Gloriana; or, the revolution of 1900

by Lady Florence Dixie

She says the last words sadly, and there is a yearning look in her fine eyes as they rove the familiar glens and corries, rugged crags and purple stretches which she and Archie Douglasdale learnt to know by heart in childhood, in their happy hunting excursions together long ago. Far away below, Loch Eilort and Glenuig Bay shimmer in the setting sun, whose light is gleaming across the grey waters of the open sea.

These two have been away all day after deer, and Archie Douglasdale is still absent on the same quest. They have not seen him since they parted with him on the Black Crags some seven hours ago.

Lord Estcourt rises and comes to her side. He is a tall, well-made man, with expressive features, and a pair of grey eyes which Society has declared to be magnificent. Plenty of women therein have been willing to fall in love with Nigel Estcourt; no end of scheming and would-be mothers-in-law have instructed their daughters in the virtues, wealth, and charming characteristics of that very nice young fellow, and charged the poor things to exert their utmost to win him. But Nigel Estcourt has never yet been seen to pay court to any woman, and Fashion marvels thereat. But since he was a boy of seventeen he has held love’s secret next his heart. It was at Ruglen Manor, long ago, when, as a mere lad, he first saw Flora Ruglen, that Nigel Estcourt first opened the book of love. It was to him that she, his first girl friend, had opened her heart, and it was to her that his boyish soul had responded. Born with a golden spoon in his mouth, with all that the world most covets, it was but natural that Fashion should court him. But Nigel Estcourt was not responsive to its adulation, and snubbed it most unmercifully.

When Flora Ruglen had married Sir Reginald Desmond, young Nigel had sorely grieved; but his friendship for her had not abated, for he loved her just the same. He was still only a boy, of course, and no one would have seriously predicted that this, his first love, would be his last.

Other men had loved Flora Desmond, and love her still. She has had no lack of offers since poor Reggie Desmond died. Over and over again has smart Jack Delamere pressed his suit. He has never loved any woman like he does her, but he presses his suit in vain; for gently, kindly but firmly, Flora Desmond has told him that she will never marry again. She had told Estcourt the same thing when for the first time, now three years ago, he had confessed his love and asked her to marry him. She had told him then that he must put that love from him for ever, for the reply which she then gave him would remain unchanged. Yet, with tears in her lovely eyes, Flora had told him also how deeply she valued his friendship, how grateful and honoured she felt by his love, and how she prayed that the strong, firm bond which had held them together so long, since as boy and girl they had first made friends, would endure through life. Perhaps if one thing had not happened, Flora Desmond might have returned young Estcourt’s love. Perhaps if the wand of fate had not decreed otherwise, her heart might have gone out to him. It seemed almost natural that she should love him, he who had received her earliest confidences and been her first friend. But one thing had intervened to make this impossible. Flora Desmond loved another.

Some women can love much and often, some can almost adore, and then forget. To Flora this was impossible. Hers was a heart which could not lightly love, which, slow to appreciate, would nevertheless, when once unlocked, love truly, faithfully, and well. And thus it had been with this woman so seemingly love free. For years ago that feeling had flooded her heart, had taken possession of her, never to pass away, when as Lady Flora Desmond, but a year after her marriage, she had seen Evie Ravensdale for the first time.

Who shall describe or fathom the depth of a true and pure love? None have been able to do so yet, none ever will. Flora’s love was such as asked for no return, content only to be allowed to love.

And yet, who knows that there may not have shot, now and again, through Flora’s heart when, after the death of Reginald Desmond, she and Evie Ravensdale were thrown often into each other’s company, a gleam of hope that her love might in time come to be returned? It may have been so; but if so, it vanished finally and for ever when the personality of Hector D’Estrange was revealed in Gloria de Lara. Unmistakably on that evening when she had rescued this latter from the prison-van and had handed her into Evie Ravensdale’s safe keeping at Montragee House, Flora Desmond had read in the dark and beautiful eyes of the young duke the secret of his heart.

It never entered her mind to cavil at his choice or to resent it. No pang of jealousy had shot through her heart against the woman to whom his love had been clearly given. Only, when she had read his secret, had the feeling rushed over her that the love which she had nursed and cherished for so long, was imperishable and impossible of recall.

Not that she wished or sought to recall it. Flora would have sooner died than part with the first true love of her life; it was to her a treasure that she prized beyond expression, priceless to her in value. He lays his right hand on her shoulder for a moment as he stands by her side, and she feels it tremble.