Chapter 8 - Page 2

Of course no good could come of this; and when, a
few years later, poor Chivers finally died in a mad-
house, his widow (draped in strange weeds) again pulled
up stakes and departed with Ellen, who had grown into
a tall bony girl with conspicuous eyes. For some time
no more was heard of them; then news came of Ellen's
marriage to an immensely rich Polish nobleman of
legendary fame, whom she had met at a ball at the
Tuileries, and who was said to have princely establishments
in Paris, Nice and Florence, a yacht at Cowes,
and many square miles of shooting in Transylvania.
She disappeared in a kind of sulphurous apotheosis,
and when a few years later Medora again came back to
New York, subdued, impoverished, mourning a third
husband, and in quest of a still smaller house, people
wondered that her rich niece had not been able to do
something for her. Then came the news that Ellen's
own marriage had ended in disaster, and that she was
herself returning home to seek rest and oblivion among
her kinsfolk.

These things passed through Newland Archer's mind
a week later as he watched the Countess Olenska enter
the van der Luyden drawing-room on the evening of
the momentous dinner. The occasion was a solemn
one, and he wondered a little nervously how she would
carry it off. She came rather late, one hand still ungloved,
and fastening a bracelet about her wrist; yet she entered
without any appearance of haste or embarrassment
the drawing-room in which New York's most
chosen company was somewhat awfully assembled.

In the middle of the room she paused, looking about
her with a grave mouth and smiling eyes; and in that
instant Newland Archer rejected the general verdict on
her looks. It was true that her early radiance was gone.
The red cheeks had paled; she was thin, worn, a little
older-looking than her age, which must have been nearly
thirty. But there was about her the mysterious authority
of beauty, a sureness in the carriage of the head, the
movement of the eyes, which, without being in the least
theatrical, struck his as highly trained and full of a
conscious power. At the same time she was simpler in
manner than most of the ladies present, and many
people (as he heard afterward from Janey) were disappointed
that her appearance was not more "stylish"
--for stylishness was what New York most valued. It
was, perhaps, Archer reflected, because her early vivacity
had disappeared; because she was so quiet--quiet in
her movements, her voice, and the tones of her low-
pitched voice. New York had expected something a
good deal more reasonant in a young woman with such
a history.

The dinner was a somewhat formidable business.