"Tell your mamma what you please, but—listen to me, Bella—if you venture to harm him in any way with your pitiful venom, I, girl as I am, will never let you go till I have revenged myself and him."
Bella, like most bullies, was a terrible coward. There was an earnestness in Valérie's words, and a dangerous light in her eyes, that frightened her, and she left the room in silence, while Valérie leaned her forehead on Spit's silky back, and cried bitterly, tears that for her life she wouldn't have shed while her cousin was there.
The next time Falkenstein called at Lowndes Square, the footman told him, "Not at home," and Waldemar swore, mentally, as he turned from the door, for though he could keep himself from seeking her, it was something new not to find her when he wished.
"She's like all the rest," he thought bitterly; "She's used me, and now she's gone to newer friends. I was a fool to suppose any woman would do otherwise. They'll tell her I can't marry; of course she'll go over to D'Orwood, or some of those confounded fools that are dangling after her."
So in his skeptical haste judged Falkenstein, on the strength of a single "Not at home," due to Cashranger malice, and the fierce throbs the mere suspicion gave him showed him that he loved Valérie too much to be able to deceive himself any longer with the assurance that his feelings towards his protégée was simple "friendship." He knew it, but he was loth to give way to it. He had long held as a doctrine that a man could forget if he chose. He had been wearied of so many, been disappointed in so much, he had had idols of the hour, in which, their first gloss off, he had found no beauty, he could not tell; it might not be the same with Valérie. Warm and passionate as a Southern, haughty and reserved as a Northern, he held many a bitter conflict in his solitary vigils at night over his pipe, after evenings spent in society which no longer amused him, or excitement with which he vainly sought to drown his cares. When he did meet Valérie out, which was rarely, as he refused most invitations now, his struggle against his ill-timed passion made his manner so cold and capricious, that Valérie, who could not divine the workings of his heart, began, despite her vehement faith in him, and conviction that he was not wholly indifferent to her, to dread that Bella might be right, and that as he had left others so would he leave her. He gave her no opportunity of questioning him as to his sudden change, for when he did call in Lowndes Square, Bella and her aunt always stationed themselves as a sort of detective police, and Falkenstein now never sought a tête-à-tête.
One evening she met him at a dinner-party. With undisguised delight she watched his entrance, and Waldemar, seeing her radiant face, thought in his haste, "She is happy enough, what does she care for me?" If he had looked at her after he had shaken hands carelessly with her, and turned away to talk to another woman, he would have discovered his mistake. But when do we ever discover half our errors before it is too late? She signed to him to come to her under pretext of looking at some croquis, and whispered hurriedly,
"Count Waldemar, what have I done—why do you never come to see me? You are so changed, so altered——"
"I was not aware of it."
"But I never see you in the Gardens now. You never talk to me, you never call on me."
"I have other engagements."