CHAPTER XII.
Norma was exultant. The thing she had longed, thirsted and well-nigh prayed for, was coming to pass. Thorne would be a free man once more, free to come back to her, free to bring again the old sweetness to her life, free to renew the spring of years ago. Sitting by the library fire in the gloaming after her cousin's departure, Norma dreamed dreams and was happy—her eyes softened, and her lips smiled. Then her face darkened slowly, and the hands in her lap clinched themselves. In her fierce joy in the possibility of her reward coming to her at last, was mingled a dread that the cup might be dashed from her lips a second time.
During the first couple of months after the removal to Virginia, Norma had relaxed her constant, imperceptible watch over Thorne. He had accompanied them to the new home unsolicited; and having come, he had remained. Small wonder that Norma had been deceived; for vanity aside, she could not help but know that no woman in that region—not even Pocahontas Mason—was her peer in beauty, wit, or accomplishments. What had she to fear, with habit and contrast both in her favor? Norma neglected to provide against one subtle and most powerful element—novelty.
For the past few weeks, first one thing, then another; trifles light as air, but forging a chain heavy enough to link suspicion with certainty, had filled the girl with the old fever of unrest. Was she never to be at rest? Would the glory of the past never shine upon the present?
Like most women who allow their minds to dwell constantly on one theme, Norma exaggerated the past. When she first left school there had been a little semi-sentiment and a good deal of rather warm cousinly attentions on Thorne's part, but without serious intention. As has been stated, Thorne liked women; he sought their society and was apt to endeavor to awaken their interest, to gain their affection. He thought that the restless craving of his nature was for love to be given him. It was not. It was the wild passion in his breast seeking to give itself. What he needed was not more love drawn into the reservoir of his heart, but an outlet for that already accumulated. This he had never had since he had reached manhood, save only in his affection for his child, and that was as yet too small a channel to afford vent for the power of love behind. And so it came to pass that in his need for an outlet, he had made a great deal of love to a great many women, and had looked more than he made.
As Norma budded into beautiful womanhood, he had been attracted by her, and had yielded to the attraction, intending no harm but accomplishing a good deal. He had liked and admired his cousin then, and in exactly the same manner and degree, he liked and admired her now.
To the young lady, the affair wore a totally different aspect; the flirtation, which had meant nothing to him and had been long ago effaced from his memory, meant every thing of value on earth to her, and was as fresh in her mind as though the years that had passed had been days or hours. Thorne's marriage had been a great blow to her—great and unexpected. She had observed his attentions to Ethel Ross, and raged at them in secret; but she had seen him equally devoted to a score of other women, and the devotion had been evanescent; with her rage and jealousy, had mingled no definite alarm. The engagement—an affair of six weeks, had been contracted while she was away from home, and the first intimation she had of it came through a letter from Ethel Ross inviting her to officiate as bridesmaid. Norma read and the heart within her died, but she made no sound, for she was a proud woman—as proud as she was passionate. She even acceded to the bride's request and, as Thorne's next of kin, led the bevy of girls selected, from the fairest of society to do honor to the occasion; her refusal would have excited comment. But as she stood behind the woman, who she felt had usurped her place, a fierce longing was in her heart to strike her rival dead at her feet.
After the marriage she continued her intimacy with Mrs. Thorne—and with Mr. Thorne. When clouds began to gather along the matrimonial horizon, and "rifts within the lute" to make discord of life's music, she beheld the one, and hearkened to the other with savage thrills of satisfaction. She did nothing to widen the breach—Norma was too proud to be a mischief-maker, but she did nothing to lessen it. She watched with sullen pleasure the cleft increase to a crack, the crack to a chasm. When the separation became an accomplished fact, it found Norma, of course, ranged strongly on the husband's side.
During the year which had elapsed since Thorne's return from abroad, Norma had contrived to establish considerable influence over her cousin. She studied him quietly, and adapted herself to his moods, never boring him with an over-display of interest, never chilling him with an absence of it. Her plan was to make herself necessary to him, and in part she succeeded. Thorne, lonely and cut adrift, came more and more frequently to his aunt's house and exhibited more and more decidedly his preference for his cousin's society. The thin end of the wedge was in, and but for the move to Virginia, and its ill-starred consequences, the inevitable result must have followed.
Would it follow now? A vision of Pocahontas, with her fair face, and her sweet gray eyes framed in a soft cloud of white, standing on the lower step of the stairway, with Thorne beside her, his head bent low over the hand he clasped, rose before Norma's eyes and caused them to burn with jealous anger. Here was the old thing repeating itself; here was flirtation again, the exact extent of which she could not determine. It must be stopped at once, trampled out ere the flame should do irremediable damage.
But how? With the question came the answer. Norma was sure that, as yet, no knowledge of Thorne's marriage had ever reached Pocahontas. She would enlighten her; and in such a way that, if there had been aught of love-making on the gentleman's part (and Norma, knowing her cousin, thought it probable there had been), every look and word and tone should seem a separate insult.
She also decided that it would be better to accept Mrs. Vincent's invitation, and return to New York for awhile. She knew very well why the invitation had been given, and saw through the shallow maneuvers to win her acceptance of it. Hugh Castleton, Mrs. Vincent's favorite brother, was in New York again, and she had not abandoned her old scheme of a match between him and her friend. Norma felt quite competent to foil her friend's plans in the present as she had foiled them in the past, so had no hesitation, on that score, in accepting the invitation. It would be better to be in New York—on the spot, while this matter should be pending. Thorne might need advice, certainly would need sympathy and petting; he must not learn to do without her. Even if he had only been amusing himself here, after his reprehensible wont, her presence in New York could do no harm and might be productive of good.