The Ambassadors Henry James (novel24 txt) đ
- Author: Henry James
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âSo do I. If it werenât,â he again amusedly sighed, âfor thatâ â!â
âWell, you owe more to women than any man I ever saw. We do seem to keep you going. Yet Sarah, as I see her, must be great.â
âShe isâ Strether fully assented: âgreat! Whatever happens, she wonât, with these unforgettable days, have lived in vain.â
Miss Gostrey had a pause. âYou mean she has fallen in love?â
âI mean she wonders if she hasnâtâ âand it serves all her purpose.â
âIt has indeed,â Maria laughed, âserved womenâs purposes before!â
âYesâ âfor giving in. But I doubt if the ideaâ âas an ideaâ âhas ever up to now answered so well for holding out. Thatâs her tribute to the idealâ âwe each have our own. Itâs her romanceâ âand it seems to me better on the whole than mine. To have it in Paris too,â he explainedâ ââon this classic ground, in this charged infectious air, with so sudden an intensity: well, itâs more than she expected. She has had in short to recognise the breaking out for her of a real affinityâ âand with everything to enhance the drama.â
Miss Gostrey followed. âJim for instance?â
âJim. Jim hugely enhances. Jim was made to enhance. And then Mr. Waymarsh. Itâs the crowning touchâ âit supplies the colour. Heâs positively separated.â
âAnd she herself unfortunately isnâtâ âthat supplies the colour too.â Miss Gostrey was all there. But somehowâ â! âIs he in love?â
Strether looked at her a long time; then looked all about the room; then came a little nearer. âWill you never tell anyone in the world as long as ever you live?â
âNever.â It was charming.
âHe thinks Sarah really is. But he has no fear,â Strether hastened to add.
âOf her being affected by it?â
âOf his being. He likes it, but he knows she can hold out. Heâs helping her, heâs floating her over, by kindness.â
Maria rather funnily considered it. âFloating her over in champagne? The kindness of dining her, nose to nose, at the hour when all Paris is crowding to profane delights, and in theâ âwell, in the great temple, as one hears of it, of pleasure?â
âThatâs just it, for both of them,â Strether insistedâ ââand all of a supreme innocence. The Parisian place, the feverish hour, the putting before her of a hundred francsâ worth of food and drink, which theyâll scarcely touchâ âall thatâs the dear manâs own romance; the expensive kind, expensive in francs and centimes, in which he abounds. And the circus afterwardsâ âwhich is cheaper, but which heâll find some means of making as dear as possibleâ âthatâs also his tribute to the ideal. It does for him. Heâll see her through. They wonât talk of anything worse than you and me.â
âWell, weâre bad enough perhaps, thank heaven,â she laughed, âto upset them! Mr. Waymarsh at any rate is a hideous old coquette.â And the next moment she had dropped everything for a different pursuit. âWhat you donât appear to know is that Jeanne de Vionnet has become engaged. Sheâs to marryâ âit has been definitely arrangedâ âyoung Monsieur de Montbron.â
He fairly blushed. âThenâ âif you know itâ âitâs âoutâ?â
âDonât I often know things that are not out? However,â she said, âthis will be out tomorrow. But I see Iâve counted too much on your possible ignorance. Youâve been before me, and I donât make you jump as I hoped.â
He gave a gasp at her insight. âYou never fail! Iâve had my jump. I had it when I first heard.â
âThen if you knew why didnât you tell me as soon as you came in?â
âBecause I had it from her as a thing not yet to be spoken of.â
Miss Gostrey wondered. âFrom Madame de Vionnet herself?â
âAs a probabilityâ ânot quite a certainty: a good cause in which Chad has been working. So Iâve waited.â
âYou need wait no longer,â she returned. âIt reached me yesterdayâ âroundabout and accidental, but by a person who had had it from one of the young manâs own peopleâ âas a thing quite settled. I was only keeping it for you.â
âYou thought Chad wouldnât have told me?â
She hesitated. âWell, if he hasnâtâ ââ
âHe hasnât. And yet the thing appears to have been practically his doing. So there we are.â
âThere we are!â Maria candidly echoed.
âThatâs why I jumped. I jumped,â he continued to explain, âbecause it means, this disposition of the daughter, that thereâs now nothing else: nothing else but him and the mother.â
âStillâ âit simplifies.â
âIt simplifiesââ âhe fully concurred. âBut thatâs precisely where we are. It marks a stage in his relation. The act is his answer to Mrs. Newsomeâs demonstration.â
âIt tells,â Maria asked, âthe worst?â
âThe worst.â
âBut is the worst what he wants Sarah to know?â
âHe doesnât care for Sarah.â
At which Miss Gostreyâs eyebrows went up. âYou mean she has already dished herself?â
Strether took a turn about; he had thought it out again and again before this, to the end; but the vista seemed each time longer. âHe wants his good friend to know the best. I mean the measure of his attachment. She asked for a sign, and he thought of that one. There it is.â
âA concession to her jealousy?â
Strether pulled up. âYesâ âcall it that. Make it luridâ âfor that makes my problem richer.â
âCertainly, let us have it luridâ âfor I quite agree with you that we want none of our problems poor. But let us also have it clear. Can he, in the midst of such a preoccupation, or on the heels of it, have seriously cared for Jeanne?â âcared, I mean, as a young man at liberty would have cared?â
Well, Strether had mastered it. âI think he can have thought it would be charming if he could care. It would be nicer.â
âNicer than being tied up to Marie?â
âYesâ âthan the discomfort of an attachment to a person he can never hope, short of a catastrophe, to marry. And he was quite right,â said Strether. âIt would certainly have been nicer. Even when a thingâs already nice there mostly is some other thing that would have been nicerâ âor as to which
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