Althea found, as she had hoped, that her whole situation was altered by the arrival of her suitor.

A woman boasting the possession of even the most rayless of that species is in a very different category from the woman as mere unsought unit.

As unit she sinks easily into the background, is merged with other unemphatic things, but as sought she is always in the foreground, not only in her own, but in others' eyes.

Be she ever so unnoticeable, she then gains, at least, the compliment of conjecture.

The significance of her personal drama has a universal interest; the issues of her situation are those that appeal forcibly to all.
Althea and her steady, sallow satellite, became the centre of a watchful circle; watchful and kindly.