"Because I've been low and mean. Now I want you to do something for Mrs. Bowen--something to amuse her; to show that we appreciate her. And I don't want you to sympathise with me at all. When I ask for your sympathy, it's a sign that I don't deserve it." "Is that so?" "Oh, be serious with me. I mean it. And I want to beg your pardon for something." "Yes; what's that?" "Can't you guess?" "No." "You needn't have your lapels silk-lined. You needn't wear _boutonnieres_." "Oh, but I've had the coat changed." "No matter! Change it back! It isn't for me to make you over. I must make myself over. It's my right, it's my sacred privilege to conform to you in every way, and I humble myself in the dust for having forgotten it at the very start. Oh, _do_ you think I can ever be worthy of you? I _will_ try; indeed I will! I shall not wear my light dresses another time! From this out, I shall dress more in keeping with you. I boasted that I should live to comfort and console you, to recompense you for the past, and what have I been doing? Wearying and degrading you!" "Oh no," pleaded Colville. "I am very comfortable. I don't need any compensation for the past. I need--sleep. I'm going to bed tonight at eight o'clock, and I am going to sleep twenty-four hours. Then I shall be fresh for Mrs. Fleming's ball." "I'm not going," said Imogene briefly. "Oh yes, you are. I'll come round to-morrow evening and see." "No. There are to be no more parties." "Why?" "I can't endure them." She was looking at him and talking at him, but she seemed far aloof in the abstraction of a sublime regret; she seemed puzzled, bewildered at herself. Colville got away. He felt the pathos of the confusion and question to which he left her, but he felt himself powerless against it. There was but one solution to it all, and that was impossible. He could only grieve over her trouble, and wait; grieve for the irrevocable loss which made her trouble remote and impersonal to him, and submit. XVIII