And Dinah had listened to it all--youthful jest, aged philosophy, all! And standing among the others, with a queer sensation that she had suddenly oldened by a dozen years, some pallid ghost of a smile rose to her lips. Here was a grand opportunity, verily, of learning a lesson at first hand, a chance in a thousand for readjusting one’s standard, for observing the nicer little shades of feeling and usage which prevail in the world to which one would fain belong. A smile, I say, rose to Dinah’s lips. Which of us does not remember how, in sharp mental stress, he has found himself looking on at the trivial accessories of his pain, as a stranger might, derisively! In the poor girl’s heart was death. She knew that for Gaston to have set at naught her pleadings, for Gaston to have quitted her thus, might render to-night a bitter crisis in the lives of both. CHAPTER XXX LINDA WARMS TO HER PART But Dinah was not unobserved, not uncared for. If Cassandra Tighe’s taste for piquant situation once in a hundred times led her astray, the ninety-nine good offices performed by the kindly old maid in the interval were sufficient, surely, to atone for the single blunder. Cassandra’s heart went out towards Dinah at the first moment when the fair sad face passed before her in the garden of Miller’s Hotel. She had listened with regret to stories of Gaston’s fickleness--even while her talents as a narrator assisted in giving such stories wider currency--had felt remorse, sharp and hard, for her own unwitting share in the ‘Arbuthnot drama.’ At this hour of which I write, Dinah standing mute, wan, beside her, Cassandra’s breast kindled with renewed compassion towards the simple unbefriended country girl, a compassion none the less genuine in that it went somewhat wide of Dinah’s actual and present trouble. ‘You look thoroughly done up, my dear Mrs. Arbuthnot. I am afraid to-day’s gadding about has been too much for you. Let us see,’ said Cassandra, in a whisper, ‘if we cannot find some quiet corner, you and I, where we may settle down and rest.’ Dinah turned on her a look of blank, unanswering pain. She wanted neither sympathy nor support, wanted only to creep below, out of sight, to avoid all temptation to disobedience, all possibility of bringing down ridicule--on Gaston! ‘I feel chilled--nothing, that is, to speak of. You are very good, Miss Tighe, but I had rather go down to the saloon alone, please. I am used to being alone, and--and I have a cloak which I must look for.’ A note of suppressed passion was in her voice. It betrayed emotion curiously at variance with the commonplace words, the staid reserved manner. And, in a moment, Cassandra Tighe’s valorous spirit had armed itself for action.