"Oh no. Not now. He'll be quite pleased. I have an idea, Grizel, that his mother said something to him about me before she died. She knew I was unhappy, I could see it in her eyes, and ever since he has been more,--how shall I put it?--not affectionate, that's over,--more _human_, shall we say? He doesn't take me _quite_ so much for granted. It occasionally enters his head that I'm not very strong. He would be quite willing for me to have a change, even without the excuse of your breakdown. Poor young wife! ... And where is the Retreat?" "In France. In Normandy. It's a convent, my dear, where they take a few _pensionnaires_, but I'll arrange that there shall be no one there but ourselves. I've been before when I needed a rest,--not the bodily _I_, but the other bit, whatever you choose to call it, the bit that _feels_! Being a good Protestant I should logically hate convents. As a solid fact, I get more good in this particular one than anywhere else in the world. The nuns are so sweet; they have such selfless, crystalline, child-hearts. After you have been with them a few days, some of their calm begins to steal into your own heart, and the fret to die out. You feel such a long, long way from the outside world, that you look at everything from a new perspective. It came upon me with quite a shock that all my trouble had been about myself! ... My own waiting, my own loss. But these sweet things have buried self... Oh, it does one good, Cassandra, and the regular Spartan life, the bare floors, the exquisite, exquisite, cleanliness,--it's all a tonic and an inspiration. It's not dull either; don't think that it's dull! I take my prettiest clothes, and an assortment of selected jokes. They love 'em, the dear things! I believe they love me too." "I'm quite sure of that." "Well!" Grizel smirked complacently, "so am I. To tell you the truth I'm a tonic to them, so I give as much as I take. They do me good, and I shock them, so we're both happy. The Reverend Mother once felt it her duty to reprove me, but her eyes danced, so I went steadfastly on, and did it again." "And the services? Do you go to the services too?" "Of course, and enjoy them so much that they have fond hopes of converting me altogether. They won't; but that's a detail. Thank goodness, I am so constituted that it's always the similarity between creeds that strikes me, never the difference, so I find help in them all... We'll allow a month for the convent,--I can't decently recover from a nervous breakdown in less than a month,--but we'll take a few days off now and then for excursions in the neighbourhood, and _then_, darling, we come home by Paris! Food for the spirit, and food for the flesh... _Nothing_ is more reviving than a becoming hat. We'll buy hats, Cassandra, and be blowed to expense... What's the very most you have ever spent on a hat?"