"You dismiss me as unworthy of your presence, and, acknowledging the justice of your decree, I sincerely deplore the fatuity that prompted the offence. Your rebuke was warranted by my foolish presumption, and, confessing the error into which I was betrayed by your condescending notice last night, I humbly and sorrowfully solicit your generous forgiveness. Fervid flattering phrases sorely belie my real character if, sinking me almost beneath your contempt, you deem me devoid of a high sense of honour, or of chivalric devotion to noble womanly delicacy. Madame Orme, if your unparalleled beauty, grace, and talent bewitched me into a passing folly and vain impertinence, for which indeed I blush, your stern reproof recalls me to my senses, to my better nature; and I beg that upon the unsullied word of an American gentleman, you will accept with my apology the earnest assurance that in quitting this room I honour and revere my matchless countrywoman far more than when I entered her noble presence. Fashionable freedom may have demoralized my tongue, but by the God above us, I swear it has not blackened my heart, nor deadened my perception and appreciation of all that constitutes true feminine refinement and purity. You have severely punished my presumptuous vanity, and now will you not mercifully pardon a man who, finding in you the perfect fulfilment of his prophetic dreams of lofty as well as lovely womanhood, humbly but most earnestly craves permission to reinstate himself in your regard; to attempt to win your esteem and friendship, which he will value far more highly than the adoration of any—yes, of all other women?"
He was so near her that she saw the regular quick flutter of the blue vein on his fair temples, and as the musical mastering voice so well remembered and once so fondly loved stole tenderly through the dark, lonely, dreary recesses of her desolate, aching heart, it waked for one instant a wild, maddening temptation, an intense longing to lift her arms, clasp them around his neck, lean forward upon his bosom, and be at rest.
In the weary years that followed, how bitterly she denounced and deplored the fever of implacable revenge that held her back on that memorable day! Verily for each of us a "Nemean Lion lies in wait somewhere," and a lost opportunity might have cost even Hercules that tawny skin he wore as trophy.
Mr. Laurance saw a slow dumb motion of the pale lips that breathed no sound to fill the verbal frame they mutely fashioned—"my husband;" and then with a gradual drooping of the heavily lashed lids, the eyes closed. Only until one might have leisurely counted five was he permitted to scan the wan face in its rare beautiful repose, then again her eyes pitiless as fate met his—so eager, so wistful—and she too rose, confronting him with a cold proud smile.
"I fear Mr. Laurance unduly bemoans and magnifies a mistake, which, whatever its baleful intent, has suffered in my rude inhospitable hands an 'untimely nipping in the bud,' and most ingloriously failed of consummation. After to-day the luckless incident of our acquaintance must vanish like some farthing rushlight set upon a breezy down to mark a hidden quicksand; for in my future panorama I shall keep no niche for mortifying painful days like this—and you, sir, amid the rush and glow and glitter of this bewildering French capital, will have little leisure and less inclination to recall the unflattering failure of an attempted flirtation with a pretty but most utterly heartless actress, who wrung her hands, and did high tragedy, and stormed and wept for gold! Not for perfumed pink billets-doux, nor yet for adulation and vows of deathless devotion from high-born gentlemen handsome and heartless enough to serve in Le Musée du Louvre as statues of Apollo, but for gold, Mr. Laurance, only for gold!"
"Do not inexorably exile me—do not refuse my prayer for the privilege of sometimes seeing you. Permit me to come here and teach you to believe in my——"
"Le jeu n'en vaut pas la chandelle!" she exclaimed, with a quick nervous laugh that grated grievously upon his ear.
"Madame, I implore you not to deny me the delight of an occasional interview."
A sudden pallor crept across his eager face, and he attempted to touch the fair dimpled hand which, still grasping the locket, rested upon the table.
Aware of his purpose, she haughtily shrank back, drew herself up, and folding her arms so tightly over her breast that the cameo ring pressed close upon her bounding heart, she looked down on him as from some distant height, with an intensity of quiet scorn that no language could adequately render, that bruised his heart like hail-stones.