“I merely wondered if they ever met,” she answered, carelessly. “I never heard my husband speak of him.” She said the word out boldly this time.
“No—I fancy not,” said Kennedy. “They were not friends at all. In fact, Hertford had no idea he was the man you had married, until I told him.”
Kennedy was a little dull, and he wondered now, why in the world she was interesting herself in such a trivial matter.
He had joined Mrs. Etheridge on the street, and he walked home with her. When they reached her handsome residence, and the doors were thrown open, she did not ask him to come in, but said good-bye rather abruptly. She crossed the magnificent hall and walked with a firm step up the grand staircase. Then, entering her own splendid apartment, she locked herself in and stood silent a few moments. Then she spoke aloud, safe from being heard in that lofty vastness.
“That was the man I could have loved,” she said, “the man I do love! And I might have married him!”
In a second, she added, in a tone grown thick and indistinct with tears:
“And he loves me, too! I know he does—or did, until he knew!”
She stretched out her arms, with her hands clenched hard, and saw herself reflected from every side in splendidly-framed mirrors, which gave back her image, from head to feet, in her elegant French costume. They showed her, too, the innumerable beauties of her luxurious rooms, hung with satin and carpeted with velvet.
She gave a cry of horror, and shut out the vision with her hands. Her birthright was gone, and this was her mess of pottage!