Court of Foxes Read Online Free PDF Page B

though Lord Tregaron was also, Lord Tregaron was nevertheless on the spot and demonstrating devotion. White roses were banished from her dreams therefore; and before a siege of red, the Marchesa Marigelda d’Astonia Subeggio capitulated finally; and Gereth, Earl of Tregaron, had stormed the unassailable heights of the house in South Audley Street.
    The first meeting was not, perhaps, calculated to encourage in him hopes of an early amorous success. The lady — beneath the eyes of the departed husband and with a vigilant duenna in incessant attendance — sat, exquisitely languid, white gowned as usual (and wearing no jewels) and touched little of the wine and none of the small, sweet cakes which the attendant footman handed round. She proved, however, upon closer acquaintance, to have something less of the mystery and remoteness which the shadows of the playhouse box had imposed upon her — emerging a young girl, slender to the point of being too thin, with great eyes, grey blue, in a face whose bones held the true beauty that remains always beauty, throughout age and the ages; a skin of transparent whiteness beneath the glory of the mari-golden hair, a mouth whose present lovely droop of melancholy must belie, surely, a more common tendency to an equally lovely laughter. A creature of pearly loveliness, of exquisite charm. So at least, evidently, thought the happy conqueror, sitting with elegant crossed silk legs, his dark, ardent face alight with admiration. ‘You have arrived but very recently in London?’
    ‘Very recently, sir.’ The Marchesa sighed to the bottom of her boots. ‘And have here no acquaintance, therefore. In Italy — ah, yes! But I have been obliged to leave Italy.’ Affairs were at present not happy for her. The fortune her husband had left her was disputed — she had been from the years of her childhood his ward, but their marriage had been brief and — hopes had been disappointed, greed disillusioned. ‘I have done what I can, but—’ She broke off, gazing down with wounded sorrow at the white hands twisted nervously in her lap.
    ‘My lady has been more than generous,’ broke in the waiting woman, standing by as chaperone: unable, evidently, to support with equanimity the sight of her mistress’s distress. ‘Boundlessly generous. But some people…’ She too broke off, bobbed another curtsey, begged my lady’s pardon and my lord’s too, but she was an old woman and could not bear to stand by and see her white lamb, begging her ladyship’s pardon again, pulled down by the ravening wolves of Rome…
    For a time must come when, the fortunate suitor having been admitted to her friendship — though as yet to nothing closer — the Marchesa would have to account for a total lack of any fortune whatsoever. The wolves of Rome would then be represented as having prevailed after all; too proud to fight back for what was so deeply begrudged her, the lady would throw herself upon her admirer’s protection. To a man of Tregaron’s means — and the family did not nowadays calculate upon less — the prospects of acquiring the enchantress by simply financing her establishment for the future, would naturally be eagerly grasped at. Private wealth well lost for love, she would let her last chances slip from hands too fondly occupied with caresses; fortune, fair fame, the beloved and doting husband, all, all would be forgotten, all offered on the altar of a passion that should last for ever. Meanwhile… ‘She is young and friendless, my lord,’ sobbed the waiting woman, over the bent golden head of her white lamb, ‘and yet so reserved and so proud…’ And she cast him a piteous look that said that when he was gone this lack of reserve on her own part would cost her dear. Mrs Brown was enjoying herself immensely.
    It was a little awkward that his lordship should leap to his feet and declare himself ready to rush to Rome at once and there rally all the resources of the law in defence of his