They went to the ball, which had a gayety unsurpassed in balls. It established Elizabeth’s place in society as one of the beauties of the season. She received vast attention from those London exquisites who claim to fix a woman’s place in beauty’s calendar. She was noticed, admired, and conversed with by royalty itself, and the Prince having thus set his mark of approval on her, Elizabeth’s title as a London beauty was settled beyond cavil. She enjoyed it thoroughly, of course; but the image of Pelham did not leave her mind. She would turn her head in the midst of the splendor and magnificence of the ball, wishing to herself, “Could I but see him now!”
The ball lasted late, and it was not over until night had flown and the rosy dawn had come. Elizabeth was one of the few women sufficiently natural to look well after a night of dancing, and she looked as fresh as the dawn itself when she stepped into her carriage. Not so Darrell, who appeared so wearied that Elizabeth reproached herself at not having left earlier.
“I didn’t wish to bring you away,” he said with his usual kindness of tone. “Nine years in the Punjaub entitles you to some indulgences, and besides I was proud of you. I like to see you happy and admired.”
Elizabeth laid her head on his shoulder in the seclusion of the brougham, and Darrell, after a pause, said in a low voice: “This is the anniversary of the boy’s death. I wouldn’t speak of it before, Elizabeth, but I hadn’t forgotten it.”
“And I,” said Elizabeth, her heart suddenly turning to the dead child, sleeping under the cypress trees in the military cemetery at Embira, “had not forgotten it, but I hoped that you had, dearest.”
They talked together for a little while of their lost darling, as the parents of dead children do, and then Darrell suddenly grew quiet. Elizabeth thought he was asleep, and would not move for fear she might disturb him. When she reached their own door, she raised her head from his shoulder. Darrell was dead.
Of all that happened in the succeeding weeks, Elizabeth had afterward but a confused recollection. She was stunned by the blow and deeply grieved. Although she had long ceased to return Darrell’s affection in kind, yet she had a deep love for him. It was so deep, so sincere, so unselfish, that his death could not fail to be a heavy grief to her,—the heaviest but one that she could know: that other was Pelham’s. Her sorrow was not joined with remorse. She had honestly and earnestly devoted her life to Darrell, and felt sure that she had made him happy; but nevertheless it was a deep and sincere sorrow.
Her first thought had been naturally and inevitably for Pelham. She was so ignorant of business, so absolutely untrained in affairs, and so much a stranger in England, that she scarcely knew where to turn. Darrell had plenty of relatives, but Elizabeth had never known them, except during her few short months in England, and none of them were particularly near Darrell either in blood or friendship. His grandfather was long since dead, and the cousin who inherited the title was in West Africa. From the beginning Elizabeth seemed overwhelmed with difficulties, with annoying details which she was called upon to decide without having the slightest experience in them. She knew nothing of the value of money, having had but little until she came into what seemed to both Darrell and herself an enormous fortune. She knew not what she had spent nor what she was spending. Thus, as in everything else, could she have only turned to Pelham and asked him what to do, everything would have gone right. But Pelham was in West Africa; it would possibly take anywhere from four to five months to communicate with him, nor was it possible for him to return for at least a year from the time he had started.
It was Pelham, however, who inherited everything that came from Lady Pelham. The sole provision for Elizabeth was about one hundred pounds a year, which was Darrell’s own small inheritance. But the fact that Pelham was the sole heir relieved Elizabeth’s mind when it was brought home to her that she would be obliged to account for everything Darrell and she had received,—every chair and table in Lady Pelham’s house, and every jewel, however trifling. Elizabeth, who was as high-minded as she was inexperienced, desired to hand over everything to Pelham direct, but she knew him, or thought she knew him, too well to suppose it possible that he should make her position the least painful or embarrassing to her. In the first weeks of her widowhood, when she had wished to remain alone in her London house, entirely secluded from the world and its affairs, she was forced to see solicitors, attorneys, business men, and persons of all sorts. Some of these presented unpaid bills for large amounts, and foremost among the intruders was one Andrew McBean, a Scotch attorney who was Pelham’s agent.
This man, with his persistence and insistence, annoyed Elizabeth almost beyond endurance; but the thing which troubled her most was the continual presenting of unpaid bills. She gave up her carriage and sold it with the horses, imagining in her simplicity that she could use this money for the payment of the accounts which rained upon her every day; and she actually did so use this money until informed by McBean that she had sold Pelham’s property and misused the proceeds. This McBean said to her one day in her own drawing-room, or what she supposed was her own drawing-room. Elizabeth’s heart fluttered with terror as McBean warned her that she would be required to account for every penny of this money—in fact of all the money that she was spending.