“She said how pretty she thought you were,” he replied.

Had he thought that would please her?  Scarcely.  If he knew her mood at all, he must have realized that this was but the sponge of vinegar held to the lips, softened but little, if at all, with the gentle flavour of hyssop.

They had finished dinner now and were just sipping coffee preparatory to departure.

“Is that all she said?” Sally asked, imperturbably.

“Oh no, I’m sure it wasn’t.  But that girl—­Miss Standish-Roe—­who’s gone with them to-night—­she was there, and she kept on breaking into our conversation so that really I can’t quite remember.”

Had he watched Sally’s face then, as closely as he had watched it all through dinner, he would have seen the colour of ashes that swept across it, tardily letting the blood drain back into her cheeks.

“Miss Standish-Roe?” she repeated, almost inaudibly.

“Yes—­Coralie—­she’s the youngest daughter of old Sir Standish-Roe.  All the others have paired off.  Didn’t you know Jack was going with them to-night?”

“Not with her.”

“By Jove—­I’m sorry, then.”  He shrugged his shoulders to free himself from the sense of discomfort to his conscience.  “I suppose I ought not to have mentioned it.”

“Why not?”

It is hard to prevent a woman, in the stress of emotion, from becoming melodramatic.  Tragedy twists her features, strikes unnatural lights in her eyes.  She has but little understanding of the drama of reserve.  She acts with her heart, not with her brain—­with her emotions, not with her intellect.  In a moment of Tragedy, it is possible for a man to think consciously in his mind of the appearance he presents.  With a woman that is impossible.  Considerate at every other time of the impression which she gives, a woman, with the full light of emotion upon her, throws appearances to the winds.  She will cry, though she knows there is nothing less prepossessing; she will distend nostrils, curl her lip with an ugly turn, fling herself utterly into the grip of the situation, and lose dignity in the tempest of her feelings, unless it be, as in some cases, that the imperiousness of anger should add a dignity to her stature.

So, in that moment, it became with Sally.  From the instant that she knew there was another woman in Traill’s life—­and it needed even less than instinct to show her that this girl was trying to steal him from her—­the whole flame of jealousy licked her with a burning tongue.  Quiet, sensitive, tender-hearted little Sally Bishop blazed into a furnace of emotion.  She did not even know that she was melodramatic; she did not stop to think what effect her expression or her action would have on this man beside her.  When he questioned the advisability of having told her that which came so near to the whole system of her being, she let reserve go, and feelings—­a pack of sensations unleashed—­raced riot across her mind, twisting her childish face into a haggard distortion of jealousy.