Alas, Adelaide, beware of that love which is given without return! Beware of the bitter humiliation of finding that he whom you have secretly admired and reverenced—he whose image you have set upon the altar of your heart, and have worshipped in the sanctity of silence and of dreaming—that even he, the idol, the beloved, looks on you with indifference, while another usurps the earnest devotion of his poet soul.
Adelaide Horton had ample time for indulgence in those waking dreams which are often so dangerous. A school-girl, young, romantic and frivolous, ignorant of the harsh ways of the world, she built fair castles in the air—ideal palaces in a lovely dreamland, which were only too soon to be shattered to the ground.
Gilbert Margrave came to New Orleans armed with those brilliant schemes of inventions in machinery, which might, as he fondly hoped, supersede slave labor, though not militating against the employment of the many.
He came well furnished with letters of introduction from powerful men in England to planters and merchants of New Orleans; but though he met with much politeness and hospitality the Louisianians shrugged their shoulders and shook their heads when he revealed his opinions and tried to win their approval of his plans. They looked upon the handsome young engineer with a feeling something akin to pity. He was an enthusiast, and, like all enthusiasts, no doubt a little of a madman.
One of the first houses at which Gilbert Margrave presented himself was that of Augustus Horton. He found Adelaide and her aunt alone in their favorite morning room; one lounging in her rocking-chair, the other, as usual, busy at an embroidery frame.
The young creole looked very pretty in her loose and floating morning robe of India muslin, richly trimmed with Valenciennes lace and peach-colored ribbons. Her hair was arranged in clusters of short ringlets, which trembled in the summer breeze, wafted in through the Venetian blinds of the veranda.
As the name of Gilbert Margrave was announced, the animated girl sprang from her easy-chair, and, flinging down her book ran forward to receive the long-looked-for visitor.
"At last!" she exclaimed. "I was sure you would come, but I have looked out for you so anxiously—I mean we all have," she added, blushing.
"A thousand thanks for your kind welcome, Miss Horton. Believe me, your house is one of the very first to which I have directed my steps."
"How good of you to remember us."