Laline knew by this time quite enough of Clare to understand that the latter wished her to remain at home, and she almost laughed outright at the idea that she must not meet her own husband, lest she might spoil another girl's chances of marrying him. But there was no thought of marriage yet, and there would be time enough to speak out before then. Laline felt that she had reached a point in her life when to look forward was impossible. Wallace himself knew that he was married, and surely that knowledge should be sufficient to deter him from creating false hopes within another girl's heart! But in Wallace's honour, as Laline knew well, but little reliance was to be placed, and a pang of pity went through her as she looked at Clare and noticed the eager brightness of her eyes.
"Are you really fond of this Wallace Armstrong?" she asked her.
"My dear, I simply adore him! Do you wonder? Oh, I forgot that you didn't admire him! But you must admit that he is handsome and fascinating."
"I dare say many people would think so. But you told me just now that he had been wild. Surely you could not love a man of really bad reputation!"
"Oh, he has sown his wild oats by this time, no doubt! I should think he is nearly thirty. Besides, all men go the pace a little—I'm sure I should if I were a man. It's really too bad that we women should have to be so very, very good! Besides, I didn't hear anything very bad—only that he'd gambled a little bit and got into debt and been sent abroad for a time to cool him down. You can't cut a man for that sort of thing, otherwise one would have to drop all one's male acquaintances except school-boys."
Laline said no more. It was obviously impossible under the circumstances to warn Clare. Sometimes the girl wondered whether she should confide in Mrs. Vandeleur; but again she hesitated. Might not that lady—who, if her niece spoke truly, was of the world-worldly—be inclined to advise her young secretary to leave off the difficult struggle for life of a penniless girl, and, by simply announcing her identity, become reconciled to an easy and prosperous existence with a wealthy husband, who to strangers' eyes appeared to be all that was handsome, well-bred, and charming?
The mere idea was horrible to Laline. Never so long as she lived would she forget that scene of which she had been an unsuspected witness on her wedding morning. At any moment she could close her eyes and recall her father's flushed face and the angry pallor of her husband, could see both men, excited by drink and hate, struggling within a few feet of where she stood. At any moment she could recall the callous tones in which her newly-made husband had spoken of her as a "lanky, half-fledged school-girl," who would be a "drag and a burden" on his life after having served his purpose by procuring for him his uncle's money and favour, and could hear again the sinister menace in his tones when he alluded to the possibility that she might refuse to tell lies to Alexander Wallace on his behalf.
That scene in the little salon of the Rue Planché had been the turning-point of Laline's career, and had suddenly transformed the dreamy, lonely child, super-sensitive to kindness and of grateful, docile nature, into a woman, alert and thoughtful beyond her years, and armed with self-control, with suspicion, and with reserve.
Her nature was not meant to tend towards independence and mistrust of others. Love had been a necessity to Laline as a child; she had loved her mother intensely, and had felt her loss as irreparable. Torn from the refined seclusion of her early home, she had tried to adapt herself to the impecunious Bohemianism of her father's house, and had tried also very hard indeed to love her father. Had Wallace Armstrong not shown himself in his true colours on his wedding morning, she would in all probability have grown much attached to him, in spite of his sullen temper and dissipated habits. Already he had appeared to her eyes as a hero, a fairy prince, who had come to rescue Cinderella from Bénoîte's back kitchen and eternal darning, cooking, and dish-washing. But when, by the half-open salon door, she had stood and heard her husband and father quarrelling over the terms of the sale by which she had become Wallace Armstrong's property to free him from his money difficulties, her child's heart broke within her breast; she seemed to see the very minds and souls of the two men, vicious, sordid, and cruel, and her pure spirit shrank in horror at the sight. The impression was one which neither time nor the wear and tear of life would ever efface; and even now, when Wallace Armstrong had again appeared within her life, to all appearance a reformed character, with little trace of his former self remaining between her and her thoughts of him, the black soul of the scoundrel who had married her seemed to rise in warning against the folly of trusting such a man.