she moved in the direction of a
window, to listen for the clatter of horse's hoofs, Mrs. Laurance
whispered:

"Is not she the loveliest creature you ever beheld? I never saw such
superb eyes, they absolutely seemed to lighten just now. Cuthbert,
did you only notice how she looked right at me? I daresay my
solitaires attracted her attention--and no wonder, they are the
largest in the house, and these actresses always have an eye to the
very best jewellery. Of course it must have been my diamonds."

From the moment when Amy Robsart entered, Cuthbert Laurance felt a
strange magnetic thrill dart through every fibre of his frame; his
sluggish pulse stirred, and as her mesmeric brown eyes, luminous,
overmastering, met his, he drew his breath in quick gasps, and his
heart in its rapid throbbing seemed to pour liquid fire into the
bounding arteries. Some vague bewildering reminiscence danced through
the clouded chambers of his brain, pointing like a mocking fiend now
this way, then in an opposite direction; one instant assuring him
that they had somewhere met before, the next torturing him with the
triumphant taunt that he had hitherto never known any one half so
lovely. Was it merely some lucky accident that had so unexpectedly
brought them during that long flattering gaze thoroughly _en
rapport?_

He no more heard his wife's hoarse whisper, than if a cyclone had
whirled between them, and, leaning forward to catch the measured
melody that floated from the countess's lips, a crimson glow fired
his cheek as he caught the lofty words.

"I know a cure for jealousy. It is to speak truth to my lord at all
times; to hold up my mind, my thoughts, before him as pure as that
polished mirror, so that when he looks into my heart he shall see
only his own features reflected there.[*] _Can he who took my little
hands and made them wifely, laying therein the precious burden of his
honour, afford to doubt the palms are clean?_"

[Footnote: * Mrs. Orme's interpolations are all italicized.]

No wonder Varney stared, and the prompter anathematized the sudden
flicker of the gas jet that caused him to lose his place; there was
no such written sentence as the last, and the rehearsal proved no
sure index of all the countess uttered that night, but the play
rolled on, and when the folding doors flew open and Amy sprang to
meet her noble husband, the house began to warm into an earnest
sympathy.

In the scene that followed she sat with chil