She turned away from him with a weary sigh.

Oh, what trouble and mockery everything was?
What a dreary, wretched piece of business life was altogether! The sense of loneliness and desolation weighed on her heart, this dull December morning, like lead.
There was to be a wedding-breakfast, but the Cure, and Father Francis, and Doctor Frank were the only guests.
Kate sat at her father's side--Grace presided now, Grace was mistress of the Hall--and listened in the same dazed and dreary way to the confusion of tongues, the fire of toasts, the clatter of china and silver, and the laughter of the guests.

She sat very still, eating and drinking, because she must eat and drink to avoid notice, and never thinking how beautiful she looked in her blue silk dress, her neck and arms gleaming like ivory against azure.

What would it ever matter again how she looked?
Captain and Mrs.Danton were going on a brief bridal-tour to Toronto--not to be absent over a fortnight.

They were to depart by the two o'clock train; so, breakfast over, Grace hurried away to change her dress.