chance.'

'"Simply asking me to give Alice a chance"; now isn't that really
just a little...?'

Lawford slowly shook his head. 'You know in your heart it isn't,
Sheila; you understand me quite well, although you persistently
pretend not to. I can't argue now. I can't speak up for myself. I
am just about as far down as I can go. It's only Alice.'

'I see; a lucid interval?' suggested his wife in a low, trembling
voice.

'Yes, yes, if you like,' said her husband patiently, '"a lucid
interval." Don't please look at my face like that, Sheila.
Think--think that it's just lupus, just some horrible
disfigurement.'

Not much light was in the large room, and there was something so
extraordinarily characteristic of her husband in those stooping
shoulders, in the head hung a little forward, and in the
preternaturally solemn voice, that Sheila had to bend a little
over the bed to catch a glimpse of the sallow and keener face
again. She sighed; and even on her own strained ear her sigh
sounded almost like one of relief.

'It's useless, I know, to ask you anything while you are in this
mood,' continued Lawford dully; 'I know that of old.'

The white, ringed hands clenched, '"Of old!"'