The cross old baronet and his faded, sad old wife, with their handsome, rather elderly daughter, all took to the young American bride with pleased interest, as she did to them. It was a mutual attraction.
Miss Trueheart, the daughter, was a tall, handsome brunette, several years past thirty; but she had many admirers, and among them one whom it was believed she favored; but he knew, as did all the rest, that Madelon Trueheart had declared she would never marry as long as her mother lived.
Molly felt sorry for that pale, sad Lady Trueheart, but sorrier still for Lord Westerly, Madelon’s faithful lover, who had loved her so long and vainly. She wanted these two to be happy, as she was with her adored Cecil.
“Only, she would be happier still with her husband, for no hidden barrier would lie between them,” she sighed to herself.
It was odd what a close intimacy grew up between the bride of seventeen and the woman of thirty-three. They managed to be together very often, and Molly went several times a week to the house in Park Lane, and had the entrée of Miss Trueheart’s boudoir, and even her dressing-room; so at last she felt bold enough to keep a promise she had made Lord Westerly, to plead his cause with his obdurate fair one.
“We have been lovers for ten years, Mrs. Laurens, and my patience is almost exhausted,” he said. “I have told Madelon that she might be with her mother most of the time, but she seems to think nothing but the sacrifice of her whole life will satisfy her parents.”
“It looks hard,” said cordial Molly, with misty eyes. “I’ll speak to her for you, Lord Westerly.”
“Heaven bless you, you good little soul!” exclaimed his lordship, to whose forty years Molly seemed nothing but a child.
So Cecil’s carriage rolled down Park Lane one day and a vision of beauty stepped therefrom, and held up her rosy lips for Cecil’s parting kiss, careless of the coachman’s stare and the footman’s grin.
“Bye-bye, Cecil; call for me in an hour,” she said, smiling, and after waiting until she had entered the house, he went away.