As I have become quite intimate with Commodore Montague's party, I
generally join their group, without the smallest fear of raising a
suspicion regarding these encounters. The attention which I pay to
Kondjé-Gul and to Suzannah have caused no little envy, for, as you know,
Kondjé-Gul pretends she does not dance. This peculiarity, together with
her original fascinations with which a certain childish simplicity is
mingled, give rise to the most extraordinary conjectures. What is the
cause of all this reserve? men ask. Is it modesty, bashfulness, or
pride? They know that she can dance splendidly, for she has been seen
dancing occasionally at private parties with Maud and Suzannah. They
think it must be due to some jealous fiancé, her betrothal to whom is
kept secret, and to whom she is devoted.
Lent having interrupted the course of public entertainments, our private
parties which usually took place at Teral House, became the gainers by
it. Maud and Suzannah felt more free and easy there, and Kondjé-Gul
experienced quite a childish delight in holding what she called her
"receptions." Our small circle was soon augmented by a dozen select
friends, picked carefully from the ranks of their young ball-room
acquaintances. There were one or two mothers among them whose presence
did not interfere with the harmony of these charming gatherings, and the
tone of elegant distinction which prevailed in no respect interfered
with their exuberant gaiety.
This break in the giddy circle of fashionable dissipation, afforded
quite a new happiness to Kondjé-Gul and me. In the course of her
initiation into the refinements of our life, her exotic charms had
acquired some new and indescribable embellishments. We spent many a long
evening alone together in that delightful privacy which affords the
sweetest opportunities for communion between loving hearts, and we grew
to feel like a modern Darby and Joan. I was quite proud of my handiwork,
and contemplated with joy this pure and ideal being whose nature I had
inspired, whose soul and whose heart I had moulded. The cultivation of
this young and virgin mind, as I may be permitted to call it, so
possessed by its Oriental beliefs, had produced a charming contrast of
enthusiasm and calm reason which imparted a most original effect to her
frank utterances of new ideas. I was often quite surprised to find in
her mingled with her Asiatic superstitions, and transformed as it were
by contact with a simpler faith, the substance of my own private
sentiments and of my wildest aspirations. One might really think that
she had borrowed her thoughts, nay, her very life, as it were, from me,
and that her tender emotions had their source in my own heart.