Then arose such a struggle and scramble for tickets as occurs in connection with one of the events of the season, and Lady Grace was worried and pestered for an invitation as if it were a permit to Paradise itself.
For a couple of seasons she had been the acknowledged belle, but now it seemed as if suddenly she had become one of the veritable queens of society. Wherever she went, she was surrounded by a crowd, eager to lay their tribute of adulation at the feet of the beautiful girl who had succeeded, where so many had failed, in securing handsome Cecil Neville, the future Marquis of Stoyle. Women who envied and hated her approached her with faces wreathed in smiles and voices soft and affectionate. Her carriage, or her horse, in the Park was surrounded by men eager to claim acquaintance with the future marchioness, who could give them invitations to so many shooting and hunting parties “when the old marquis died!”
And Lady Grace bore herself through it all with charming moderation. She delighted in all this worship, but it may be truly said, that she was never happier than when Lord Cecil was by her side. Some of us tire of the prize we scheme and toil so eagerly for; but in Lady Grace’s eyes the prize she had so basely won increased in value day by day.
She had loved him the first night they had met at Barton Towers, and her love, perhaps by opposition and the struggle she had made to win him, had grown into an absorbing passion. She was restless and nervous when he was absent, and those who knew her well could tell when he was in the room or near at hand, by the joyous smile on her lips and the soft glow in her eyes.
“Always thought that girl had no heart,” remarked one keen observer. “Only shows how a fellow can be mistaken in a woman. She’s as clean gone upon Cissy as a girl can be.”
“And Cissy?” queried the man to whom he spoke; “what about him?”
The cynic shrugged his shoulders.
“Don’t know. Seems as if he’s got something on his mind, and couldn’t get it off. Never saw a man so changed in all my life; perhaps his happiness is rather too much for him.”
And yet Lord Cecil’s conduct gave no cause for evil comment. No man could be more attentive to his fiancée. He was with her every day, was by her side at nearly all the “at homes,” was seen at the crushes at concerts and balls, her shawl upon his arm, the arm itself always at her command; and yet the old “Cissy” had gone, and in its place was the tall, grave-faced man, with the look as if he had something on his mind.
The night of the party arrived. Some preparations had been necessary, and they had been made with a lavish hand. The big house, which had sheltered so many generations of the Stoyles through so many London seasons, was ablaze with lights, which shone upon the handsome decorations of the great saloon and the magnificent dresses of the women.