United States or South Africa ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The house is new; smell of new wood and mortar; deused disagreeable in Honoria. If it had not been for the Duke, she would have fallen. That's a monstrous clever fellow, that Rosecouleur. Admires Honoria vastly. Come, the pictures." "Mr. John Vanbrugen Denslow, you are an ass!"
It was then Honoria abdicated that throne of conventional purity which hitherto she had held undisputed. Women who were plain in her presence outshone Honoria, by meeting this ducal apparition, that called itself Rosecouleur, and which might have been, for aught they knew, a fume of the Infernal, shaped to deceive us all, with calm and haughty propriety. The sensation did not subside.
"I seem to remember presenting the Duke of Rosecouleur with a similar ring, in Italy," said Dalton, resuming his seat; "but the coincidence does not resolve my philosophic doubt, excited by the affair of the picture. We all supposed that we saw a portrait of the Hon. Mrs.
Honoria has fallen to-night. I shall transfer my allegiance." "And Denslow?" "A born sycophant; he thinks it natural that his wife should love a duke, and a duke love his wife." "So would you, if you were any other than you are." "Faugh! it is human nature." "Not so; would you not as soon strangle this Rosecouleur for making love to your wife in public, as you would another man?" "Rather." "Pooh!
"It is unexpected," he said, in a thoughtful manner, looking me full in the eyes. "You knew the Duke of Rosecouleur in Europe?" "At Paris, yes, and in Italy he was a travel friend; but we heard lately that he had retired upon his estates in England; and certainly, he is the last person we looked for here." "Unannounced." "That is a part of the singularity."
Dalton fell short of himself; for, though his head stooped to none, unless conventionally, the sudden and unaccountable presence of the Duke of Rosecouleur annoyed and perplexed him. His own sovereignty was threatened. Lethal stiffened himself to the ordeal of an introduction; the affair seemed to exasperate him. Denslow alone, of the men, was in his element.
It was a thrill of the universal Boswell; I seemed to feel the presence of "the most aristocratic man of the age." Honoria introduced me. "My Lord Duke, allow me to present my friend, Mr. De Vere; Mr. De Vere, the Duke of Rosecouleur." Was I, then, face to face with, nay, touching the hand of a highness, and that highness the monarch of the ton?
To Denslow, Honoria, Dalton, and myself he offered nothing. Strange? Not at all. Was he not the guest, and had not I been presented to him by Honoria as her "friend?" a word of pregnant meaning to a Duke of Rosecouleur! To Adonaïs he gave a lock of hair of the great novelist, Dumas, in a locket of yellow tourmaline, a stone usually black. Lethal smiled at this. He felt relieved.
"Denslow, I have told you a thousand times never to concede position." "Yes, but this is a duke, man, a prince!" "This from you? By Jove, De Vere, I wish you and I could live a hundred years, to see a republican aristocrat. We are still mere provincials," added Dalton, with a sigh. Denslow perspired with mortification. "You use me badly, I tell you, Dalton, this Rosecouleur is a devil.
I give you up. If you had simply said, 'Yes, it would have satisfied me." Dalton seemed perplexed. He called a servant and sent him with an order for Nalson, the usher, to come instantly to him. Nalson appeared, with his white gloves and mahogany face. "Nalson, you were a servant of the Duke in England?" "Yes, Sir." "Is the person now in the rooms the Duke of Rosecouleur?"
Word Of The Day