As Gerald took her hands for a moment in his, he saw that there was a tear trembling in each corner of her eyes, blue as the skies on an April morn. He saw, too, or thought he saw, behind those tears, Love, that, suddenly surprised, had not had time to hide himself. All her being seemed suffused with an indescribable tenderness. The black thoughts that had coiled themselves round Gerald's heart from the hour of his leaving Stammars till the time of his return, his jealousy of Dayrell, his doubts as to whether Eleanor really cared for him--all vanished in this moment of supreme joy, like mists before the rising sun. It was impossible that he should doubt any longer. An impulse that was uncontrollable, that swept away the floodgates of thought and reason, came over him. He was still holding her hands and gazing into her eyes. He drew her to him--close to him. He wrapped his arms round her, and pressed her to his bosom, her face upturned to his. He bent his head, and touched with his lips the blossom of hers.
"Oh, my darling! if I could but tell you how much I love you!" he murmured in her ear. "If I could but tell you how happy it makes me to see you again!"
Her face was rosy red, but the moment he had kissed her, the violet of her eyes seemed to darken, and a strange, fathomless look came into them, such as he had never seen before. Then the tears fell, and for one brief, happy moment--while the secondhand of a clock might have marked six--she let her head rest where he had put it. Suddenly the great hall bell clanged loudly. The family had come back. Eleanor started, as the fawn starts from the covert when it hears the hunter's horn. For a single instant her eyes met Gerald's. An instant later he was in the room alone.
He stood for a little while like a man suddenly roused from sleep, who hardly knows where he is, or what has befallen him. "Was it my darling herself that rested in my arms, and whose lips I kissed just now?" he said. "Or have I suddenly lost my wits and only imagined it all? No! It must be true--it shall be true At last she is mine--mine for ever!" Then, like one who feels himself to be still half asleep, he walked out of the room and shut the door behind him.
Hardly had the door closed, when Olive Deane stepped from her hiding-place behind the curtains of one of the windows, from which spot she had been an unseen witness of the foregoing scene. Her pupils were away, and she had nothing to do. She had gone into the back drawing-room at dusk, before the lamps were lighted, and had sat down on the cushioned seat, that ran round the inner side of the large bow window. Presently a servant came in to light the lamps, but went away again without perceiving Olive. Sitting there, behind the partially-drawn curtains, she was, as it were, in a tiny room of her own; and there she might probably have remained the whole evening without being discovered, had she chosen to do so. In fact, when Eleanor came in a little later, and sat down at the piano and began to play, Olive neither spoke nor stirred, but sat watching her rival with jealous, hungry eyes, and made no sign. Thus it fell out that she became an uninvited witness of the scene between Eleanor and Gerald.
There was a look of triumph on Olive's pale face as she stepped out of her hiding-place. In her black eyes there was an unwonted sparkle. "Checkmate at last!" she said. "Before long, I shall be able to tell Matthew that the hour of his vengeance has come. What will he say when he knows that the accepted lover of dainty Miss Lloyd is no gentleman, such as Captain Dayrell, but a beggarly adventurer, without money enough to pay for the clothes he wears? Surely his revenge will be twice as sweet as it would otherwise have been. As for her--one short hour will strip her of name, wealth, position, and of the man to whom she has given her hand--for Pomeroy is not the man I take him to be if he does not cast her off the moment her real story is told him. Fine feathers make fine birds, Miss Eleanor Lloyd. We shall see how you will look when you are stripped of yours. Before three months are over, you will be grateful to anyone who will obtain for you a situation at forty pounds a year."
[CHAPTER VI.]
A SECRET OF THE SEA.
Mr. Byrne had been in the habit of writing a line to Ambrose Murray every few days, in order to satisfy the latter as to how matters were progressing at the house in Spur Alley. In one of his brief notes he mentioned that Van Duren had left home on business for a couple of days. Gerald Warburton happened to be at Miss Bellamy's when this note came to hand, and Murray at once proposed that he and Gerald should visit Byrne and his daughter in Spur Alley, while Van Duren was out of town. Gerald assented, and at six o'clock that evening they found themselves at Van Duren's door. Mrs. Bakewell, as she ushered them upstairs, informed them that Miss Byrne had gone out about an hour previously, but that the old gentleman would no doubt be very glad to see them.
There was no answer to the woman's knock at Mr. Byrne's door. "Poor old gentleman, he gets weaker and deafer every day," she said. "He's not long for this world, I'm afraid." Then she opened the door, and went into the room. Mr. Byrne was sitting, as he seemed ever to sit, in his great easy-chair in front of the fire. Mrs. Bakewell touched him on the shoulder, and shouted in his ear: "Two gentlemen to see you, sir."