How did she feel? She had no time to think of that. All her strength was expended in concealing her agitation. She arranged her dress, and remarked that the water was unusually muddy. In fact, it had an opaque greenish hue. The old Countess did not notice it.
"I never suspected that he was married!" she exclaimed. "He should have told us. A man has no right to conceal such a fact."
And Erika replied, with an air of easy indifference that surprised even herself, "I suppose, grandmother, he did not imagine that the circumstance could possess the slightest interest for us."
CHAPTER XXIII.
In addition to many trying and strange characteristics possessed by Erika, Providence had bestowed upon her one which at this time stood her in stead. Upon any severe agitating experience a few hours of cool, hard self-consciousness were sure to ensue,--hours in which she was perfectly able to appear in the world with dry eyes, and not even the keenest observer could perceive any change in her, save that her laugh was perhaps more frequent and more silvery.
This condition of mind was far from being an agreeable one: moreover, the reaction afterwards was terrible: nevertheless, thanks to this moral paralysis, Erika was able in critical moments to preserve appearances.
The day on which, as she supposed, her happiness, her faith, the entire purpose of her life, lay in ruins about her, was occupied with social duties of every description. She performed them all,--an afternoon tea, with lawn-tennis, a dinner, and at last a supper with music at the Austrian Consul's.
And even when the old Countess on their way home from the Consul's proposed that they should look in at Frau von Neerwinden's, upon whom they had not called since the memorable evening when Minona read, Erika declared herself quite willing to do so. Perhaps this was because she had a secret hope of meeting Lozoncyi there; for she longed to see him, to show him how entirely he had been mistaken if he had supposed----
Ah! what pretexts we invent to deceive ourselves as to the cowardly impulses of our desires!
But he was not at Frau von Neerwinden's, where the old Countess found herself so well entertained, however, that she passed an hour, discussing the latest Venetian scandal, in which Erika took no interest. She strolled away from the group of elderly guests and through the open glass doors leading out upon a balcony above the water, where she seemed quite forgotten by those within the apartment.