His attention is chiefly bestowed upon Harry. How the poor fellow suffers! writhing beneath the ostentatious anxiety of his betrothed, who exhausts herself in sympathetic inquiries as to his pallor, ascribing it to every cause save the true one.
"What will become of him if he does not succeed in ridding himself of this intolerable burden?" Lato asks himself. An inexpressible dread assails him. "A candidate for suicide," he thinks, and for a moment he feels dizzy and ill.
But why should Harry die, when his life might be adjusted by one word firmly uttered? He might be saved, and then what a sunny bright future would be his! If one could but help him!
The dinner is half over; punch is being served. The tall windows of the dining-hall are wide open, the breeze has died away for the time, the night is quiet, the outlook upon the park enchanting. Coloured lamps, shaped like fantastic flowers, illumine the shrubbery, whence comes soft music.
All the anguish which had been stilled for the moment stirs within Lato's breast at sound of the sweet insinuating tones. They arouse within him an insane thirst for happiness. If it were but possible to obtain a divorce! Caressingly, dreamily, the notes of "Southern Roses" float in from the park.
"Ah! how that reminds me of my betrothal!" says Selina, moving her fan to and fro in time with the music. Involuntarily Lato glances at her.
She wears a red gown, decoletée as of old. Her shoulders have grown stouter, her features sharper, but she is hardly changed otherwise; many would pronounce her handsomer than she had been on that other sultry September evening when it had first occurred to him that he--loved her--no, when he lied to himself--because it seemed so easy.
He falls into a revery, from which he is aroused by the poet Angelico Orchys, who rises, glass in hand, and in fluent verse proposes the health of the betrothed couple. Glasses are clinked, and scarcely are all seated again when Fainacky toasts the married pair who are celebrating to-day the sixth anniversary of their betrothal. Every one rises; Selina holds her glass out to Lato with a languishing glance from her half-closed eyes as she smiles at him over the brim.
He shudders. And he has dared to hope for a divorce!
The clinking of glasses has ceased; again all are seated; a fresh course of viands is in progress; there is a pause in the conversation, while the music wails and sighs outside, Fainacky from his place at table making all sorts of mysterious signs to the leader.