"I need good-looking ones, tonight," he said, mustering patience. But even as the words were out he realized he had phrased it badly; any reference to good looks set her off. "The hell you do, dunce!"

       He wished she wouldn't keep rubbing in his inferior Intelligence. Ordinarily she was smart enough not to do that. Bink knew he was no genius, but he wasn't Subnormal either; she was the one who was both. "I have to attend the Anniversary Ball," he explained, though of course she already knew that. "It would be an insult to the Queen if I attended sloppily dressed."

       "Dolt!" she screamed from her hideaway. "You're attending in costume! No one will see your stinking shoes!"

       Oops, that was right. He had made his trip for nothing.

       "But that's all too typical of your selfishness," she continued with righteous ire. "Bugging off to the party to have a good time while I suffer home alone, chewing on the walls." That was literal; the cheese was old and hard, but she gnawed on it when she got angry, and she was angry most of the time now.

       Still, he tried to be positive. He had only been married a year, and he loved Chameleon. He had known at the outset that there would be good times and bad times, and this was a bad time. A very bad time. "Why don't you come to the ball too, dear?"

       She exploded with cynical wrath. "Me? When I'm looking like this? Spare me your feebleminded sarcasm!"

       "But as you reminded me, it's a costume party. The Queen is cloaking every attendee in a disguise of her choosing. So no one will see-"

       "You utter moronic nincompoop!" she bawled, and he had heard something crash.