The Widowed Bride — page 143: what you’re looking at

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

134 THE WIDOWED BRIDE. pearl-dotted vail looped fantastically away from her dark ringlets, over which the syringa buds drooped as if they loved to caress the glossy spirals, and the magnificent sweep of emerald velvet trailing far behind her over the carpet. She looked at herself with a half-conscious thrill of pride in the contemplation of her own radiant young beauty. Yes, she became it passing well, she thought, as she noted the sparkle in her deep hazel eyes, the roses on her satin- smooth cheeks. Oh! why—why, was she not born to such imperial decorations as these? Whyshould she never taste the rarified air of courts—she, whose nature craved it so passionately ? Suddenly a curious whim, or rather caprice, darted into her restless brain. **] will!” she exclaimed aloud, throwing back the pearl vail that drooped so low over her fair forehead. ‘‘I will, just for once! Nobody can prevent me! Lady Blanche would not care. She would ouly laugh and call-it an excel- lent joke. And, as for my lady, the countess, I should rather enjoy her wrath and indignation at what she will be sure to phrase my unwarrantable presumption. I think I hear her mouthing out the words now. At all events, the plan is worth trying, just for the sake of aggravating my lady. She has shown the flag of defiance plainly enough. I know of no good reason why I should hesitate to retaliate.” There was a fevered red in her cheeks, a new light burn- ing in her eyes, as she carefully removed the gorgeous dress, article by article, marveling the while to observe how per- fectly its component parts fitted her own slender young figure, and then laid it carefully away in its boxes, in Blanche’s inner dressing-room. ‘Shall I put it away, Miss Percival?” asked the upper housemaid, who was in the hall without, when Rena emerged from her temporary masquerade. ‘“‘Leave it just where it is,” said Rena, quietly, and passed on to her own room. Her first action on entering there, was to go to her little rosewood writing-desk, a present from Lady Blanche, only the week before, unlock it, and take thence the letter the countess had written to the Duchess of St. Burgoyne. She lighted one of the wax tapers, in the little ivory taper-stand on the dressing-table, and held the missive in the clear, white flame, watching it burn until the ends of her own comicbooks.