“I know where Fifth Avenue is, and I will go there if it kills me. But I hope that proud, beautiful lady will not be there to wither me with her angry eyes!”
CHAPTER IX.
AN HOUR TO BE REMEMBERED.
The Fifth Avenue mansion where Mrs. Dalrymple lived was little less than a palace as she was little less than a princess, if royal beauty, royal wealth, and almost royal state could count. Her parents were dead, she was mistress of herself and many millions, and at barely thirty-three, while looking scarcely twenty-five, had scores of hearts at her feet from which to choose, if that way lay her happiness.
Some said that she had been widowed young, others that she was divorced, some that her heart was buried in a grave, others that she was a man hater. No one ever heard her own that either was true. She simply smiled and went her way, heedless of praise or blame.
That autumn evening when she swept down the grand staircase into the brilliantly lighted hall, her rich violet velvet robe trailing behind her, her jewels flashing like stars, she heard an altercation at the door. Her pompous servant was saying harshly:
“You cannot come in here; no, indeed, there’s no use begging me, I tell you. Go around to the servants’ entrance!”
Mrs. Dalrymple stopped short, listening to the low, pleading, girlish voice that half sobbed:
“I tell you I’m not a beggar! Oh, do let me in to see Mr. Laurier just once more!”
The man was about to laugh rudely just as his mistress came up behind him, exclaiming in her sweet, frosty voice:
“What is the trouble here?”