"My beautiful Leone," he cried, "you must not talk about the grave.

There should be no death and no grave for one like you."

"There will be none to my love," she said, but rather to herself than to him. Then she roused herself and laughed, but the laugh was forced and bitter. "Why should I speak of my love?" she said. "Mine was a 'Mad Love.'"

The day drifted on to a golden, sunlight afternoon, and the wind died on the waters while the lilies slept. And then they went slowly home.

"Has it been a happy day, Leone?" asked Lord Chandos, as they drew near home.

"It will have no morrow," she answered, sadly. "I shall keep those water-lilies until every leaf is withered and dead; yet they will never be so dead as my hopes--as dead as my life, though art fills it and praises crown it."

"And I," he said, "shall remember this day until I die. I have often wondered, Leone, if people take memory with them to heaven. If they do, I shall think of it there."

"And I," she said, "shall know no heaven, if memory goes with me."

They parted without another word, without a touch of the hands, or one adieu; but there had been no mention of parting, and that was the last thing thought of.

CHAPTER LI.

THE CONFESSION.

"I do not believe it," said Lady Marion; "it is some absurd mistake. If Lord Chandos had been out alone, or on a party of pleasure where you say, he would have told me."

"I a.s.sure you, Lady Chandos, that it is true. Captain Blake spoke to him there, and Lady Evelyn saw him. Madame Vanira was with him."

The speakers were Lady Chandos and Lady Ilfield; the place was the drawing-room at Stoneland House; the time was half past three in the afternoon; and Lady Ilfield had called on her friend because the news which she had heard preyed upon her mind and she felt that she must reveal it. Like all mischief-makers Lady Ilfield persuaded herself that she was acting upon conscientious motives; she herself had no nonsensical ideas about singers and actresses; they were quite out of her sphere, quite beneath her notice, and no good, she was in the habit of saying, ever came from a.s.sociating with them. She had met Madame Vanira several times at Stoneland House, and had always felt annoyed over it, but her idea was that a singer, an actress, let her be beautiful as a G.o.ddess and talented above all other women, had no right to stand on terms of any particular friendship with Lord Chandos. Lady Ilfield persuaded herself it was her duty, her absolute Christian duty, to let Lady Chandos know what was going on. She was quite sure of the truth of what she had to tell, and she chose a beautiful, sunshiny afternoon for telling it. She wore a look of the greatest importance--she seated herself quite close to Lady Marion.

"My dear Lady Chandos," she said, "I have called on the most unpleasant business. There is something which I am quite sure I ought to tell you, and I really do not know how. People are saying such things--you ought to know them."

The fair, sweet face lost none of its tranquillity, none of its calm.

How could she surmise that her heart was to be stabbed by this woman's words?

"The sayings of people trouble me but little, Lady Ilfield," she replied, with a calm smile.

"What I have to say concerns you," she said, "concerns you very much. I would not tell you but that I consider it my duty to do so. I told Lady Evelyn that she, who had actually witnessed the scene, ought to be the one to describe it, but she absolutely refused; unpleasant as the duty is, it has fallen on me."

"What duty? what scene?" asked Lady Chandos, beginning to feel something like alarm. "If you have anything to say, Lady Ilfield, anything to tell me, pray speak out; I am anxious now to hear it."

Then indeed was Lady Ilfield in her glory. She hastened to tell the story. How Captain and Lady Evelyn Blake had gone with a few friends for a river-party, and at Ousely had seen Lord Chandos with Madame Vanira, the great queen of song.

Lady Marion's sweet face colored with indignation. She denied it emphatically; it was not true. She was surprised that Lady Ilfield should repeat such a calumny.

"But, my dear Lady Chandos, it is true. I should not have repeated it if there had been a single chance of its being a falsehood. Lady Evelyn saw the boat fastened to a tree, your husband and Madame Vanira sat on the river bank, and when the captain spoke to Lord Chandos he seemed quite annoyed at being seen."

Lady Marion's fair face grew paler as she listened; the story seemed so improbable to her.

"My husband--Lord Chandos--does not know Madame Vanira half so well as I do," she said; "it is I who like her, nay, even love her. It is by my invitation that madame has been to my house. Lord Chandos was introduced to her by accident. I sought her acquaintance. If people had said she had been out for a day on the river with me there would have been some sense in it."

Lady Ilfield smiled with the air of a person possessed of superior knowledge.

"My dear Lady Chandos," she said, "it is time your eyes were opened; you are about the only person in London who does not know that Lord Chandos is Madame Vanira's shadow."

"I do not believe it," was the indignant reply. "I would not believe it, Lady Ilfield, if all London swore it."

Lady Ilfield laughed, and the tinge of contempt in that laugh made the gentle heart beat with indignation. She rose from her seat.

"I do not doubt," she said, "that you came to tell me this with a good-natured intention. I will give you credit for that always, Lady Ilfield, when I remember this painful scene, but I have faith in my husband. Nothing can shake it. And if the story you tell be true, I am quite sure Lord Chandos can give a good explanation of it. Permit me to say good-morning, Lady Ilfield, and to decline any further conversation on the matter."

"For all that," said Lady Ilfield to herself, "you will have to suffer, my lady; you refuse to believe it, but the time will come when you will have to believe it and deplore it."

Yet Lady Ilfield was not quite satisfied when she went away.

While to Lady Chandos had come the first burst of an intolerable pain, her first anguish of jealousy, her only emotion at the commencement of the conversation was one of extreme indignation. It was a calumny, she told herself, and she had vehemently espoused her husband's cause; but when she was alone and began to think over what had been said her faith was somewhat shaken.

It was a straightforward story. Captain and Lady Evelyn Blake were quite incapable of inventing such a thing. Then she tried to remember how Tuesday had pa.s.sed. It came back to her with a keen sense of pain that on Tuesday she had not seen him all day. He had risen early and had gone out, leaving word that he should not return for luncheon. She had been to a morning concert, and had stayed until nearly dinner-time with the countess. When she returned to Stoneland House he was there; they had a dinner-party, and neither husband nor wife had asked each other how the day was spent. She remembered it now. Certainly so far his absence tallied with the story; but her faith in her husband was not to be destroyed by the gossip of people who had nothing to do but talk.

What was it Lady Ilfield had said? That she was the only person in London who did not know that her husband was Madame Vanira's shadow.

Could that be true? She remembered all at once his long absences, his abstraction; how she wondered if he had any friends whom he visited long and intimately.

Madame Vanira's beautiful face rose before her with its n.o.ble eloquence, its grandeur and truth. No, that was not the woman who would try to rob a woman of her husband's love. Madame Vanira, the queen of song, the grand and n.o.ble woman who swayed men's hearts with her glorious voice; Madame Vanira, who had kissed her face and called herself her friend. It was impossible. She could sooner have believed that the sun and the moon had fallen from the skies than that her husband had connived with her friend to deceive her. The best plan would be to ask her husband. He never spoke falsely; he would tell her at once whether it were true or not. She waited until dinner was over and then said to him:

"Lance, can you spare me a few minutes? I want to speak to you."

They were in the library, where Lord Chandos had gone to write a letter.

Lady Marion looked very beautiful in her pale-blue dinner dress and a suit of costly pearls. She went up to her husband, and kneeling down by his side, she laid her fair arms round his neck.

"Lance," she said, "before I say what I have to say I want to make an act of faith in you."

He smiled at the expression.

"An act of faith in me, Marion?" he said. "I hope you have all faith."

Then, remembering, he stopped, and his face flushed.

"I have need of faith," she said, "for I have heard a strange story about you. I denied it, I deny it now, but I should be better pleased with your denial also."

"What is the story?" he asked, anxiously, and her quick ear detected the anxiety of his voice.

"Lady Ilfield has been here this afternoon, and tells me that last Tuesday you were with Madame Vanira at Ousely, that you rowed her on the river, and that Captain Blake spoke to you there. Is it true?"

"Lady Ilfield is a mischief-making old----" began Lord Chandos, but his wife's sweet, pale face startled him.

"Lance," she cried, suddenly, "oh, my G.o.d, it is not true?"

The ring of pain and pa.s.sion in her voice frightened him; she looked at him with eyes full of woe.