The Widowed Bride — page 228: what you’re looking at

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

THE WIDOWED BRIDE. 219 many lonely years garnered up for you in my heart!” she’ cried, passionately. He touched his lips caressingly to her forehead. “But,” he added, chancing to turn his head, ‘who is _ that coming up the path from the steamboat-landing?” Rena leaned forward to look, and as she looked, a crim- son shadow crept over her cheek. | “Ttis the Marquis of Balfour,” she said, almost beneath her breath. “The Duke of St. Burgoyne’s son? Yes,” said Lord Glenhampton, ‘‘I remember him asa very fine man. But how has he managed to find us out here?” Lord Balfour was warmly greeted by the whole party, who gathered around to welcome him, and to hear the latest news from England. “But I did not come from England,” said Lord Balfour. “I chanced to be somewhere in the neighborhood of the sources of the Nile, with a party of friends, when I received a letter from my mother telling me of the extraordinary good fortune which had happened to the Earl of Glenhamp- ton—the unexpected discovery of his long lost daughters. Of course I came at once to offer my congratulations.” Rena sat leaning her forehead on her hand, and marking tiny circles around the roots of the daisies with the point of her parasol. She did not look up, but her heart beat tumultuously within her bosom at his words, ‘‘to offer his congratulations.”” Was that all he had come for? For she felt now the value and magnitude of the treasure she had allowed to slip from herhands. Lady Katherine Arden would perhaps be a more fitting bride for the Mar- uis of Balfour than the nameless and obscure Rena ercival, But it was not until after dinner that he found an oppor- tunity to speak to her alone. Lord Glenhampton tmhwilling to brave at his years the chill of the night air sweeping over the lake had gone to his book. Lord Vere, who had persuaded Blanche that nightingales haunted an upper ledge of a sloping hill-side had lured her up the heighths to listen for their music, and Ernest Evelyn and his wife had turned toward ‘Villeneuve to see if any letters awaited them there; and so it happened that Lady Katherine and the Marquis of Balfour were alone on the terrace, where the former had sketched out the pro- Eomicbooks (E(0) mn