Lady Gwendolyn was not one of those brides who like to advertise themselves. To steal quietly through the crowd, unrecognized and unobserved, was all she asked; and she knew her husband’s refined tastes would be offended, as well as her own, by any display. But that he approved of the brown cashmere, and the quiet, but elegant, little hat of the same color, was evident from his eyes as he took a survey of her dainty figure ere he handed her into the carriage.
On their way to the station Colonel Dacre held his wife’s hand; but he did not attempt any further demonstration, and she was thankful for the self-denial, which gave her time to recover a little from the confusion of her position.
But once in the coupé he had engaged, and on their way to Dover, all his pent-up passion seemed to break forth, and he crushed her against his breast as he murmured:
“Now for my kiss—the one you have kept back for your happy husband, love.”
And as she shyly approached her lips to his it seemed to both as if their very souls mingled in that long, glad, passionate embrace.
CHAPTER XIX.
THE FIRST CLOUD.
“I declare, we have been six months abroad, and not yet come across a single person we know,” said Lady Gwendolyn to her husband one morning. “I wonder how it is?”
“Well, we haven’t tried to come across people we know, for one thing.”
“But it might easily have happened accidentally.”