of the hall. And when
the singing, helped by the looks and personality of the singer, had
added to the girl's success, Lady Niton sat fanning herself in reflected
triumph, appealing to the spectators on all sides for applause. The
topics that Diana fled from, Lady Niton took up; and when Mrs.
Fotheringham, bewildered by an avalanche of words, would say--"Give me
time, please, Lady Niton--I must think!"--Lady Niton would reply,
coolly--"Not unless you're accustomed to it"; while she finally capped
her misdeeds by insisting that it was no good to say Mr. Barton had a
warm heart if he were without that much more useful possession--a
narrow mind.

Thus buttressed and befriended on almost all sides, Diana drank her cup
of pleasure. Once in an interval between two dances, as she passed on
Oliver Marsham's arm, close to Lady Lucy, that lady put up her frail old
hand, and gently touched Diana's. "Do not overtire yourself, my dear!"
she said, with effusion; and Oliver, looking down, knew very well what
his mother's rare effusion meant, if Diana did not. On several
occasions Mr. Perrier sought her out, with every mark of flattering
attention, while it often seemed to Diana as if the protecting kindness
of Sir James Chide was never far away. In her white _ingenue's_ dress
she was an embodiment of youth, simplicity, and joy, such as perhaps our
grandmothers knew more commonly than we, in our more hurried and complex
day. And at the same time there floated round her something more than
youth--something more thrilling and challenging than mere girlish
delight--an effluence, a passion, a "swell of soul," which made this
dawn of her life more bewitching even for its promise than for its
performance.

For Marsham, too, the hours flew. He was carried away, enchanted; he had
eyes for no one, time for no one but Diana; and before the end of the
evening the gossip among the Tallyn guests ran fast and free. When at
last the dance broke up, many a curious eye watched the parting between
Marsham and Diana; and in their bedroom on the top floor Lady Lucy's two
nieces sat up till the small hours discussing, first, the situation--was
Oliver really caught at last?--and then, Alicia's refusal to discuss it.
She had said bluntly that she was dog-tired--and shut her door
upon them.

* * * * *

On a hint from his mother, Marsham went to say good-night to her in her
room. She threw her arms round his neck, whisperin