"Minnie had disgraced her family; her name had, since her unfortunate marriage, been brought in question. Assuredly, though Mr. Tremenhere had hushed slander by resolution, yet Minnie must have given some room for it! It was very unfortunate that she had ever been known, by the publicity he had given at the club, as his wife; and perhaps some day, as a relative of their's—for people always will inquire who's who? Therefore they must, of course, for decency sake, put on mourning. Perhaps it was better so to do; it would silence whisperings, as it was known to many that the husband and wife had been separated before her death. Something, too, was rumoured, of a duel having been fought; but as no public scandal had been given by a divorce, an assumption of sorrow would appear in favour of her memory, should the truth ever become known!"
So Lady Ripley and her daughter swept the floors of their hotel in Paris (whither they had gone, to seek oblivion of sorrow in change of scene) in robes of sombre hue, craped and bugled with jet, and only in a very quiet soirée permitted themselves to be "at home" or "abroad."
Tremenhere had been a favourite in Florence before his marriage, with many a high dame; that event threw a partial veil over him: he grew domestic.
Now he came forth again in a new character. In the first state he had an absorbing idea—his mother's fame; this was his guiding star. With Minnie's supposed fall, this fell too; it "sought the sea," and was engulfed.
Tremenhere now was a thoroughly heartless, reckless man. Without hope, present or future, he lived for the moment. At first he hesitated, in the candour of his heart, even to wear mourning for Minnie; then a thought—a more generous one to the dead—arose; he forgave her, and would spare her memory from calumny, by any act of his, so glaring in disrespect. As the pale, interesting widower, one whose fate had been so mysterious—one ejected from his high estate by his parents' error—he became the fashionable rage, the pet artist, the sought-after guest; and the man submitting to all, courted nothing, for nothing moved him.
It will not be our province to betray beforehand Lady Dora's heart—let it work its own way, and shew itself. Lady Ripley could not close her doors against Tremenhere, without risking scandal to her relative's memory, should any busy tongue ever proclaim she had been such to them; besides, he was the fashion, and received every where, as more than an artist even of fame, as a man who ranked their equal by birth, though a cloud now obscured him. Burton had never been a favourite in society, and not a few hoped yet to see Tremenhere restored to his home. So Lady Ripley did the more prudent thing, received him with something approaching to cordiality. Moreover, he was every where; not to receive him, would be to shut fashion out of doors. No portrait was perfect unless he painted it, no bust a model unless he chiseled it; and the man walked among all like a soul in transmigration, seeking the one hidden thing, which should bid it back to the heaven it had lost, and was striving to regain.
"Come here, you dreadful man!" exclaimed Lady Lysson, as he entered her apartments one day in the Hotel Mirabeau, "and account for yourself. Here is Lady Dora complaining bitterly that her portrait, as 'Diane Chasseresse,' will never be completed! I shame to hear so bad an account of my protegé."
"Lady Lysson," he said, taking her cordially proffered hand, "I cannot plead guilty; the fault is Lady Dora Vaughan's. Three days have I placed it upon my easel, and, after impatiently awaiting her ladyship to give me a sitting, have been compelled to remove it for some other claimant."
"What have you to answer to this charge, Lady Dora?" asked the lively hostess with mock gravity, appealing to the lady, who was sitting at another table sketching when Tremenhere entered, and who had received him as usual with a constrained air, merely bowing.
"I reply," answered that lady, "that my mother, having been particularly engaged, it was impossible for me to wait upon Mr. Tremenhere; and indeed, dear Lady Lysson, you are well aware I have not complained of the delay. It is a matter of indifference to me, the completion of that portrait."