present except her
hostess. This was her habitual manner now, assumed to save herself
from slights. When she entered, Mrs. Kilroy had half risen from her
seat, and endeavoured to attract her attention; but Beth passed her
by, deliberately chose a seat, and sat down. Her demeanour, so
apparently cold and self-contained, was calculated to command respect,
but it cost Beth a great deal to maintain it. She felt she was alone
in an unfriendly atmosphere--a poor little thing, shabbily dressed in
home-made mourning, and despised for she knew not what offence; and
she suffered horribly. She had grown very fragile by this time, and
looked almost childishly young. Her eyes were unnaturally large and
wistful, her mouth drooped at the corners, and the whole expression of
her face was pathetic. Mrs. Kilroy looked at her seriously, and
thought to herself, "That girl is suffering."

Mrs. Carne offered Beth tea, but she refused it. She could not accept
such inhuman hospitality. She had come to do her duty, not to force a
welcome. She glanced at the clock. Five minutes more, and she might
go. The conversation buzzed on about her. She was sitting next to a
strange lady, a serene and dignified woman, dressed in black velvet
and sable. Beth glanced at her the first time with indifference, but
looked again with interest. Mrs. Carne bustled up and spoke to the
lady in her effusive way.

"You are better, I hope," she said, as she handed her some tea. "It
really is _sweet_ to see you looking so _much_ yourself again."

"Oh yes, I am quite well again now, thanks to your good husband," the
lady answered. "But he has given me so many tonics and things lately,
I always seem to be shaking bottles. I am quite set in that attitude.
Everything I touch I shake. I found myself shaking my watch instead of
winding it up the other day."

"Ah, then, you are quite yourself again, I see," Mrs. Carne said
archly. "But why didn't you come to the Wilmingtons' last night?"

"Oh, you know I never go to those functions if I can help it," the
lady answered, her gentle rather drawling voice lending a charm to the
words quite apart from their meaning. "I cannot stand the kind of
conversation to which one is reduced on such occasions--if you can
call that conversation which is but the cackle of geese, each
repeating the utterances of the other. When the Lord loves a woman, I
think He takes her out of society by some means or other, and keeps
her out of it for her