'Of course it is nonsense. Can I go back on my whole life? can I change all my friends? If I did I should only collect more exactly like them, and without knowing I was doing it. Lie low for a month or so, and then pursue the same old way. With the best intentions in the world we cannot change ourselves.' 'But you don't intend to give me up, Olive?' 'Do you want me to, Reggie?' 'No, dearest, we've held together a long time--seven years--we cannot give each other up.' 'We can't give each other up,' said Mrs. Lahens. 'It never shall be broken off, unless you break it off.' Lord Chadwick asked himself if he desired to break with her? He looked at her, and thought that he had never seen her look so old; but he could not imagine his life without her. Apart from her, there was nothing for him. His name had been mixed up in questionable city transactions; his wife had divorced him, and he was over forty... Notwithstanding his title, he'd find it difficult to marry a girl with money; he couldn't marry one without. Besides, he loved Olive as well as a man could love a woman whose lover he has been for seven years. ... Mrs. Lahens looked at him, and wondered what there was in him that attached her so firmly. They had once loved each other passionately. All that was over now... But still she loved him. ... He was all she had in the world. To live with her husband without Reggie! no, she could not think of it. Even if she did, Agnes would profit nothing by it. Every one knew of their _liaison_. No one talked about it any more, it had been in a way accepted, and for them to separate would only serve to set Mayfair gossiping again. 'I know I appear selfish,' she said; 'not to want to see my daughter must seem selfish. But I am not selfish, Reggie. I've never been selfish where you have been concerned, have I?' 'I at least can't accuse you of selfishness, Olive. You've always been a good friend to me. There was my bankruptcy---'