AN IRISH DEFIANCE

MELISSA stood meekly before her mistress.

“My Lady Sunderland’s compliments, madam,” she said, with her usual purr; “will you play basset to-night?”

“No,” replied Lady Clancarty; “many thanks; but tell my mother that I am to have guests, and my purse is too thin for basset.”

As the door closed on Melissa, Lady Clancarty rose from her dressing-table.

“I will wear the pink flowered brocade, Alice,” she said.

Alice opened her eyes. “Oh, my lady,” she remonstrated, “it is too lovely; I thought you meant it only for the king’s levees.”

Her mistress smiled. “May not the king come here—if he chooses?” she said mischievously. “The brocade, Alice.”

Unconvinced, Alice brought the garment, a beautiful and costly thing frosted with rare lace, and as she helped Lady Betty put it on she was more and more impressed with its charms.

“Oh, my lady,” she murmured, “you do look lovely in it—’tis too fine by half.”

Betty craned her neck backward, looking over her shoulder into the glass; the folds of the sheeny satin fell about her, the bodice fitted like a glove, displaying every curve of her well-rounded form, and it was low cut, revealing a neck and shoulders like snow. The beauty smiled.

“Bring me my string of pearls,” she said.

Alice brought them without a word and helped her fasten them about her throat. Betty looked into the mirror again and then fell to fingering the bracelet on one round arm.

“Alice,” she said, half laughing, “he is here.”

The handmaid started, looking at her in wonder.

“Who, my lady?—not Lord Clancarty?”

“The stranger we met in the woods at Althorpe,” her mistress replied, “who would have kissed me for a milkmaid.”

“Indeed, madam, I think he would as lief kiss you as a queen,” Alice said blushing, “the bold gallant! He is here—and who is he?”Lady Clancarty clasped and unclasped her bracelet while the roses deepened in her cheeks.

“He is called Richard Trevor,” she said softly; “a pretty name, Alice, Richard—rich-hearted, lion-hearted—like our great Plantagenet.”

Alice looked at her in bewilderment. Lady Betty had as many moods as April: did she mean to fall in love, at last, after all her loyalty to that unknown and terrible exile? Alice wondered. But saying nothing she stooped down, instead, to smooth the shining folds of the beautiful gown.

“Go fix the candles, Alice,” Lady Clancarty said, with a soft little sigh, “and place a table for cards—and the lute and guitar—place them there also. Presently my guests will be here.”

The handmaid obeyed, too perplexed by this new mood of my lady’s to venture on the smallest observation. She had arranged the room with simple taste when Lady Betty entered it a few moments later. It was not as large a room as her mother’s, but it was furnished, too, with an open fireplace where a single log burned, for the nights were chilly. Candles were set on the mantel and the table, while through the open door came the buzz of conversation, for Lady Sunderland was deep in a game of basset with Lady Dacres and his Grace of Bedford. Betty did not disturb them but observed them from a distance, noticing her mother’s rouged face and nodding headdress, and Lady Dacres’s pinched and eager features. The old dame was as keen as any gamester. The mother and daughter had so little in common that they seemed like strangers, and the younger countess stood looking at the log in deep thought when Richard Trevor was announced. As she courtesied, she gave him a quick, keen glance, but made nothing of that bold handsome face of his, though quick to note the distinction of his appearance and bearing, those of a man used to courts as well as camps. She saw it all at a glance, as she had seen it at first, but she chose to receive him with cool politeness.

“You play basset, of course, sir?” she said demurely.

But he saw the pitfall.

“I’m too poor, madam,” he replied smiling. “I can remember hearing an old courtier tell how he lost his fortune to King Charles at basset.”

“I trust the king gave it back to him,” she said quickly.“He made him a lottery cavalier,” rejoined Mr. Trevor calmly.

Betty smiled scornfully. “And for such a king men have died!” she said significantly.

“Ingratitude is only human at the worst,” he replied, laughing softly, “and you know, ‘the king can do no wrong!’”

Lady Betty put her finger on her lip, with a glance toward the card-players.

“You are right,” he said, regardless of her caution, “’tis quite useless to die for any king. There is only one thing worth dying for, and that—is supremely worth living for, too.”

“And it is not a king?” she commented thoughtfully, “or a queen?”

“A queen, yes,” he admitted, “but the queen of hearts. The only thing worth living for,” he said, and his voice grew deep and tender, “and dying for, my Lady Clancarty, is—Love.”

She blushed and her eyes fell. He had the most compelling glance she had ever encountered. Those eyes of his would enthrall hers, and she looked away.

“I never heard of any man dying of it,” she remarked, with a bitter little laugh.“That’s because a wise man would rather live for it,” he said; “what exquisite torment for a man to die and leave it behind him—in the shape of a lovely widow.”

“Ah,” said Lady Betty, with a roguish smile, “therein lies the sting!”

“Precisely,” admitted the Irishman; “if there’s one thing that could bring me back to this vale of tears it is my successor!”

“I have heard that in India the widows are burnt on the funeral pyres,” she remarked, a glow of amusement in her eyes; “you might arrange it so for the future Mrs. Trevor.”

He shook his head disconsolate. “She’s sure to be a woman of spirit,” he said; “I couldn’t get her consent.”

Betty shrugged her shoulders. “After all you have said of love you can’t find a woman to die for it?”

“I would rather she lived for it,” he said, with his daring smile, “and for me!”

“Men are purely selfish,” she retorted with fine indifference, “it’s always ‘for me’; hadn’t you better dream of living for her?”

“I do!” he replied promptly; “faith, if I didn’t dream of her I should immediately expire—she’s the star of my life.”“Oh!” said Lady Betty, in a strange voice, “it has gone as far as that?—she is French, I suppose?” she added with polite interest and elevated brows.

“I never inquire into the nationality of divinities,” he said coolly; “she’s an angel, and that’s enough for her humble adorer.”

“You Papists are fond of saints,” remarked my lady, tapping the floor with her foot.

“And sinners,” he admitted.

Betty turned her shoulder toward him.

“What color are her eyes?” she asked, playing with her fan.

“I can’t look into them at this moment,” he replied with audacity, “but I hope to tell you later.”

She flashed a withering glance at him.

“They are brown,” he announced coolly.

Anger and amusement struggled for a moment on Lady Betty’s face, and then she laughed and dropped her fan.

He stooped to pick it up and something green and shrivelled fell before her. Lady Betty put her foot on it. He handed her the fan with a bow. The voices in the other room rose a little in a dispute.

“What are they saying?” she asked, swaying her fan before her face.He listened and smiled. “They are talking of Lady Horne’s divorce,” he said; “what is your ladyship’s view of it?”

She hesitated—and there is a proverb!

“You are a Papist,” she said, “do you believe that a marriage—even a foolish one—is indissoluble?”

“Certainly I do,” he replied piously; “perish the thought of severing the tie!”

She reddened.

“So, ’tis ‘for better or for worse’!” she said bitterly, “and usually for worse.”

“‘Until death us do part,’” he quoted piously again.

Lady Betty started and turned from red to white.

“’Tis a horrible idea,” she said, with a shudder,—Lord Sunderland would have heard her with amazement,—“no escape for a poor woman who has been ensnared into a wretched union!”

“A wretched union,” he repeated slowly, a change coming over his face, “a wretched union; are all marriages so wretched, my lady?”

“A great many of them,” she retorted tartly, and he could only see the curve of her white shoulder and the back of her head.He knelt on one knee and began to look around on the floor with an anxious face. After a moment she looked at him over her shoulder.

“What is it?” she asked, blushing and biting her lip.

“My shamrock,” he said, peeping under the table with an air of perplexity.

“Do you always carry vegetables with you?” she asked witheringly.

“I have—since last night,” he retorted, still searching.

“And you dropped it here?” she asked innocently.

He passed his sword under a chair and drew it back slowly over the floor.

“Yes,” he replied, in a tone of deep anxiety, “’twas here.”

She moved to the other side of the fireplace.

“Is that it?” she asked, coolly pointing.

He pounced upon the withered sprig and kissed it, and rising stood looking at her.

“But,” he said, and a daring smile played about his mouth; he took a step nearer, “but some marriages are made—in heaven.”

“And others—” Lady Clancarty pointed downward with a wicked smile.“Ah,” he answered, “those are of earth, earthy; but when love steps in, then, my lady, then—”

“There comes my Lord Savile,” she said, and smiled sweetly.

“Damn him!” he muttered beneath his breath.

The door opened to admit Lord Savile and Mr. Benham, and her greeting was cordiality itself.

“Here’s a gentleman who has staked all his fortune on his gray mare and lost it!” Mr. Benham said, his hand on Savile’s shoulder, “and he has done nothing but weep for it.”

“Saint Thomas!” exclaimed that nobleman, “I’m not the first to stake all on a woman and lose.”

“Leave the saint out of it, my lord, when you put the sinner in,” said Lady Betty.

“Oh, Saint Mary, there goes my last crown!” came from the other room in the shrill lament of Lady Dacres.

Both Savile and Trevor laughed.

“Change the sex of your saint and you have an honorable example,” remarked Trevor, as he picked up the countess’ guitar and began to finger it lightly.“I’m a ruined man,” said Savile recklessly, “unless that fickle dame—Fortune—smiles on me to-morrow.”

“You ought to call her a fickle mare, my lord,” suggested Lady Betty artlessly; “when Fortune runs upon four legs it must needs be more fleet than upon two.”

Lord Savile looked into her eyes with a smile.

“If love were kind, fortune might fly, my lady,” he said daringly, but very low.

Lady Clancarty flushed hotly as she turned to greet a newcomer, Sir Edward Mackie, one of Devonshire’s gentlemen; a young fellow with a round, boyish face, who had worn his heart upon his sleeve until he lost it to Lady Betty. But so ingenuous was he, so frankly generous and devoted, that she gave him now her sweetest smile.

Meanwhile, Mr. Trevor still tuned the guitar, but he had heard Savile’s whisper to my lady and had watched her face with keen and searching eyes. Young Mackie brought news for Lady Clancarty.

“Your brother has come,” he said eagerly, “my Lord Spencer; I have just had the honor to wait upon him. Very proud I am too, my lady, for is he not one of the new lights of the party, and one of the most learned young men in Britain?”

She shrugged her white shoulders laughing.

“He is all that, Sir Edward,” she said, “and more—much more,” she added with a droll expression of despair.

“Much learning doth make him mad,” said Mr. Trevor smiling. “I have known such cases on the Continent.”

“’Tis instructive,” Betty admitted, smiling at Sir Edward’s boyish face, “but ’tis dry.”

“Give me a fine horse, a fine woman, and fine music, and all the books in England might burn,” said Benham.

“Oh!” said Lady Betty, and she lifted her brows with a contemptuous glance.

“In sequence, according to your valuation of them, sir,” remarked Mr. Trevor, with a cool smile, “a poor compliment to the sex. But music expresses something—something only—of the beauty and charm of a fair woman.”

“Sing to us, do!” interposed the countess, “I despise comparisons.”

“To hear is to obey, my lady,” he replied, beginning at once to play the sad wild air that made her start and change color.Would he dare to sing that here? she thought, her heart beating hard; would he dare? How little she knew him! In a moment his rich tenor voice, a voice of peculiar charm and timbre, filled the room and even startled the card-players.

He sang the wild ballad through to the end, and as he ceased, Lady Betty turned to him and smiled, applauding softly. But she said nothing, although young Mackie was openly delighted, and Lady Sunderland exclaimed that it was a marvellous fine performance of a poor song.

“’Tis an old ballad, madam,” Mr. Trevor replied courteously, “and perhaps a poor one, but dear to the Irish heart.”

“Sing an English one next time, sir, or a Dutch—la—yes, your Grace of Bedford, we grow to love everything Dutch.”

Lord Savile meanwhile, with his hands thrust into his pockets and his face flushed, lounged nearer to the singer.“A very pretty performance,” he said, with an insolent drawl, “worthy a tavern musician. By Jove, sir, the tune is pestiferous here; an Irishman and a cow-stealer are synonymous.”

Richard Trevor smiled, his gray eyes flashing dangerously.

“And English noblemen are often cowards, and liars to boot, sir,” he said in an undertone, his hand still on the guitar.

“I am at your service,” said Savile, in a passionate voice.

Trevor glanced warningly at Lady Clancarty.

“Elsewhere, my lord, with pleasure,” he said, still smiling, “I might add with joy.”

Lady Sunderland came in now with her guests; she had won at basset and was in high good humor.

“A song,” she cried, “another song.”

Her eyes sought Trevor and he bowed gravely.

“At another time, my lady,” he said; “now I must wait on a friend, who has the first claim upon me. My ladies all, good-night,” and he bowed gracefully, a certain merry defiance in his glance.

Lady Betty held out her hand involuntarily.

“I thank you for the ballad,” she said and smiled.He carried her hand to his lips and, it may be, kissed it with more fervor than courtesy required, for the rosy tide swept over her white neck and her cheeks and brow.

As he went out, Lady Sunderland tapped her fan upon her lips. “Don’t tell it,” she said, with the coquetry of a girl of sixteen, “don’t tell it, but la!—he has the finest figure I ever saw, and the legs of an Apollo.”

“’Pon my soul, madam, that’s a compliment that’s worth dying for,” Mr. Benham said, with a peculiar smile at Savile.

Betty seeing it, went over and stood staring into the embers on the hearth, though she pretended to be talking to young Mackie.