Prince Fortunatus, William Black [pdf e book reader .txt] 📗

/> "Ah, Leo, you do not understand," Nina said to him--for Miss Girond was now talking to Mr. Carey, who had come up.

"I don't understand what?"

"You do not understand Miss Burgoyne," said Nina.

"What don't I understand about her, then?"

Nina shook her head.

"Why should I say? You will not believe. Perhaps she is grateful to you for bringing in that young man--yes, perhaps--but if she would rather have yourself to go and talk with her and be her companion before all those people? Oh, you do not believe? No, you are too modest--as she is vain and jealous. All during the dinner she was playing coquette, openly, for every one to see; Estelle says it was to pique the young man who came from the other room; no, Leo, it was not--it was meant for you!"

"Oh, nonsense, Nina!--I wasn't thinking anything about her!"

"Does she think that, Leo?" Nina said to him, gently. "Ah, you do not know that woman. She is clever; she is cunning; she wishes to have the fame of being associated with you--even in a photograph for the shop-windows; and you are so blind! The duel?--yes, she would have liked that, too, for the newspapers to speak about it, and the public to talk, and her name and yours together; but then she says, 'No, he will owe more to me if I interfere and get an apology for him,' It is one way or the other way--anything to win your attention--that you should care for her--and that you should show it to the world--"

"Nina, Nina," said he, "you want to make me outrageously vain. Do you imagine she had a single thought for me when she had Lord Denysfort to carry on with--he hasn't much in his head, poor devil! but a title goes a long way in the theatrical world--and when she could practise on the susceptibilities of her humble adorer who was further down the table? Oh, I fancy Miss Burgoyne had enough to occupy herself with this evening without thinking of me. She was quite busy."

"Ah, you do not understand, Leo," Nina said. "But some day you may understand--if Miss Burgoyne still finds you indifferent, and becomes angry. But before that, she will try much--"

"Nina!"

"You will see, Leo!" Nina said; and that was all she could say just then, for Mr. Lehmann came up to take the general vote as to whether they would rather have tea out there in the moonlight or return to the dining-room.

But any doubt as to the manner in which Miss Burgoyne regarded his intercession on behalf of Mr. Percival Miles was removed, and that in a most summary fashion, by the young lady herself. As they were about to leave the hotel, the men were standing about in the hall, chatting at haphazard or lighting a fresh cigar, while they waited for the women-folk to get ready. Lionel saw Miss Burgoyne coming along the corridor, and was glad of the chance of saying good-night to her before she got on to the front of Lord Denysfort's drag. But it was not good-night that Miss Burgoyne had in her mind.

"Mr. Moore," she said, when she came up, and she spoke in a low, clear, incisive voice that considerably startled him. "I am told it was through you that that boy was invited to the dinner to-night."

He looked at her in amazement.

"Well, what then?" he exclaimed. "What was the objection? I thought he was a friend of yours. That boy?--that boy is a sufficiently important person, surely--heir to the Petmansworth estates--why I should have thought--"

She interrupted him.

"I consider it a gross piece of impertinence," she said, haughtily. "I suppose you thought you were conferring a favor on me! How dared you assume that any one--that any one--wished him to be present in that room?"

She turned proudly away from him, without waiting for his reply.

"Lord Denysfort, here I am," said she; and the chinless young man with the large ears gave her his arm and conducted her down the steps. Lionel looked after her--bewildered.


CHAPTER XV.


"LET THE STRUCKEN DEER GO WEEP."

But if Lionel regarded this constant association with Nina--this unreserved discussion of all their private affairs--even the sort of authority and guidance he exercised over her at times--as so simple and natural a thing that it was unnecessary to pause and ask whither it might tend, what about Nina herself? She was quite alone in England; she had more regard for the future than he had; what if certain wistful hopes, concealed almost from herself, had sprung up amid all this intimate and frankly affectionate companionship?

One morning she and Estelle were walking in to Regent Street, to examine proofs of certain photographs that had been taken of them both (for Clara figured in the shop-windows now, as well as Capitaine Crepin). Nina was very merry and vivacious on this sufficiently bright forenoon; and to please Estelle she was talking French--her French being fluent enough, if it was not quite perfect as to accent. They were passing along Piccadilly, when she stopped at a certain shop.

"Come, I show you something," she said.

Estelle followed her in. The moment the shopman saw who it was he did not wait to be questioned.

"It is quite ready, miss; I was just about to send it down."

He brought forward the double loving-cup that Lionel had given to Nina; and as the young lady took it into her hands she glanced at the rim. Yes; the inscription was quite right: "From Leo to Nina"--that was the simple legend she had had engraved.

"Here is the cup I spoke of, Estelle; is it not beautiful? And then I would not trouble Lionel to have the inscription made--I told him I would have it done myself and asked him what the words should be--behold it!"

The cup was duly admired and handed back to be sent down to Sloane Street; then Estelle and she left the shop together.

"Oh, yes, it is very beautiful," said the former, continuing to speak in her native tongue, "and a very distinguished present; but there is something still more piquant that he will be buying for you ere long--can you not guess, Nina?--no?--not a wedding-ring?"

The audacity of the question somewhat disconcerted Nina; but she met it with no sham denial, no affected protest.

"He has not spoken to me, Estelle," Nina said, gravely and simply, "And sometimes I ask myself if it is not better we should remain as we are--we are such good friends and companions. We are happy; we have plenty to occupy ourselves with; why undertake more serious cares? Perhaps that is all that Lionel thinks of it; and, if it is so, I am content. And then sometimes, Estelle, I ask myself if it would not be better for him to marry--when he has made his choice, that is to say; and I picture him and his young wife living very happily in a quite small establishment--perhaps two or three rooms only, in one of those large buildings in Victoria Street--and everything very pretty around them, with their music and their occupations and the visits of friends. Would not that be for him a life far more satisfactory than his present distractions--the gayeties and amusements--the invitations of strangers?"

"Yes, yes, yes!" her companion cried, with instant assent. "Ah, Nina, I can see you the most charming young house-mistress--I can see you receive your guests when they come for afternoon music--you wear a tea-gown of brocade the color of wall-flower, with cream-colored lace--you speak French, English, Italian as it is necessary for this one and that--your musical reunions are known everywhere. Will madame permit the poor Estelle to be present?--Estelle, who will not dare to sing before those celebrated ones, but who will applaud, applaud--in herself a prodigious claque! And now, behold! Miss Burgoyne arrives--Miss Burgoyne in grand state--and nevertheless you are her dear Nina, her charming friend, although in her heart she hates you for having carried off the handsome Lionel--"

"Estelle," said Nina, gently, "you let your tongue run away. When I picture to myself Lionel in the future, I leave the space beside him empty. Who is to fill it?--perhaps he has never given a thought to that. Perhaps it will always be empty; perhaps one of his fashionable friends will suddenly appear there, who knows? He does not seem ever to look forward; if I remonstrate about his expenditure, he laughs. And why should he give me things of value? I am not covetous. If he wishes to express kindness, is not a word better than any silver cup; If he wishes to be remembered when he is absent, would not the smallest message sent in a letter be of more value than a bracelet with sapphires--"

"Oh, Nina," her companion exclaimed, laughing, "what a thing to say!--that you would rather have a scrap of writing from Lionel Moore than a bracelet with sapphires--"

"No, Estelle, I did not," Nina protested, rather indignantly; "I was talking of the value of presents generally, and of their use or uselessness."

"And yet you seemed very proud of that loving-cup, Nina, and of the inscription on it," Estelle said, demurely; and there the subject ended, for they were now approaching the photographer's.

It was a Saturday night that Honnor Cunyngham and her mother--who had come up from Brighton for a few days--had been induced to fix for their visit to the New Theatre; and as the evening drew near, Lionel became more and more anxious, so that he almost regretted having persuaded them. All his other troubles and worries he could at once carry to Nina, whose cheerful common-sense and abundant courage made light of them and lent him heart; but this one he had to ponder over by himself; he did not care to tell Nina with what concern he looked forward to the impressions that Miss Cunyngham might form of himself and his surroundings when brought immediately into contact with them. And yet he was not altogether silent.

"You see how it is, Nina," he said, in tones of deep vexation. "That fellow Collier has been allowed to gag and gag until the whole piece is filled with his music-hall tomfoolery, and the music has been made quite subsidiary. I wonder Lehmann doesn't get a lot of acrobats and conjurors, and let Miss Burgoyne and you and me stop at home. "The Squire's Daughter" is really a very pretty piece, with some delightful melody running through it; but that fellow has vulgarized it into the lowest burlesque."

"What does it matter to you, Leo?" Nina said. "What he does is separate from you. He cannot vulgarize your singing."

"But he makes all that clowning of his so important--it has become so big a feature of the piece that any friends of yours coming to see the little opera might very naturally say, 'Oh, is this the kind of thing he figures in? This is an intellectual entertainment, truly!'"

"But you do not join in it, Leo!" Nina protested.

"In the most gagging scene of all, I've got to stand and look on the whole time!" he said.

"Oh, no, Leo," Nina said, with mock sympathy, "you can listen to Miss Burgoyne as she talks to you from behind her fan."

"Those two ladies I told you of," he continued, "who are coming on Saturday night--I wonder what they will think of all that low-comedy stuff. I begin to wish I hadn't asked them to come behind, but I thought it might be a sort