"Is he here to-night?" Wyn could not resist asking.
"Yes, somewhere. I do not see him just now, Mrs. Miles carried him off. Ah! here he comes, with that girl in the primrose gown; is it not one of your sisters?"
"Yes,—Hilda," answered Wyn, with much interest. "Is that Mr. Percivale? What a fine head!"
"Is it not?" said Lady Mabel, with enthusiasm. "You are an artist, you can appreciate it. Some people say he has red hair, and that his style is so outré; for my part, I do like a man who dares to be unlike other men! He has a distinct style of his own, and he knows it. He declines to clip and trim himself down to the level of everybody else! but there is nothing obtrusive about him."
This was true. As Percivale advanced, Wyn was constrained to admit that a more distinguished gentleman she had never beheld. His face fascinated her. It expressed so clearly the simple nobility of his soul. He came up to where Lady Mabel was standing, Hilda Allonby on his arm, and then a number of introductions took place.
Suddenly, with impetuous footstep, a gentleman approached the group. Elsa turned her face, and one of her slow, beautiful smiles dawned over eyes and mouth as, with perfect self-possession, she stretched out her hand in greeting.
It was Osmond; he was white as death, and so excited as to be unable to speak connectedly. He took the little white-gloved hand in his, and seemed at once to become oblivious of his surroundings. Wyn was obliged to remind him of his manners.
"Osmond, here is Lady Mabel."
Mr. Percivale, at the sound of the name, turned round suddenly, and for several seconds the two men remained looking one another in the face.
They presented the somewhat unusual spectacle of a pair of rivals, both of whom were quite determined to fight fair. But Percivale's tranquillity was in strong contrast to Osmond's flushed and manifest disorder. To Wyn there was something cruel about it—the rich yacht-owner, the poor, struggling artist. It could never be an even contest.