One bright moonlight evening the gentlemen rowed us up the mill-stream, and as we returned we landed at our favorite oak. The waters, swelled by recent rains, came dashing and tumbling along in mimic billows; the moon beamed down a heavenly radiance, and as the little wavelets broke against the shore, they glittered like molten silver, covering the wild blossoms with dazzling fairy gems. Kate's two lovers were talking and walking with Mrs. Morris and Effie along the shore. Lucien, Kate, and I, remained on a little bank that rose abruptly from the water. She did, indeed, look most bewitchingly beautiful; her soft, white dress, bound at the waist by a flowing ribbon, floated in graceful folds around her; her lovely neck, shoulders and arms, were quite uncovered, and her rich, dark hair fell in loose, long curls, making picturesque shadows in the moonlight. She could act the inspired enthusiast to perfection; and what our Effie really was, she could affect most admirably. She seemed unconscious of our presence; indeed, I do not think she thought I was near her, and, as if involuntarily, she burst out into one of her affected rhapsodies, her eyes beamed brightly, and she expressed her feelings most rapturously, concluding with repeating, in low, earnest, half trembling tones, some lines of Lucien's she had taken from my Scrap Book, descriptive of the very scene before her, written the preceding summer for Effie, after a moonlight ramble together. The poetry was quite impassioned; and I heard Kate murmur with a sigh, as she turned away after concluding her quotation, as if sick at heart, "Ah! I would give years of brilliant success for one hour of devotion from such a lover."
No one heard her but Lucien and myself--and I was one listener more than she would have desired; for Lucien's ear alone was the ejaculation intended, the good for nothing little flirt. It produced the intended effect, for I saw Lucien watching her with admiring interest. She noted the impression, and cunningly kept it up. There was such a contrast between Effie and Kate, rather to Effie's disadvantage, I had to confess, and Kate's affected expressions of intense feeling, rather served to heighten Effie's natural coldness of manner. Why waste words--the conclusion is already divined. The coquette succeeded--and ere a week had passed Lucien was her infatuated, devoted admirer; Effie was quite forgotten. Lucien's two friends, wretched, and completely maddened by the cool, contemptuous rejections they received from Kate, left Stamford, vowing eternal hatred for womankind, and uttering deep, dire denunciations against all coquettes, leaving the field open to Lucien, who seemed to have perfectly lost all sense of propriety in his infatuation. Effie looked on as calmly and quietly as though she were not particularly interested. I fancied, for the credit of romance and sentiment, that her cheek was paler; and I thought I could detect at times a trembling of her delicate lips--but she said not a word. Mrs. Morris and I displayed much more feeling; but what could we do--and half amused, half vexed, we watched the conduct of the naughty little flirt. Suddenly Kate received a summons home--and right glad I was to hear of it. She announced it to us one evening, saying she expected her father the next day. The following afternoon she came over to our cottage, accompanied with two middle-aged gentlemen. The elder of the two was Mr. Barclay, her father, who had known Mrs. Morris in early life; the other she introduced as Col. Paulding, a friend. Col. Paulding's manner struck us with surprise. He called her "Kate;" and though dignified, was affectionate. She seemed painfully embarrassed, and anxious to terminate the visit. She answered our questions hurriedly, and appeared ill at ease. Lucien was not present, fortunately for her; and I fancied she watched the door, as if anxiously fearing his entrance; certain it was she started nervously at every distant sound.