed if I stole away up here with you,"
Una answered, with affected carelessness.
Mrs. Wilson smiled on her pupil, and answered, kindly:
"I'm glad you came, dear; but, of course, you will be missed. Your
husband would miss you, if there was a room full of company."
Una answered in a strange tone:
"No, not to-night; for Miss Ida Hayes is there."
Mrs. Wilson put down her glass of milk and looked curiously at the
speaker. She began to comprehend the cause of her strange looks and
words. She said to herself:
"This pretty little girl-bride has grown jealous of some meaningless
attention of Eliot to Miss Hayes. She loves her husband, and the boy is
somehow too stupid to see it, or, perhaps, he does not care. I would
speak to him, but I do not like to meddle in so delicate an affair."
Aloud, she said gently:
"I like to have you up here with me, but your husband and friends
will think I am selfish, dear; so you had better go back to the
drawing-room. Miss Ida Hayes is not charming enough to make up to Eliot
for your absence."
Una turned around suddenly and looked at her gravely.
"Very well, then; I will go, since you don't want me; but I shall go to
my own room," she said.
And she did, and there Edith found her, pretending to read, when she
came to seek her half an hour later.
"You selfish child! put down your book. We are going to have some
music, and we want your alto," she said.
"I can not sing to-night; my head aches," Una answered; and none of
Edith's arguments could alter her refusal. She was obliged to go down
alone and make excuses for her sister-in-law.
"She has a headache, and can not come down," she said; and Sylvie
laughed in her sleeve.
"She is jealous of Ida," she thought, maliciously.