The Wildfire Club - The Emma Hardinge Britten Archive

158 THE IJlPROVVISATOBE,
admiration, there was something unusually cold, and even
stern, in his kindly face. He was well, and even fashionably,
dressed; and with the plasticity of his gentle and
refined nature, had easily caught all the graces which must
externally polish the, gem ere it is deemed worthy to shine
in the repertoires of fashion. The change in him, then,
since ten months before he had stood, ragged, sick, and
famishing, before the prima donna's gate, can scarcely be
estimated; but deeper far was the change in the heart
of his companion. For the first time in her young life
she loved. Wealth, rank, ambition, all that had hitherto
lured her on the road of life, had now become but idle
gauds, compared to the luxury of listening to his dear
voice, of gazing into his deep, soul-like eyes. 'Vhatever
of hidden depths were within that wild, impulsive nature
had all welled up into this wealth of love for him. With
a fancy brilliant and spiritual, and a nature which seemed
to hold strange communion, or rather be under constant
impression from an unseen world of power, Gabrielle believed
she saw in this strange, visionary improvvisatore the
human embodiment of that unseen world of which she
dreamed and fully persuaded herself she was the tool.
Yes, yes, Ernest was her fate - the incarnation of all her
visions of beauty, genius. and a better world, and she
would, must love him; "her spirit compelled her - her
human destiny alone rebelled."
Without any apparent effort to resist or yield to the
unmistakable interest the fair cantatrice manifested for
him. the gentle, dreamy singer seemed to occupy quite
naturally the place she assigned him. Affectionately grateful
for her kindness, delighted with her talent and beauty,
and tenderly interested in her unqualified affection for himself,
he loved her as much as - she sometimes bitterly