This is her second season in society. She is universally admired—indeed, is quite 'the rage.' 'All the young men are dying for her'—I quote from the observations about town; but few have the hardihood to pay serious court to the daughter of Hiram Meeker.
Yet you perceive one man has ventured—successfully ventured.
Who is he? I do not wonder you inquire with some degree of curiosity. I shall proceed to gratify it.
The large, dark, coarse-visaged, foreign-looking fellow, who 'lives but to adore the angel of beauty and perfection' at his side, and with whom the 'angel' is so blindly infatuated, is Signor Filippo Barbonne, a second-rate performer of the last season's opera troupe!
It is a fact, reader, so it will be vain for me to deny it.
What, meantime, can I say by way of explanation? I hardly know. This Signor Filippo, who is an impudent, audacious scamp, made the acquaintance of Belle two years ago, when she was a schoolgirl. She was amused at seeing him follow her persistently, and at last she permitted him to accost her.
The cunning fellow conducted himself with the utmost deference, not to say humility. He pretended not to have the slightest knowledge who she was. He had been seized and subdued by her charms, her loveliness; and it was quite sufficient happiness for him to be permitted to watch for her and to tread in her steps day by day. He only wished to speak and tell her so, lest she might suppose him disrespectful.
The ice once broken, arrangements for accidental meetings followed.
Signer Filippo did not disclose himself, except to say his position was so far below hers, that he had but one hope, one aspiration, which was, that she would permit him to be her willing slave forever. He asked and expected nothing beyond the privilege of worshipping her.
But how happens it that Belle Meeker is desperately in love with the Signor?