[CHAPTER XXXIII.]
About twelve months after what the newspapers called "The Mystery in High Life at Naples," on a very bright day in June, the Earl of Ferrers and Margaret, his wife, were standing at the open window of the drawing-room at the court.
This window commands the best view of the drive, and it seemed by the intentness with which the two pairs of eyes watched it that they were expecting some one.
Leyton Court always looks at its best in June, and it has never looked better than it did this year, for the earl had spent a great deal of money on the place—"a small fortune," as it was said. A new wing had been built; the old part of the house redecorated; but above and beyond all, an addition had been made to the picture-gallery, which raised it to the first rank in England.
This had been done "to pleasure" Margaret, the countess, whom the world rightly regarded as one of its best and noblest artists. This same world, too, had gone slightly mad over the countess, and would have been delighted to make her the sensation of the season. For, consider! she was not only the wife of a wealthy earl, but the heroine of as romantic a history as the modern world wots of. Even now people did not know the full particulars, did not know more than that the countess was supposed to have died, and that the earl had, in all innocence, married Violet Graham; and that Violet Graham had died of heart disease at Naples, and Mr. Austin Ambrose had poisoned himself—for love of her. All this the world knew, but it was still ignorant of the details, of the diabolical plot which Austin Ambrose had woven, and so nearly successfully. But it knew enough to make Margaret a "sensation," and it was quite prepared to meet her in saloons and ballrooms, and point at her in the park, and fight for introductions to her, and intrigue to get her to its concerts and dinner-parties.
But Margaret had declined to be made a sensation of. Immediately after the tragedy at the palace at Naples, both she and Blair disappeared, not together, as the world hinted, but separately; and it was only through the appearance of her pictures at the various European galleries that people were made aware of her existence.
For months Margaret lived in a seclusion as impenetrable as that of a Trappist, and it was not until Blair had fallen ill and sent for her that she had gone to him. Then the rumor went round that Leyton Court was being done up, and that the earl and countess were going to live there just like an ordinary couple who had not been the hero and heroine of romance.
"I hope they won't be late," said Blair, looking at his watch and then staring down the drive.
"The trains are always late—unless you want to catch them, then they are fatally punctual!" said Margaret. "I feel as if I were growing old waiting for them!"