A soft warmth flushed her face for a moment; she hesitated slightly, toying with the snowy blossom; then she gave it him. He had not asked it like a love gage.
He took it, and bowed silently over her hand.
"You will find it very cold," said Lady Ida, with a trifle of embarrassment, nestling herself in her dormeuse in her warm bright nest among the exotics.
He smiled—a very gentle smile.
"Yes, I am frozen out. Adieu!"
He paused a moment, looking at her—that brilliant picture framed in flowers; then, without another word, he bowed again and left her, the woman he had learned too late to love, and had lost by his own folly for ever.
"Frozen out? What could he mean?—there is no frost," thought Lady Ida, left alone in her hot-house warmth among the white and scarlet blossoms, a little startled, a little disappointed, a little excited with some vague apprehension, she could not have told why; while Bertie Winton went on out into the cold gray winter's morning from the old Northamptonshire Hall that would know him no more, with no end so likely for him as that which had just been prophesied—a shot in a gambling hell.
Facilis descensus Averni—and he was at the bottom of the pit. Well, the descent had been very pleasant. Bertie set his teeth tight, and let the waters close over his head and shut him out of sight. He knew that a man who is down has nothing more to do with the world, save to quietly accept—oblivion.
It was a hot summer night in Secessia.