It was best for Irene thus to get back again into a wider social sphere—­to make some new friends, and those of a class that such a woman as Mrs. Everet would naturally draw around her.  Three years of suffering, and the effort to lead a life of self-denial and active interest in others, had wrought in Irene a great change.  The old, flashing ardor of manner was gone.  If she grew animated in conversation, as she often did from temperament, her face would light up beautifully, but it did not show the radiance of old times.  Thought, more than feeling, gave its living play to her countenance.  All who met her were attracted; as her history was known, observation naturally took the form of close scrutiny.  People wished to find the angular and repellant sides of her character in order to see how far she might be to blame.  But they were not able to discover them.  On the subjects of woman’s rights, domestic tyranny, sexual equality and all kindred themes she was guarded in speech.  She never introduced them herself, and said but little when they formed the staple of conversation.

Even if, in three years of intimate, almost daily, association with Rose, she had not learned to think in some new directions on these bewildering questions, certain womanly instincts must have set a seal upon her lips.  Not for all the world would she, to a stranger—­no, nor to any new friend—­utter a sentiment that could in the least degree give color to the thought that she wished to throw even the faintest shadow of blame on Hartley Emerson.  Not that she was ready to take blame to herself, or give the impression that fault rested by her door.  No.  The subject was sacred to herself, and she asked no sympathy and granted no confidences.  There were those who sought to draw her out, who watched her face and words with keen intentness when certain themes were discussed.  But they were unable to reach the penetralia of her heart.  There was a chamber of record there into which no one could enter but herself.

Since the separation of Irene from her husband, Mr. Delancy had shown signs of rapid failure.  His heart was bound up in his daughter, who, with all her captious self-will and impulsiveness, loved him with a tenderness and fervor that never knew change or eclipse.  To see her make shipwreck of life’s dearest hopes—­to know that her name was spoken by hundreds in reprobation—­to look daily on her quiet, changing, suffering face, was more than his fond heart could bear.  It broke him down.  This fact, more perhaps, than her own sad experiences, tended to sober the mind of Irene, and leave it almost passive under the right influences of her wise young friend.