"Circumstances have always forbade it," he answered, with a smile, which Constance declared was the most fascinating thing she ever saw in her life.
Fleda was arranging her flowers, with the help of some very unnecessary suggestions from the donor.
"Mr. Lewis," said Constance, with a kind of insinuation very different from her mother's, made up of fun and dating, "Mr. Carleton has been giving me a long lecture on botany, while my attention was distracted by listening to your spirituel conversation."
"Well, Miss Constance?"
"And I am morally certain I sha'n't recollect a word of it if I don't carry away some specimens to refresh my memory, and in that case he would never give me another."
It was impossible to help laughing at the distressful position of the young lady's eyebrows, and, with at least some measure of outward grace, Mr. Thorn set about complying with her request. Fleda again stood tapping her left hand with her flowers, wondering a little that somebody else did not come and speak to her, but he was talking to Mrs. Evelyn and Mr. Stackpole. Fleda did not wish to join them, and nothing better occurred to her than to arrange her flowers over again; so, throwing them all down before her on a marble slab, she began to pick them up one by one, and put them together, with, it must be confessed, a very indistinct realization of the difference between myrtle and lemon blossoms; and as she seemed to be laying acacia to rose, and disposing some sprigs of beautiful heath behind them, in reality she was laying kindness alongside of kindness, and looking at the years beyond years where their place had been. It was with a little start that she suddenly found the person of her thoughts standing at her elbow, and talking to her in bodily presence. But while he spoke with all the ease and simplicity of old times, almost making Fleda think it was but last week they had been strolling through the Place de la Concorde together, there was a constraint upon her that she could not get rid of, and that bound eye and tongue. It might have worn off, but his attention was presently claimed again by Mrs. Evelyn, and Fleda thought best, while yet Constance's bouquet was unfinished, to join another party, and make her escape into the drawing-rooms.
CHAPTER VII.
"Have you observed a sitting hare,
List'ning, and, fearful of the storm
Of horns and hounds, clap back her ear,
Afraid to keep or leave her form?
PRIOR.
By the Evelyns' own desire, Fleda's going to them was delayed for a week, because, they said, a furnace was to be brought into the house, and they would be all topsy-turvy till that fuss was over. Fleda kept herself very quiet in the meantime, seeing almost nobody but the person whom it was her especial object to shun. Do her best, she could not quite escape him, and was even drawn into two or three walks and rides, in spite of denying herself utterly to gentlemen at home, and losing, in consequence, a visit from her old friend. She was glad at last to go to the Evelyns, and see company again, hoping that Mr. Thorn would be merged in a crowd.
But she could not merge him, and sometimes was almost inclined to suspect that his constant prominence in the picture must be owing to some mysterious and wilful conjuration going on in the background. She was at a loss to conceive how else it happened that, despite her utmost endeavours to the contrary, she was so often thrown upon his care, and obliged to take up with his company. It was very disagreeable. Mr. Carleton she saw almost as constantly, but, though frequently near, she had never much to do with him. There seemed to be a dividing atmosphere always in the way, and whenever he did speak to her, she felt miserably constrained, and unable to appear like herself. Why was it? she asked herself, in a very vexed state of mind. No doubt, partly from the remembrance of that overheard conversation which she could not help applying, but much more from an indefinable sense that at these times there were always eyes upon her. She tried to charge the feeling upon her consciousness of their having heard that same talk, but it would not the more go off. And it had no chance to wear off, for somehow, the occasions never lasted long something was sure to break them up while an unfortunate combination of circumstances, or of connivers, seemed to give Mr. Thorn unlimited facilities in the same kind. Fleda was quick-witted and skilful enough to work herself out of them once in a while; more often the combination was too much for her simplicity and straightforwardness.