[CHAPTER XXIV.]
The invitations for Mrs. Vernon's lawn-party had been issued at least a fortnight, and but few people had declined them.
It was well known that she gave charming entertainments, and people were always eager to attend. A lawn-party, too, was so romantic, "too sweet for anything," declared the young women who adored those out-of-door entertainments where the most flagrant flirtations were possible, and where the plainest faces acquired a certain beauty from the blended light of lamp-light and moonlight, and the flickering leaf-shadows cast by the over-arching trees.
Older people dreaded the night-air and the dew, but to these the drawing-rooms were always open, so that no one dreamed of declining Mrs. Vernon's elegant cards.
Lady Clive was present that evening, her fair and stately beauty, so like her brother's, thrown into perfect relief by a robe of blue and silver, with pale, gleaming pearls around her graceful throat and white arms.
Lady Vera wore white satin and tulle, with water-lilies here and there, a beautiful dress that was most becoming to her, and made her look regal as a young princess.
A flush of excitement glowed upon her cheeks, and her eyes were bright and restless with a strange look of expectancy and almost dread in their beautiful depths.
The constant thought in her mind was:
"I shall see my enemies to-night. What will be the result? They pretend to regard me as a perfect stranger. What shameless audacity. I cannot understand how they can carry it out so boldly. And yet God knows that but for my oath of vengeance I would never speak. Ivy might have my husband and welcome. Yet I would give much to know whose death it was I read in that American paper. Leslie Noble's father, perhaps, though I had some vague idea that he was dead long ago."
Colonel Lockhart is present too, this evening, ever watchful, ever near his darling, though without the least appearance of intrusiveness.