"I guess nothing," he replied, "save that perhaps I may in some way
serve you."

"Serve me?" she cried, with a flash of anger through her tears. "It is a
late hour to speak of service, after what you have brought on this
house!"

Odo turned pale. "Here indeed, madam," said he, "are words that need an
explanation."

"Oh," she broke forth, "and you shall have it; though I think to any
other it must be writ large upon my countenance." She rose and paced the
floor impetuously. "Is it possible," she began again, "you do not yet
perceive the sense of that execrable scene? Or do you think, by feigning
ignorance, to prolong my humiliation? Oh," she said, pausing before him,
her breast in a tumult, her eyes alight, "it was I who persuaded my
father of your discretion and prudence, it was through my influence that
he opened himself to you so freely; and is this the return you make?
Alas, why did you leave your fashionable friends and a world in which
you are so fitted to shine, to bring unhappiness on an obscure household
that never dreamed of courting your notice?"

As she stood before him in her radiant anger, it went hard with Odo not
to silence with a kiss a resentment that he guessed to be mainly
directed against herself; but he controlled himself and said quietly:
"Madam, I were a dolt not to perceive that I have had the misfortune to
offend; but when or how, I swear to heaven I know not; and till you
enlighten me I can neither excuse nor defend myself."