"It will have no morrow," she answered, sadly. "I shall keep those water-lilies until every leaf is withered and dead; yet they will never be so dead as my hopes—as dead as my life, though art fills it and praises crown it."
"And I," he said, "shall remember this day until I die. I have often wondered, Leone, if people take memory with them to heaven. If they do, I shall think of it there."
"And I," she said, "shall know no heaven, if memory goes with me."
They parted without another word, without a touch of the hands, or one adieu; but there had been no mention of parting, and that was the last thing thought of.
CHAPTER LI.
THE CONFESSION.
"I do not believe it," said Lady Marion; "it is some absurd mistake. If Lord Chandos had been out alone, or on a party of pleasure where you say, he would have told me."
"I assure you, Lady Chandos, that it is true. Captain Blake spoke to him there, and Lady Evelyn saw him. Madame Vanira was with him."
The speakers were Lady Chandos and Lady Ilfield; the place was the drawing-room at Stoneland House; the time was half past three in the afternoon; and Lady Ilfield had called on her friend because the news which she had heard preyed upon her mind and she felt that she must reveal it. Like all mischief-makers Lady Ilfield persuaded herself that she was acting upon conscientious motives; she herself had no nonsensical ideas about singers and actresses; they were quite out of her sphere, quite beneath her notice, and no good, she was in the habit of saying, ever came from associating with them. She had met Madame Vanira several times at Stoneland House, and had always felt annoyed over it, but her idea was that a singer, an actress, let her be beautiful as a goddess and talented above all other women, had no right to stand on terms of any particular friendship with Lord Chandos. Lady Ilfield persuaded herself it was her duty, her absolute Christian duty, to let Lady Chandos know what was going on. She was quite sure of the truth of what she had to tell, and she chose a beautiful, sunshiny afternoon for telling it. She wore a look of the greatest importance—she seated herself quite close to Lady Marion.