“It is true, Heaven knows. We returned and were just going into the house when you and Sir Everard spoke about us—we were not a stone’s throw from you, and of course every word you said fell out clear and distinct. I confess I was surprised at all I heard, as you know you did not speak the truth. However we won’t discuss that point now. What I did hear made me resolve on an explanation with Lord Delaval at once. So I just told him frankly that I did not care for him and would never marry him!”
“In other words, you were amiable enough to reject him before he had the trouble of offering himself,” Gabrielle says with a mocking smile.
“He had told me before that he loved me passionately, Gabrielle!” Zai murmurs with a hot deprecatory blush.
Her delicacy of character would not have let her reveal this except in defence of the seemingly fast conduct that has called down Gabrielle’s sneers. And Gabrielle is well punished for her sneers—for this revelation of Zai’s drives the colour from her cheek, and makes her writhe with jealousy.
“Very probably he did,” she answers sharply. “Lord Delaval is a would-be monopoliser of women’s hearts, and passionate love-making is one of the tricks of his trade. I don’t believe there was a bit of genuine sentiment in all he said.”
“I don’t know, and I don’t care if it was so. His protestations hadn’t a feather’s weight with me. And I never wish to see him again,” Zai says quietly and truthfully.
“It never appears to strike you what people will say of last night. Society hasn’t much romance in its composition. Society does not know, and would not credit that Zai Beranger wanders by day and night, blind to external influences, with a buckler girded on her heart on which is written ‘Carlton Conway.’ And if Belgravia cannot comprehend such high-flown sentiment, is it strange that I, born and bred amongst the canaille, with unlimited faith in the practical and matter-of-fact, and with a contempt for the foolish and the sickly romance of women, cannot help doubting and blaming you?”
“Blame has no effect on me,” Zai says rather defiantly, with her little head erect. She is astonished and irritated at the cool condemnatory way in which it pleases Gabrielle to speak. It strikes her that there is too much presumption in it, and her really sweet nature, trodden on, like the traditional worm, seems inclined to “turn.”
“But Lady Beranger is a slave to on dits, and she will lash herself into a fury if you don’t carry out her scheme of marrying you to Lord Delaval, after your curious behaviour last night.”
“It is mamma’s fault, and not mine that it happened; she is always throwing Lord Delaval and me together, and the whole thing is hateful to me.”