Pluma could not help but smile at the ardent delight depicted in Daisy"s face.
"I am afraid I can not stay," she said, doubtfully, glancing down in dismay at the pink-and-white muslin she wore. "Every one would be sure to laugh at me who saw me. Then I would wish I had not stayed."
"Suppose I should give you one to wear--that white mull, for instance--how would you like it? None of the guests would see you,"
replied Pluma.
There was a wistful look in Daisy"s eyes, as though she would fain believe what she heard was really true.
"Would you really?" asked Daisy, wonderingly. "You, whom people call so haughty and so proud--you would really let me wear one of your dresses? I do not know how to tell you how much I am pleased!" she said, eagerly.
Pluma Hurlhurst laughed. Such rapture was new to her.
The night which drew its mantle over the smiling earth was a perfect one. Myriads of stars shone like jewels in the blue sky, and not a cloud obscured the face of the clear full moon. Hurlhurst Plantation was ablaze with colored lamps that threw out soft rainbow tints in all directions as far as the eye could reach. The interior of Whitestone Hall was simply dazzling in its rich rose bloom, its lights, its fountains, and rippling music from adjoining ferneries.
In an elegant apartment of the Hall Basil Hurlhurst, the recluse invalid, lay upon his couch, trying to shut out the mirth and gayety that floated up to him from below. As the sound of Pluma"s voice sounded upon his ear he turned his face to the wall with a bitter groan. "She is so like--" he muttered, grimly. "Ah! the pleasant voices of our youth turn into lashes which scourge us in our old age.
"Like mother, like child.""
The lawn fete was a grand success; the _elite_ of the whole country round were gathered together to welcome the beautiful, peerless hostess of Whitestone Hall. Pluma moved among her guests like a queen, yet in all that vast throng her eyes eagerly sought one face. "Where was Rex?" was the question which constantly perplexed her. After the first waltz he had suddenly disappeared. Only the evening before handsome Rex Lyon had held her jeweled hand long at parting, whispering, in his graceful, charming way, he had something to tell her on the morrow. "Why did he hold himself so strangely aloof?" Pluma asked herself, in bitter wonder. Ah! had she but known!
While Pluma, the wealthy heiress, awaited his coming so eagerly, Rex Lyon was standing, quite lost in thought, beside a rippling fountain in one of the most remote parts of the lawn, thinking of Daisy Brooks.
He had seen a fair face--that was all--a face that embodied his dream of loveliness, and without thinking of it found his fate, and the whole world seemed changed for him.
Handsome, impulsive Rex Lyon, owner of several of the most extensive and lucrative orange groves in Florida, would have bartered every dollar of his worldly possessions for love.
He had hitherto treated all notion of love in a very off-hand, cavalier fashion.
"Love is fate," he had always said. He knew Pluma loved him. Last night he had said to himself: The time had come when he might as well marry; it might as well be Pluma as any one else, seeing she cared so much for him. Now all that was changed. "I sincerely hope she will not attach undue significance to the words I spoke last evening," he mused.
Rex did not care to return again among the throng; it was sweeter far to sit there by the murmuring fountain dreaming of Daisy Brooks, and wondering when he should see her again. A throng which did not hold the face of Daisy Brooks had no charm for Rex.
Suddenly a soft step sounded on the gra.s.s; Rex"s heart gave a sudden bound; surely it could not be--yes, it was--Daisy Brooks.
She drew back with a startled cry as her eyes suddenly encountered those of her hero of the morning. She would have fled precipitately had he not stretched out his hand quickly to detain her.
"Daisy," cried Rex, "why do you look so frightened? Are you displeased to see me?"
"No," she said. "I--I--do not know--"
She looked so pretty, so bewildered, so dazzled by joy, yet so pitifully uncertain, Rex was more desperately in love with her than ever.
"Your eyes speak, telling me you _are_ pleased, Daisy, even if your lips _refuse_ to tell me so. Sit down on this rustic bench, Daisy, while I tell you how anxiously I awaited your coming--waited until the shadows of evening fell."
As he talked to her he grew more interested with every moment. She had no keen intellect, no graceful powers of repartee, knew little of books or the great world beyond. Daisy was a simple, guileless child of nature.
Rex"s vanity was gratified at the unconscious admiration which shone in her eyes and the blushes his words brought to her cheeks.
"There is my favorite waltz, Daisy," he said, as the music of the irresistible "Blue Danube" floated out to them. "Will you favor me with a waltz?"
"Miss Pluma would be so angry," she murmured.
"Never mind her anger, Daisy. I will take all the blame on _my_ shoulders. They are unusually broad, you see."
He led her half reluctant among the gay throng; gentlemen looked at one another in surprise. Who is she? they asked one of the other, gazing upon her in wonder. No one could answer. The sweet-faced little maiden in soft, floating white, with a face like an angel"s, who wore no other ornament than her crown of golden hair, was a mystery and a novelty. In all the long years of her after life Daisy never forgot that supremely blissful moment. It seemed to her they were floating away into another sphere. Rex"s arms were around her, his eyes smiling down into hers; he could feel the slight form trembling in his embrace, and he clasped her still closer. With youth, music, and beauty--there was nothing wanting to complete the charm of love.
Leaning gracefully against an overarching palm-tree stood a young man watching the pair with a strange intentness; a dark, vindictive smile hovered about the corners of his mouth, hidden by his black mustache, and there was a cruel gleam in the dark, wicked eyes scanning the face of the young girl so closely.
"Ah! why not?" he mused. "It would be a glorious revenge." He made his way hurriedly in the direction of his young hostess, who was, as usual, surrounded by a group of admirers. A deep crimson spot burned on either cheek, and her eyes glowed like stars, as of one under intense, suppressed excitement.
Lester Stanwick made his way to her side just as the last echo of the waltz died away on the air, inwardly congratulating himself upon finding Rex and Daisy directly beside him.
"Miss Pluma," said Stanwick, with a low bow, "will you kindly present me to the little fairy on your right? I am quite desperately smitten with her."
Several gentlemen crowded around Pluma asking the same favor.
With a smile and a bow, what could Rex do but lead Daisy gracefully forward. Those who witnessed the scene that ensued never forgot it.
For answer Pluma Hurlhurst turned coldly, haughtily toward them, drawing herself up proudly to her full height.
"There is evidently some mistake here," she said, glancing scornfully at the slight, girlish figure leaning upon Rex Lyon"s arm. "I do not recognize this person as a guest. If I mistake not, she is one of the hirelings connected with the plantation."
If a thunderbolt had suddenly exploded beneath Rex"s feet he could not have been more thoroughly astounded.
Daisy uttered a piteous little cry and, like a tender flower cut down by a sudden, rude blast, would have fallen at his feet had he not reached out his arm to save her.
"Miss Hurlhurst," cried Rex, in a voice husky with emotion, "I hold myself responsible for this young lady"s presence here. I--"
"Ah!" interrupts Pluma, ironically; "and may I ask by what right you force one so inferior, and certainly obnoxious, among us?"
Rex Lyon"s handsome face was white with rage. "Miss Hurlhurst," he replied, with stately dignity, "I regret, more than the mere words express, that my heedlessness has brought upon this little creature at my side an insult so cruel, so unjust, and so bitter, in simply granting my request for a waltz--a request very reluctantly granted.
An invited guest among you she may not be; but I most emphatically defy her inferiority to any lady or gentleman present."
"Rex--Mr. Lyon," says Pluma, icily, "you forget yourself."
He smiled contemptuously. "I do not admit it," he said, hotly. "I have done that which any gentleman should have done; defended from insult one of the purest and sweetest of maidens. I will do more--I will shield her, henceforth and forever, with my very life, if need be. If I can win her, I shall make Daisy Brooks my wife."
Rex spoke rapidly--vehemently. His chivalrous soul was aroused; he scarcely heeded the impetuous words that fell from his lips. He could not endure the thought that innocent, trusting little Daisy should suffer through any fault of his.
"Come, Daisy," he said, softly, clasping in his own strong white ones the little fingers clinging so pitifully to his arm, "we will go away from here at once--our presence longer is probably obnoxious.
Farewell, Miss Hurlhurst."
"Rex," cried Pluma, involuntarily taking a step forward, "you do not, you can not mean what you say. You will not allow a creature like that to separate us--you have forgotten, Rex. You said you had something to tell me. You will not part with me so easily," she cried.
A sudden terror seized her at the thought of losing him. He was her world. She forgot the guests gathering about her--forgot she was the wealthy, courted heiress for whose glance or smiles men sued in vain--forgot her haughty pride, in the one absorbing thought that Rex was going from her. Her wild, fiery, pa.s.sionate love could bear no restraint.
"Rex," she cried, suddenly falling on her knees before him, her face white and stormy, her white jeweled hands clasped supplicatingly, "you must not, you shall not leave me so; no one shall come between us.
Listen--I love you, Rex. What if the whole world knows it--what will it matter, it is the truth. My love is my life. You loved me until she came between us with her false, fair face. But for this you would have asked me to be your wife. Send that miserable little hireling away, Rex--the gardener will take charge of her."
Pluma spoke rapidly, vehemently. No one could stay the torrent of her bitter words.
Rex was painfully distressed and annoyed. Fortunately but very few of the guests had observed the thrilling tableau enacted so near them.