"My dear," said Mrs. Bobby, wisely, "paragons don't marry other paragons, or the world would be somewhat more dull than it is at present. A man who is very serious should marry a woman who is a trifle frivolous, and in that way they strike the happy medium."
"I don't know," said Elizabeth. "They would be more likely, I should think, to strike a—a discordancy. It would be fatiguing to try to please a man like that. One could never, do what one would, come up to his standard."
"You wouldn't have to," said Mrs. Bobby, softly, "he would think you perfect, if—he loved you."
"Do you think so?" said Elizabeth, with rather a dreary smile. "I think, for my part, that he would be harder to satisfy, he would exact all the more, because—he loved you." She sat pondering the idea for a moment, then with a careless little gesture, she seemed to dismiss the subject as a thing of small consequence. "It's much better not to try to satisfy people like that," she declared. "What a lot of time we are wasting! It must be time to dress." She got up and moved towards the door.
Mrs. Bobby followed her with her eyes. "I'll send Celeste to you," she said. "Wear your most becoming gown. Look your best, and do your hair the way I like it. I assure you, such trifles have their effect—even upon a paragon."
Chapter XXI
"Look my best!" Elizabeth repeated, standing before her muslin-skirted dressing-table, and staring at the haggard apparition that met her eyes. "Wear my most becoming gown, do my hair the most becoming way! It all sounds so easy. But what can bring back my color, what can take away these terrible dark rings, this horrible strained, anxious look? Any one can see, to look at me, that I've something on my mind....