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Page 3
Both her aunt and uncle looked at her with slightly shocked
surprise--and she saw it at once and reddened a little.
But this incident caused the remarkable looking foreigner to
crystallize in interest for her, especially when, in raising his
glass of champagne, she saw that on his wrist there was a bracelet
of platinum with a small watch set with very fine diamonds. She
could hardly have been more surprised if he had worn a ring in his
nose, so unaccustomed was she to any type but that of the curates
and young gentlemen of Exminster.
Canon and Mrs. Ebley finished their dinner in disdainful silence
and sailed from the room with chilling glances, but as Stella
Rawson followed them demurely she raised her soft eyes when she
came to the object of her relatives' contempt, and met his serene
blue ones--and for some reason thrilled wildly.
There was a remarkable and powerful magnetism in his glance; it
was as if a breath of some other world touched her, she seemed to
see into possibilities she had never dreamed about. She resented
being drawn into a far corner on the right hand of the hall, and
there handed an English paper to read for half an hour before
being told to go to bed. She was perfectly conscious that she was
longing for the stranger to come out of the restaurant, that she
might see him again.
But it was not until she was obediently following her aunt's black
broche train to the lift up the steps again that the tall man
passed them in the corridor. He never even glanced in their
direction, and went on as though the space were untenanted--but
had hardly got beyond, when he turned suddenly, and walked rapidly
to the lift door, passing them again. So that the four entered it
presently, and were taken up together.
Stella Rawson was very close to the remarkable looking creature.
And again a wild nameless attraction crept over her. She noticed
his skin was faintly browned with the sun, but was otherwise as
fine as a child's--finer than most children's. And now she could
see that three most wonderful pearls were his shirt-studs.
He got out on the second floor, one beneath them, and said,
"Pardon," as he passed, but not as a French word, nor yet as if it
were English.
During these few seconds Stella was quite aware that he had never
apparently looked at her.
"I call such an appearance sacrilegious," Mrs. Ebley said. "A man
has no right to imitate one of the blessed apostles in these
modern days; it is very bad taste."
CHAPTER II
Stella Rawson woke the next day with some sense of rebellion.
There came with the rest of her post a letter from her betrothed.
And although it was just such a letter as any nice girl engaged of
her own free will to the Bishop's junior chaplain ought to have
been glad to receive, Stella found herself pouting and criticizing
every sentence.
"I do wish Eustace would not talk such cant," she said to herself.
"Even in this he is unable to be natural--and I am sure I shall
not feel a thing like he describes when I stand in St. Peter's. I
believe I would rather go into the Pantheon. I seem to be tired of
everything I ought to like to-day!" And still rebellious she got
up and was taken by her uncle and aunt to the Vatican--and was
allowed to linger only in the parts which interested them.
"I never have had a taste for sculpture," Mrs. Ebley said. "People
may call it what names they please, but I consider it immoral and
indecent."
"A wonder to me," the Uncle Erasmus joined in, "that a prelate--
even a prelate of Rome--should have countenanced the housing of
all these unclothed marbles in his own private palace."
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