CHAPTER XXIII.
Jack walked leisurely enough through the fernery looking this way and that in search of the phantom girl; but once clear of the ball-room, he hurried through the ante-rooms and down the staircase—utterly ignoring the adieus which were sent after him by the crowd on the stairs—and reached the hall.
The carriages were already taking up, and without ceremony he pushed through the footmen into the open air.
“Has a carriage left just now—five minutes ago?” he asked.
“Two or three, sir,” said the footmen, and, too busy to answer any further questions, he dashed off.
Jack waited just outside the stream of light for nearly an hour, his coat collar turned up, his hands thrust in his pockets. But though many a beautiful face passed him and was driven away, Una’s lovely face was not amongst them.
“I must have fallen asleep and been dreaming,” he muttered. “How could she possibly have been there?”
Then he called a hansom, and was driven to the club.
His blood was on fire, his brain was in a whirl; two faces—Una’s and Lady Bell’s—seemed to dance before his eyes. Do something he must to get rid of them, or they would drive him mad.
There was only one thing to do—play. Before the morning he had lost every penny of his twenty-one pounds six and fourpence, and a couple of hundred besides.