The warm golden light of an autumn sun was struggling through the half-closed curtains of a window, in the mansion of Sir Marmaduke Wade.
It was still early in the afternoon; and the window in question, opening from an upper storey, and facing westward, commanded one of the finest views of the park of Bulstrode. The sunbeams slanting through the parted tapestry lit up an apartment, which by its light luxurious style of furniture, and costly decoration, proclaimed itself to be a boudoir, or room exclusively appropriated to the use of a lady.
At that hour there was other and better evidence of such appropriation: since the lady herself was seen standing in the embayment of its window, under the arcade formed by the drooping folds of the curtains.
The sunbeams glittered upon tresses of a kindred colour—among which they seemed delighted to linger. They flashed into eyes as blue as the canopy whence they came; and the rose-coloured clouds, they had themselves created in the western sky, were not of fairer effulgence than the cheeks they appeared so fondly to kiss.
These were not in their brightest bloom. Though slightly blanched, neither were they pale. The strongest emotion could not produce absolute pallor on the cheeks of Marion Wade—where the rose never altogether gave place to the lily.
The young lady stood in the window, looking outward upon the park. With inquiring glance she swept its undulating outlines; traced the softly-rounded tops of the chestnut trees; scrutinised the curving lines of the copses; saw the spotted kine roaming slowly o’er the lea, and the deer darting swiftly across the sward; but none of these sights were the theme of her thoughts, or fixed her attention for more than a passing moment.
There was but one object within that field of vision, upon which her eyes rested for any length of time; not constantly, but with glances straying from it only to return. This was a gate between two massive piers of mason-work, grey and ivy-grown. It was not the principal entrance to the park; but one of occasional use, which opened near the western extremity of the enclosure into the main road. It was the nearest way for any one going in the direction of Stone Dean, or coming thither.
There was nothing in the architecture of those ivy-covered piers to account for the almost continuous scrutiny given to it by Mistress Marion Wade; nor yet in the old gate itself—a mass of red-coloured rusty iron. Neither was new to her. She had looked upon that entrance—which opened directly in front of her chamber window every day—almost every hour of her life. Why, then, was she now so assiduously gazing upon it?
Her soliloquy will furnish the explanation.
“He promised he would come to-day. He told Walter so before leaving the camp—the scene of his conquest over one who appears to hate him—far more over one who loves him No. The last triumph came not then. Long before was it obtained. Ah me! it must be love, or why should I so long to see him?”