Bonny Jean, and A Severe Threat — page 185: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

178 | A SEVERE THREAT. title and every worldly advantage in the grave of eee just for a few hours of rapture.” Aunt Esther paused, and her keen gray eyes went over the drooping figure before her, the flower-like face hidden still in the white, jeweled hands. ‘‘ How absurdly happy you were,” the old lady went on, slowly, ‘‘for a little while! Ah, me! Venetia, you may sur- round that one picture with a sunny halo, and enshrine it in the inner sanctuary of your heart; for, if I mistake not, you will never see such happiness again. We kept your secret well, and down on the sloping coast, not far from the ‘Golden Gate,’ you found your pretty Eden. But there was a serpent in Paradise, you know, and the ill-omened reptile found you even there. How well I remember the dark and gloomy morning when the blow fell that bereft you of his love! It never was love, Lady Venetia—never aught but passion ; and the day of which I speak saw that ill-omened passion in tatters. You remember it all, for you can never forget it—how he overheard an indiscreet conversation, and learned what you had done—knew that your errand to America had been just that— to marry Lloyd Vernon. Had he loved you truly, Venetia, I firmly believe that he would have overlooked your apparent -Immodesty and unwomanliness. Men love flattery, and noth- ing flatters-a man so surely as the knowledge that a pretty woman entertains a secret preference for his lordship. But the truth came out, and Lloyd Vernon’s imitation of love showed its counterfeit side. He told you plainly, harshly, brutally, that he held only disgust in his heart for you—that he would never live with you as your husband ; he ordered you out of his sight—back to England—forbade any attempt at corre- spondence, and, with all proofs of the marriage safe in his own possession, he swore that you should never be acknowledged as his wife. Yes, you may well weep, Lady Venetia Chandos, to think that you have thrown your happiness away like this, and turned your back upon all that might have been prosperity and “comicbooks (alo)