Chapter 24 - Page 2

least, or making any
effort to evade it: under her most scathing comments she was composed and
unmoved. On the first occasion of my lady's referring to her plans for
her future, she received a blow which fairly stunned her. The girl rose
from her chair, and looked her straight in the face unflinchingly, and
with a suggestion of _hauteur_ not easy to confront.

"I beg you will not speak to me of that again," she said: "I will not
listen." And turning about, she walked out of the room.

"This," her ladyship had said in sepulchral tones, when she recovered her
breath, "this is one of the results of Miss Octavia Bassett." And nothing
more had been said on the subject since.

No one in Slowbridge was in more brilliant spirits than Octavia herself
on the morning of the _fête_. Before breakfast Miss Belinda was startled
by the arrival of another telegram, which ran as follows:--

"Arrived to-day, per 'Russia.' Be with you tomorrow evening. Friend with
me.

"MARTIN BASSETT."

On reading this communication, Miss Belinda burst into floods of
delighted tears.

"Dear, dear Martin," she wept; "to think that we should meet again! _Why_
didn't he let us know he was on the way? I should have been so anxious
that I should not have slept at all."

"Well," remarked Octavia, "I suppose that would have been an advantage."

Suddenly she approached Miss Belinda, kissed her, and disappeared out of
the room as if by magic, not returning for a quarter of an hour, looking
rather soft and moist and brilliant about the eyes when she did return.

Octavia was a marked figure upon the grounds at that garden-party.

"Another dress, my dear," remarked Mrs. Burnham. "And what a charming
color she has, I declare! She is usually paler. Perhaps we owe this to
Lord Lansdowne."

"Her dress is becoming, at all events," privately remarked Miss Lydia
Burnham, whose tastes had not been consulted about her own.

"It is she who is becoming," said her sister: "it is not the dress so
much, though her clothes always have a _look_, some way. She's prettier
than ever to-day, and is enjoying herself."

She was enjoying herself. Mr. Francis Barold observed it rather gloomily
as he stood apart. She was enjoying herself so much, that she did not
seem to notice that he had avoided her, instead of going up to claim her
attention. Half a dozen men were standing about her, and making
themselves agreeable; and she was apparently quite equal to the
emergencies of the occasion. The young men from Broadoaks had at once
attached themselves to her train.