“Let me but get Daisie Bell married off safely to Royall, then I will find Dallas again, and wind my toils around him,” she mused, as she rode by Daisie’s side, weaving in her busy mind the details of a plot that would have made her spring from the carriage in dismay had she even guessed at her companion’s thought.
But the wondrous X-ray that is to lay bare the secrets of the mind to startled gazers not being discovered yet, Daisie rode on in peace, getting somewhat reconciled now to the prospect of the visit, having, like all healthy young girls, a keen appetite for social pleasures.
She knew that she should not forget for a moment her dream of love and its woeful ending, but she thought that participation in the evening’s amusement might dull the keen edge of her pain. Her pride was aroused, too, and she was determined that Mrs. Fleming should not see that she was pining over Dallas Bain’s desertion.
Daisie did not mean for any one to guess that her poor heart was broken, so she did her part with the rest, laughing and singing like the happiest girl in the world, though all the while her poor heart was calling tenderly:
“Oh, Dallas, my love, come back, come back!”
CHAPTER XII.
AN UNBIDDEN GUEST.
Did the strange, mysterious influences ever about and around us, though beyond our ken, bear to Dallas Bain the yearning heart cry of his deserted love? Did they bring him back to her side that night?
Far away, ’mid the busy haunts of the world of men, he had sought forgetfulness, and found it not.
He was a haunted man—haunted by a face, a voice, a wealth of golden hair, a soul—for was not Daisie’s soul always following and seeking his in the mystery that held him from her side? So at last, by the force of her yearning, she drew him back.
He was proud and angry, but insensibly his heart began to soften, he began to invent excuses, to believe that he had been too hasty, had judged her too harshly.