CHAPTER XXXVI.

Ida wended her way over the flower-strewn meadow, with her heart beating more wildly than it had ever beaten before. She could not forget the flower-like little infant that had looked up into her face, and which had so strangely affected her.

Even the guests noted her heightened color; and Vivian Deane, watching her narrowly from across the table, wondered what brought the brightness to her eyes.

She looked at Eugene Mallard with intense interest. Surely there was no corresponding gladness in his eyes. Indeed, he looked unusually careworn.

"I will soon find out what has happened," said Vivian, with a pang of bitter jealousy.

A little later Vivian sought Ida in her boudoir.

"It has commenced to rain," she said, "and I am at a loss to know what to do with myself. The Staples girls have gone to their rooms to rest, and their mother wearies me talking about Christian charity. The gentlemen have repaired to the smoking-room, and so I have sought you."

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"You are very welcome," said Ida. "I will do my best to amuse you."

As she looked at Vivian, she said to herself:

"How foolish I have been to imagine that this brilliant, beautiful girl should care for a man who belonged to another girl."

Vivian had a very fascinating way when among women, and now she exerted herself to please Eugene Mallard's young wife as she had never exerted herself to please any one before.

"What a very cozy boudoir you have, Ida!" she said. "It is like a casket for some precious jewel. How considerate your husband was to have it furnished to suit your rich dark beauty. I used to think that nothing was pretty except white and gold or blue and white."

"That is only natural," returned Ida. "You are a pronounced blonde, you know."

"Then you do not agree with me that there is a possibility of blondes liking rich dark surroundings?"

"No; I should not fancy so," returned Ida, "except that blondes usually fall in love with dark men."

Vivian flushed a vivid scarlet, which Ida did not see, for at that moment Vivian's face was turned from her.

"Yes, that is very true," returned Vivian, making an effort to control her emotion.

In her case, Vivian knew that the old saying was at fault. The strong, passionate love of her heart had gone out to Eugene Mallard, and he was fair. He was her ideal of manly beauty. The faces of other men appeared quite insignificant when compared to his. She was anxious to turn the conversation into another channel.

"I have often thought, amid all this gayety, how lonely you must be at times without some girl friend to talk matters over with you," said Vivian.

"You are quite right," said Ida, eagerly. "I do need a girl friend, some one of my own age, to whom I could open my heart."

Vivian glided up to her and threw her arms about her neck.

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"Let me be that friend," she whispered, eagerly.

The young wife looked at her wistfully; her cheeks flushed.

"I shall be only too glad, Vivian," Ida said.

"If she had heard that I was in love with her husband, I must first throw her off the track," thought Vivian.

"I am going to tell you a secret," she murmured, aloud; "but you must not reveal it to any one, I have had a strange love affair, Ida."

She felt the young wife start, her figure tremble; she saw the lovely face grow pale. But not appearing to notice her agitation, she went on:

"My hero is as dark as a Spanish knight. I met him recently. It was a case of love at first sight. He proposed to me within a fortnight. But my relatives do not like him, wealthy, handsome, courteous though he is. They have forbidden him the house, yet I think in time they will overcome their objections."

She could plainly see how her fictitious story relieved the young wife. The color came back to Ida's cheeks, the light to her eyes. She threw her arms impulsively about Vivian, and kissed her fair, lovely, treacherous face.

"You are indeed to be envied, Vivian," she said, earnestly. "To love and be loved is the greatest happiness God can give any one. I hope, for your sake, that your lover may win his way to the hearts of your relatives. But you know that the course of true love never did run smoothly."

"My lover is a great friend of your husband's, and perhaps he has told you about it?"

"No," said Ida. "I assure you that Mr. Mallard has not spoken to me on the subject," and she looked very discomforted.

"I am sure your husband must have received a letter from my lover and hidden it away somewhere. Won't you be so kind as to look thoroughly through his desk, and see?" asked Vivian.

Ida drew back in alarm.

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"Oh, I could do not do what you ask. Mr. Mallard's rooms are in another part of the house," Ida answered, thoughtlessly.

Ida now realized the importance of the admission she had thoughtlessly made. But she could not recall her words—it was too late.

Vivian looked astounded. This was a state of affairs of which she had never dreamed. Her idea had been to find some pretext to look through Eugene Mallard's desk, and to abstract all the notes she had written to him.

She remembered one or two which she had written in which she had poured out her love for him in a mad fashion, and she would not like any one to come across them.

But here she had unearthed a startling surprise. Eugene Mallard's rooms were in another part of the house. Then they were indeed estranged. She must find out the secret that lay between them.

"I am so sorry to have unearthed so sad a secret," cried the false friend, winding her arms more tightly about Ida, and turning her face away, that the young wife might not observe the look of triumph in it. "But every life has its sorrow, and perhaps it was meant that I should comfort you. If you are wearing out your heart longing for the sympathy of a true friend, oh, dear Ida, please do confide in me, and let me help you!"

The words had such a ring of sympathy in them that it was no wonder the young wife believed her. She was young and unversed in the ways of the world, or this beautiful false friend could not have deceived her so.

"Oh, Vivian, I am unhappy," she sobbed, "surely the most unhappy girl the sun ever shone on! I must make a confidant of some one—tell some one my troubles, or I shall die. My—my husband does not love me!"

"Does not love you!" repeated Vivian. "Then why on earth did he marry you?"

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The hapless young wife could find no answer to that question; her head drooped, and her lips were dumb.

"I am so glad you told me this," said Vivian; and it was strange that Ida did not notice the ring of triumph in the voice of her false friend as she said: "I will do my best to bring you two together. I do not ask which one is at fault. Both can not be entirely blameless."

"There is a shadow between us which never can be lifted," sobbed the young wife, putting her head on Vivian's shoulder. "There is love on only one side," went on Ida, despairingly. "He is indifferent to me, and—and he will grow to hate me."

"Forgive me, please, if I have been so engrossed in my own love affair that I did not notice anything was amiss between my old friend Eugene and his fair young bride."

"I almost dread to think of the future," moaned the young wife. "There are times when I give myself up to wondering over the strange problems of life, and I ask myself why I, who should be happy, find the world so dark and dreary."

"You must be very patient," said Vivian, "and above all things, let me warn you against being the first to make overtures for a reconciliation."

"Oh, I am so very, very glad that I have had this talk with you," sobbed Ida, "for during the past week I had come to the conclusion that the very first time I found my husband in the library, I would go up to him, and say; 'This kind of life is killing me. It would be better far for you to plunge a knife in my breast and kill me. Either take me to your heart, either make me your wife in fact as well as name, or send me out into the coldness and bitterness of the world. I can endure this no longer. Your friends crowd about me, thinking I am the happiest person in the world, while I am the most miserable. I must go from here, because I have learned to love you, my husband, with all my heart and soul. You may be surprised to hear this from me, but it is the truth. I love you as no one else ever will.[159] You may live for years, flattered and happy, but no love like mine will ever come to you again. Although you married me, yet you do not love me, and never will. Always remember that the wife who is leaving you loves you with all her heart. I would not tell you this now, but that I know in this world we may never meet again.'"

Her voice died away in a whisper as she uttered the last word, and the false friend who had determined to part husband and wife said she had learned just in time what was necessary to prevent a reconciliation between Ida and her husband.