She tore off her clothes and flung herself on to the pillow, annoyed, exasperated, and generally bewildered. Then she got up, lighted the candle again, and surveyed her fresh, incomparable beauty in the mirror.
“Am I getting old—ugly?” she murmured. “Ah yes—Natalie is pretty enough to get things if she tries!”
CHAPTER XXI
NATALIE TRIES HER LUCK
Life at the trading-post might have been a pleasant thing to Angela but for one patent fact, and this fact was rendered more palpable every hour. It requires a woman to thoroughly analyze another woman’s feelings, and Angela experienced little difficulty in probing the heart of Natalie. From the moment when Jim had first stepped through the doorway Angela had been aware of the fact that all Natalie’s interest was centered on him.
She had seen the look of suspense in Natalie’s face when Devinne had inquired of Jim their relationship, and had heard the soft sigh when the untruthful answer was returned. Hitherto she had imagined love at first sight to be a mere figure of speech, but not now. It was chiefly that fact which aroused her anger against Jim. It looked as if he deliberately gave the lie to encourage these passionate advances of Natalie. 280
Jim himself was the flower of innocence. Natalie was certainly an attractive woman, and she had the knack of enhancing her attractiveness by subtle, and not ungraceful, movement of her body and limbs. But all her charms were eclipsed by the mystical beauty of Angela. But for her constant obtrusiveness, it is doubtful whether Jim would have noticed her prettiness at all. He found the post a pleasant enough place after the eternal discomforts of the trail, and Devinne a thoroughly good fellow.
He did not fail to notice a queer change in Angela—a relapse into moody silence, so different from the cheerfulness which she had exhibited in the immediate past—but ascribed it to the fact that she was still pining for civilization and the old life. And he meant that she should have this, despite her resolution to accept nothing from him. Once they touched Dawson, he meant to get her aboard a boat—by physical force if necessary—and face the miseries of life without her.