“No, you didn’t, Mrs. Armistead—­you would not be so crude as to say it directly.  You merely dropped a hint, which would lead everybody to understand that you believed it.”

Sylvia paused, just long enough to let the wicked lady suffer, but not long enough to let her find a reply.  “When you tell your friends about this scene,” she continued, “please make clear that I did not drop hints about anything, but said exactly what I meant—­that the story is false, so far as it implies any evil done by Mr. Shirley, and that I am deeply ashamed of myself for having ever believed it.  It is all in the past now, of course—­we are both of us married, and we shall probably never meet again.  But it will be a help to us in future to have had this little talk—­will it not, Frank?”

There was a pause, while Sallie Ann Armistead recovered from her dismay, and got back a little of her fighting power.  Suddenly she rose:  “Virginia,” she said, firmly, “you are neglecting your guests.”

“I don’t think you ought to go until Frank has got himself together,” said Sylvia.  “Frank, can you sort your cards now?”

“Virginia!” commanded Sallie Ann, imperiously.  “Come!”

Mrs. Witherspoon rose, and so did Sylvia.  “We can’t stay here alone,” said she.  “Frank, will you take Mrs. Witherspoon in?” And she gently but firmly took Mrs. Armistead’s arm, and so they marched back into the drawing-room.

Dolly and Emma had progressed to separate tables, it developed, so that the ordeal of Frank and Sylvia was over.  Through the remainder of the evening Sylvia chatted and played, and later partook of refreshments with Malcolm McCallum, and mildly teased that inconsolable bachelor, quite as in the old days.  Now and then she stole a glance at Frank Shirley, and saw that he was holding up his end; but he kept away from her, and she never even caught his eye.

At last the company broke up, and Sylvia thanked her hostess for a most enjoyable evening.  She stepped into the motor with Celeste, and sat with compressed lips, answering in monosyllables her “little sister’s” flood of excited questions—­“Oh, Sylvia, didn’t you feel perfectly terrible? Oh, sister, I felt thrills running up and down my back!  Sister, what did you say to him?  Sister, do you know old Mr. Perkins kept leaning over me and asking what was happening; and how could I shout into his deaf ear that everybody was stopping to hear what you were saying to Frank Shirley?”

At the end of the ride, there was Aunt Varina waiting up as usual—­to renew her own youth in the story of the evening, what this person had worn and what that person had said.  But Sylvia left her sister to tell the story, and fled to her room and locked the door, and flung herself upon the bed and gave way to a torrent of weeping.

Half an hour later Celeste went up, and finding that the door between her room and Sylvia’s was unlocked, opened it softly, and stood listening.  Finally she stole to her sister’s side and put her arm about her.  “Never mind, sister dear,” she whispered, solemnly, “I know how it is!  We women all have to suffer!”