"Of course she is better. See what a high color she has," said the voice of Freddy Richmond, the first she clearly distinguished amid the din.

"I strongly disapprove of rouging," said Mrs. Wildair, in an audible whisper, to Mrs. Gleason, as they both swept up stairs with a great rustling of silks.

"What a bewildered look she has," said Miss Harper, with a slight laugh, as she too, brushed past; "one would think she was walking in a dream."

"Here comes Captain Arlingford, Hattie, dear," as she tripped after her; "she will awake now."

Poor Georgia! she did indeed feel like one in a dream; yet she heard every jibe as plainly as even the speakers could wish, but she replied not.

"My dear Mrs. Wildair, I am rejoiced to see you again, and looking so well too," said the frank, manly voice of Captain Arlingford, as he shook her hand warmly. "I trust you have quite recovered from your late indisposition."

"Quite, I thank you," said Georgia, trying to smile. Every voice and every look she had lately heard had been so cold and harsh that her languid pulses gave a grateful bound at the honest, hearty warmth of the frank young sailor's tone.

Richmond Wildair had just entered in time to witness this little scene, and something as near a scowl as his serene brow could ever wear, darkened it at that very moment. Well has it been said that "jealousy is as cruel as the grave," it is also willfully blind. The very openness, the very candor of this greeting, might have disarmed all suspicion, but Richmond Wildair would not see anything but his earnest eagerness, and the smile that rewarded him.

Going up to Georgia, he brushed almost rudely past Arlingford, and, offering her his arm, he said coldly:

"You will take cold standing in this draught, my dear; allow me to lead you to the drawing-room."

At his look and tone the smile died away. He saw it, and the scowl deepened.

Placing her on a sofa, he stooped over and said in a hissing whisper in her ear:

"Do not _too_ openly show your preference for the gallant captain this evening, Mrs. Wildair. If you cannot dissimulate for my sake, try it for your own. People _will_ talk, you know, if your partiality is too public."

A flash like sheet-lightning leaped from Georgia's eyes, as the insulting meaning of his words flashed upon her; she caught her breath and sprang to her feet, but with a bow and a smile he turned and was gone.

"Oh, mercy! that I were dead!" was the pa.s.sionate cry wrung from her anguished heart at this last worst blow of all. "Oh, this is the very climax of wrong and insult! Oh, what, _what_ have I done to be treated thus?"

How this evening pa.s.sed Georgia never knew. As Miss Harper had said, she was like one in a dream, but it was over at last; and, totally worn out and exhausted, she was sleeping a deep dreamless sleep of utter prostration.

Next morning, at the breakfast table, Henry Gleason suddenly called out--

"Well, ladies and gentlemen, what's to be the bill of fare for to-day?"

"Somebody was talking of teaching us to skate yesterday," said Miss Harper. "I want to learn dreadfully. What do you say to going down to that pond we were looking at and giving us our first lesson."

"I'm there!" said Master Henry, whose language was always more emphatic than choice, "what do you say, all of you young shavers?"

"I second the motion for one," said Mr. Curtis

"And I for another," said Lieutenant Gleason, and a universal a.s.sent came from the gentlemen.

"And what says our host?" said Miss Harper, with a smile.

"That he is always delighted to sanction anything Miss Harper proposes,"

he said, with a bow.

"And what says our _hostess_?" said Captain Arlingford, turning to Georgia, who with her fict.i.tious bloom gone, sat pale and languid at the head of the table.

"That she is afraid you will have to hold her excused," replied Georgia.

"I scarcely feel well enough to accompany you."

"You are indeed looking ill," said Miss Arlingford, anxiously; "pray allow me to stay with you, then, as you are unable to go out."

"And me too!" sung out Henry Gleason so eagerly that the mouthful he was eating went the wrong way, nearly producing strangulation. "There is not much fun in teaching girls to skate; all they do is stand on their feet a minute, then squeal out, and flop down like a lot of bad balloons, and then get up and screech and go head over heels again. It's twice as jolly hearing Miss Arlingford sing."

Miss Arlingford laughed, and bowed her thanks for the compliment.

"And may I beg to stay too?" said Captain Arlingford; "I am really getting quite played out with so much exertion, and mean to take life easy for a day or two. Come now, Mrs. Wildair, be merciful to Harry and me?"

"I think you had better try to join us, Georgia," said Richmond, with no very pleased look; "the air will do you good."

"Indeed I cannot," said Georgia, who was half blinded with a throbbing headache; "my head aches, and I beg you will excuse me. But I cannot think of depriving any of you of the pleasure of going, though I thank you for your kind consideration."

"Now, Mrs. Wildair, I positively shall not take a refusal," said Miss Arlingford, who saw that it would do better not to leave Georgia alone with her morbid fancies. "I shall take it quite unkindly if you send me away. I shall try if I cannot exorcise your headache by some music, and I really must intercede, too, for my young friend, Master Harry here, who was delightful enough to compliment me a little while ago."

"And will no one intercede for me?" said the captain.

"_I_ will," said Harry. "We three will have a real nice good time all to ourselves---- hanged if we don't! Oh, Miss Arlingford, you're a--a _brick_! you are so!" he exclaimed enthusiastically; "and Mrs. Georgia, I guess you'd better let Arlingford stay too. Three ain't company, and four _is_."

And "Do, Mrs. Wildair!" "Do, Mrs. Georgia," chimed in Captain and Miss Arlingford laughingly. And Georgia, unable to refuse without positive rudeness, smiled a faint a.s.sent.

For one instant a scowl of midnight blackness lingered on the face of Richmond, the next it was gone, and Georgia saw him, smiling and gay, set off with the rest on their skating excursion.

The dinner hour was past before they arrived. Georgia had spent a pleasanter morning than she had for many a day, and there was something almost like cheerfulness in her tone as she addressed some questions to her husband after his return. He did not reply, but turned on her a terrible look, that sent her sick and faint back in her seat, and then, without a word, he pa.s.sed on and was gone.

That look was destined to overthrow all Georgia's new-found calmness for that day. She scarcely understood what had caused it. Surely he must have known she was ill, she thought, and not fitted to join in an excursion like that, and surely he could not be angry at her for staying at home while too sick to go out. Feeling that the gayety of the drawing-room that evening was like "vinegar upon niter" to her feelings, she quitted it and pa.s.sed out into the long hall. The moon was shining brightly through the gla.s.s sides of the door, and she leaned her burning forehead against the cold panes and looked out at the bright stars shining down on the placid earth.

There was a rustle of garments behind her, a soft cat-like step she knew too well, and turning round she saw the hateful face with its baleful smile fixed upon her.

A flush of indignation covered her pale face. Could she not move a step without being dogged by this creature?

"Well, Mrs. Georgia," began Freddy, with a sneer, "I hope you had a pleasant time to-day with the gay sailor."

Georgia clinched her hands and set her teeth hard together to keep down her rising pa.s.sion.

"Leave me!" she said, with an imperious stamp.

"Oh, just let me stay a little while," said Freddy, jeeringly. "What confidence he must have in you to make an appointment in the very face of your husband!"

"Will you leave me?"

"Not just yet, my dear cousin," Freddy said, smiling up in her face.

"What a romantic thing it would be if we were to have an elopement in real life--how delightful it would be, wouldn't it?"

Georgia's face grew ghastly, even to her lips, and her whole frame shook with the storm of pa.s.sion raging within. Freddy saw it, and exulted in her power.

"How delightfully jealous Richmond is, to be sure, of his pauper bride and her sailor lover; how his friends will talk when they go back to the city--and how Mrs. Wildair, of Richmond Hall, who is too much of a fool ever to know how to carry out an intrigue properly, will be laughed at.