But we have digressed. Mrs. Bernard's drawing-room presented a picture of comfort and elegance as Agnes entered it on the evening of Ella's party. A few select friends were gathered there, all apparently perfectly at home, and amusing themselves without restraint, according to their diversified inclinations. Some were examining the choice engravings that lay scattered on the tables; others were standing in a group round the piano, admiring some new music which Ella had that day received; while the elder members of the party were gathered round the fireside, enjoying its cheerful blaze, and merrily discussing the events of the season. Innocent amusement seemed to be the rule of the evening, and Agnes, though she had left home unusually depressed in spirits, felt a glow of pleasure thrill through her heart as she contemplated the scene, and responded with her usual sweet, though, latterly, pensive smile, the kind greetings of her friends.
"How pale Miss Wiltshire looks to-night," observed one young lady to another who was seated at the piano as Agnes entered the apartment.
"She does, indeed, pale and sad both," was the response.
Arthur, who had overheard the remark, could not help admitting to himself its correctness, as he crossed the room to pay his respects to Agnes, and as, unobserved, he watched her closely, it was evident to him that, while with her usual unselfishness, she strove to promote the happiness of others by entering cheerfully into conversation, from the half suppressed sigh, and the shadow that at intervals stole over her face, some painful subject, very foreign from the scene around, occupied her thoughts.
"I am afraid you are not well to-night, Miss Wiltshire," he at length said, in a tone low and gentle as a woman's, for Agnes, seated on a corner of the sofa, and imagining herself unobserved by the rest of the company, had for a moment closed her eyes, as though to shut out surrounding objects, while an expression of mental anguish flitted across her features.
How precious to the aching heart is human sympathy. The words were nothing in themselves, but the tenderness of tone in which they were spoken, told plainly that it was anything but a matter of indifference to the speaker, and Agnes, blushing deeply as she met Arthur's compassionate glance, felt the conviction, darting like a ray of sunbeam through her mind, that to at least one person in the world she was dearer than aught else beside.
"I have only a slight headache," was her reply to his kind inquiry, and one which was strictly correct, for the headache was the result of mental agitation during the day.
"I shall recommend you, then, to sit quite still, while I constitute myself, for the evening, your devoted knight; and shall, therefore, remain here, ready to obey your slightest behests, be they what they may."
"I shall certainly then insist, in the first place, that others be not deprived of the pleasure of your company for my gratification. I should be selfish, indeed, if I allowed you to do so."
"Notwithstanding, here I am, and here I intend to remain until I am forced away," said Arthur, smiling as, seating himself comfortably beside her on the sofa, he drew a portfolio from the centre table, which contained some sketches taken during his recent tour, and, in pointing out the different places and relating his adventures in each, Agnes became so much interested as to forget her headache, and even the anxiety which had weighed down her mind but a short time before.