CHAPTER XXXIV
Mrs. Gordon, reclining at ease on a satin divan in her elegant parlor, was entertaining a caller—no less a person than the beautiful widow, Mrs. Merivale.
The wife of the wealthy publisher was a pale, faded, pretty woman, once a belle and beauty, now a chronic invalid. She mingled but little in society, on account of her delicate health, but chance had made her acquainted with Maud Merivale, and the fair widow for some reason of her own had followed up the acquaintance. Mrs. Gordon was rather pleased than otherwise with this new friend. She loved beauty, and Mrs. Merivale was decidedly good to look upon. All the adventitious aid of art had been called in to preserve her fading charms; and in the richest, and most becoming of spring toilets, she looked very fair and sweet and youthful in the aristocratic semi-darkness of the curtained parlor.
They had been discussing a subject dear to Mrs. Gordon's matronly heart, but full of secret gall and bitterness to the widow—the marriage of Beatrix Gordon to St. Leon Le Roy.
Inwardly fuming with jealous rage, Mrs. Merivale held her passions in with a strong rein, and smiled her sweetest as she dilated on her last summer's visit to Eden where she had met Beatrix and enthusiastically "fallen in love with her on the spot."
"So beautiful, so graceful," said Mrs. Merivale, arching her penciled brows. "She will make so charming a mistress for Eden. And they are home from Europe, you tell me?"
"Two weeks ago," answered Mrs. Gordon.
"You have seen them, of course—how happy the meeting must have been between the long-parted mother and daughter," sentimentally.
"No, I have not seen my darling yet," sighed Mrs. Gordon. "They were suddenly summoned home by the illness of Mrs. Le Roy and did not have time to communicate with me. Mr. Gordon has promised to take me down to Eden in a few days, though. I am so impatient to see Beatrix I can scarcely wait."
"No doubt," smiled the visitor, sympathetically. She had followed Mrs. Gordon's eyes to a life-size portrait of a pretty blue-eyed girl that hung against the wall. She had seen the lady's glance wander in the same direction several times. Her curiosity was aroused, and, looking critically at the really beautiful portrait, she detected a strong resemblance between the fair, fresh, girlish face and the pretty, faded, matronly woman.
"Your own portrait, is it not?" she asked, with a smile.
Mrs. Gordon looked pleased and flattered.
"Is it really so much like me?" she asked.
"Your image! I should have recognized it anywhere!" pronounced the widow, following up the good impression she had made.
"Well, my daughter was always said to resemble me; but really, now, Mrs. Merivale, you must have recognized Beatrix. You flatter me too much," simpered Mrs. Gordon.
Mrs. Merivale's false smiles and grimaces gave way for once to an expression of honest surprise.
"Do you mean to tell me that it isn't your portrait—taken when you were, perhaps, a little younger?" she asked.
"No, it is not mine. Do you not recognize my daughter, Mrs. Merivale? It is Beatrix herself."
"Beatrix!"
Mrs. Merivale gazed bewildered at the fair young pictured face. The soft blue eyes smiled into hers, the pale-gold hair waved softly over the low, white brow, the face had a fair, refined loveliness all its own, but it was not the face she recalled as that of Beatrix Gordon. There flashed before her mind's eye a face bright and soft like a tropic flower, lighted by dark, starlike eyes, crowned by grand tresses of dusky, burnished gold—a face before whose rare and witching beauty this other one paled like a flower before a star.
She looked at Mrs. Gordon, surprise and bewilderment on her face, her turquoise-blue eyes open to their widest.
"Are you jesting?" she said. "Or have you another daughter? You do not really wish me to believe that this is Beatrix?"
"Why not?" Mrs. Gordon asked, a little gravely.
"It is not the least bit like her," declared Mrs. Merivale, who had left her seat and rustled over to the portrait; "it is utterly unlike her! The eyes are blue here, the hair pale gold; yet your daughter whom I saw at Eden had dark eyes and hair of the darkest golden shade."
Mrs. Gordon laughed lightly.
"You have surely forgotten how Beatrix looked," she said. "That canvas represents her truly and perfectly. The best judges have agreed that the portrait is marvelously true to nature. My dear Mrs. Merivale, you are thinking of someone else. I have no other child than Beatrix, and there are no dark eyes in our family."
Mrs. Merivale remained silent for a moment. Her face had a dazed expression.
"I am not mistaken," she said to herself. "Is it likely I should forget how the girl looked who stole St. Leon from me? She had great black eyes, full of fire and soul. She was rarely beautiful. This portrait looks like a mere doll beside her. And yet Mrs. Gordon swears that this is Beatrix Gordon. If it is true, as she says, then there is some mystery about it. What does it mean?"
She went back to her seat again and replied to Mrs. Gordon with a light laugh.
"Yes, I see now that I was mistaken. I was thinking of someone else. One meets so many fair faces in society."
But to herself, she was saying:
"If there is a mystery, I will find it out. Nothing will please me so well as to injure the girl who married St. Leon Le Roy."
But though her suspicions were aroused, they were vague and unformed. She did not dream of the real truth.
Before leaving she said, with her most innocent and engaging air:
"I have a great mind to run down to Eden with you when you go. It is only recently that I received a letter from Mrs. Le Roy, inviting me to visit her. We are quite old friends, you know. Shall you object to having me make one of your party?"
Mrs. Gordon thought it would be rather pleasant than otherwise to have the pretty, vivacious widow accompany them to Eden. She expressed her opinion very graciously, and Mrs. Merivale was delighted.
"A thousand thanks," she twittered. "I shall enjoy the trip with you and Mr. Gordon so much. And I do so want to see dear Mrs. Le Roy, and our sweet bride and her husband, who, by the bye, was once my fiancé. But that was long ago. I threw him over for Mr. Merivale, who had the most money, although, unfortunately, he sunk a great deal in a foolish speculation after I married him. Ah, well, St. Leon will bear me no ill will now when he has secured such a bonny bride."
She lingered until they had named the day for the trip, then departed, full of vague plans against the happiness of St. Leon's bride.
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