Wife in Name Only

by Charlotte M. Brame

"Do you really like it, Norman--without flattery?"

"I never flatter, Philippa, not even in jest; you should know that."

"I never heard you flatter," she acknowledged. "I took pains with my toilet, Norman, to please you; if it does so I am well content."

"There is another waltz," said Lord Arleigh; "we will go back to the ball-room."

"Make him love me!" she said to herself, in bitter disdain. "I might as well wish for one of the stars as for his love--it seems just as far off."

Chapter X.

Lord Arleigh did not go to Beechgrove as he had intended. He found so many old friends and so many engagements in London that he was not inclined to leave it. Then, too, he began to notice many little things which made him feel uncomfortable. He began to perceive that people considered him in some kind of way as belonging to Miss L'Estrange; no matter how many surrounded her, when he entered a room they were seen one by one to disappear until he was left alone by her side. At first he believed this to be accidental; after a time he knew that it must be purposely done.

Miss L'Estrange, too, appeared to see and hear him only. If any one wanted to win a smile from her lovely lips, he had but to make way for Lord Arleigh; if any man wanted a kind word, or a kind glance from the beautiful eyes, he had but to praise Lord Arleigh. People soon perceived all this. The last to discover it was Lord Arleigh himself. It dawned but slowly upon him. He began to perceive also that Philippa, after a fashion of her own, appropriated him. She looked upon it as a settled arrangement that he should ride with her every day--that every day he must either lunch or dine with them--that he must be her escort to theater and ball. If he at times pleaded other engagements she would look at him with an air of childish wonder and say:

"They cannot have so great a claim upon you as I have, Norman?"

Then he was disconcerted, and knew not what to answer; it was true that there was no one with so great a claim--it seemed to have been handed down from his mother to him.