And in this mood he returned to Paris: and a week had elapsed since the ball. It will not seem strange if, on his arrival, he shut himself up in his studio, away from the world, for days. How commune with that?—or those who had known her, and now smiled over her grave?
Every moment his feelings became more vindictive towards Lady Dora: it was the only passion surviving in his heart—all the others were wrecked, and had gone down with the "Hirondelle."
Perhaps it was well that Marmaduke Burton had gone, no one knew whither, or a worse one than vindictiveness might have revived. Assuredly he might have been driven to murder, had he once given way to his prompting fiend.
It will seem almost strange to many, perhaps, that with this anguish raging in his heart, he never once thought even of suicide. Tremenhere was a brave man—an essentially courageous one; he feared nothing in this world. But he had a strong religious sense, implanted by his mother: he feared the suicide's unfailing hell, when madness comes not to plead for the act before Heaven. He was preparing himself, in the solitude of his chamber, for a pilgrimage of suffering and repentance, before he should meet her spirit, doomed in its other state to throw off the garb of mercy and forgiveness she would ever have worn, and before Heaven accuse, perhaps condemn, him. He was preparing to face the world, and veil his suffering—to toil on; and then he asked himself, "For what?" Here his mother arose before him.
"Yes," he said, "I have deserted, forgotten, reviled her; it shall be my task to place her high in brightness and purity. And if, in my passage, one lip breathes Minnie's name in shadow before me, then will I bare all my own heavy sorrow, and, condemning myself, clear her! Now, it would but sully a fame like hers, to drag her forth uncalled for. I must watch my opportunity; and the day I debase her enemies—her enemy, her heartless cousin—I will elevate her where none shall dare attaint her again!"
He heard Lord Randolph had called; and here it was that his heart turned towards that man. He remembered the kindly, though unadvisedly done, act at Uplands; this man's kindness of manner; his respectfulness towards her. Now the veil of darkness had fallen, he saw all aright; and a love—a love almost of womanly weakness—arose in his heart towards him. He was the first person whom he received; and when the other started at his pale cheek, he simply answered, he had been ill; a sudden obligation to visit the country, where illness had seized upon him. He started, however, when Lord Randolph begged his congratulations on his approaching marriage with Lady Dora, who had accepted him the previous day. However, his start was not perceptible to his friend, and he spoke all the speeches of usage as warmly as such are generally spoken; and, taking his arm, they proceeded together to the Hotel Mirabeau.
Lady Dora and her mother sat alone when they entered. The former, despite her general self-possession, coloured painfully, and then became of marble whiteness, while the pale, curling lip alone spoke her internal battle to seem calm.
"I bring you an invalid friend," said Lord Randolph; "Tremenhere has been very ill."
She looked fixedly at him; his eyes were hollow, his cheeks white; but even these were not sufficient excuse, to that despotic heart. "He should have kept his appointment," she mentally said, "any way."
"Have you been at home?" asked Lady Ripley; "for Lord Randolph told us you were not there when he called."