“And he—what brought him from his bogs and mountains?� asked the little Marquise. “Was he qualifying for the diplomatic service, or studying art?�
Grandmamma turned her brilliant eyes calmly upon the less aristocratic countenance of her daughter-in-law. “He was doing neither. He was staying in Paris in attendance upon his fiancée, who had come over to buy her trousseau. I forget her name—she was the only daughter of a baronet of Leicestershire, and an heiress. The match had been made by her family. Monsieur Dunbar, though poor, being the cadet of a great family and heir to an ancient title—his brother, Lord Hailhope, having in early youth sustained an accident in the gymnasium which rendered him a cripple for life.�
“So a wife with a ‘dot’ was urgently required!� commented the little Marquise. “Let us hope she was not without esprit and a certain amount of good looks, in the interests of Monsieur Dunbar.�
“I saw her on the night of my first ball,� said Grandmamma, laying down her tatting and folding her delicate, ivory-tinted hands, adorned with a few rings of price, upon her dove-colored silk lap. “She had sandy hair, much drawn back from the forehead, and pale eyes of china-blue, with the projecting teeth which the caricatures of ‘Cham’ gave to all Englishwomen. Also, her waist was rather flat, and her satin boots would have fitted a sapeur; but she had an agreeable expression, and I afterward heard her married life with Monsieur Dunbar was fairly happy.�
“And Monsieur himself—was he as happy with her as—as he might have been, supposing he had never visited Paris—never called at the studio of Varolan?� asked the little Marquise, with a peculiar intonation.
Grandmamma’s rosary was of beautiful pearls. She let the shining things slide through her fingers meditatively as she replied:
“My daughter, I cannot say. We met at that ball—the last ball given at the Tuileries before the terrible events of the fifteenth of July. I presented Monsieur Dunbar to my mother. We danced together, conversed lightly of our prospects; I felt a serrement de cœur, and he, Monsieur Dunbar, was very pale, with a peculiar expression about the eyes and mouth which denoted violent emotion strongly repressed. I had noticed it when Monsieur de Courvaux came to claim my hand for the second State quadrille. He wore his uniform as Minister of Commerce and all his Orders.... His thick nose, white whiskers, dull eyes, and bent figure contrasted strangely with the fine features and splendid physique of Monsieur Dunbar. Ah, Heaven! how I shivered as he smiled at me with his false teeth, and pressed my hand within his arm.... He filled me with fear. And yet at heart I knew him to be good and disinterested and noble, even while I could have cried out to Angus to save me.... But I was whirled away. Everyone was very kind. The Empress, looking tall as a goddess, despotically magnificent in the plenitude of her charms, noticed me kindly. I danced with the Prince Imperial, a fresh-faced, gentle boy. Monsieur de Courvaux was much felicitated upon his choice, and Maman was pleased—that goes without saying. Thus I came back to Monsieur Dunbar. We were standing together in an alcove adorned with palms, admiring the porphyry vase, once the property of Catherine the Great, and given by the Emperor Alexander to the First Napoleon, when for the first time he took my hand. If I could paint in words the emotion that suddenly overwhelmed me!... It seemed as though the great personages, the distinguished crowds, the jeweled ladies, the uniformed men, vanished, and the lustres and girandoles went out, and Angus and I were standing in pale moonlight on the shores of a lake encircled by mountains, looking in each other’s eyes. It matters little what we said, but the history of our first meeting might have prompted the sonnet of Arvers.... You recall it:
“Mon cœur a son secret, mon âme a son mystère,
Un amour éternel dans un instant conçu:
Le mal est sans remède.�