And Colville might, to a great extent, have applied the quotation to himself, as we may soon show.
Times there were when Mary thought bitterly, 'Why did he teach me to love him, and then neglect me so? It was cruel, cruel! I was so happy and content till he came.'
And often did this idea haunt her while she taught her little pupils to play the sweet, low 'Birks of Invermay.' But ere long a shock awaited her.
On leaving the house of these pupils one day near Portman Square, she incidentally saw, when taking her parasol off the hall table, the visiting-cards of Lady Dunkeld and the Hon. Blanche Galloway lying there, and a thrill, a presentiment of coming evil, filled her heart; this emotion was verified when, on calling next day, a brief note was handed to her, enclosing a little cheque, with the blunt information that her services were dispensed with.
Her name had by some means caught the ears of these malevolent ones, and this, she knew, was the result of their influence and enmity; and, gentle though her nature, a rush of anger and disgust, not unmingled with dismay, filled her heart.
How was she to break this new calamity to poor ailing Ellinor—the tidings of her rude dismissal? And, loth to return to her home, she wandered through the streets for a time in aimless misery.
To add to the gloom of her spirit, it was a foggy November afternoon, and she felt the most intense depression, all the more so that she was as yet unaccustomed to the breathless atmosphere, or rather want of atmosphere—peculiar to London generally, and never so much as in that season—the month of death, as the French call it.
Walking onward in the aimless way described, she found herself at the end of Upper Brook Street, where it opens into Grosvenor Square, and there a lady was stepping from her carriage before one of the stately mansions. Mary, full of her own sad thoughts, nearly jostled her, and, pausing, apologised.
The lady, a tall and handsome woman, paused too, and Mary recognised Mrs. Deroubigne, who had complimented her upon her playing, and spoken so kindly to her at Lady Dunkeld's dance; and something pleading and pathetic in Mary's whole air and face now made Mrs. Deroubigne regard her attentively for a moment.
'We have met before,' said she. 'You are the young lady I had the pleasure of hearing play at Number 60, Park Lane?'