It was undoubtedly gratifying to be the husband...
It was undoubtedly gratifying to be the husband of one of the handsomest and most popular young married women in New York, especially when she was also one of the sweetest-tempered and most reasonable of wives; and Archer had never been insensible to such advantagesAs for the momentary madness which had fallen upon him on the eve of his marriage, he had trained himself to regard it as the last of his discarded experimentsThe idea that he could ever, in his senses, have dreamed of marrying the Countess Olenska had become almost unthinkable, and she remained in his memory simply as the most plaintive and poignant of a line of ghosts

But all these abstractions and eliminations made of his mind a rather empty and echoing place, and he supposed that was one of the reasons why the busy animated people on the Beaufort lawn shocked him as if they had been children playing in a grave-yard

He heard a murmur of skirts beside him, and the Marchioness Manson fluttered out of the drawing-room windowAs usual, she was extraordinarily festooned and bedizened, with a limp Leghorn hat anchored to her head by many windings of faded gauze, and a little black velvet parasol on a carved ivory handle absurdly balanced over her much larger hatbrim

"My dear Newland, I had no idea that you and May had arrived! You yourself came only yesterday, you say? Ah, business—business—professional duties Many husbands, I know, find it impossible to join their wives here except for the week-end She cocked her head on one side chanel cc logo earrings and languished at him through screwed-up eyes"But marriage is one long sacrifice, as I used often to remind my Ellen—"

Archer's heart stopped with the queer jerk which it had given once before, and which seemed suddenly to slam a door between himself and the outer world; but this break of continuity must have been of the briefest, for he presently heard Medora answering a question he had apparently found voice to put

"No, I am not staying here, but with the Blenkers, in their delicious solitude at PortsmouthBeaufort was kind enough to send his famous trotters for me this morning, so that I might have at least a glimpse of one of Regina's garden-parties; but this evening I go back to rural lifeThe Blenkers, dear original beings, have hired a primitive old farm-house at Portsmouth where they gather about them representative people She drooped slightly beneath her protecting brim, and added with a faint blush: "This week DrAgathon Carver is holding a series of Inner Thought meetings thereA contrast indeed to this gay scene of worldly pleasure—but then I have always lived on contrasts! To me the only death is monotonyI always say to Ellen: Beware of monotony; it's the mother of all the deadly sinsBut my poor child is going through a phase of exaltation, of abhorrence of the worldYou know, I suppose, that she has declined all invitations to stay at Newport, even with her grandmother Mingott? I could hardly persuade her to come with me to the Blenkers', if you will believe it! The life she leads is dior logo morbid, unnaturalAh, if she had only listened to me when it was still possible When the door was still open But shall we go down and watch this absorbing match? I hear your May is one of the competitors

Strolling toward them from the tent Beaufort advanced over the lawn, tall, heavy, too tightly buttoned into a London frock-coat, with one of his own orchids in its buttonholeArcher, who had not seen him for two or three months, was struck by the change in his appearanceIn the hot summer light his floridness seemed heavy and bloated, and but for his erect square-shouldered walk he would have looked like an over-fed and over-dressed old man

There were all sorts of rumours afloat about BeaufortIn the spring he had gone off on a long cruise to the West Indies in his new steam-yacht, and it was reported that, at various points where he had touched, a lady resembling Miss Fanny Ring had been seen in his companyThe steam-yacht, built in the Clyde, and fitted with tiled bath-rooms and other unheard-of luxuries, was said to have cost him half a million; and the pearl necklace which he had presented to his wife on his return was as magnificent as such expiatory offerings are apt to beBeaufort's fortune was substantial enough to stand the strain; and yet the disquieting rumours persisted, not only in Fifth Avenue but in Wall StreetSome people said he had speculated unfortunately in railways, others that he was being bled by one of the most insatiable members of her profession; and to every report of lady dior bag threatened insolvency Beaufort replied by a fresh extravagance: the building of a new row of orchid-houses, the purchase of a new string of race-horses, or the addition of a new Meissonnier or Cabanel to his picture-gallery

He advanced toward the Marchioness and Newland with his usual half-sneering smile"Hullo, Medora! Did the trotters do their business? Forty minutes, eh? Well, that's not so bad, considering your nerves had to be spared He shook hands with Archer, and then, turning back with them, placed himself on MrsManson's other side, and said, in a low voice, a few words which their companion did not catch

The Marchioness replied by one of her queer foreign jerks, and a "Que voulez-vous?" which deepened Beaufort's frown; but he produced a good semblance of a congratulatory smile as he glanced at Archer to say: "You know May's going to carry off the first prize

"Ah, then it remains in the family," Medora rippled; and at that moment they reached the tent and MrsBeaufort met them in a girlish cloud of mauve muslin and floating veils

May Welland was just coming out of the tentIn her white dress, with a pale green ribbon about the waist and a wreath of ivy on her hat, she had the same Diana-like aloofness as when she had entered the Beaufort ball-room on the night of her engagementIn the interval not a thought seemed to have passed behind her eyes or a feeling through her heart; and though her husband knew that she had the capacity for both he marvelled afresh at the way in which vintage gucci bags experience dropped away from her

She had her bow and arrow in her hand, and placing herself on the chalk-mark traced on the turf she lifted the bow to her shoulder and took aimThe attitude was so full of a classic grace that a murmur of appreciation followed her appearance, and Archer felt the glow of proprietorship that so often cheated him into momentary well-beingReggie Chivers, the Merry girls, and divers rosy Thorleys, Dagonets and Mingotts, stood behind her in a lovely anxious group, brown heads and golden bent above the scores, and pale muslins and flower-wreathed hats mingled in a tender rainbowAll were young and pretty, and bathed in summer bloom; but not one had the nymph-like ease of his wife, when, with tense muscles and happy frown, she bent her soul upon some feat of strength

"Gad," Archer heard Lawrence Lefferts say, "not one of the lot holds the bow as she does"; and Beaufort retorted: "Yes; but that's the only kind of target she'll ever hit

Archer felt irrationally angryHis host's contemptuous tribute to May's "niceness" was just what a husband should have wished to hear said of his wifeThe fact that a coarseminded man found her lacking in attraction was simply another proof of her quality; yet the words sent a faint shiver through his heartWhat if "niceness" carried to that supreme degree were only a negation, the curtain dropped before an emptiness? As he looked at May, returning flushed and calm from her final bull's-eye, he had the feeling that he had never yet lifted that costume jewelry chanel curt