Embarrassed on his side, he could only answer:
"I have nothing to tell."
"Were there many visitors at the gallery?" she asked.
"About the same as usual."
"Any that you particularly noticed?" she went on. "I mean, among the ladies."
He laughed uneasily. "You forget how interested I am in the pictures," he said.
There was a pause. She looked up at him--and suddenly looked away again. But he saw it plainly: there were tears in her eyes.
"Do you mind turning down the gas?" she said. "My eyes have been weak all day."
He complied with her request--the more readily, having his own reasons for being glad to escape the glaring scrutiny of the light.
"I think I will rest a little on the sofa," she resumed. In the position which he occupied, his back would have been now turned on her. She stopped him when he tried to move his chair. "I would rather not look at you, Ernest," she said, "when you have lost confidence in me."
Not the words, but the tone, touched all that was generous and noble in his nature. He left his place, and knelt beside her--and opened to her his whole heart.
"Am I not unworthy of you?" he asked, when it was over.
She pressed his hand in silence.
"I should be the most ungrateful wretch living," he said, "if I did not think of you, and you only, now that my confession is made. We will leave Munich to-morrow--and, if resolution can help me, I will only remember the sweetest woman my eyes ever looked on as the creature of a dream."
She hid her face on his breast, and reminded him of that letter of her writing, which had decided the course of their lives.
"When I thought you might meet the happy woman in my life-time, I said to you, 'Tell me of it--and I promise to tell her that she has only to wait.' Time must pass, Ernest, before it can be needful to perform my promise. But you might let me see her. If you find her in the gallery to-morrow, you might bring her here."
Mrs. Lismore's request met with no refusal. Ernest was only at a loss to know how to grant it.
"You tell me she is a copyist of pictures," his wife reminded him. "She will be interested in hearing of the portfolio of drawings by the great French artists which I bought for you in Paris. Ask her to come and see them, and to tell you if she can make some copies. And say, if you like, that I shall be glad to become acquainted with her."
He felt her breath beating fast on his bosom. In the fear that she might lose all control over herself, he tried to relieve her by speaking lightly. "What an invention yours is!" he said. "If my wife ever tries to deceive me, I shall be a mere child in her hands."
She rose abruptly from the sofa--kissed him on the forehead--and said wildly, "I shall be better in bed!" Before he could move or speak, she had left him.
X.
THE next morning he knocked at the door of his wife's room and asked how she had passed the night.
"I have slept badly," she answered, "and I must beg you to excuse my absence at breakfast-time." She called him back as he was about to withdraw. "Remember," she said, "when you return from the gallery to-day, I expect that you will not return alone."
* * * * * * *
Three hours later he was at home again. The young lady's services as a copyist were at his disposal; she had returned with him to look at the drawings.
The sitting-room was empty when they entered it. He rang for his wife's maid--and was informed that Mrs. Lismore had gone out. Refusing to believe the woman, he went to his wife's apartments. She was not to be found.
When he returned to the sitting-room, the young lady was not unnaturally offended. He could make allowances for her being a little out of temper at the slight that had been put on her; but he was inexpressibly disconcerted by the manner--almost the coarse manner--in which she expressed herself.
"I have been talking to your wife's maid, while you have been away," she said. "I find you have married an old lady for her money. She is jealous of me, of course?"
"Let me beg you to alter your opinion," he answered. "You are wronging my wife; she is incapable of any such feeling as you attribute to her."
The young lady laughed. "At any rate you are a good husband," she said satirically. "Suppose you own the truth? Wouldn't you like her better if she was young and pretty like me?"
He was not merely surprised--he was disgusted. Her beauty had so completely fascinated him, when he first saw her, that the idea of associating any want of refinement and good breeding with such a charming creature never entered his mind. The disenchantment to him was already so complete that he was even disagreeably affected by the tone of her voice: it was almost as repellent to him as the exhibition of unrestrained bad temper which she seemed perfectly careless to conceal.
"I confess you surprise me," he said, coldly.
The reply produced no effect on her. On the contrary, she became more insolent than ever.
"I have a fertile fancy," she went on, "and your absurd way of taking a joke only encourages me! Suppose you could transform this sour old wife of yours, who has insulted me, into the sweetest young creature that ever lived, by only holding up your finger--wouldn't you do it?"
This passed the limits of his endurance. "I have no wish," he said, "to forget the consideration which is due to a woman. You leave me but one alternative." He rose to go out of the room.
She ran to the door as he spoke, and placed herself in the way of his going out.
He signed to her to let him pass.
She suddenly threw her arms round his neck, kissed him passionately, and whispered, with her lips at his ear: "Oh, Ernest, forgive me! Could I have asked you to marry me for my money if I had not taken refuge in a disguise?"
XI.
WHEN he had sufficiently recovered to think, he put her back from him. "Is there an end of the deception now?" he asked, sternly. "Am I to trust you in your new character?"
"You are not to be harder on me than I deserve," she answered, gently.