Thanks to the gossiping tongue of old Doctor Shirley, the interesting
news regarding Mrs. St. John speedily became a widespread and accepted
fact in society.
It was quite a nine days' wonder at first, and in connection with its
discussion a vast deal of speculation was indulged in regarding the
possible future of Mr. Howard Templeton, the fair and gilded youth whose
heritage might soon be wrested from him, leaving him to battle
single-handed with the world.
Before people had stopped wondering over it, Mrs. Egerton added her
quota to the excitement by the information that her niece, Mrs. St.
John, had gone abroad, taking her mother and sister with her.
_She_ had wanted Lora with _her_ that season--she had long ago promised
Mrs. Carroll to give Lora a season in the city--but the girl was so wild
over the idea of travel that Xenie had taken her with her for company,
acting on the advice of Doctor Shirley, who declared that change of
scene and cheerful company were actually essential to the preservation
of the young invalid's life.
The old doctor, when people interrogated him, confirmed Mrs. Egerton's
assertion.
He said that Mrs. St. John had fallen into a state of depression and
melancholy so deep as to threaten her health and even her life.
He had advocated an European tour as the most likely means of rousing
her from her grief and restoring her cheerful spirits, and she had
taken him at his word and gone.
So when Howard Templeton, who had gone down into the country on a little
mysterious mission of his own the day after his visit to Lora Carroll,
returned to the city, he was electrified by the announcement that Mrs.
St. John, with her mother and sister, had sailed for Europe two days
previous.
Howard was unfeignedly surprised and confounded at the news.
His face was a study for a physiognomist as he revolved it in his mind.
He went to his private room, ensconced himself in the easiest chair,
elevated his feet several degrees higher than his head, and with his
fair, clustering locks and bright, blue eyes half obscured in a cloud of
cigar smoke, tried to digest the astonishing fact which he had just
learned.
It did not take him long to do so.
The brain beneath the white brow and fair, clustering curls was a very
clear and lucid one.
He sprang to his feet at last, and said aloud:
"How clever she is, to be sure! It is the most natural thing in the
world and the easiest way of carrying out her daring scheme. How
perfectly it will smooth over everything."
He walked up and down the richly carpeted room in his blue Turkish silk
dressing-gown, his dark brows drawn together in a thoughtful frown, the
lights and shades of conflicting feelings faithfully mirrored on his
fair and handsome face.
"Why not?" he said, aloud, presently, as if discussing some vexed
problem with his inner consciousness. "Why not? I have as good a right
to follow as she had to go. I need have no compunctions about spending
Uncle John's money. The stroke of fate has not fallen yet. The fabled
sword of Damocles hangs suspended over my head, still it may never fall.
And in the meantime, why shouldn't I enjoy an European tour? I will, by
Jove, I'll follow my Lady Lora by the next steamer. And then--ah,
then--checkmate my lady."
He laughed grimly, and nodded at his full length reflection in the long
pier-glass at the end of the room.
Then after that moment of exultation a different mood seemed to come
over him. His handsome face became grave and even sad.
Throwing himself down carelessly upon a luxurious divan, he took up a
volume of poetry lying near and tried to lose himself in its pages.
"Alas! how easily things go wrong,
A sigh too much or a kiss too long--
And there follows a mist and a blushing rain,
And life is never the same again."
He read the words out moodily, then threw the book down impatiently upon
the floor.
"These foolish poets!" he said, half-angrily. "They seem always to be
aiming at the sore spots in a fellow's heart. How they rake over the
ashes of a dead love and strew them along one's path. Love! how strange
the word sounds now, when I hate _her_ so bitterly!"