Hardly a day of that week passed in which he did not in some way meet Erica.He met her in the park with her aunt; he sat next to her at an evening concert; he went to the theater and watched her all through "Hamlet," and came to the Fane-Smith's box between the acts.Yet, desperately as he was in love, he could not delude himself with the belief that she cared for him.She was always bright, talkative, frank, even friendly, but that was all.Yet her unlikeness to the monotonously same girls, whom he was in the habit of meeting, fascinated him more and more each day.She was to go back to town on the Monday; on Friday it so happened that she met Leslie Cunningham at a great flower show, and with perfect unconsciousness piqued him almost beyond endurance.Now at last he hoped to make her understand his admiration.They discussed "Hamlet," and he had just brought the conversation adroitly round to the love scene in the third act, when Erica suddenly dashed his hopes to the ground.
"Oh, how lovely!" she exclaimed, pausing before a beautiful exotic.
"Surely that must be an orchid?"
And the reluctant Leslie found the conversation drifting round to botany, about which he knew little and cared less.Once more his hopes were raised only to be frustrated.He was sitting besides Mrs.Fane-Smith and Erica, and had managed to stem the tide of the botany.The band was playing.Erica, half listening to the music and half attending to his talk, looked dreamily peaceful; surely now was the time! But all at once the clear eyes looked up with their perfectly wide-awake interest, and she exclaimed:
"I do wish the Farrants would come! They certainly meant to be here.I can't make it out."Leslie patiently talked about the member for Greyshot; but, just when he hoped he was quit of the subject, Erica gave an exclamation of such unfeigned delight that a consuming envy took possession of him.
"Oh, there he is! And Ralph and Dolly, too!"And in a moment the Oakdene party had joined them, and Leslie saw that his chances for that day were over.Before long he had made his escape, leaving the grounds not moodily, but with the light of a new and eager determination in his eye.
