Then he mused, his thoughts still running on Isabel: "Think of calling such a girl as that vain! She isn't a bit vain. It is the other women that are so beastly jealous of her!"
Which also was not true; Isabel was extremely vain, and Paul had already done his best to make her more so; but his eyes were blinded that he could not see.
CHAPTER VIII.
Elton Manor.
"Love," she said, "is just a game
That does for summer weather!"
"Love," he answered, "is a flame
Putting lesser lights to shame:
Making wealth and rank and fame
Weigh lighter than a feather!"
"Sure," she cried, "we mean the same;
Love is but a fancy name
For you and me together."
When Paul Seaton and Dick Esdaile were respectively twenty-six and thirteen, the former was offered the post of editor to the new magazine, The Pendulum, and the latter was considered fit to enter Eton. So Paul concluded his pleasant life at Esdaile Court and went to live in London, to prepare himself the more fully for that great book he meant to write some day. By that time his friendship with Miss Carnaby was an established factor in his existence. Paul called it friendship, because he was as yet too poor to call it by any other name; but the other name was ready, as soon as Paul had secured a sufficient status and income to allow him to rechristen the sentiment. He was very glad to take up his abode in London. But, there again, London was only a euphemism for Isabel. Living in London meant seeing Isabel frequently; therefore London was the most desirable place of residence under the sun.
Lady Farley was always "at home" on Thursday afternoons, and consequently Thursday became Paul's Sabbath. He called as often as he dared; and when he felt it but decent to allow a Thursday to elapse without his dropping in at Prince's Gate, he sympathized with the Irish peasant who said: "His Riverence is going to Dublin Fair, so there will be no Sunday this week".
And Isabel also measured time by Thursday afternoons, and felt such seasons a blank indeed if they did not bring Paul. She waited till he arrived before she ordered up the second brew of tea, and she took care to pour his cup out first; she talked to him for as much time as she could spare from other visitors; and listened to him all the time that she was conversing with them, and he was talking to somebody else; she introduced him only to clever men and to plain women; and, in short, she generally behaved herself as all right-minded and right-mannered young women do under similar circumstances. She derived almost as much happiness as Paul did from their friendship; but she pretended that she did not know that friendship was only a nom de plume; all the same, she could have found the right name in the dictionary with her eyes shut.
Tickets of admission into Eden are variously worded; and Paul Seaton received one—after he had been for a year or so editor of The Pendulum—couched in the following terms:—
"DEAR MR. SEATON,