The Ambassadors Henry James (novel24 txt) đ
- Author: Henry James
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These, however, were but parenthetic memories, and the turn taken by his affair on the whole was positively that if his nerves were on the stretch it was because he missed violence. When he asked himself if none would then, in connection with it, ever come at all, he might almost have passed as wondering how to provoke it. It would be too absurd if such a vision as that should have to be invoked for relief; it was already marked enough as absurd that he should actually have begun with flutters and dignities on the score of a single accepted meal. What sort of a brute had he expected Chad to be, anyway?â âStrether had occasion to make the enquiry but was careful to make it in private. He could himself, comparatively recent as it wasâ âit was truly but the fact of a few days sinceâ âfocus his primal crudity; but he would on the approach of an observer, as if handling an illicit possession, have slipped the reminiscence out of sight. There were echoes of it still in Mrs. Newsomeâs letters, and there were moments when these echoes made him exclaim on her want of tact. He blushed of course, at once, still more for the explanation than for the ground of it: it came to him in time to save his manners that she couldnât at the best become tactful as quickly as he. Her tact had to reckon with the Atlantic Ocean, the General Post-Office and the extravagant curve of the globe. Chad had one day offered tea at the Boulevard Malesherbes to a chosen few, a group again including the unobscured Miss Barrace; and Strether had on coming out walked away with the acquaintance whom in his letters to Mrs. Newsome he always spoke of as the little artist-man. He had had full occasion to mention him as the other party, so oddly, to the only close personal alliance observation had as yet detected in Chadâs existence. Little Bilhamâs way this afternoon was not Stretherâs, but he had none the less kindly come with him, and it was somehow a part of his kindness that as it had sadly begun to rain they suddenly found themselves seated for conversation at a cafĂ© in which they had taken refuge. He had passed no more crowded hour in Chadâs society than the one just ended; he had talked with Miss Barrace, who had reproached him with not having come to see her, and he had above all hit on a happy thought for causing Waymarshâs tension to relax. Something might possibly be extracted for the latter from the idea of his success with that lady, whose quick apprehension of what might amuse her had given Strether a free hand. What had she meant if not to ask whether she couldnât help him with his splendid encumbrance, and mightnât the sacred rage at any rate be kept a little in abeyance by thus creating for his comradeâs mind even in a world of irrelevance the possibility of a relation? What was it but a relation to be regarded as so decorative and, in especial, on the strength of it, to be whirled away, amid flounces and feathers, in a coupĂ© lined, by what Strether could make out, with dark blue brocade? He himself had never been whirled awayâ ânever at least in a coupĂ© and behind a footman; he had driven with Miss Gostrey in cabs, with Mrs. Pocock, a few times, in an open buggy, with Mrs. Newsome in a four-seated cart and, occasionally up at the mountains, on a buckboard; but his friendâs actual adventure transcended his personal experience. He now showed his companion soon enough indeed how inadequate, as a general monitor, this last queer quantity could once more feel itself.
âWhat game under the sun is he playing?â He signified the next moment that his allusion was not to the fat gentleman immersed in dominoes on whom his eyes had begun by resting, but to their host of the previous hour, as to whom, there on the velvet bench, with a final collapse of all consistency, he treated himself to the comfort of indiscretion. âWhere do you see him come out?â
Little Bilham, in meditation, looked at him with a kindness almost paternal. âDonât you like it over here?â
Strether laughed outâ âfor the tone was indeed droll; he let himself go. âWhat has that to do with it? The only thing Iâve any business to like is to feel that Iâm moving him. Thatâs why I ask you whether you believe I am? Is the creatureââ âand he did his best to show that he simply wished to ascertainâ ââhonest?â
His companion looked responsible, but looked it through a small dim smile. âWhat creature do you mean?â
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