Eusebie La Compte, the heiress of the bleak promontory, had not the radiant beauty of her sister, whose brilliant complexion, shining golden hair and sparkling blue eyes had been inherited by her daughter; no, the pale face, sandy locks and gray eyes of Eusebie formed but a tame copy of the brighter picture.
Yet Eusebie could not be called “plain,” and far less “ugly.” Her form seemed cast in the same mold as that of her beautiful elder sister, only it was thinner. Her profile had the same classic facial angle, but it was sharper. Her complexion was quite as fair, only it was paler. Her hair was of the same color, only it was duller. Her eyes were of the same hue, but they were dimmer.
If Eusebie had been healthy and happy, she would have been as beautiful and brilliant as her sister; or if she had been smitten, as Eleanor had, by hectic fever only, which gives color to the cheeks and light to the eye. But to be afflicted with malaria, which dulls the complexion and dims the eyes, is quite another thing.
Nevertheless, there were times when Eusebie was almost beautiful. It was when any strong emotion flushed her cheeks and fired her eyes.
The West Indian party did not go much into society. The health of Señora Eleanor forbade their doing so. The only company they saw was our party from Louisiana.
The illness of the mother and the negligence of the nurse, threw the little Gloria very much upon the care of Eusebie, who was almost always to be found in Madame de Crespigney’s circle.
Thus it happened that Eusebie and Marcel were brought daily together, and united by their common interest in the beautiful child, Gloria.
So Eusebie, the pale, agueish girl, fell in love with the handsome young Marcel—fell in love with him, not after the manner of the soft-hearted girl, who sighed in secret and slipped out of sight, but after the manner of the woman who says to herself, “Love or death,” and thinks towards her victim, “Your love or your life!”
Marcel de Crespigney being of a tender, affectionate, sympathetic nature, had been more or less in love all the days of his youth. In earliest infancy he was ardently in love with his nurse. At five years old he was passionately enamored of his nursery governess, a bright young Yankee girl. And when she married the Methodist minister, Marcel wept tears of agony. His Sunday-school teacher, an amiable old maid, was his next flame. When she died of yellow fever he put crape on his little cap and flowers on her grave.
Then followed, as queens of his soul—his sisters’ music mistress, his mother’s seamstress, and the overseer’s sister-in-law. At the age of fifteen he actually offered marriage to the doctor’s widow, a genial, soft-eyed, warm-hearted matron of thirty-five, who, in her wisdom and goodness, refrained from wounding his affection by contempt, but gravely and kindly assured him that, though she declined to be engaged then, yet she would wait for him, and if he should be in the same mind five years from that time, she would listen to him.