Beyond the Rocks

Theodora asked no more questions. She kept her eyes fixed on the stage,

but she knew Hector had raised his glasses now and was scanning the box,

and had probably seen her.

What ought it to matter to her that he should be going to marry Miss

Winmarleigh? He could be nothing to her--only--only--but perhaps it was

not true. This woman, Mrs. Devlyn, whom she began to feel she should

dislike very much, had said it was looked upon as settled, not that it

was a fact. How could a man be going to marry one woman and make

desperate love to another at the same time? It was impossible--and

yet--she would not look in any case. She would not once raise her eyes

that way.

And so in these two boxes green jealousy held sway, and while Hector

glared across at Theodora she smiled at Delaval Stirling, and spoke

softly of the music and the voices, though her heart was torn with pain.

"Do you see Hector Bracondale is back again, Delaval?" Mrs. Devlyn said.

"Do you know why he stayed in Paris so long? I heard--" And she

whispered low, so that Theodora only caught the name "Esclarmonde de

Chartres" and their modulated mocking laughter.

How they jarred upon her! How she felt she should hate London among all

these people whose ways she did not know! She turned a little, and

Josiah's vulgar familiar face seemed a relief to her, and her tender

eyes melted in kindliness as she looked at him.

"You are very pale to-night, my love," he said. "Would you like to go

home?"

But this she would not agree to, and pulled herself together and tried

to talk gayly when the curtain went down.

And Hector blamed his own folly for having come up to this box at all.

Here he must be glued certainly for a few moments; now that they could

talk, politeness could not permit him to fly off at once.

"The house is very full," Miss Winmarleigh said--it was a remark she

always made on big nights--"and yet hardly any new faces about."

"Yes," said Hector.

"Does it compare with the Opera-House in Paris, Hector?" Miss

Winmarleigh hardly ever went abroad.

"No," said Hector.--Not only had Delaval Stirling retained his seat, but

Chris Harford, Mrs. Devlyn's brother, had entered the box now and was

assiduously paying his court. "Damned impertinence of the woman,

forcing her relations upon them like that," he

thought.--"Oh--er--no--that is, I think the Paris Opera-House is a

beastly place," he said, absently, "a dull, heavy drab brown and dirty

gilding, and all the women look hideous in it."