THE PRIEST OR THE WOMAN?
LORD LORING hurried away to his dressing room.

"I won't be more than ten minutes," he said--and left Romayne and Stella together.
She was attired with her customary love of simplicity.

White lace was the only ornament on her dress of delicate silvery gray.

Her magnificent hair was left to plead its own merits, without adornment of any sort.
Even the brooch which fastened her lace pelerine was of plain gold only.
Conscious that she was showing her beauty to the greatest advantage in the eyes of a man of taste, she betrayed a little of the embarrassment which Romayne had already noticed at the moment when she gave him her hand.

They were alone, and it was the first time she had seen him in evening dress.
It may be that women have no positive appreciation of what is beautiful in form and color--or it may be that they have no opinions of their own when the laws of fashion have spoken.