Annie’s curiosity was excited, and, contrary to her custom of devoting her attention entirely to what was going on on the stage, she managed, on her next appearance to say a few lines, to get an opportunity of looking toward the box the two speakers had indicated. And she gave one of the slightest, most imperceptible of starts, for the lady was Lilian, exquisitely dressed and looking handsomer than ever. Annie could not see the face of the man behind her in her glance at the box; but she was anxious to know who it was, and later in the evening she was satisfied; for a young actor named Gerald Gibson told another in her hearing that the lady was Mrs. Falconer, that he had been to a dance at her house two nights before, and that “the tall man with the eye-glass,” who was one of the other occupants of the box, was a Colonel Richardson, who had just returned from abroad.
All this filled Annie with excitement and anxiety. Had Lilian recognized her? Who were the other people in the box? Had Colonel Richardson really only just returned from abroad? These and other questions concerning her sister-in-law and the rest of her husband’s family kept her awake that night in a fever of newly awakened interest in the Braithwaites. The remembrance of her life at Garstone occupied her very little now, the long, solitary hours of daylight, when she was not engaged in rehearsal, she filled by writing, her old taste for which had revived to console her for her otherwise monotonous life. After the exchange of a few letters with William, she had heard no more from him, and it was now more than two years since she had received his last. During all this time no news had reached her, of her husband or his family. She had said of late bitterly to herself that, if they had cared to do so, they would have found her out long ago, and she had begun to wonder whether she would ever see any of them again, when this unexpected, yet most natural event, showed her again the one of all the Braithwaites whom she least cared to see.
Annie liked Gerald Gibson, as everybody in the theater did—a grave, quiet, thoughtful-looking man, whose reserved manners impressed those around him with respect, even though it was often merely the result of his having nothing in particular to say. He might have been the son of a cheesemonger, but he was as perfect a gentleman not only in look and manner, but in mind, as if he had been the son of a duke. Annie knew, though she had known him only a few weeks, that she could speak without reserve to him. On the evening after she had seen Lilian, therefore, she found an opportunity, when they were on the stage together, but not immediately concerned in the business of the scene, of alluding to the beauty who had made such a sensation among them the night before.
“I think I heard you say you were fortunate enough to know her, Mr. Gibson,” said she, her interest peeping out from under the indifferent words.
“I don’t know her well. I was introduced to her about ten days ago, and somebody got me a card for an ‘At home’ at her house.”
“She is very beautiful, ain’t she?”
“Yes, very, for those who admire massive beauty.”
“Then don’t you admire her?”
“Yes; but I have seen women I admire more.”
“I don’t like such frosty enthusiasm. Is she nice, pleasant, amiable?”