Harlequin and Columbine

Book Excerpt: ...such susceptible gallantry she had never yet been known to resist falling in love with her leading-man before she quarrelled with him. Miss Lyston's protest having lasted the whole of the preceeding night, and not at all concluding with Mr. Surbilt's departure, about breakfast-time, avowedly to seek total anaesthesia by means of a long list of liquors, which he named, she had spent the hours before rehearsal interviewing female acquaintances who had been members of the susceptible lady's company--a proceeding which indicates that she deliberately courted hysteria. Shortly after the outraged rehearsal had been resumed, she unfortunately uttered a loud, dry sob, startlingly irrelevant to the matter in hand. It came during the revelation of "Roderick Hanscom's" secret, and Potter stopped instantly."Who did that?""Miss Lyston, sir," Packer responded loyally, such matters being part of his duty. The star turned to face the agitated criminal. "Miss Lyston," he said, delaying each syllable to pack it..