“But outside me, you have been worried about something. You have quite changed from your gay spirits at Hurlingham.”
“My love, I exhausted myself at Hurlingham. You and I were laughing like children. That can’t last. But for me there is no outside world. Be sure of that. My world begins and ends where you are.”
“My own dear love,” she whispered softly.
And so hand in hand they listened to the last act, while Lady Hartley amused herself now with the stage, and now with the audience, and left these plighted lovers alone in their fool’s paradise.
Sunday was given up to church and church parade, looking at people and gowns and bonnets in Hyde Park. Vansittart had to be observant and ready, amusing and amused, as he walked beside his sister and his betrothed. He had to say smart things about the people and the bonnets, to give brief biographies of the men whom he saluted, or with whom he spoke. He had to do this, and to be gay and light-hearted in the drive to Richmond, and at the late luncheon in the pretty upstairs room at the Star and Garter, where the balcony hung high over the smiling valley, over the river that meanders in gracious curves through wooded meadows and past the townlet of “Twicks.” Happiness is the dominant in the scale of prosperous love. Why or how should he fail to be happy, adored by this sweet girl, who in less than six weeks was to be his, to have and to hold till death?
He played his part admirably, was really happy during some of those frivolous hours, telling himself that the thing which had happened at Venice was a casualty for which Fate would not too cruelly punish him.
“Even Œdipus Rex had a good time of it after he killed his father at the cross roads,” he told himself mockingly. “It was not till his daughters were grown up that troubles began. He had a long run of prosperity. And so, Dame Fortune, give me my darling, and let her not know for the next twenty years that this right hand is red with her kindred’s blood. Let her not know! And after twenty years of bliss—well, let the volcano explode, and bury me in the ashes. I shall have lived my life.”
He parted with Eve in Bruton Street after tea. She was going to an evening service with Lady Hartley. They were to hear a famous preacher, while the mundane Sir Hubert dined at Greenwich with some men. Eve was to leave Waterloo Station early next morning, and as Lady Hartley was sending her maid to see the young lady and her luggage safely lodged at the Homestead, Vansittart was told he would not be wanted.
“This is a free country,” he said. “You will find me at the station to say good-bye.”
He went home to dine with his mother, a very melancholy dinner. Mrs. Vansittart’s pale cheeks bore traces of tears, and she was obviously unhappy, although she struggled to keep up appearances, talked about the weather, the sermon she had heard in the morning, the dinner, anything to make conversation while the servants were in the room.