set her quivering with resentment; and yet she elected to betake
herself to the presence of people whom she knew no more than
"formally." Bibbs marveled. Surely, he reflected, some traces of
emotion must linger upon Sibyl's face or in her manner; she could not
have ironed it all quite out in the three or four minutes it took her
to reach the Vertreeses' door.

And in this he was not mistaken, for Mary Vertrees was at that moment
wondering what internal excitement Mrs. Roscoe Sheridan was striving
to master. But Sibyl had no idea that she was allowing herself to
exhibit anything except the gaiety which she conceived proper to the
manner of a casual caller. She was wholly intent upon fulfilling the
sudden purpose that brought her, and she was no more self-conscious
than she was finely intelligent. For Sibyl Sheridan belonged to a
type Scriptural in its antiquity. She was merely the idle and half-
educated intriguer who may and does delude men, of course, and the
best and dullest of her own sex as well, finding invariably strong
supporters among these latter. It is a type that has wrought some
damage in the world and would have wrought greater, save for the
check put upon its power by intelligent women and by its own "lack
of perspective," for it is a type that never sees itself. Sibyl
followed her impulses with no reflection or question--it was like
a hound on the gallop after a master on horseback. She had not even
the instinct to stop and consider her effect. If she wished to make
a certain impression she believed that she made it. She believed
that she was believed.

"My mother asked me to say that she was sorry she couldn't come
down," Mary said, when they were seated.