"I think not."
"Well, your partner for this dance, whoever he is, doesn"t seem to be in a hurry to claim you," says Rylton, making his rude speech very suavely. "You may as well give it to me."
At this moment Hescott, looking rather out of breath, comes up to them, pushing the curtain near him aside.
"What a place to hide yourself!" says he to t.i.ta. "I have been hunting for you everywhere." Here he catches sight of Rylton. "Oh, you, Rylton! t.i.ta is in good company, at all events."
"She is always in good company, of course," returns Rylton, smiling.
"Why, is it _you,_ then, who is my partner?" says t.i.ta, quickly looking at Tom. "Maurice wants me to dance this with him. I told him I should be delighted to, but----"
"Did you tell me that?" interrupts Sir Maurice, always smiling.
"Well, if I didn"t say it, I meant it," with a shrug. "But, you see, I had lost my card, so I wasn"t sure whether I was engaged to somebody else or not."
"Why----" begins Hescott.
He stops dead short. Suddenly it occurs to him that perhaps she doesn"t wish her husband to _know!_ He curses himself for this thought afterwards. She--_she_ to descend to duplicity of any sort!
"It is you who have my card!" cries t.i.ta suddenly, as if just remembering, and with a merry laugh. "Of course! How could I have forgotten!"
"How, indeed!" says her husband pleasantly; his mouth is looking a little hard, however.
"Give it to me," says t.i.ta.
Hescott gives her the car in silence. If she is ignorant, he, at all events, is quite aware that there is thunder in the atmosphere.
t.i.ta runs her eye down the card.
"Yes, this dance is yours," says she, looking up at Tom.
"If you would prefer to dance it with Sir Maurice----" begins he.
He is looking at her. His heart feels on fire. _Will_ she elect to dance with this husband, who, as report goes, so openly prefers another?
"No, no, no!" cries t.i.ta gaily; "I have promised you. Maurice can ask me for another later on."
"Certainly," says Sir Maurice courteously.
He nods and smiles at them as they leave the recess, but once past his view, his expression changes; his brow grows black as night.
What does it all mean? Is she as innocent as heaven itself, or as false as h.e.l.l? All things point the latter way.
First she had said---- What was it she had said? That she didn"t know whether she were engaged to this dance or not. A clear putting off--a plan to gain time. She had lost her card; she couldn"t imagine how and where. Then comes the inevitable cousin _with_ the card. And his hesitation--that was fatal. He surely was clever enough to have avoided that. _She_ had known what to do, however; she had taken the bull by the horns. She had given "Tom," as she calls him, a safe lead.
And yet--and yet! Her face comes back to him. Could he accuse that face of falsehood? And another thing: If she and that cousin of hers were in collusion, would they have so openly defied him, as it were?
No; it is out of the question. So far as she goes, at all events, there is nothing to complain of. That she is indifferent to him--her husband--is, of course, beyond question. He himself had arranged all that beforehand--before his marriage. Both he and she were to have a loose rein, and there was to be no call for affection on either side.
His mind runs back to those early days when he had asked t.i.ta to marry him. He had been altogether satisfied with the arrangements then made--arrangements that left him as free as air, and his wife too. He had thought with boredom of this marriage, and had grasped at any alleviation of the martyrdom. And now it is just as he had ordained it. And yet----
t.i.ta has disappeared. Once or twice he had caught a glimpse of her floating round the room with her cousin, but for the past five minutes she has not been _en evidence_ at all. Sir Maurice, moving out of the recess, is touched by a hand from behind. He turns.
Marian Bethune, beautiful, more animated than usual, and with her eyes sparkling, smiles up at him.
"How dull you look!" cries she gaily. "Come out here on the balcony and enjoy the moonlight for awhile."
She had been standing out there in the shadow, and had heard and seen what had occurred between t.i.ta and her husband, and later on with Tom Hescott. Rylton follows her. The soft chill of the air outside attracts him. It seems to check all at once the bitter anger that is raging in his heart. It surprises himself that he should be so angry. After all, what is t.i.ta to him? A mere name. And yet----
Outside here the night looks exquisite. Star after star one sees decking the heavens with beauty.
"Many a night I saw the Pleiads, rising through the mellow shade, Glitter like a swarm of fire-flies tangled in a silver braid."
Such a night is this, delicate, tender, its charms heightened by a soft low wind that sweeps over the gardens and sends a sigh or two to the balconies above.
"Well!" says Mrs. Bethune.
She had led him to the far end of the balcony, where no seats are, and where, therefore, one may be sure of seclusion--for the moment, at all events. She looks up at him. Some pale pink lamps from behind throw a slight radiance on her--not too deep a radiance. They are too far behind for that, but yet enough to soften her, to idealize her, and to render even more delicate the exquisite flesh tints of her face.
She has waited for her answer some time, but is well satisfied that no answer has been forthcoming. Rylton"s eyes are resting upon hers, as if surprised at this new fairness of hers. His glance is full of admiration, yet there is something of sadness--of anger in it, too, that annoys her, in spite of her exultation. For whom is the anger--for that little fool he has married? It seems to her an absurd thing that he should cast a thought, even an angry one, upon his wife when she--Marian--is here.
She has been leaning upon the rails of the balcony, and now draws closer to him.
"Why waste a thought on her?" says she in a low tone that is almost a whisper.
"On her! Who?" asks he quickly, and with an evident start.
"Oh!" with a shrug. "If you don"t wish to go into it."
"But into what?"
He frowns. He is feeling very irritable still, in spite of his admiration of her beauty.
She makes a little gesture of contempt.
"If you will not acknowledge me as even your friend."
"You!" says he sharply. "You! _Are_ you my friend?"
There is a pause. She looks away from him. And then----
"Oh, _more_ than that!" cries she in a low but pa.s.sionate tone.
_"Far_ more!"
She lays her hand upon her throat, and looks up to heaven. The moonlight, striking upon her as she so stands, makes her fairness even greater.
"Marian! You mean----"
The past rushes in upon him. He has turned to her.