And a divorce suit of some thirty years ago, which as a
very young girl of fourteen, she remembered--all now came again to her
memory,--in which the principal actors were Lionel's father, Hugh
Trevalyon and his beautiful wife Nora. Both were passionate lovers of
the drama; the Trevalyons frequently wintered at Paris, where they
made the acquaintance of one of the principal actors of the day. He
was a handsome man with a charm of manner none could resist, and as
fate would have it, living at the same hotel, he so ingratiated
himself into favour with both, who in their admiration of his talents
almost deified him, that he was the recipient of an invitation in his
idle days to the Towers; while there, an overwhelming passion for his
beautiful hostess completely mastered him. She, always fascinated by
his seductive manner, when he pleaded, gave way, feeling that she had
met her master; accustomed to worship his talents, she simply felt she
was his if he willed; finally at the close of a night of revelry, ball
and theatricals at the Towers she gave up, consenting, nay willing, to
elope at his wish, with only a passing thought to her little boy and
once loved husband; she was his; he was her god, and she never dreamed
of the man she had taken for better or for worse; her husband sued for
and obtained a divorce, the actor marrying his love at once, but she
only lived for two short years passing in her beauty and frailty from
the judgment of society to the judgment of high heaven.
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