Society's Verdict

Chapter I

All that's best of dark and bright, Meet in her aspect and her eyes. The writer of the verse commencing Vice is a monster of such hideous mien, That to be hated needs but to be seen, clearly had not seen all forms of it. Many he had, doubtless, and they had left an unpleasant impression upon his mind, but not all ; for instance, he had never seen Mrs. Adair. She was vice incarnate, but she was not e "hideous" by any means. On the contrary, she was a very bewitching mass of silk, tulle, and sin. How many hearts had she wounded, and wronged, and dishonoured, and broken ? How many decep tive speeches had issued from that rosy mouth, that looked so pure, good, and womanly ? The day was hot in the extreme. The " upper ten thousand" looked, as they lolled back in their carriages that day, either flaccid, of a white heat, or, worse still, of a dusky red.

Mrs. Adair was pressing the pavement of Eegent Street — she had the fair excuse of being a pedestrian — yet she was as fresh, as perfect at all points, as when she had started some hours before from her suburban villa residence. Her delicate skirt of pale silver-gray grenadine was daintily raised in one silver-gray kidded hand. It floated around her in a cloudy fashion, rendered " distinct " by the black lace— Spanish lace ; she wore the real article, a seventy-guinea shawl. Her bonnet was a French bonnet, therefore indescribable; but it was as perfect in all its component parts as was the crimson rose which rested under the brim, upon her intensely black hair. Her eyes were lakes of fire, brilliancy, and sweetness — a trifle too bright, perhaps; they blazed sometimes. Not the rose which bloomed in her bonnet, on that bed of lustrous hair, glowed with a richer brighter tint, than that pretty woman's cheeks ; they were so blooming, indeed, that men, in passing, eyed them admiringly, and women suspiciously.

Glorious in womanly charms of a higher order than are often to be met with, and in French millinery which would render even -a plain woman charming, Mrs. Adair walked along radiant, until she came to the door of a jeweller's shop, at which she paused a moment before entering, just to bestow a comprehensive glance over a carriage and pair of sturdy brown horses that stood there waiting. When she walked into the shop she had ample time for observation, for the attention of the presiding young spirits of the gems was concentrated on a party that stood at a counter at the opposite side — two ladies and a gentleman. The elder lady was a stout good-humoured matron of about fifty, with a handsome, healthy, florid face, and in handsome, expressive, florid attire. "Evidently the owner of that elegant equipage, they are both of country build," murmured Mrs. Adair to herself with a sneer.

The younger lady was a tall fair girl, with a fine generous figure, and a face such as Leech loved ; she had the upturned eye and lash readers of Punch are so familiar with. The gentleman fell under Mrs. Adair's notice last, but directly her eyes rested on that fine handsome perfect type of the fair well-bred Englishman, a visible shock ran through her frame, and rapidly crossing the shop, she placed one well-gloved hand on his arm, exclaiming : "Lewis Gordon, you in town ! " He turned round with a visible increase of colour on his pale face, and in reply to her eager question, remark, salutation, call it what you will, answered : " Yes, I am in town." This being a statement of such a very apparent fact, went to prove nothing more than the gentleman's embarrassment. " And' being in town you will, I am sure, come down to see me ?

" She smiled sweetly as she asked it. The young clergyman, for Lewis Gordon was a clergy man, though it was not shown in the cut of his coat, did not seem to view the invitation at all in an enthusiastic light, on the contrary he seemed rather desirous of bringing the interview to a close, for he made no sign of acquiescence, and began tapping his boot with the cane he carried. She — that woman with the crimson rose and the lustrous hair — saw he did not want her to stand there before him, all beautiful as she was, any longer ; but she was not to be baffled ; no man had ever succeeded in baffling her yet. In ERROR. a lower tone than she had before spoken, she said, just indicating them with her hand, and conveying, at the same time, the knowledge to him that she desired an introduction : "Your friends; are they?"

" In town for a few days only," he interrupted hastily. " You will surely introduce me, Lewis ; " she did not emphasise the word as I have done, she just breathed upon it in a way that surpasses typography. "I should be happy to do so," he answered rather nervously, " but, as I tell you, they are only in town for a day or two." She half closed her large dark eyes and began : " Lewis ! have you forgotten my name — Mrs. Adair." Something in the tone altered his resolution, for he said hurriedly : " Mrs. Adair — Mrs. Reeve, Miss Reeve." " Being such an old friend of Lewis's must be the excuse for this out-of-the-way proceeding," said Mrs. Adair, when the bows and short speeches of civility had been gone through successfully, making it appear by her manner that she had succumbed to Lewis's entreaties, instead of having driven him, sorely against his will, to do the deed of introduction.

Mrs. Reeve, who looked upon every fresh introduction as the beginning of a new and happy epoch, said : " She was delighted, she was sure, and only wondered Lewis had never mentioned such a a charming ' old friend ; ' but, perhaps, he has to Claire." She went on nodding and laughing, and, almost to Mrs. Adair's own amusement, winking. " More's said to her than to me, you understand." Mrs. Adair directed one lightning glance at Miss Claire Reeve, and then turning to the counter, after saying " Oh yes, perfectly," she asked for a bracelet of some particular make; it did not seem easy to find, so, after a little brow-knitting and lip-compressing, and a few other graceful signs of impatience had been given, she said : "It must match this," essaying at the same time to unclasp a bracelet from her arm; but the bracelet was refractory and would not come off, unless Mr. Gordon would be so very kind as to assist — thank him very much, giving him so much trouble.

Lewis Gordon undid it with a trembling hand, and took occasion to whisper : " Be careful, Bella — for mercy's sake be careful." "You will come, then," she replied, in her low whisper, " to-night." " Anywhere — any time ; what is your address ?"' She laid a couple of her cards down on the counter ; they bore the name of " Mrs. Adair,"" in the best style of engraving, and written in the corner was the address, "Aspen Cottage, Blackheath Park ; " and then she bowed herself away from them after a few more short sen tences, and walked away. Claire Reeve completed her purchases in an aggrieved, not to say savage, frame of mine. It is not pleasant, doubtless, to be taken into a shop by the lover of your choice, in full and entire confidence that you are the "first, the only one, his heart has thought of for a minute," and to meet in that shop a lady possessed of beauty to a degree you cannot ignore, and who claims to be an old and special friend of that lover's — when, moreover, he has never mentioned her to you and you see her presence affects him in an unaccount able way.

Claire's honest gray eyes had never looked darker or deeper with love than they did now with anger, as she bent them on Lewis ; and when, at last, their business ended, she walked out and took her seat in the carriage, there was a red spot on her usually creamy-pale cheeks. The street was rather crowded and the horses went at a foot-pace. I have not a hated enemy in the world ; if I had I would wish him to be seated in a close carriage, which is going at a foot-pace, with the girl he is engaged to seated opposite to him, and jealous of a rival whom, for " reasons unknown," he cannot assist her in skinning alive. " What a pretty woman that Mrs. Adair is, to be sure, Lewis," remarked, in all unconscious innocence, Mrs. Reeve. " Do you think so, mamma ; I can't call any woman pretty who rouges, and " " I don't think she does that ; I believe her colour to be her own," Lewis Gordon replied, and then hastily added : " Look, Claire, that cab-horse will get smashed to a certainty ; really the driving in London is wonderful — wonderful."

" Oh, never mind the driving, Lewis ; tell me about this Mrs. Adair, who she is and how long you have known her." " I knew an Ernest Adair," broke in Mrs. Reeve, " I wonder whether she's his wife ; Adair of Craigtullock, in Perthshire — he was as nice a young man as ever " " Her husband's name was not Ernest," said Lewis, almost pettishly. "But he may be a brother of Ernest's. Adair of Craigtullock — the old man, the father of Ernest, you know — had a lot of sons — six or seven, I don't know which it was; but six or seven." " May be a brother ! I should hope, mamma, that if she had a husband alive she wouldn't go into such absurd raptures at seeing another man as she did just now in a public shop ; it's dis gusting. She's a widow — isn't she, Lewis ? " " Yes, that is — yes ; of course she is."

" Why ' of course ' ? Now, Lewis, why should she be a widow more than every other woman one meets ? " " Do ask her, Lewis, when you see her, to tell you if her husband was a brother of Ernest Adair's. Shall we go to the park, Claire?" ERROR. 14 " I have a headache, mamma, dear ; and it's insufferably hot ; still, if you wish " " No, no, my dear," interrupted her good natured parent; "we'll go home at once, then. I only thought we might meet someone we know, and that's always so pleasant." Truly amiable Mrs. Reeve ! " More likely to see some more of Lewis's ' old friends,' mamma ; say, are we not, Lewis ? When are you going to see her ? " " I don't know. I am not sure about going to see her at all. A fellow hasn't time to be rushing round, ' making calls ' on everybody." " Oh Lewis ! not ' on everybody ; ' but I should imagine this a very exceptional case — besides, I heard you promise."

"You will come in and dine with us, Lewis," said kind Mrs. Reeve, when the carriage stopped at last at the door of their hotel. "Not to-day, thank you," said the harassed Lewis. " I have an appointment — a business appointment with a fellow. Good-bye, Claire." " Good-bye," said the young lady, giving him the tips of her fingers ; "a queer time of day for business. Good-bye ; do come in, mamma." Perhaps the thought that it was a " queer time of day for business " only occurred to Lewis when he left them, and had time for reflection — a thing which, 1 must confess, had been denied to him from the moment of Mrs. Adair's appearance — at any rate I would rather suppose such to be the case than to believe it possible for a young clergyman of rigorous high-church principles to be guilty of telling a story.

Instead of meeting any " fellow " he walked away to a coffee-house by himself, where, in place of an orthodox dinner, he refreshed himself with a cup of the strong black exhilarating beverage. He sat with his elbow resting on the table, and his face on his hand, and there was that " something " in his air and look which made the most casual visitor to the place gaze at him and say : " Surely that young fellow has lost some heavy stake." The young, fair, blue-eyed, strikingly handsome man had just the appearance of a gambler who had received some awful check in mid-career. When the clock struck seven he rose, muttering to himself : " The follies of my boyhood are finding me out with a vengeance ; " and called a cab, which he directed to drive to " North Kent line, London Bridge." He got out at the Blackheath station at eight o'clock, and on hearing how short the distance was proceeded on foot to Blackheath Park.

Mrs. Adair had returned home to her six o'clock dinner ; returned in time to make a very exquisite toilette for it, which, as she was alone, one would have thought unnecessary. The matchless boy who opened the door to her — and whose rotundity of chest and profusion of buttons caused him to be the envy, and consequently the derision, of all the vulgar boys of the neighbourhood — informed her in reply to her eager question that "no one had called;" this answer seemed to relieve her immensely. Could that lovely, rich, brilliant woman dread anyone; or had she only a general sensible horror of morning calls ? " Dress Miss Ada prettily," she said to her maid when she was about descending to her dinner, " I may want her to-night." At about eight o'clock she began to listen and watch, and a few minutes after Mr. Gordon was announced.

He came in, neither pale nor trembling now, but with a proud determination in face and manner that made her regard him with admiration — nay, more. " Shall I let that pale-faced girl win him from me ? Never ! " she said to herself as she rose to greet him. " I am here at your bidding ; now, what do you want, Mrs. Adair." " In the first place I want — not to be called Mrs. Adair any longer; the old name from vol. i. o your lips falls more softly, more naturally on my ears." 33 She had a marvellous voice, a perfect intonation, a wonderful play of feature, and this evening she tried to charm. " When we parted — years ago now — we decided that ' henceforth we should be as strangers ' to each other ; that arrangement is incompatible with a familiarity of address." He did not seek to avoid or meet her eyes ; his indifference stung her.

"When we parted," she commenced pathetic ally. " Ah Lewis ! but things have changed since then ; he was dead." " Bella ! " " Ah ! that touches you, does it ! " she said, with flashing eyes. "It grieves you sorely, does it ? You have grown to hate me in these years, and love another, perhaps. Tell me, are you engaged to that girl ? " "To what girl?" " Don't bandy words with me, Lewis Gordon," she said haughtily. "To that girl I saw in the shop to-day." " I hate the word ' engaged.' I am going to marry Miss Claire Reeve." "And yet 'engaged' would be a better word in your case than 'going to marry.' You will perhaps recognise the innaccuracy of that phrase, when you reflect on what I told you just now — he was dead." " Isabel, you are deceiving me." " I am not. Now, will you keep a promise you made me once ?

" " What is it ? " " I am tired of being called ' Mrs. Adair.' " She spoke slowly, and laid her beautiful hand on his; he shook her off as if she stung him. "Never; you are mad, Bella, and trying to make me so too. Let me go." " Not till you assure me that engagement shall c ERROR. 20 be broken off at once; promise me that, and I will be quiet." " I promise ; let me go." " Stop one moment," she said, ringing the bell. "What would Miss Claire Reeve say to your daughter, I wonder ? " He looked at her keenly, and she answered the unspoken thought. "Yes, Lewis; you have never thought, never asked, never cared for the result of that journey which separated us." "Am I so unhappy, indeed?" he said sadly, " Let me see my child, Bella." Soon, in obedience to Mrs. Adair's order, a lovely child, some four or five years old, came dancing into the room.

Not all the flounces and ribbons with which she was almost smothered could conceal her extreme loveliness. Unlike her beautiful southern-faced mother, Ada had large deep blue eyes and bright golden hair. Lewis Gordon took her up on his knee without speaking. He sat for a minute or two with his face down on the child's bright head; then he looked up and said, almost humbly : "Will you let me have this little darling, Bella ? " " You have love to give her then ? " she asked eagerly. " Love to give her ? — yes. I ask again, let me have her." " Go now, Ada," Mrs. Adair said kindly to the child; "we do not want you any longer, darling. Ah, I have found a way to his heart now," she thought triumphantly, as she saw the lingering clasp and kiss Lewis bestowed on the child. " I can talk to you no longer to-night, Bella ; I feel almost distracted !

Let me go." "I will not even ask you to come again, Lewis," she said quietly, as she held his hand at parting, " for you feel now that you must ; but such scenes are not good for my household, who, I feel confident, are airing their eyes and ears at the keyhole. You shall not come here again until you are calmer. I go to the opera on Saturday; on Saturday morning I'll send you a note, giving you the number of my box. You must join me there." '" Not there, Bella." "Yes, there. I will have it so," she replied imperiously, with a stamp of the little foot. " Am I not your wife ? And then I will decide as to whether I will let you have Ada or not; but however I decide, Lewis Gordon, be assured that I have a mother's heart for Ada ! " She touched him more with those few words than by all else she had said.

When Mr. Gordon left her Mrs. Adair drew her chair to a writing-table, and hastily scribbled off a short note : "I have done as you ordered me, seen Mr. Gordon, that is, instead of written to him. Your injunctions are obeyed. Do not come here; your appearance might shock the proprieties of this place, but meet me on Saturday morning in Kensington Gardens, same tree as before." When she had folded and placed it in an envelope she directed it to " S. Dessanges, Esq., Great Western Hotel." " The vile wretch ! " she said to herself, in cold, cutting, [clear accents, as she gazed at the name she had written. Late into the night Mrs. Adair sat playing brilliant pieces at her magnificently-toned piano; and all at once, after a long time, she broke into " Com' e bello." Her rich, powerful, thrillingly sweet voice seemed the very soul of passion, as she sang those tender words.

Of whom could she have been thinking as she poured out that song ? It was late — or early morning rather — before Mrs. Adair pressed her pillow. Had she a bad conscience, or did she simply like turning night into day ? Or was she so much amused with her own performance that she did not heed how rapidly the fleeting hours went by? Or was she making plans for the future ? I do not know. She might have been one on whose "bosom's lord" a sin the more or less sat lightly enough. It is not the wicked people who sleep the worst. At any rate beautiful heartless " vice " sat long into the night, singing " Com' e bello." We have seen her in hot Regent Street under a trying sun, let us now, if the kind reader can stand a little bit more millinery, look at her when the heat of the day has given way to a touching evening langour.

Let us look at her as she sits there with the full blaze of half-a-dozen wax candles falling full upon her. I said before she had changed her attire. In place of the silvery grenadine there reigned a rich blue-clouded moire-antique — a blue that was blue at night — cut low, with short sleeves ; and around the body and arms there was a quantity of rich soft black lace. Her lustrous black hair was taken back over her tiny ears, and braided round the back of the handsomest little head in the world, where it was confined with a cut-steel comb. The lace on the sleeve did not reach mid-way' to her elbow, and there was not a bracelet to mar the perfect beauty of her arm — that arm, small, round, white, and massive as a statue's. Her forehead was rather low, but wide, and when she was not speaking there was always a slight Hue of care or thought across it.

She had the haugh tiest, and at the same time the loveliest mouth from which soft tones have ever issued, and the pure line of her nose and chin are not to be shadowed forth by any word-painting. But after all, when every other feature had excited rapturous admiration, you found that her eyes were what absorbed you most ; they and their long black lashes and exquisite brows completely divided her face into two distinct parts, they were so splen didly large and dark. I am conscious that my poor language will hardly give a correct idea of that which I wish to convey; this perhaps will express it better — a black velvet band across her face could not have been more " marked " than were Mrs. Adair's eyes and their lashes. She was rather a tall woman ; a tall woman with wide sloping shoulders, and a tiny waist, and a long arching throat.

She had a peculiar walk ; it was undulating, and yet not like a cat's. She never tripped or skipped in any elastic volatile fashion, or shuffled, or " pranced," as too many women do. She "walked" like a woman who knows " walking " is an art, and has accordingly studied it, would do. And so, leaving Lewis Gordon to go back to his hotel and toss impatiently through the long hours of the night, as his brow presses a pillow that memory is rendering a thorny one — and leaving Claire to dream in her girlish faith of a realised beau-ideal, a modern Bayard, of a heart true, loyal, fresh, untried as her own ; and to ERROR. 27 wake occasionally to think Mrs. Adair a " most unpleasant person" — and leaving Mrs. Adair to solace herself with sweet music, and to sing " Com' e bello " late into the night — I will bring my first chapter to a conclusion.

Chapter II

You changed a wholesome heart to gall. Saturday morning, twelve o'clock. The Ride was pretty full in spite of its being late in the season, but though it was pretty full, there was not a better-trained, more showy-looking lady's horse there than the one on which Mrs. Adair was mounted, nor a better-fitting habit than the one she wore ; and what an unexceptionable pad-groom Buttons made, to be sure. That little bay horse must have had a splendid mouth, or she would never have taken him so close to the rails every now and then. She was watching for someone, and she constantly kept an outside place ; she rode with the third pummel, and her little bay would have had some trouble to unseat her. Many acquaintances were quite proud to raise their hats to pretty Mrs. Adair, who returned all bows with a "stand off" and "keep your distance to-day, if you please," air.

By-and-by she got off, and made her way on foot to a shady part of Kensington Gardens, and took her seat under a spreading tree, and waited, tapping her boot with the little gold-headed riding-whip. At last her quick eye fell upon an approaching figure. A man past the prime of life — if such a man could be ever said to have a prime — with gray dashes in his hair and whiskers, and red dashes in what should have been the whites of his eyes. A man tall and stout, dressed entirely in black, with rumples in his waistcoat, and a velvet collar to his coat, and a tie fastened round his throat with a pin with a large red stone in it, with yellow gloves — with the fingers too long — and a painfully glossy hat; altogether not the kind of man one would have imagined Mrs. Adair would be waiting for. She took in all the little peculiarities of his costume at a glance, and muttered to herself : " Worse and worse."

He came up and held out his hand to her, and she took it, unwillingly enough. As she withdrew her own, he saw her with her left hand, in which she held a handkerchief, make a movement as if she would have wiped some contaminating soil from the one he had just released ; 'twas the action of a moment, but he saw it, and smiled, and pulled his long badly trimmed beard — and then stuck both hands into his trousers pockets — and laughed, and finally sat himself down by her side, and said " Well, Bella ; have you got me some money ? I want it badly enough." He called her " Bella " in a coarsely familiar way ; and seeing she winced under it, he deter mined on calling her " Bella " again. "I have not been able to procure you any yet," she answered, not turning her eyes upon him though — she dared not let him see the look she felt was there.

" Patience ; you shall have some soon." " Patience is a good thing ; but money is better. You lied — not that that's anything new for you — when you said in your note you had 'obeyed my injunctions.' My injunctions — my orders — were that you should get me more money ; and those you haven't obeyed ; now you do it soon." "Patience," she repeated, "I have obeyed them so far as telling Lewis, Mr. Gordon, that — that — what you told me — that Withers was dead." "And did Lewis, Mr. Gordon, believe you, or did he know you too well?" " I scarcely know yet ; I am to meet him again to-night." " Where ? " (with an evil glance at her that made her start visibly). " At the opera." He relieved his mind with a light volley of oaths. " So you've money to throw away on the opera, and yet you've none for my — for my necessities; there must be an end to this!"

"What am I to do — what can I do?" said the woman wildly ; but the moment after the bright sunny smile played over her face, for a group passed, and she recognised and bowed to Mrs. and Miss Reeve and Lewis Gordon. " Who are those people ?" " Slight acquaintances of mine." " What is their name ? " " Grey — that is the ladies are called Grey, and the gentleman's name is — let me think — oh ! Holbrook." " You are lying to me — I know you are," he said calmly, "only I have no means of proving it ; you have fine acquaintances in these days, Bella, and you don't want them to see me ; well, they're not my sort, they're not — I don't want to know 'em, I don't ; still it's worth your while to keep me quiet, judging by your smart dress ; I made myself smart to-day to meet you, now you pay for it." " You drink and gamble more than ever," she almost sobbed ; " I never can supply — well, I promise you shall have money either Monday or Tuesday, and then will you let me alone for a time ?"

"Yes, I'll not bother you for a time," he responded; "and now I'm going. Come, shake hands, Bella, it's no use being squeamish about it — you must do it." And again her slender graceful hand was extended to meet his — the very opposite to her own. VOL. I. D " I am going to lean on them rails now, along with the other gentlemen what's got nothing to do, and lots of money ; and mind you bow to me, for I've one or two friends about, and I choose them to see a fine lady bowing to me." " What's the use " she began. " Bless you," interrupted the man, " they won't know what you are." " I'll confess everything to Lewis Gordon to-night, rather than be in that man's power any longer : " she said so to herself, when his last speech was ringing in her ears as she sat watching his square lumbering form fading away amongst the trees.