第115章

On the next morning Miss Boncassen did not appear at breakfast.

Word came that she had been so fatigued by the lawn-tennis as not to be able to leave her bed. 'I have been to see her,' said Mrs Montacute Jones, whispering to Lord Silverbridge, as though he were particularly interested. 'There's nothing really the matter.

She will be down to lunch.'

'I was afraid she might be ill,' said Silverbridge, who was now hardly anxious to hide his admiration.

'Oh, no;--nothing of that sort, but she will not be able to play again today. It was your fault. You should not have made her dance last night.' After that Mrs Jones said a word about it all to Lady Mabel. 'I hope the Duke will not be angry with me.'

'Why should he be angry with you?'

'I don't suppose he will approve of it, and perhaps he'll say I brought them together on purpose.'

Soon afterwards Mabel asked Silverbridge to walk with her to the waterfall. She had worked herself into such a state of mind that she hardly knew what to do, what to wish, or how to act. At one moment she would tell herself that it was better in every respect that she should cease to think of being the Duchess of Omnium. It was not fit that she should think of it. She herself cared but little for the young man, and he,--she would now tell herself,--now appeared to care as little for her. And yet to be Duchess of Omnium! But was it not clear that he was absolutely in love with this other girl? She had played her cards so badly that the game was now beyond her powers. Then other thoughts would come. Was it beyond her powers? Had he not told her in London that he loved her? Had he not given her the ring which she well knew he valued?

Ah;--if she could but have been aware of all that had passed between Silverbridge and the Duke, how different would have been her feelings! And then would it be not so much better for him that he should marry her, one of his own class, than this American girl, of whom nobody knew anything? And then,--to be the daughter of the Duke of Omnium, to be the future Duchess, to escape from all the cares which her father's vices and follies had brought upon her, to have to come an end all of her troubles! Would it not be sweet?

She had made her mind up to nothing when she asked him to walk up to the waterfall. There was present to her only the glimmer of an idea that she ought to caution him not to play with the American girl's feelings. She knew herself to be aware that when the time for her own action came her feminine feelings would get the better of her purpose. She could not craftily bring him to the necessity of bestowing himself upon her. Had that been within the compass of her powers, opportunities had not been lacking to her. On such occasions she had always 'spared him'. And should the opportunity come again, again she would spare him. But she might perhaps do some good,--not to herself, that was now out of the question,--but to him by showing him how wrong he was in trifling with this girl's feelings.

And so they started for their walk. He of course would have avoided it had it been possible. When men in such matters have two strings to their bow, much inconvenience is felt when the two become entangled. Silverbridge no doubt had come over to Killancodlem for the sake of making love to Mabel Grex, and instead of doing so, he had made love to Isabel Boncassen. And during the wakes of the night, and as he had dressed himself in the morning, and while Mrs Jones had been whispering to him her little bulletin as to the state of the young lady's health, he had not repented himself of the change. Mabel had been, he thought, so little gracious to him that he would have given up that notion earlier, but for his indiscreet declaration to his father. On the other hand, making love to Isabel Boncassen seemed to him to possess some divine afflatus of joy which made it of all imaginable occupations the sweetest and most charming. She had admitted of no embrace. Indeed he had attempted none unless that touch of the hand might be so called, from which she had immediately withdrawn. Her conduct had been such that he had felt it to be incumbent on him, at the very moment, to justify the touch by a declaration of love. Then she had told him that she would not promise to love him in return. And yet it had been so sweet, so heavenly sweet!

During the morning he had almost forgotten Mabel. When Mrs Jones told him that Isabel would keep her room, he longed to ask for leave to go and make some inquiry at the door. She would not play lawn-tennis with him. Well;--he did not now care much for that.

After what he had said to her she must at any rate give him some answer. She had been so gracious to him that his hopes ran very high. It never occurred to him to fancy that she might be gracious to him because he was heir to the Dukedom of Omnium. She herself was so infinitely superior to all wealth, to all rank, to all sublunary arrangements, conventions, and considerations, that there was no room for confidence of that nature. But he was confident because he smile had been sweet, her eyes bright,--and because he was conscious, though unconsciously conscious of something of the sympathy of love.

But he had to go to the waterfall with Mabel. Lady Mabel was always dressed perfectly,--having great gifts of her own in that direction. There was a freshness about her which made her morning costume more charming than that of evening, and never did she look so well as when arrayed for a walk. On this occasion she had certainly done her best. But he, poor blind idiot, saw nothing of this. The white gauzy fabric which had covered Isabel's satin petticoat on the previous evening still filled his eyes. Those perfect boots, the little glimpses of party-coloured stockings above them, the looped-up skirt, the jacket fitting but never binding that lovely body and waist, the jaunty hat with its small fresh feathers, all were nothing to him. Nor was the bright honest face beneath the hat anything to him now;--for it was an honest face, though misfortunes which had come had somewhat marred the honesty of the heart.