The weather was so warm, that the two ladies had left the interior of the apartment for the airy shade of this veranda.
We have not seen Adelaide Horton since the scene on board the Selma—that disgraceful scene, in which the young girl had suffered the pangs of jealousy to goad her to an action unworthy the better feelings of her impulsive nature. Bitter and immediate had been the punishment which followed that action.
Despised by the man she loved, cast off by her cousin and affianced husband, Mortimer Percy; harassed with the tortures of self-reproach, the unhappy girl had ample cause for painful reflection and regret.
She would have made any sacrifice to recall her words of denunciation the moment after their utterance.
The memory of her old friendship for Cora Leslie stung her to the heart, and the mildly reproachful gaze of the Octoroon haunted her perpetually.
Mrs. Montresor had done her best to console her niece; but Adelaide's gayety and light-heartedness had entirely deserted her.
She was no longer the same high-spirited girl who had arrived two months before in New Orleans.
The ladies looked up from their work as Augustus and the lawyer approached them. Adelaide perceived her brother's ill-concealed agitation, and asked the cause of it.
He related his adventure on the quay.
"Then Cora and Gilbert Margrave have left for Saint Louis?"