With an effort she said, "There's no reason for doing that. I don't want to interfere with your business."
"I'm neglecting nothing. And that shopping must be done."
She made no reply, but went to the window, and from the height looked down and out upon the mighty spread of the city. He observed her a moment with a dazed pitying expression, took his hat and departed.
It was nearly two hours before he got together sufficient courage to return. He had been hoping—had been saying to himself with vigorous effort at confidence—that he had simply seen one more of the many transformations, each of which seemed to present her as a wholly different personality. When he should see her again, she would have wiped out the personality that had shocked and saddened him, would appear as some new variety of enchantress, perhaps even more potent over his senses than ever before. But a glance as he entered demolished that hope. She was no different than when he left. Evidently she had been crying, and spasms of that sort always accentuate every unloveliness. He did not try to nerve himself to kiss her, but said:
"It'll not take you long to get ready?"
She moved to rise from her languid rest upon the sofa. She sank back. "Perhaps we'd better not go to-day," suggested she.
"Don't you feel well?" he asked, and his tone was more sympathetic than it would have been had his sympathy been genuine.
"Not very," replied she, with a faint deprecating smile. "And not very—not very——"
"Not very what?" he said, in a tone of encouragement.
"Not very happy," she confessed. "I'm afraid I've made a—a dreadful mistake."