CHAPTER XXXI.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XVIII, Issue 1218, 30 January 1886, Page 1 (Supplement)

CHAPTER XXXI.

THE OPERA.

- A dead silence, succeeded quickly by almost frantic applause, followed one of Patti's most magnificent scenes.

The audience was electrified and left almost breathless ; even Colonel Lennox had withdrawn his eyes from the lovely face which .enchanted him; Isabel, for. one moment, almost forgot her desire for vengeance. That orowded house seemed spell-bound, and during that minute Lord Castlemaine returned to the box. He opened the door most cautiously, fearing to disturb the audience, then so deeply engrossed. He was astonished to see a gentleman there ; he was still more astonished at finding in that gentlemen, Colonel Lennox, the man whom he disliked;

It was of little use to recall that dislike now, for 'his young wife, her face radiant with smiles, introduced Colonel Lsnnox to him at once. He was compelled to bow to him, although, if he had given way to his natural impulse, he would have politely opened the door and asked him to retire.

He was compelled to answer the colonel's courteous greeting with a smile and oivil words, but he would fain have said to him : " Yon are a man whose moral character I detest;" you are quite unfit to be on even the most distant terms of intimaoy with my wife ; have the goodness to leave us, and do not seek to renew your acquaintance." Those words were the honest impulee of his heart ; but who, in these days, carries out such impulses? He bitterly regretted afterward that he had not followed the dictates of bis heart.

It was a strange thing that the old, hot Castlemaine jealousy was aroused in him at once. Colonel Lennox was just then leaning over the crimson velvet chair in which Lady Castlemaine sat, and her husband disliked the familiarity of the attitude. It seemed to him that the colonel looked too admiringly at the lovely white shoulders ; he was not tha man to submit to such a thing. ,

" Excuse me," he said. " I want to speak to Lady Castlemaine." He stood with such an air of expectation that the colonel was compelled to stand up and move away. Lord Oastlemaine took his plaoe with an air of a man who knew what he had done and meant it.

"Thank fortune 1 It is ooming at laßt, coming, I am sure," said Isabel, for she read in Lord Castlemaine's face something which she had never Been there before. Her heart beat, she saw no more of the stage. The heroine of the opera vanished from her eyes ; Bhe was engrossed with a drama of real life ; and this was the first act. " A crowded house," said the colonel. . " Very," replied his lordship. 11 Patti grows no older ; she looks to me as young and beautiful as on the first day I saw her."

No answer this time from his lordship. "No need," he said to himself, curtly ; "he should not discuss the beauty of any woman with a man like this." Isabel noticed and thought it more prudent to throw herself into the breaoh ; they must not quarrel too soon, or her plan would be nipped in the bud, and there would be no tragedy. She thought it wiser to draw the oolonel's attention to herself. She looked at him with the smile that, meant so muob. "Do you consider personal beauty indispensible in an actress, Colonel Lennox she asked. " I think it possible to bo an exceedingly good actreßS without it," he replied. "I must admit that, at the same time, I think next to genius it is the greatest gift an actress can have." "But not indispensable?" said Miss Hyde. " No, not exaotly. I remember once seeing "La Grande Duchesse" beautifully put upon the stage, and Wanda had so large a. mouth that to my thinking it quite spoiled everything else. Ido not think personal beauty indispensable, but I do think that any great blemish is a great drawbaok." "I do not agree with you," said Lady Castlemaine. " I think all genius is beautiful. Genius and soul will make any face a thousand times more lovely than either color or features." " What can genius do with a nez retrousse, a large mouth, small eyes ?" " Overcome them," cried Lady Castlemaine, 11 as it overcomes everything else. Do you not think I am right, Rudolph ?" she added, turning to her husband. „ ' " You are always right," he [replied, with a lover- like gesture that drove the colonel to distraction, " and in this case you are doubly right. Genius, rather than beauty, is the chief charm in the face of anactress."

" You may have both," said Isabel Hyde, M as in the case of Patti."

" Ah, then," laughed Colonel Lennox, " all the world gives in, and worships." "If a beautiful face has a foolish expression," said Lady Castlemaine, " no one cares for it." The Colonel smiled, without speaking. "Why are you smiling?" asked Lady Castlemaine.

" I was just thinking," he replied, " of a friend of mine. He is a fine, stalwart fellow ; I believe he is one of the finest men in England, and he was a great beauty worshipper— very oritical-, too. We used to say that he would never marry, until the Venus de Medici came to life. He did marry — and his wife -ia the plainest, the most commonplace little lady ever seen. She has brown eyes, brownhair, a brown complexion, and is in every way the reverse to beautiful, but he worships her, and thinks there is no one so lovely." "And the moral of that story?" interrupted Lady Ca&tlemaine. " The morals of my stories are the worst and weakest pait of them." "The Bame as they are of yourself," thought Lord Castlemaine ; but he kept the thought to himself. Colonel Lennox looked at the beautiful countess.

" The moral to this one particular story," said the gallant colonel, "is that no two people judge of beauty alike, and that every person has his or her own standard."

" Mine is a high one," said Lady Castlemaine, and she looked with loving eyes at her husband.

A glance which Colonel Lennox saw, and which made him gnash his teeth ; a glance which Isabel Hyde saw, and which sent a chill through her heart.

"My standard- is also the highest," said Colonel Lennox, with a low bow to Lady Castlemaine.

And if ever a husband looked black, it was his lordship. "I think," he said, "that very few people know what real beauty is. Genius is grand ; the soul shining in a face makes it fair, but moral beauty is, the best beauty after all." >• Colonel Lennox sighed, and thought the very idea wearisome. He heartily wished his lordship had kept away. The interview which he had promised himself with the beautiful countess had no particular enjoyment while her husband stood there like a grim sentinel. When "Hermani" ended Lady Castlemaine rose. " I am always dazed after listening long to music," Bhe said ; and there waa something strange in the expression of her face. Quick as lightning Colonel Lennox held out his arm, before Lord Castlemaine had time to move. •' Permit me," he said. She could not refuse ; she could not abruptly turn from him and take her husband's arm. She moved slowly away with him. Isabel- laid the tips of her fingers on the arm of Lord Castlemaine. " I wonder," she said, " how many times we have been down these stairs together ?" He made no answer. "What. a magnificent pair they make," cried Isabel, pretending to be seized by some irrestible impulse. "They? Of whom are you speaking?" asked Lord Castlemaine, suddenly. " Gertrude and Colonel Lennox," she said. "He ia so tall, so strong, so dark ; she is so slender and so fair. They look well together." Lord Castlemaine felt too angry to speak. That any' one should dare to connect the name of his beautiful young wife with that of Colonel Lennox seemed to him an 'outrage. He might be a magnificent officer ; he might be one of the greatest heroes of the Zulu war, but he did not bear the character of a moral man, and he should never be a friend of his wife's. By the light of the lamps Isabel saw the pallor of his face ; but there was no pity in her heart for him. What had she suffered, and who had pitied her? Let him suffer now, it was his turn. Not a word was spoken. .It was a curiously silent quartet. Cclonel Lennox led Lady Castlemaine to the carriage; he made the most profound bow to her * and Miss Hyde"; one, somewhat less profound, to Lord Castlemaine, then retired. Not one word of him did L,ord Castlemaine utter. He talked of Patti ; of his friend from Canada ; of the opera, but not one word of Colonel Lennox. Isabel listened anxiously, waiting for the name, but she never heard it. Lord Castlemaine did not care to say what he had to say before a stranger. ' During the remainder of the evening there was no word, fjady Castlemaine sat down at the piano and ran over most of the beautiful airs from " Hermani." Lord Castlemaine praised them. Miss Hyde wasted some little time in speculating whether most actresses did or did not go to heaven. Lord Castlemaine laughed, although he did not quite

approve. "What an unreal life it must be!" said Lady Castlemaine. "After all, no life is worth living that is not perfectly straight and true.".