"Infinitely more," said Sir Roland, returning to his paper. "A labourer"s wife, my dear, has an occasional beating to chasten her spirit, and she is considerably the better for it."
His wife stood still, very erect and queenly.
"Not only the better, but the happier," she said very bitterly. "Even a dog would rather be beaten than kicked to one side."
Sir Roland lowered his paper again with startling suddenness.
"Is that your point of view?" he said. "Then I fear I have been neglecting my duty most outrageously. However, it is an omission easily remedied. Let me hear no more of this masquerade, Lady Brooke! You have my orders, and if you transgress them you will be punished in a fashion scarcely to your liking. Is that clearly understood?"
He looked straight up at her with cold, smiling eyes that yet seemed to convey a steely warning.
She shivered very slightly as she encountered them. "You make a mockery of everything," she said, her voice very low.
Sir Roland uttered a quiet laugh.
"I am nevertheless a man of my word, Naomi," he said. "If you wish to test me, you have your opportunity."
He immersed himself finally in his paper as he ended, and she, with a smile of proud contempt, turned and pa.s.sed from the room.
She had married him out of pique, it was true, but life with him had never seemed intolerable until he had shown her that he knew it.
She took her invitation with her, and in her own room sat down to read it once again. It was from a near neighbour, Lady Blythebury, an acquaintance with whom she was more intimate than was Sir Roland. Lady Blythebury was a very lively person indeed. She had been on the stage in her young days, and she had decidedly advanced ideas on the subject of social entertainment. As a hostess, she was notorious for her originality and energy, and though some of the county families disapproved of her, she always knew how to secure as many guests as she desired. Lady Brooke had known her previous to her own marriage, and she clung to this friendship, notwithstanding Sir Roland"s very obvious lack of sympathy.
He knew Lord Blythebury in the hunting-field. Their properties adjoined, and it was inevitable that certain courtesies should be exchanged. But he refused so steadily to fall a captive to Lady Blythebury"s bow and spear, that he very speedily aroused her aversion. He soon realised that her influence over his wife was very far from benevolent towards himself, but, save that he persisted in declining all social invitations to Blythebury, he made no attempt to counteract the evil. In fact, it was not his custom to coerce her. He denied her very little, though with regard to that little he was as adamant.
But to Naomi his non-interference was many a time more galling than his interdiction. It was but seldom that she attempted to oppose him, and, save that Lady Blythebury"s masquerade had been discussed between them for weeks, she would not have greatly cared for his refusal to attend it. When Sir Roland a.s.serted himself, it was her habit to yield without argument.
But now, for the first time, she asked herself if he were not presuming upon her wifely submission. He would think more of her if she resisted him, whispered her hurt pride, recalling the courteous indifference which it was his custom to mete out to her. But dared she do this thing?
She took up the invitation again and read it. It was to be a fancy-dress ball, and all were to wear masks. The waltz which she had learned to dance from Lady Blythebury herself and which was only just coming into vogue in England, was to be one of the greatest features of the evening.
There would be no foolish formality, Lady Blythebury had a.s.sured her.
The masks would preclude that. Altogether the whole entertainment promised to be of so entrancing a nature that she had permitted herself to look forward to it with considerable pleasure. But she might have guessed that Sir Roland would refuse to go, she reflected, as she sat in her dainty room with the invitation before her. Did he ever attend any function that was not so stiff and dull that she invariably pined to depart from the moment of arrival?
Again she read the invitation, recalling Lady Blythebury"s gay words when last they had talked the matter over.
"If only Una could come without the lion for once!" she had said.
And she herself had almost echoed the wish. Sir Roland always spoilt everything.
Well!--She took up her pen. She supposed she must refuse. A moment it hovered above the paper. Then, very slowly, it descended and began to write.
The chatter of many voices and the rhythm of dancing feet, the strains of a string-band in the distance, and, piercing all, the clear, high notes of a flute, filled the spring night with wonderful sound. Lady Blythebury had turned her husband"s house into a fairy palace of delight. She stood in the doorway of the ballroom, her florid face beaming above her Elizabethan ruffles, looking in upon the gay and ever-shifting scene which she had called into being.
"I feel as if I had stepped into an Arabian Night," she laughed to one of her guests, who stood beside her. He was dressed as a court jester, and carried a wand which he flourished dramatically. He wore a close-fitting black mask.
"There is certainly magic abroad," he declared, in a rich, Irish brogue that Lady Blythebury smiled to hear. For she also was Irish to the backbone.
"You know something of the art yourself, Captain Sullivan?" she asked.
She knew the man for a friend of her husband"s. He was more or less disreputable, she believed, but he was none the less welcome on that account. It was just such men as he who knew how to make things a success. She relied upon the disreputable more than she would have admitted.
"Egad, I"m no novice in most things!" declared the court jester, waving his wand bombastically. "But it"s the magic of a pretty woman that I"m after at the present moment. These masks, Lady Blythebury, are uncommon inconvenient. It"s yourself that knows better than to wear one. Sure, beauty should never go veiled."
Lady Blythebury laughed indulgently. Though she knew it for what it was, the fellow"s blarney was good to hear.
"Ah, go and dance!" she said. "I"ve heard all that before. It never means anything. Go and dance with the little lady over there in the pink domino! I give you my word that she is pretty. Her name is Una, but she is minus the lion on this occasion. I shall tell you no more than that."
"Egad! It"s more than enough!" said the court jester, as he bowed and moved away.
The lady indicated stood alone in the curtained embrasure of a bay-window. She was watching the dancers with an absorbed air, and did not notice his approach.
He drew near, walking with a free swagger in time to the haunting waltz-music. Reaching her, he stopped and executed a sweeping bow, his hand upon his heart.
"May I have the pleasure--"
She looked up with a start. Her eyes shone through her mask with a momentary irresolution as she bent in response to his bow.
With scarcely a pause he offered her his arm.
"You dance the waltz?"
She hesitated for a second; then, with an affirmatory murmur, accepted the proffered arm. The bold stare with which he met her look had in it something of compulsion.
He led her instantly away from her retreat, and in a moment his hand was upon her waist. He guided her into the gay stream of dancers without a word.
They began to waltz--a dream--waltz in which she seemed to float without effort, without conscious volition. Instinctively she responded to his touch, keenly, vibrantly aware of the arm that supported her, of the dark, free eyes that persistently sought her own.
"Faith!" he suddenly said in his soft, Irish voice. "To find Una without the lion is a piece of good fortune I had scarcely prayed for. And what was the persuasion that you used at all to keep the monster in his den?"
She glanced up, half-startled by his speech. What did this man know about her?
"If you mean my husband," she said at last, "I did not persuade him. He never wished or intended to come."
Her companion laughed as one well pleased.
"Very generous of him!" he commented, in a tone that sent the blood to her cheeks.
He guided her dexterously among the dancers. The girl"s breath came quickly, unevenly, but her feet never faltered.
"If I were the lion," said her partner daringly, "by the powers, I"d play the part! I wouldn"t be a tame beast, egad! If Una went out to a fancy ball, my faith, I would go too!"
Lady Brooke uttered a little, excited laugh. The words caught her interest.
"And suppose Una went without your leave?" she said.
The Irishman looked at her with a humorous twist at one corner of his mouth.