The crowd was drawn off toward the dancing saloon, and at that moment the reception room, in which Ada stood, was somewhat relieved of the glittering crowd that had pressed around her but a moment before.
Still several persons were grouped near her, glad to seize upon every disengaged moment of the hostess; for never in her brightest mood had she been half so brilliant as now. Her lips grew red with the flashes of wit that passed through them. Her eyes flashed with animation, and a warm scarlet flush lay upon her cheek, burning there like flame, but growing more and more brilliant as the evening wore on. Sometimes she would pause in the midst of a sentence, and look searchingly in the crowd. Then a frown would contract her forehead, as if the jewelled garland were beset with hidden thorns that pierced her temples; but when reminded of this her smile grew brilliant again, and some flash of wit displaced the impression her countenance had made the moment before.
She had just made some laughing reply to a gentleman who stood near her, and turning away, cast another of those anxious looks over the room. She gave a faint start; her eye flashed, and drawing her form up to its full height, she stood with curved lips and burning cheeks, ready to receive her husband. He came down the room, slowly moving forward with his usual noiseless grace. He paused now and then as the crowd pressed on him, and it was a full minute after she first saw him, before he approached her near enough to speak.
"My dear lady, I shall never forgive myself for coming so late," he said, reaching forth his hand. "Why did not your invitations say at once that we were invited to paradise?"
For one moment Ada turned pale and lost her self-possession. The audacious coolness of the man astonished her. She had expected to take him by surprise, and promised herself the enjoyment of his confusion; but before his speech was finished the blood rushed to her cheek, her lips grew red again, and her eyes seemed showering fire into his. He had taken her hand, while speaking, and pressed it gently, but with a meaning that aroused all the pride of her nature.
Did he hope to practice his old arts upon her? Was she a school girl to be won back by a pressure of the hand and frothy compliments to her dwelling? The crafty man had mistaken her for once. She withdrew her hand with a laugh.
"So you were ignorant that the goddess of plenty reigned here."
There was meaning in the light words, and for an instant Leicester's audacious eyes fell beneath the glance of hers; but he recovered himself with a breath.
"The character is badly chosen. I could have selected better."