Afar off, over the dancing, moonlighted waters she saw a pleasure-boat gliding swiftly over the rippling waves. She could hear their merry laughter and gay, happy voices, and snatches of mirthful songs. Suddenly the band struck up an old, familiar strain. Poor little Daisy leaned her head against the iron railing of the porch and listened to those cruel words––the piece that they played was “Love’s Young Dream.”
Love’s young dream! Ah! how cruelly hers had ended! She looked up at the white, fleecy clouds above her, vaguely wondering why the love of one person made the earth a very paradise, or a wilderness. As the gay, joyous music floated up to her the words of the poet found echo in her heart in a passionate appeal:
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“No one could tell, for nobody knew, Why love was made to gladden a few; And hearts that would forever be true, Go lone and starved the whole way through,” |
Oh, it was such a blessed relief to her to watch that shadow. Rex was pacing up and down the room now, his arms folded and his head bent on his breast. Poor, patient little Daisy, watching alone out in the starlight, was wondering if he was thinking of her.
No thought occurred to her of being discovered there with 105 her arms clasped around that marble pillar watching so intently the shadow of that graceful, manly figure pacing to and fro.
No thought occurred to her that a strange event was at that moment transpiring within those walls, or that something unusual was about to happen.
How she longed to look upon his face for just one brief moment! Estrangement had not chilled her trusting love, it had increased it, rather, tenfold.
Surely it was not wrong to gaze upon that shadow––he was her husband.
In that one moment a wild, bitter thought swept across her heart.
Did Rex regret their marriage because she was poor, friendless, and an orphan? Would it have been different if she had been the heiress of Whitestone Hall?