All in a flutter of delight was Mary Blanchet when preparing to enter that magical circle. She was going at last to meet great men and brilliant women. Perhaps, some day, she might even come to be known among them--to shine among them. She could never be done embracing Minola for having brought her to the gate of that heaven. She spent all the day dressing herself and adjusting her hair; but as the hours went on she became almost wretched from nervousness. When it was nearly time for them to go she was quivering with agitation. They went in a brougham hired specially for the occasion, because, although Mrs. Money offered to send her carriage, and Mary would have liked it much, Minola would hear of nothing of the kind. Mary was engaged all the way in the brougham in the proper adjustment of her gloves. At last they came to the place. Minola did the gentleman's part, and handed her agitated companion out. Mary Blanchet saw a strip of carpet on the pavement, an open door with servants in livery standing about, blazing lights, brightly dressed women going in, a glimpse of a room with a crowd of people, and then Minola and she found themselves somehow in a ladies'

dressing-room.

"Minola, darling, don't go in without me. I am quite nervous--I should never venture to go in alone."

Minola did not intend to desert her palpitating little companion, who now indeed clung to her skirts and would not let her go had she been inclined. Miss Blanchet might have been a young beauty just about to make her _debut_ at a ball, so anxious was she about her appearance, about her dress, about her complexion; and at the same time she was so nervous that she could hardly compel her trembling fingers to give the finishing touches which she believed herself to need. Minola looked on wondering, puzzled, and half angry. The poetess was unmistakably a little, withered, yellowing old maid. She had not even the remains of good looks. No dressing or decoration possible to woman could make her anything but what she was, or deceive any one about her, or induce any one to feel interested in her. The handsome, stately girl who stood smiling near her was about to enter the drawing-room quite unconcerned as to her own appearance, and indeed not thinking about it; and the homely little old maid was quite distressed lest the company generally should not sufficiently admire her, or should find any fault with her dress.

"Come along, you silly poetess," said Minola at last, breaking into a laugh, and fairly drawing her companion away from the looking-gla.s.s.

"What do you think anybody will care about you or me? We'll steal in unnoticed, and we'll be all right."

"It's the first time I ever was in London society, Minola, dear, and I'm quite nervous."

"It's the first time I ever was in London society, and I'm not a bit nervous. No one knows us, dear--and no one cares. So come along."

She fairly carried Mary Blanchet out of the dressing-room, along a corridor lined with seats, on which people who had been in the drawing-room and had come out, were chattering, and flirting, and lounging--and at last over the threshold of the drawing-room, and into the presence of the hostess. A few friendly words were got through, and Minola dragged her companion along through the crowd into the recess formed by a window where there were some unoccupied seats.

"Now, Mary, that's done. The plunge is made, dear! We are in society!

Let us sit down here--and look at it."

"This," said Mary faintly--"this, at last, is society."

"I suppose it is, dear. At least it will do very well for you and me.

We should never know any difference. Imagine all these people marquises and countesses, and what more can we want to make us happy? They may be marquises and countesses for all I know."

"I should think there must be some great poets, and authors, and artists, Minola. I am sure there must be. Oh, there is my brother!"

In effect Mr. Herbert Blanchet had already fixed his dark eyes on Minola, and was making his way up to her retreat, rather to Minola's distress. He addressed Minola at once with that undefinable manner of easy and kindly superiority which he always adopted toward women, and which, it must be owned, impressed some women a great deal. To his sister he held out, while hardly looking at her, an encouraging hand of recognition.

"Have you seen Delavar's picture?" he asked Minola.

"No. Who is Delavar?"

"Delavar? He _was_ the greatest painter of our time--at least of his school; for I don't admit that his school is the true one."

"Oh, is his picture here?"

"In the other room--yes. He painted it for Mr. Money--for Mrs. Money rather I should say--and it has just been sent home. Come with me and I will show it to you."

"And Mary?"

"We'll come back for Mary presently. The rooms are too full. We couldn't all get through. If you'll take my arm, Miss Grey!"

Minola rose and took his arm, and they made their way slowly through the room. They moved even more slowly than was necessary, for Herbert Blanchet was particularly anxious to show off his companion and himself to the fullest advantage. The moment Minola entered the room he saw that she was the handsomest girl there, and that her dressing was simple, graceful, and picturesque. He knew that before a quarter of an hour had pa.s.sed everybody would be asking who she was, and he resolved to secure for himself the effect of being the first to parade her through the rooms. He was a singularly handsome man--as has been said before--almost oppressively handsome; and a certain wasted look about his eyes and cheeks added a new and striking effect to his appearance.

He was dark, she was fair; he was a tall man, she was a rather tall girl; and if his face had a worn look, hers had an expression of something like habitual melancholy, which was not perhaps in keeping with her natural temperament, and which lent by force of contrast an additional charm to her eyes when they suddenly lit up at the opening of any manner of animated conversation. No combination could be more effective, Mr. Blanchet felt, than that of his appearance and hers; and then she was a new figure. So he pa.s.sed slowly on with her, and he knew that most people looked at them as they pa.s.sed. He took good care, too, that they should be engaged in earnest talk.

"I am delighted to have you all to myself for a moment, Miss Grey--to tell you that I know all about your goodness to Mary. That is why I would not bring her with us now. No--you must let me speak--I am not offering you my thanks. I know you would not care about that. But I must tell you that I know what you have done. I have no doubt that you are her sole support--poor Mary!"

"I am her friend, Mr. Blanchet--only that."

"Her only friend too. Her brother has not done much for her. To tell you the truth, Miss Grey, it isn't in his power now. You don't know the struggles of us, the unsuccessful men in literature, who yet have faith in ourselves. I am very poor. My utmost effort goes in keeping a decent dress-coat and buying a pair of gloves; I don't complain--I am not one bit deterred, and I only trouble you with this confession, because whatever I may have been in the past I had rather you knew me to be what I am--a wretched, penniless struggler--than believe that I left my sister to be a burden on your friendship."

"Mary is the only friend I have," said Minola. "It is not wonderful if I wish to keep her with me. And you will make a great success some time."

He shook his head.

"If one hadn't to grind at things for bare living, one might do something. I am not bad enough, or good enough; and that's the truth of it. I dare say if I were mean enough to hunt after some woman with money, I might have succeeded as well as others--but I couldn't do that."

"No, I am sure you could not."

"I am not mean enough for that. But I am not high-minded enough to accept any path, and be content with it and proud of it. Now I shan't bore you any more about myself. I wanted you to know this that you might not think too harshly of me. I know you felt some objection to me at first; you need not try politely to deny it."

"Oh, no; I don't want to deny it. I prefer truth to politeness, a great deal. I did think you had neglected your sister; but really I was not surprised. I believe other men do the same thing."

"But now you see that I have some excuse?"

"I am glad to hear it, Mr. Blanchet."

"Glad to hear that I am so wretchedly poor, Miss Grey?" he said with a smile, and bending his eyes on her. "Glad to hear that your friend's brother is such a failure?"

"I would rather a thousand times hear that you were poor than that you were heartless. I don't call it a failure to be poor. I should call it a failure to be selfish and mean."

She spoke in a low tone, but very earnestly and eagerly, and she suddenly thought she was speaking too eagerly, and stopped.

"Well," he said, after a moment's pause, "here is the picture. We shall get to it presently, when these people move away."

They had entered, through a curtained door, a small room which was nearly filled with people standing before a picture, and admiringly criticising it. Minola, with all her real or fancied delight in noting the jealousies and weaknesses of men and women, could hear no words of detraction or even dispraise.

"Is the painter here?" she asked of her companion in a whisper.

"No; I haven't seen him. Perhaps he'll come in later on."

"Would you think it cheap cynicism if I were to ask why they all praise the picture--why they don't find any fault with it?"

"Oh, because they are all of the school, and they must support their creed. Our art is a creed to us. I don't admit that I am of Delavar's school any more; in fact, I look upon him as a heretic. He is going in for mere popularity; success has spoilt him. But to most of these people here he is still a divinity. They haven't found him out yet."

"Oh!"

This little exclamation broke from Minola as some people at length struggled their way outward, and allowed her to see the whole of the picture.

"What is it called?" she asked.

"Love stronger than death."

The scene was a graveyard, under a sickly yellow moon, rising in a livid and greenish sky. A little to the left of the spectator was seen a freshly-opened grave. In the foreground were two figures--one that of a dead girl, whom her lover had just haled from her coffin, wrapped as she was in her cerements of the tomb; the other that of the lover. He had propped the body against the broken hillock of the grave, and he was chanting a love-song to it which he accompanied on his lute. His face suggested the last stage of a galloping consumption, further enlivened by the fearsome light of insanity in his eyes. Some dreary bats flopped and lollopped through the air, and a few sympathetic toads came out to listen to the lay of the lover. The cypresses appeared as if they swayed and moaned to the music; and the rank weeds and gra.s.ses were mournfully tremulous around the sandalled feet of the forlorn musician.

Minola at first could not keep from shuddering. Then there followed a shocking inclination to laugh.

"What do you think of it?" Blanchet asked.

"Oh, I don't like it at all."