dear, I've brought you a visitor."
Dinah moved forward in response to his gentle insistence, but her shyness went with her. She was aware of something intangible in the atmosphere that startled, that almost frightened, her.
The gaunt figure of a woman clad in a long, white robe sat at a table in the middle of the room with a sheaf of letters littered before her. Her emaciated arms were flung wide over them, her white head was bowed.
But at Scott's quiet announcement, it was raised with the suddenness of eager expectancy. For the fraction of a second Dinah saw dark, sunken eyes ablaze with a hope that was almost terrible in its intensity.
It was gone on the instant. They looked at her with a species of dull wonder. "Are you a friend of Scott's? I am very pleased to meet you," a hollow voice said.
A thin hand was extended to her, and as Dinah clasped it a sudden great pity surged through her, dispelling her doubt. Something in her responded swiftly, even passionately, to the hunger of those eyes. The moment's shock passed from her like a cloud.
"My sister Mrs. Everard," said Scott's voice at her shoulder. "Isabel, this is Miss Bathurst of whom I was telling you."
"You lent me your jewels," said Dinah, looking into the wasted face with a sympathy at her heart that was almost too poignant to be borne. "Thank you so very, very much for them! It was so very kind of you to lend them to a total stranger like me."
The strange eyes were gazing at her with a curious, growing interest. A faint, faint smile was in their depths. "Are we strangers, child?" the low voice asked. "I feel as if we had met before. Why do you look at me so kindly? Most people only stare."
Dinah was suddenly conscious of a hot sensation at the throat that made her want to cry. "It is you who have been kind," she said, and her little hand closed with confidence upon the limp, cold fingers. "I am wearing your things still, and I have had such a lovely time. Thank you again for letting me have them. I am going to return them now."
"You need not do that." Isabel spoke with her eyes still fixed upon the girlish face. "Keep them if you like them! I shall never wear them again. They tell me—they tell me—I am a widow."
"Miss Isabel darlint!" Biddy spoke sibilantly from the background. "Don't be talking to the young lady of such things! Won't ye sit down then, miss? And maybe I can get ye a cup o' tay."
"Ah, do, Biddy!" Scott put in his quiet word. "There is no tea like yours. Isabel, Miss Bathurst is a keen dancer. She and Eustace have been most energetic. It was a pity you couldn't come down and see the fun."
"Oh! Did you enjoy it?" Isabel still looked into the brown, piquant face as though loth to turn her eyes away.
"I loved it," said Dinah.
"Was Eustace kind to you?"
"Oh, most kind." Dinah spoke with candid enthusiasm.
"I am glad of that," Isabel's voice held a note of satisfaction. "But I should think everyone is kind to you, child," she said, with her faint, glimmering smile. "How beautiful you are!"
"Me!" Dinah opened her eyes in genuine astonishment. "Oh you wouldn't think so if you saw me in my ordinary dress," she said. "I'm nothing at all to look at really. It's just a case of 'Fine feathers,'—nothing else."
"My dear," Isabel said, "I am not looking at your dress. I seldom notice outer things. I am looking through your eyes into your soul. It is that that makes you beautiful. I think it is the loveliest thing that I have ever seen."
"Oh, you wouldn't say so if you knew me!" cried Dinah, conscience-stricken. "I have horrid thoughts often—very often."
The dark, watching eyes still smiled in their far-off way. "I should like to know you, dear child," Isabel said. "You have helped me—you could help me in a way that probably you will never understand. Won't you sit down? I will put my letters away, and we will talk."
She began to collect the litter before her, laying the letters together one by one with reverent care.
"Can I help?" asked Dinah timidly.
But she shook her head. "No, child, your hands must not touch them. They are the ashes of my life."
An open box stood on the table. She drew it to her, and laid the letters within it. Then she rose, and drew her guest to a lounge.
"We will sit here," she said. "Stumpy, why don't you smoke? Ah, the music has stopped at last. It has been racking me all the evening. Yes, you love it, of course. That is natural. I loved it once. It is always sweet to those who dance. But to those who sit out—those who sit out—" Her voice sank, and she said no more.
Dinah's hand slipped softly into hers. "I like sitting out too sometimes," she said. "At least I like it now."
Isabel's eyes were upon her again. They looked at her with a kind of incredulous wonder. After a moment she sighed.
"You would not like it for long, child. I am a prisoner. I sit in chains while the world goes by. They are all hurrying forward so eager to get on. But there is never any going on for me. I sit and watch—and watch."
"Surely we must all go forward somehow," said Dinah shyly.
"Surely," said Scott.
But Isabel only shook her head with dreary conviction. "Not the prisoners," she said. "They die by the wayside."
There fell a brief silence, then impetuously Dinah spoke, urged by the fulness of her heart. "I think we all feel like that sometimes. I know at home it's just like being in a cage. Nothing ever happens worth mentioning. And then quite suddenly the door is opened and out we come. That's partly why I am enjoying everything so much," she explained. "But it won't be a bit nice going back."
"What about your mother?" said Scott.
Dinah's bright face clouded again. "Yes, of course, there's Mother," she agreed.
She looked across at Scott as if she would say more; but he passed quietly on. "Where is your home, Miss Bathurst?"
"Right in the very heart of the Midlands. It is pretty country, but oh, so dull. The de Vignes are the rich people of the place. They belong to the County. We don't," said Dinah, with a sigh.
Scott laughed, and she looked momentarily hurt.
"I don't see what there is funny in that. The County people and the shop people are the only ones that get any fun. It's horrid to be between the two."
"Forgive me!" Scott said. "I quite see your point. But if you only knew it, the people who call themselves County are often the dullest of the dull."
"You say that because you belong to them, I expect," retorted Dinah. "But if you were me, and lived always under the shadow of the de Vignes, you wouldn't think it a bit funny."
"Who are the de Vignes?" asked Isabel suddenly.
Dinah turned to her. "We are staying here with them, Billy and I. My father persuaded the Colonel to have us. He knew how dreadfully we wanted to go. The Colonel is rather good-natured over some things, and he and Dad are friends. But I don't think Lady Grace
