“Oh, I haven’t got their superficial tricks. I don’t paint my eyebrows or comb my wig in public or play with ladies’ fans. But—Well, to tell the truth the age is a little sick, and all of us who live in it have caught the sickness too.”
“But surely I live in it?”
“No, you don’t!” He released her. “You’re no part of this shabby world. And thank God you’re not!”
“Thank God? But why? Don’t you like these people? I thought they were your friends. I’ve wished I could be more like them —the ladies, I mean.” Now she was thinking of the Duchess of Ravenspur.
His mouth gave a bitter twist at that. “Corinna, my darling, where can you have got such a foolish idea? Don’t ever dare think of it again. Oh, Corinna, you can’t know how glad I am that I saw you that day in Port Royal—”
Suddenly her fears and jealousies were gone. A great and wonderful sense of relief swept through her, washing out the hatred, the poison of mistrust that had been festering there.
“
“So do I. You were on your way to church. And you were wearing a black-lace gown with a black veil over your hair and roses pinned in it. I thought you were Spanish.”
“And my father thought
“No wonder. I must have been a disreputable looking fellow. I hadn’t got ashore half-an-hour before. Remember—I followed you into church—”
“And stared at me all through the service! Oh, how furious father was! But I didn’t care—I was in love with you already!”
“Dirty clothes, five-day beard, and all?”
“Dirty clothes, five-day beard, and all! But when you came to call that night—oh, Bruce, you can’t imagine how you looked to me! Like all the princes out of every fairy-tale I’ve ever read!”
She looked up at him, her eyes illumined like stained-glass in a chapel. Suddenly his own eyes closed, as if to shut out the sight of something that troubled him, but at the same time his arms drew her close and his head bent to kiss her. Oh, you’ve been a fool! Corinna told herself. Of course he loves you—and of course he’s faithful! I’d see it when he looked at me, I’d feel it when he touched me, if he weren’t.
And yet, the next time she saw the Duchess of Ravenspur, her resentment was stronger than ever. For the woman looked at her, she knew it, with a kind of sliding contempt, a sort of secret sneer, as though she had an advantage over her. Her Grace seemed, however, more friendly than she had at first, and she always spoke to Corinna pleasantly.
But at last Corinna felt that she could bear this uncertainty, these jealous suspicions of hers no longer. And finally, as if in the hope that she could exorcise the demon by speaking its name, she determined to talk to Bruce, as casually as she could, about the Duchess—though it had been some time since she had been able to hear the woman’s name without wincing inside. They were coming home one night from the Palace when she forced herself to begin the conversation. She had known for a long time what she would say and had repeated the sentence over so many times that the words seemed to come out flat and stilted.
“How lovely the Duchess of Ravenspur looked tonight. I do think she’s more beautiful than my Lady Castlemaine—don’t you?” Her heart was pounding so that she could scarcely hear her own voice and her hands, clenched tight inside her muff, felt wet and cold.
Horsemen rode beside the coach and the torches they carried threw a bright unsteady light in upon them, but Corinna looked straight ahead. It seemed to her that he hesitated a long while before answering and those few seconds passed in torture. I should never have said it! she thought miserably. The sound of her name means something to him—something I don’t want to know about. I wish I had kept quiet–
Then she heard him say, with no more emotion in his voice than if it were some comment upon the weather: “Yes, I think she is.”
She felt a kind of sudden relief and now she said, almost gayly: “She flirts furiously with you. I suppose I should be jealous of her.”
Bruce looked at her and smiled faintly, but made no reply.
But Corinna was determined not to stop now that she had made the break. “Is it true she was once an actress? Or is that only gossip? The other women don’t seem to like her. They say terrible things about her—of course, they’re probably jealous,” she added hastily.
“Do women ever like one another? Not very often, I think. But it’s true she was an actress—several years ago.”
“Then she isn’t of quality?”
“No. Her people were yeomen farmers.”
“But how did she come by her fortune and title?”
