"Which young men do not, do they? Oh, fie, you naughty girl! I saw you with young Lord Frederick over there——Dear Miss Vane, this is our sweet songstress, Miss Cynthia West—Miss Vane. I have just been telling her how much you admire her lovely singing;" and then the hostess hurried away.
Something like an electric shock seemed to pass through Cynthia's frame. She did not show any trace of emotion, the smile did not waver on her lips; but suddenly, as she bowed gracefully to the handsome, keen-eyed old lady to whom she had just been introduced, she saw herself a ragged, unkempt, savage little waif and stray, fresh from the workhouse, standing on a summer day upon a dusty road, the centre of a little group of persons whose faces came back to her one by one with painful distinctness. There was the old lady—not so wrinkled as this old lady, but still with the same clearly-cut features, the same sharp eyes, the same inflexible mouth; there was the child with delicate limbs and dainty movements, with sweet sympathetic eyes and lovely golden hair, which Cynthia had passionately admired as she had never admired any other hair and eyes in the world before; and there was a young man. His face had hitherto been the one that she thought she remembered best; she was suddenly aware that she had so idealised and glorified it that its very features had become unreal, and that when she met it in the flesh in later years it remained unrecognisable. Never once till now had it been borne in upon her that this hero of her childish dreams and her present lover were one and the same. It was a terrible shock to her—and greater even then she knew.
"I am glad to make your acquaintance, Miss West," said Miss Leonora Vane, holding out her hand so cordially that Cynthia could not in common politeness refuse to take it. "Your singing has delighted everybody—and myself, I am sure I may say, not least. You have been some time in Italy, I suppose? Do sit down here and tell me where you studied."
Cynthia fancied that she heard the same voice telling her what a wicked girl she was, and that she deserved to be whipped for running away from the workhouse. She repressed a little shudder, and answered smilingly—
"You are very kind. Yes, I have studied in Italy."
"Under Lamperti, I hear. Do you think of coming out in opera next season? You may always count me among your audience."
Cynthia remembered how this courteous gentlewoman had once put her hand over her eyes and declared that the sight of Westwood's daughter made her ill. The burning sense of injustice that had then taken possession of the child's soul rose up as strong as ever in the woman. She wished, in her bitterness, that she were free to rise from her seat and cry aloud—
"Yes, look at me—listen to me—for I am Westwood's daughter! I am the child of a felon and escaped convict, a man whom you call a murderer—and I am proud of my name!"
Curiously enough, Miss Vane touched closely upon this subject before long. She was anxious to know whether Cynthia's name was her own or only assumed for stage purposes, and managed to put her question in such a way that it sounded less like impertinence than a manifestation of kindly interest—which was very clever of Miss Vane.
"No," said Cynthia coldly, "'West' is not my name exactly; but I prefer to be known by it at present."