Moths by Ouida — page 65: what you’re looking at

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

MOTHS. SL aetae &% ‘* Ma chere, your lovely daughter did not appreciate my flow- érsor myself. She told me to tell you she was tired, and has gone to her room. She is beautiful, very beautiful; but I cans not say that she is complimentary.” | . “She is only a child, said Lady Dolly, hurriedly; she was half relieved, half frightened. ‘‘ She 7s rude!” she added, re- gretfully. ‘‘ itis the way she has been brought up. You must forgive her, she is young.” ss Forgive her! Mais de bon ecur! Anything feminine that runs away is only too delightful in these times,” said the prince, coolly. ‘*‘Do not change her. Do not tease her. Do not try. to make her like yourself. I prefer her as she is.” ey Doliy looked at him quickly. Was it possible that alread y—— Sergius Zouroff was lying back in his chair with his eyes closed. He was laughing a little silently, in an unpleasant way that he had; he had spoken insolently, and Lady Dolly could not resent his insolence. ‘‘ You are very kind, prince,” she said, as negligently as she could behind her fan. ‘‘ Very kind, to treat a child’s boutades as @ girl’s charm. She has really seen nothing, you know, shut up an that old Northern house by the sea; and she is as eccentric as if she were eighty years old. Quite odd in her notions, quite!” ‘*Shall we play?” said Zouroff. They began to play, most of them, at a little roulette-table. Musicians were interpreting, divinely, themes of Beethoven and Schumann; the great glass halls and marble courts of the flowers were open with all their array of bloom; the green gardens and gay terraces were without in the brilliiancy of moonlight; the sea was not a score of yards away, sparkling with phosphorus and star-rays; but they were indifferent toall these things. They began to play and heeded nothing else. The music sounded on deaf ears; the flowers breathed out odors on closed nostrils; the suminer night spread its loveliness in vain; and the waters of salt wave and fresh fountain murmured on unheeded. Play held them. Sergius Zouroff lost plenty of money to Lady Dolly, who went to bed at two o'clock, worried and yet pleased, anxious and yet exultant. | Vere’s room was placed next to hers. She looked in before passing on to herown. The girl Jay sound asleep in the sweet dreamless sleep of her lingering childhood, her hair scattered like gold on the pillows, her limbs in the lovely grace of a serene and unconscious repose. Lady Dolly looxed at her as she slept, and an uneasy pang shot through her. ‘‘Tf he do mean that,” she thought, ‘‘I suppose it would be horrible. And how much too pretty and too innocent she would be for him—the beast!” Then she turned away, and went to her own chamber, and began the toilsome martyrdom oi having her perruque unfast- sned and her night’s preparations for the morning’s enamel be- ga. : / -com cboo < Ge : yw 2 Pda. | . - ~ -% "" :