Page:Once a Week Volume V.djvu/376

 . 28, 1861.] “—Mr. Newton, do tell me you believe me in this. I know I have been very false; but yet when you put that question to me, ‘My whole heart?’ I told you the truth, concealing nothing. Pray, then, believe me about Mr. Westby. I shall have plenty to suffer without thinking that I have injured his character in your estimation,”estimation.” [sic]

“I do believe you, Lilian; and I thank God, I can do it.”

“Can you go and put your hand in his? I mean now, when you leave me.”

“Miss Temple!”

“It is the last request I shall ever make you.”

“I cannot promise,” he replied. “Thus much, though,” he added, as he regarded the sad expression of her face, “I will go directly to his chambers where I know he is up at work, and if I find that the power is in me to go in and shake his hand, I will do so. Farewell, Miss Temple.”

If George Newton had only waited.

Oh! human heart, passing strange—the ebbing tide of feeling was on the turn. Remorse had started into existence. Who knows? in a few minutes more he might have won her, for he had shown that he was worthy to be loved. A moment’s reflection told her how great was the request she had made. Westby was not wrong when he had asserted the goodness of George Newton’s heart. In her admiration for that goodness (and admiration formed the condition of Lilian’s love), she could have thrown herself in his arms; and he, could he have forgiven her? I make no assertion; but I fancy that the strength of his resentment would have been shaken by one kiss.

But George Newton was rolling off in a Hansom to Westby’s chambers; and Lilian Temple lay sobbing on the sofa in her father’s dressing-room.

“Why, where’s Mr. Newton, Lilian?” exclaimed Mrs. Temple, entering the room. “Jane told me he was here.”

“He has been here, mama; but he has now gone—”

“Gone!”

Lilian made no reply.

“Not broken off, Lilian?—”

“I have broken it off,” she replied with emphasis.

“I confess I can’t understand you, Lilian. When Mr. Newton was supposed to be ruined—”

“Then, at least, mama,” interrupted Lilian, “give me credit for something better than mercenary motives.”

Lilian drew the envelope of Westby’s note from her bosom, and holding it to the candle, let it gradually consume.

“Why, Lilian, not changed your dress yet!” exclaimed Frank Scott. “By-the-bye, Mrs. Vernon’s been asking me about doing the play at her house.”

“As far as I am concerned, Frank, I have determined never to play that part again—I hate it!”

was the end of the year, and the Temples were occupying their house at Brighton.

“I confess that I don’t mind making people wait for me, but I hate waiting for them,” remarked Lilian.

“Mrs. Vernon always contrives to be late,” rejoined Frank Scott.

“I’ll be bound it’s Margaret Vernon’s anxiety about her hair! I say, Frank, can you guess why Mrs. Vernon was so anxious to be my chaperon this evening?” inquired Lilian, archly.

“No; why?” replied Scott, impervious to any joke on the subject.

“Because” (and Lilian smiled) “a certain young lady is in love with a certain young gentleman—but I won’t reveal secrets.”

Then ensued a long silence, and Lilian and Scott fell respectively into reveries in face of a most delightful fire.

Let the circumstances of the case be duly stated. It was a cold December evening, and furthermore it was after dinner.

Poets may talk as they will of purling brooks, but I contend that there is not a more loving friend to sleep than a delicious flickering flame which woos the eyelids to the eye with its golden glare, and sings softly in the ear with the music of its chimney dance. And those mosses by purling streams, granted that they are very soft—but, then, there is rheumatism, with beetles, and such like denizens, in that bronzy green. Let us at once discard such damp idealism—depend upon it that an arm-chair, stuffed by a master-hand, where the arms are just high enough for the elbow to support the head without straining, outdistances all poetic moss.

As I take it, the inevitable end of after-dinner castle-building in the living coal is sleep. Lilian leant forward, her head resting on her hand, for fear of injury to her dainty head-dress. Her thoughts wandered fantastically. “Comme il est beau,” she muttered to herself, glancing at Frank Scott, whose head was thrown back, resting on his bent arm, showing the fine profile of his face and a plumy whisker—light tan tint—the softness of floss silk—the crispness of bank notes. Alas, for the vanity of men! I’m half inclined to believe that Scott had thrown himself into a sort of artistic pose.

“No wonder girls fall in love with him,” thought Lilian, “out of sheer admiration for his beauty, and envy me desperately.”

Now the word beauty as applied to men always drove Lilian’s thoughts to the wax busts in hairdressers’ windows; the recumbent face of Scott seemed to grow before her eyes into wax, and a sort of dim, jumbling, incoherent inquiry arose as to the respective merits of men’s faces, real or in wax, till the whole question was carried to dreamland for solution. Now, when the eyes of Lilian were fairly closed, the eyes of Scott opened wide. There was no doubt that it was going very ill with Scott: in a quiet state of mind sleep would have been inevitable. Poor foolish Scott! He would not have dared do it had Lilian been awake—he gazed upon her with eyes of tenderest admiration. Ah, me! there had hitherto been a