The Essential Elinor Glyn Collection. Glyn Elinor

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СКАЧАТЬ and sat in the House of Lords as Baron Bracondale; creation, 1505; seat, Bracondale Chase. Brothers, none. Sister living, Anne Charlotte, married to the fourth Earl of Anningford.

      Theodora read all this over twice, and also even the predecessors and collateral branches--but that was while she burned the midnight oil and listened to the snorts and coughs of Josiah Brown, slumbering next door.

      For the time being she raised her eyes and looked into Lord Bracondale's, and something told her they were the nicest eyes she had ever seen in this world.

      Then when a voluble French count had rushed up, with garrulous apologies for being late, the party was complete, and they swept into the restaurant.

      Theodora sat between the Western millionaire and the Russian Prince, but beyond--it was a round table, only just big enough to hold them--came her hostess and Lord Bracondale, and two or three times at dinner they spoke, and very often she felt his eyes fixed upon her.

      Mrs. McBride, like all American widows, was an admirable hostess; the conversation never flagged, or the gayety for one moment.

      The Western millionaire was shrewd, and announced some quaint truths while he picked his teeth with an audible sound.

      "This is his first visit to Europe," Princess Worrzoff said afterwards to Theodora by way of explanation. "He is so colossally rich he don't need to worry about such things at his time of life; but it does make me turn to hear him."

      Captain Fitzgerald was in his element. No guest shone so brilliantly as he. His wit was delicate, his sallies were daring, his looks were insinuating, and his appearance was perfection.

      Theodora had every reason to tingle with pride in him, and the widow felt her heart beat.

      "Isn't he just too bright--your father, Mrs. Brown?" she said as they left the restaurant to have their coffee in the hall. "You must let me see quantities of you while we are all in Paris together. It is a lovely city; don't you agree with me?"

      And Theodora did.

      Lord Bracondale was of the same breed as Captain Fitzgerald--that is, they neither of them permitted themselves to be superseded by any other man with the object of their wishes. When they wanted to talk to a woman they did, if twenty French counts or Russian princes stood in the way! Thus it was that for the rest of the evening Theodora found herself seated upon a sofa in close proximity to the man who had interested her at dinner, and Mrs. McBride and Captain Fitzgerald occupied two arm-chairs equally well placed, while the rest of the party made general conversation.

      Hector Bracondale, among other attractions, had a charming voice; it was deep and arresting, and he had a way of looking straight into the eyes of the person he was talking to.

      Theodora knew at once he belonged to the tribe whom Sarah had told her could never be husbands.

      She wondered vaguely why, all the time she was talking to him. Why had husbands always to be bores and unattractive, and sometimes even simply revolting, like hers? Was it because these beautiful creatures could not be bound to any one woman? It seemed to her unsophisticated mind that it could be very nice to be married to one of them; but there was no use fighting against fate, and she personally was wedded to Josiah Brown.

      Lord Bracondale's conversation pleased her. He seemed to understand exactly what she wanted to talk about; he saw all the things she saw and--he had read _Jean d'Agrve_!--they got to that at the end of the first half-hour, and then she froze up a little; some instinct told her it was dangerous ground, so she spoke suddenly of the weather, in a banal voice.

      Meanwhile, from the beginning of dinner, Lord Bracondale had been saying to himself she was the loveliest white flower he had yet struck in a path of varied experiences. Her eyes so innocent and true, with the tender expression of a fawn; the perfect turn of her head and slender pillar of a throat; her grace and gentleness, all appealed to him in a maddening way.

      "She is asleep to the whole of life's possibilities," he thought. "What can her husband be about, and _what_ an intoxicatingly agreeable task to wake her up!"

      He had lived among the world where the awaking of young wives, or old wives, or any woman who could please man, was the natural course of the day. It never even struck him then it might be a cruel thing to do. A woman once married was always fair game; if the husband could not retain her affections that was his lookout.

      Hector Bracondale was not a brute, just an ordinary Englishman of the world, who had lived and loved and seen many lands.

      He read Theodora like an open book: he knew exactly why she had talked about the weather after _Jean d'Agrve_. It thrilled him to see her soft eyes dreamy and luminous when they first spoke of the book, and it flattered him when she changed the conversation.

      As for Theodora, she analyzed nothing, she only felt that perhaps she ought not to speak about love to one of those people who could never be husbands.

      Captain Fitzgerald, meanwhile, was making tremendous headway with the widow. He flattered her vanity, he entertained her intelligence, and he even ended by letting her see she was causing him, personally, great emotion.

      At last this promising evening came to an end. The Russian Prince, with his American Princess, got up to say good-night, and gradually the party broke up, but not before Captain Fitzgerald had arranged to meet Mrs. McBride at Doucet's in the morning, and give her the benefit of his taste and experience in a further shopping expedition to buy old bronzes.

      "We can all breakfast together at Henry's," he said, with his grand manner, which included the whole party; and for one instant force of habit made Theodora's heart sink with fear at the prospect of the bill, as it had often had to do in olden days when her father gave these royal invitations. Then she remembered she had not been sacrificed to Josiah Brown for nothing, and that even if dear, generous papa should happen to be a little hard up again, a few hundred francs would be nothing to her to slip into his hand before starting.

      The rest of the party, however, declined. They were all busy elsewhere, except Lord Bracondale and the French Count--they would come, with pleasure, they said.

      Theodora wondered what Josiah would say. Would he go? and if not, would he let her go? This was more important.

      "Then we shall meet at breakfast to-morrow," Lord Bracondale said, as he helped her on with her cloak. "That will give me something to look forward to."

      "Will it?" she said, and there was trouble in the two blue stars which looked up at him. "Perhaps I shall not be able to come; my husband is rather an invalid, and--"

      But he interrupted her.

      "Something tells me you will come; it is fate," he said, and his voice was grave and tender.

      And Theodora, who had never before had the opportunity of talking about destiny, and other agreeable subjects, with beautiful Englishmen who could only be--lovers--felt the red blood rush to her cheeks and a thrill flutter her heart. So she quickened her steps and kept close to her father, who could have dispensed with this mark of affection.

      "Dearest child," he said, when they were seated in the brougham, "you are married now and should be able to look after yourself, without staying glued to my side so much--it is rather СКАЧАТЬ