“I merely came to tell you, that I wash my hands of you, Letty, and I am thankful that my poor dear husband did not live to see this day. I have one piece of advice to give you, and that is, that you marry Captain Lumley. I believe he is ready to make you his wife—go out to him in India, and remain there. I understand that as Society in the East is only too well accustomed to scandals and divorces, you will probably be received, and enabled to make a fresh start. Thanks to Hugo’s generosity, and with a captain’s Indian pay, you will be quite comfortably off.”
To all this advice the inquisitor received no reply, and rising red-faced from her seat, she added angrily:
“I see it’s no use talking to you for your good. You are in one of your tempers. I had intended offering you your uncle’s P. & O. trunks; but I shall do nothing further—good-bye!”
To the friendless divorcée, Cousin Maude played the part of a good and rich Samaritan. As it was winter time she took her to the Riviera, but Letty still exhibited a lack of energy and indifference to her surroundings, which was disheartening to her companion; however, by degrees, sunshine, peace, and youth had their effect, and, as a crushed flower in water, she revived. Her beauty and grace were remarkable. She had at last ‘come into her own,’ and was now a lovely girl—no longer the pallid, cowed bride of four years previously. Since then, she had experienced matrimony, misery, love—real love—and disgrace; also the tardy realisation of her own endowment.
If in former days, Blagdon was bitterly disappointed by his wife’s insignificance, Mrs. Hesketh was now proportionately amazed at her success; by the many staring eyes that followed her companion, the éclat, the sensation she created was quite remarkable—the girl was much too conspicuous for a divorcée in retreat.
Kind, generous Maude Hesketh, though sincerely attached to her protégée, was not without certain human weaknesses. She was inclined to be pessimistic, analytical, inquisitive, and occasionally a little irritable. In her secret heart she felt both sore and envious; she had been a notable beauty in her time, and although she had never encouraged admirers, yet was keenly alive to the homage of their eyes. To-day, all these looks and whispers were for another; whilst she was merely a well-preserved, elderly woman, to whom no one threw a second glance. She had accepted admiration as her right, and she now felt as if she had lost her youth for a second time!
For good and sundry reasons, the two ladies kept themselves in strict seclusion; they occupied a private sitting-room, and went out in a private carriage with a pair of capital horses. Now and then Mrs. Hesketh came across acquaintances, who glanced interrogatively at her graceful companion. As a rule she made no introductions, but when these could not possibly be avoided, she murmured the name of “Mrs. Glyn.”
Among the other guests at the “Calafornie,” Cannes, was a certain needy, worldly widow, Mrs. Plassy—Mrs. Bolingbroke-Plassy with a lively daughter of two-and-twenty.
This widow, made valiant attempts to attach herself to Mrs. Hesketh,—who was notoriously rich, had the air of a duchess, and a charming landau at her disposal; it was also known to her, that the most distinguished people in Cannes had left cards upon this lady. But Mrs. Hesketh—who could play the grande dame to perfection, had ‘no use’ for Mrs. Plassy, mistrusted her worming civilities, her subdued flatteries, and kept her inflexibly at arm’s length. The pretty companion was more approachable (Letty could never repulse a dog, much less a fellow-creature), and she and Miss Plassy, drawn together by their youth, and tastes, played tennis, and sang duets. The innocent soprano little suspected how deeply and sincerely she was hated by the contralto; she thought Lydia a pleasant, lively, unaffected girl, and if her mother was, as Cousin Maude declared, an inquisitive, marauding ‘old soldier,’ what harm did it do to anyone?
‘The old soldier’ had deeply resented Mrs. Hesketh’s uncompromising repulse; her animosity was kindled, and she instituted searching enquiries into the lady’s career,—which proved to be blameless; but, to her amazement, pretty, shrinking Mrs. Glyn, had a very black record! The fact leaked out—through a treacherous lady’s-maid—that this pretty girl was no less a person than the notorious and divorced Mrs. Blagdon! Fortunately the friends, were on the point of departure for San Remo, for Mrs. Plassy mentioned the discovery, as a dead secret, to every woman of her acquaintance in the hotel,—and they all held up their hands in speechless horror.