[CHAPTER XXVII.]
A year has passed since the ill-fated Hesperus was burned in mid-ocean with such terrible loss of human life.
In the sultry heat of August, Vane Charteris has forsaken the breathless, dusty city for the coolness and verdure of that terrestrial paradise among the hills, Langton Villa.
He is the guest of Miss Langton, who queens it right royally here over the grand domain she had nearly lost by her folly of one year ago.
They walk up and down beneath the trees, Maud and her handsome lawyer, in the glow of the evening sunset, with the lovely sights and sounds of summer all around them.
The heiress, in a robe of palest blue, with creamy lace, looks her fairest. Mr. Charteris, always handsome, is none the less so for the shadow brooding darkly in the deep blue eyes, lending its touch of earnestness to the grave, pale face.
"How dull and distrait you are," she says at length, impatiently. "Let us sit down here beneath this tree, and I will try to charm this dull mood away."
But for once she finds her fascinations fail. Vane, always inclined to be taciturn, is more than usually so to-night, even to the verge of embarrassment.
She wonders why his eyes evade her own, why he makes no reply to some tender epithets that falls cooingly from the beautiful lips.
"I thought you loved me, Vane," she breaks out at last, with some indignation.