Page:The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14.djvu/77

1864.] But the wedding passed as weddings do,—to-day cake, to-morrow crumbs,—and at length the carriages were ordered for The Rim. The evening had not been without its triumphs to Éloise, however many masks she wore over her inner depression. St. George had forgotten her till a late hour, and, conspicuous as Marlboro's devoir had been, her own acceptance of it had been scarcely less so. Perhaps there was nothing in the world, of its kind, more beautiful than Éloise Changarnier's dancing. Fragrances, if they were visible, would float with just such a dreamy grace from flower to flower. Simple and sensuous, yet airy and fine, was the spirit of every motion; and with every wave, with every look, she appealed to the beholder's heart. Swimming down the room on the slow circles of the indolent languor of the waltz, perfumes fanning all about her, the wind lifting the curtains and letting in gleams of amethyst heavens and low-hanging stars, the music pulsing in passionate throbs,—once only she raised her eyes, and the great beryl jewels rested on Earl St. George Erne's, as he leaned against the wall with his supreme indifference of lordly manner; and if he revenged himself with the swift gleam of that involuntary smile that must never kindle for her, though it shot its light over brow and lip forever, he never knew it. An instant afterwards he was beside her, yet he dared not with the next strain suffer it to be his arm that upheld her, and Éloise sat where he placed her and danced no more. And then Mrs. Murray came, and they all took their seats in the carriages: Laura jubilant, but stately; Lottie eminently dishevelled, and still clutching the crumpled list of her partners; Master Will with his fists in his eyes, and heavy beneath a drowsiness from which he soon had enough to waken him; while in Mr. St. George's deportment to every one there was a shade of the old sardonic displeasure with which he was occasionally wont to favor his friends. But Lottie, after a few furlongs, was asleep in somebody's arms; the rest were, perhaps, living the evening over again in reverie; the other carriages were far, far ahead, and theirs, which, having been detained, was the last, trundled on slowly over a bad road. At length Laura stirred, and exclaimed,—

"Did you ever hear such divine music, Éloise? Why didn't Mrs. Arles come, do you know, Mr. Marlboro'?"

"Does Mrs. Arles go into such general society?" replied Mr. Marlboro'.

"Can't say. How long she wore black! so long that it has really become quite gray! Has she been husbanding her charms, or is she husbanding them now? Don't you shake your fan at me, Éloise Changarnier, or I shall tell how you said it yourself this very noon!"

The carriage-top had been thrown open, and at the moment of these words Miss Changarnier saw Mr. St. George, from his seat on the box beside the coachman, hastily start and turn, but whether on account of Mrs. Arles, or at something in the road, she could not discern; for Marlboro's horse having very singularly fallen lame in the stables that night, she had heard Mr. St. George muttering something about foul play, as he offered the other a seat, and she felt that he entertained apprehensions. Had she seen Marlboro's arm raised quiveringly, while the lash of the riding-whip fell across the groom's face in a welt, as he dismissed him, she might have felt also a womanly fear that the apprehensions were not groundless. For Marlboro', unable to get speech with Éloise one moment apart from others that day, had fled home in a fury, and had thus, when his anger cooled, been obliged to ride alone to the place of merry rendezvous.

Gradually, now, as they jogged along, Mrs. Murray began nodding here and there about the carriage, dropping her head very much as if she meant to drop it for good and all; one by one the others forgot themselves; but Éloise could see Marlboro' in the opposite corner sitting alert and pale and sparkling-eyed, and felt that Mr. St. George was watching every brier on the road-side, beneath his slouching brim. At length the