Moths by Ouida — page 76: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

2 MOTHS. “Why can’t you get on with people?” Lady Dolly would ask Vere, irritably. | “T donot think they like me,” said Vere, very humbly; and her mother answered, very sharply and sensibly: ‘Everybody is liked as much as they wish to be. If you. show Bele you like them, they like you. It is perfectly simple. ou get what you give, my dear, in this world. But the sad_ truth is, Vere, that you are unamiable.” ; | Was she in truth unamiable? She felt the tears gather in her eyes. She put her hand on the hound Loris’s collar, and went away with him into the gardens '—the exquisite gardens with the gleam of the sea between the festoons of their roses that no one hardly ever noticed except herself. In a deserted spot where a marble Antinous reigned over a world of gardenias, she sat down on a rustic chair and ge her arm round the dog’s neck and cried like the child that she was. : She thought of the sweet-brier bush on the edge of the white cliff. Oh, if only Correze had been here to tell her what to do! The dog kissed her in his own way, and was sorrowful for her sorrow; the sea-wind stirred the flowers; the waves were near enough at hand for their murmuring to reach her; the quietness and sweetness of the place soothed her. She would surely see Correze again, she thought; perhaps in Paris, this very winter, if her mother took her there. He would tell her if she were right or wrong in having no sympathy with all these people; and the tears still fell down her cheeks as she sat there and fancied she heard that wondrous voice rise once more above the sound of the sea. " ‘‘Mademoiselle Vera, are-you unhappy? and in Felicite!” said a voice that was very unlike that unforgotten music—the voice of Sergius Zourofi. Vere looked up startled, with her tears still wet, like dew. Zouroff had been kindness itself to her, but her first disgust for him had never changed. She was alarmed and vexed tobe found by him, so, alone. ‘oWhat frets you?” he said, with more gentleness than often came into his tones. ‘‘It is a regret to me as your host, that you should know any regret in Felicite. If there be anything I can do, command me.” ‘You are very good, monsieur,” said Vere, hesitatingly. wf It is nothing, very little, at least; my mother is vexed with me. ‘‘Indeed! Your charming mother, then, for once must be in the wrong. What is it?” ‘* Because. people do not like me.” ** Who is barbarian enough not to like you? Iam a barbarian, but——” His cold eyes grew eloquent, but she did not see their gaze, for- ghe was looking dreamily at the far-off sea, ‘No one likes me,” said Vere, wearily, ‘‘and my mother thinks ismy fault. Nodoubtitis. Ido not care for what they care >) comicbooks.co