table."

Yes; Blanche was excitable, Pocahontas assented absently; she was
bracing her will, and steeling her nerves to endure without flinching.
Not for worlds would she--even by the quivering of an eyelash--let
Norma see the torture she was inflicting. She felt that Norma had an
object in this disclosure, and was dimly sure that the object was
hostile. She would think it all out later; at present Norma must not
see her anguish. A woman would sooner go to the stake and burn slowly,
than allow another woman, who is trying to hurt her, to know that she
suffers.

Norma continued, speaking gently, without haste or emotion, telling of
the feverish brightness of those early days of marriage, and of the
clouds that soon obscured the sunshine--telling of the _ennui_ and
unhappiness, gradually sprouting and ripening in the ill-assorted
union--shielding the man, as women will, and casting the blame on the
woman. Finally she told of the separation, lasting now two years, and
of the letter from his wife which had caused Thorne's precipitate
departure the day after the Shirley ball.

But of the divorce now pending she said never a word.

"Have they any children?" questioned Pocahontas steadily.

And was told that there was one--a little son, to whom the father was
attached, and the mother indifferent. It was a strange case.

Again Pocahontas assented. Her voice was cold and even; its tones low
and slightly wearied. To herself it appeared as though she spoke from
a great distance, and was compelled to use exertion to make herself
heard. She was conscious of two distinct personalities--one prostrate
in the dust, humiliated, rent and bleeding, and another which held a
screen pitifully before the broken thing, and shielded it from
observation. When Norma bid her good-night she responded quietly, and
rising accompanied her guest to her room to see that every arrangement
was perfect for her comfort.

Far into the night she sat beside her dying fire trying to collect her
faculties, and realize the extent of the calamity which had befallen
her. The first, and, for the time, dominant emotion was a stinging
sense of shame, an agony of rage and humiliation which tingled hotly
through her, and caused her cheek to flame, and her body to writhe as
from the lash of a whip. She had been degraded; an insult had been put
upon her. Her eyes blazed, and her hands clinched. Oh, for strength
to hurl the insult back--for a man's arm