University of Virginia Library

5. CHAP. V.

If Lady Ravelgold showed beautiful by the
uncompromising light and in the ornamented hall
of Almack's, she was radiant as she came through
the mirror door of her own loved-contrived and
beauty-breathing boudoir. Tremlet had been showed
into this recess of luxury and elegance on his
arrival, and Lady Ravelgold and her daughter,
who preceded her by a minute or two, had gone to
their chambers, the first to make some slight changes
in her toilette, and the latter (entirely ignorant of her
lover's presence in the house,) to be alone with a
heart never before in such painful need of self-abandonment
and solitude.

Tremlet looked about him in the enchanted room
in which he found himself alone, and, spite of the
prepossessed agitation of his feelings, the voluptuous
beauty of every object had the effect to divert and
tranquillize him. The light was profuse, but it came
softened through the thinnest alabaster; and while
every object in the room was distinctly and minutely
visible, the effect of moonlight was not more soft
and dreamy. The general form of the boudoir
was an oval, but within the pilasters of folded silk
with their cornices of gold, lay crypts containing

copies exquisitely done in marble of the most graceful
statues of antiquity, one of which seemed, by
the curtain drawn quite aside and a small antique
lamp burning near it, to be the divinity of the place
—the Greek Antinous, with his drooped head and
full, smooth limbs, the most passionate and life-like
representation of voluptuous beauty that intoxicates
the slumberous air of Italy. Opposite this, another
niche contained a few books, whose retreating
shelves swung on a secret door, and as it stood half
open, the nodding head of a snowy magnolia leaned
through, as if pouring from the lips of its broad
chalice the mingled odours of the unseen conservatory
it betrayed. The first sketch in crayons of a
portrait of Lady Ravelgold by young Lawrence,
stood against the wall, with the frame half buried
in a satin ottoman; and, as Tremlet stood before it,
admiring the clear, classic outline of the head and
bust, and wondering in what chamber of his brain
the gifted artist had found the beautiful drapery in
which he had drawn her, the dim light glanced
faintly on the left, and the broad mirror by which
he had entered swung again on its silver hinges,
and admitted the very presentment of what he gazed
on. Lady Ravelgold had removed the jewels from
her hair, and the robe of wrought lace, which she
had worn that night over a boddice of white satin
laced loosely below the bosom. In the place of this
she had thrown upon her shoulders a flowing wrapper
of purple velvet, made open after the Persian
fashion, with a short and large sleeve, and embroidered
richly with gold upon the skirts. Her admirable
figure, gracefully defined by the satin petticoat
and boddice, showed against the gorgeous purple
as it flowed back in her advancing motion, with a
relief which would have waked the very soul of
Titian; her complexion was dazzling and faultless
in the flattering light of her own rooms; and there
are those who will read this who know how the
circumstances which surround a woman—luxury,
elegance, taste, or the opposite of these—enhance
or dim, beyond help or calculation, even the highest
order of woman's beauty.

Lady Ravelgold held a bracelet in her hand as
she came in.

“In my own house,” she said, holding the glittering
jewel to Tremlet, “I have a fancy for the style
antique. Tasseline, my maid, has gone to bed, and
you must do the devoir of a knight, or an abigail,
and loop up this Tyrian sleeve. Stay—look first
at the model—that small statue of Cytheris, yonder!
Not the shoulder—for you are to swear mine is prettier—but
the clasp. Fasten it like that. So! Now
take me for a Grecian nymph the rest of the evening.

“Lady Ravelgold!”

“Hermione or Agläe, if you please! But let us
ring for supper!”

As the bell sounded, a superb South American
trulian darted in from the conservatory, and, spreading
his gorgeous black and gold wings a moment
over the alabaster shoulder of Lady Ravelgold, as if
he took a pleasure in prolonging the first touch as
he alighted, turned his large liquid eye fiercely on
Tremlet.

“Thus it is,” said Lady Ravelgold, “we forget
our old favourites in our new. See how jealous he
is!”

“Supper is served, miladi!” said a servant entering.

“A hand to each, then, for the present,” she said,
putting one into Tremlet's, and holding up the trulian
with the other. “He who behaves best shall drink
first with me.”

“I beg your ladyship's pardon,” said Tremlet,
drawing back, and looking at the servant, who
immediately left the room. “Let us understand
each other! Does Lady Imogen sup with us tonight?”

“Lady Imogen has retired,” said her mother, in
some surprise.

“Then, madam, will you be seated one moment
and listen to me?”

Lady Ravelgold sat down on the nearest ottoman,
with the air of a person too high bred to be taken
by surprise, but the colour deepened to crimson in
the centre of her cheek, and the bird on her hand
betrayed by one of his gurgling notes that he was
held more tightly than pleased him. With a calm
and decisive tone, Tremlet went through the explanation
given in the previous parts of this narration.
He declared his love for Lady Imogen, his hopes
(while he had doubts of his birth) that Lady Ravel-gold's
increasing obligations and embarrassments
and his own wealth might weigh against his disadvantages,
and now, his honourable descent being
established, and his rank entitling him to propose
for her hand, he called upon Lady Ravelgold to
redeem her obligations to him by an immediate
explanation to her daughter of his conduct toward
herself, and by lending her whole influence to the
success of his suit.

Five minutes are brief time to change a lover
into a son-in-law; and Lady Ravelgold, as we have
seen in the course of this story, was no philosopher.
She buried her face in her hands, and sat silent for
awhile after Tremlet had concluded; but the case
was a very clear one. Ruin and mortification were
in one scale, mortification and prosperity in the
other. She rose, pale but decided, and requesting

Monsieur le Conte Manteuffel to await her a few
minutes, ascended to her daughter's chamber.

“If you please, sir,” said a servant, entering in
about half an hour, “miladi and Lady Imogen beg
that you will join them in the supper-room.”