nonentity. You think he's grand, you think he's great, though no one else thinks so."
Isabel's colour deepened; she felt this really acute of her companion, and it was certainly a proof of
the aid that passion might render perceptions she had never taken for fine. "Why do you always
comeback to what others think? I can't discuss Mr. Osmond with you."
"Of course not," said Caspar reasonably. And he sat there with his air of stiff helplessness, as if not
only this were true, but there were nothing else that they might discuss.
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"You see how little you gain," she accordingly broke out--"how little comfort or satisfaction I can
give you."
"I didn't expect you to give me much."
"I don't understand then why you came."
"I came because I wanted to see you once more--even just as you are."
"I appreciate that; but if you had waited a while, sooner or later we should have been sure to meet,
and our meeting would have been pleasanter for each of us than this."
"Waited till after you're married? That's just what I didn't want to do. You'll be different then."
"Not very. I shall still be a great friend of yours. You'll see."
"That will make it all the worse," said Mr. Goodwood grimly.
"Ah, you're unaccommodating! I can't promise to dislike you in order to help you to resign
yourself."
"I shouldn't care if you did!"
Isabel got up with a movement of repressed impatience and walked to the window, where she
remained a moment looking out. When she turned round her visitor was still motionless in his
place. She came toward him again and stopped, resting her hand on the back of the chair she had
just quitted. "Do you mean you came simply to look at me? That's better for you perhaps than for
me."
"I wished to hear the sound of your voice," he said.
"You've heard it, and you see it says nothing very sweet."
"It gives me pleasure, all the same." And with this he got up. She had felt pain and displeasure on
receiving early that day the news he was in Florence and by her leave would come within an hour
to see her. She had been vexed and distressed, though she had sent back word by his messenger
that he might come when he would. She had not been better pleased when she saw him; his being
there at all was so full of heavy implications. It implied things she could never assent to--rights,
reproaches, remonstrance, rebuke, the expectation of making her change her purpose. These things,
however, if implied, had not been expressed; and now our young lady, strangely enough, began to
resent her visitor's remarkable self-control. There was a dumb misery about him that irritated her;
there was a manly staying of his hand that made her heart beat faster. She felt her agitation rising,
and she said to herself that she was angry in the way a woman is angry when she has been in the
wrong. She was not in the wrong; she had fortunately not that bitterness to swallow; but, all the
same, she wished he would denounce her a little. She had wished his visit would be short; it had no
purpose, no propriety; yet now that he seemed to be turning away she felt a sudden horror of his
leaving her without uttering a word that would give her an opportunity to defend herself more than
she had done in writing to him a month before, in a few carefully chosen words, to announce her
engagement. If she were not in the wrong, however, why should she desire to defend herself? It
was an excess of generosity on Isabel's part to desire that Mr. Goodwood should be angry. And if
he had not meanwhile held himself hard it might have made him so to hear the tone in which she
suddenly exclaimed, as if she were accusing him of having accused her: "I've not deceived you! I
was perfectly free!"
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"Yes, I know that," said Caspar.
"I gave you full warning that I'd do as I chose."
"You said you'd probably never marry, and you said it with such a manner that I pretty well
believed it."
She considered this an instant. "No one can be more surprised than myself at my present
intention."
"You told me that if I heard you were engaged I was not to believe it," Caspar went on. "I heard it
twenty days ago from yourself, but I remembered what you had said. I thought there might be
some mistake, and that's partly why I came."
"If you wish me to repeat it by word of mouth, that's soon done. There's no mistake whatever."
"I saw that as soon as I came into the room."
"What good would it do you that I shouldn't marry?" she asked with a certain fierceness.
"I should like it better than this."
"You're very selfish, as I said before."
"I know that. I'm selfish as iron."
"Even iron sometimes melts! If you'll be reasonable I'll see you again."
"Don't you call me reasonable now?"
"I don't know what to say to you," she answered with sudden humility.
"I shan't trouble you for a long time," the young man went on. He made a step towards the door,
but he stopped. "Another reason why I came was that I wanted to hear what you would say in
explanation of your having changed your mind."
Her humbleness as suddenly deserted her. "In explanation? Do you think I'm bound to explain?"
He gave her one of his long dumb looks. "You were very positive. I did believe it."
"So did I. Do you think I could explain if I would?"
"No, I suppose not. Well," he added, "I've done what I wished. I've seen you."
"How little you make of these terrible journeys," she felt the poverty of her presently replying.
"If you're afraid I'm knocked up--in any such way as that--you may he at your ease about it." He
turned away, this time in earnest, and no hand-shake, no sign of parting, was exchanged between
them.
At the door he stopped with his hand on the knob. "I shall leave Florence to-morrow," he said
without a quaver.
"I'm delighted to hear it!" she answered passionately. Five minutes after he had gone out she burst
into tears.
CHAPTER XXXIII
Her fit of weeping, however, was soon smothered, and the signs of it had vanished when, an hour
later, she broke the news to her aunt. I use this expression because she had been sure Mrs. Touchett
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would not be pleased; Isabel had only waited to tell her till she had seen Mr. Goodwood. She had
an odd impression that it would not be honourable to make the fact public before she should have
heard what Mr. Goodwood would say about it. He had said rather less than she expected, and she
now had a somewhat angry sense of having lost time. But she would lose no more; she waited till
Mrs. Touchett came into the drawing-room before the mid-day breakfast, and then she began.
"Aunt Lydia, I've something to tell you."
Mrs. Touchett gave a little jump and looked at her almost fiercely. "You needn't tell me; I know
what it is."
"I don't know how you know."
"The same way that I know when the window's open--by feeling a draught. You're going to marry
that man."
"What man do you mean?" Isabel enquired with great dignity.
"Madame Merle's friend--Mr. Osmond."
"I don't know why you call him Madame Merle's friend. Is that the principal thing he's known by?"
"If he's not her friend he ought to be--after what she has done for him!" cried Mrs. Touchett. "I
shouldn't have expected it of her; I'm disappointed."
"If you mean that Madame Merle has had anything to do with my engagement you're greatly
mistaken," Isabel declared with a sort of ardent coldness.
"You mean that your attractions were sufficient, without the gentleman's having had to be lashed
up? You're quite right. They're immense, your attractions, and he would never have presumed to
think of you if she hadn't put him up to it. He has a very good opinion of himself, but he was not a
man to take trouble. Madame Merle took the trouble for him."
"He has taken a great deal for himself!" cried Isabel with a voluntary laugh.
Mrs. Touchett gave a sharp nod. "I think he must, after all, to have made you like him so much."
"I thought he even pleased YOU."
"He did, at one time; and that's why I'm angry with him."
"Be angry with me, not with him," said the girl.
"Oh, I'm always angry with you; that's no satisfaction! Was it for this that you refused Lord
Warburton?"
"Please don't go back to that. Why shouldn't I like Mr. Osmond, since others have done so?"
"Others, at their wildest moments, never wanted to marry him. There's nothing OF him," Mrs.
Touchett explained.
"Then he can't hurt me," said Isabel.
"Do you think you're going to be happy? No one's happy, in such doings, you should know."
"I shall set the fashion then. What does one marry for?"
"What YOU will marry for, heaven only knows. People usually marry as they go into partnership-
to set up a house. But in your partnership you'll bring everything."
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"Is it that Mr. Osmond isn't rich? Is that what you're talking about?" Isabel asked.
"He has no money; he has no name; he has no importance. I value such things and I have the
courage to say it; I think they're very precious. Many other people think the same, and they show
it. But they give some other reason."
Isabel hesitated a little. "I think I value everything that's valuable. I care very much for money, and
that's why I wish Mr. Osmond to have a little."
"Give it to him then; but marry some one else."
"His name's good enough for me," the girl went on. "It's a very pretty name. Have I such a fine one
myself?"
"All the more reason you should improve on it. There are only a dozen American names. Do you
marry him out of charity?"
"It was my duty to tell you, Aunt Lydia, but I don't think it's my duty to explain to you. Even if it
were I shouldn't be able. So please don't remonstrate; in talking about it you have me at a
disadvantage. I can't talk about it."
"I don't remonstrate, I simply answer you: I must give some sign of intelligence. I saw it coming,
and I said nothing. I never meddle."
"You never do, and I'm greatly obliged to you. You've been very considerate."
"It was not considerate--it was convenient," said Mrs. Touchett. "But I shall talk to Madame
Merle."
"I don't see why you keep bringing her in. She has been a very good friend to me."
"Possibly; but she has been a poor one to me."
"What has she done to you?"
"She has deceived me. She had as good as promised me to prevent your engagement."
"She couldn't have prevented it."
"She can do anything; that's what I've always liked her for. I knew she could play any part; but I
understood that she played them one by one. I didn't understand that she would play two at the
same time."
"I don't know what part she may have played to you," Isabel said; "that's between yourselves. To
me she has been honest and kind and devoted."
"Devoted, of course; she wished you to marry her candidate. She told me she was watching you
only in order to interpose."
"She said that to please you," the girl answered; conscious, however, of the inadequacy of the
explanation.
"To please me by deceiving me? She knows me better. Am I pleased to-day?"
"I don't think you're ever much pleased," Isabel was obliged to reply. "If Madame Merle knew you
would learn the truth what had she to gain by insincerity?"
"She gained time, as you see. While I waited for her to interfere you were marching away, and she
was really beating the drum."
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"That's very well. But by your own admission you saw I was marching, and even if she had given
the alarm you wouldn't have tried to stop me."
"No, but some one else would."
"Whom do you mean?" Isabel asked, looking very hard at her aunt. Mrs. Touchett's little bright
eyes, active as they usually were, sustained her gaze rather than returned it. "Would you have
listened to Ralph?"
"Not if he had abused Mr. Osmond."
"Ralph doesn't abuse people; you know that perfectly. He cares very much for you."
"I know he does," said Isabel; "and I shall feel the value of it now, for he knows that whatever I do
I do with reason."
"He never believed you would do this. I told him you were capable of it, and he argued the other
way."
"He did it for the sake of argument," the girl smiled. "You don't accuse him of having deceived
you; why should you accuse Madame Merle?"
"He never pretended he'd prevent it."
"I'm glad of that!" cried Isabel gaily. "I wish very much," she presently added, "that when he
comes you'd tell him first of my engagement."
"Of course I'll mention it," said Mrs. Touchett. "I shall say nothing more to you about it, but I give
you notice I shall talk to others."
"That's as you please. I only meant that it's rather better the announcement should come from you
than from me."
"I quite agree with you; it's much more proper!" And on this the aunt and the niece went to
breakfast, where Mrs. Touchett, as good as her word, made no allusion to Gilbert Osmond. After
an interval of silence, however, she asked her companion from whom she had received a visit an
hour before.
"From an old friend--an American gentleman," Isabel said with a colour in her cheek.
"An American gentleman of course. It's only an American gentleman who calls at ten o'clock in
the morning."
"It was half-past ten; he was in a great hurry; he goes away this evening."
"Couldn't he have come yesterday, at the usual time?"
"He only arrived last night."
"He spends but twenty-four hours in Florence?" Mrs. Touchett cried. "He's an American
gentleman truly."
"He is indeed," said Isabel, thinking with perverse admiration of what Caspar Goodwood had done
for her.
Two days afterward Ralph arrived; but though Isabel was sure that Mrs. Touchett had lost no time
in imparting to him the great fact, he showed at first no open knowledge of it. Their prompted talk
was naturally of his health; Isabel had many questions to ask about Corfu. She had been shocked
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by his appearance when he came into the room; she had forgotten how ill he looked. In spite of
Corfu he looked very ill to-day, and she wondered if he were really worse or if she were simply
disaccustomed to living with an invalid. Poor Ralph made no nearer approach to conventional
beauty as he advanced in life, and the now apparently complete loss of his health had done little to
mitigate the natural oddity of his person. Blighted and battered, but still responsive and still ironic,
his face was like a lighted lantern patched with paper and unsteadily held; his thin whisker
languished upon a lean cheek; the exorbitant curve of his nose defined itself more sharply. Lean he
was altogether, lean and long and loose-jointed; an accidental cohesion of relaxed angles. His
brown velvet jacket had become perennial; his hands had fixed themselves in his pockets; he
shambled and stumbled and shuffled in a manner that denoted great physical helplessness. It was
perhaps this whimsical gait that helped to mark his character more than ever as that of the
humorous invalid--the invalid for whom even his own disabilities are part of the general joke.
They might well indeed with Ralph have been the chief cause of the want of seriousness marking
his view of a world in which the reason for his own continued presence was past finding out. Isabel
had grown fond of his ugliness; his awkwardness had become dear to her. They had been
sweetened by association; they struck her as the very terms on which it had been given him to be
charming. He was so charming that her sense of his being ill had hitherto had a sort of comfort in
it; the state of his health had seemed not a limitation, but a kind of intellectual advantage; it
absolved him from all professional and official emotions and left him the luxury of being
exclusively personal. The personality so resulting was delightful; he had remained proof against
the staleness of disease; he had had to consent to be deplorably ill, yet had somehow escaped being
formally sick. Such had been the girl's impression of her cousin; and when she had pitied him it
was only on reflection. As she reflected a good deal she had allowed him a certain amount of
compassion; but she always had a dread of wasting that essence--a precious article, worth more to
the giver than to any one else. Now, however, it took no great sensibility to feel that poor Ralph's
tenure of life was less elastic than it should be. He was a bright, free, generous spirit, he had all the
illumination of wisdom and none of its pedantry, and yet he was distressfully dying.
Isabel noted afresh that life was certainly hard for some people, and she felt a delicate glow of
shame as she thought how easy it now promised to become for herself. She was prepared to learn
that Ralph was not pleased with her engagement; but she was not prepared, in spite of her affection
for him, to let this fact spoil the situation. She was not even prepared, or so she thought, to resent
his want of sympathy; for it would be his privilege--it would be indeed his natural line--to find
fault with any step she might take toward marriage. One's cousin always pretended to hate one's
husband; that was traditional, classical; it was a part of one's cousin's always pretending to adore
one. Ralph was nothing if not critical; and though she would certainly, other things being equal,
have been as glad to marry to please him as to please any one, it would be absurd to regard as
important that her choice should square with his views. What were his views after all? He had
pretended to believe she had better have married Lord Warburton; but this was only because she
had refused that excellent man. If she had accepted him Ralph would certainly have taken another
tone; he always took the opposite. You could criticise any marriage; it was the essence of a
marriage to be open to criticism. How well she herself, should she only give her mind to it, might
criticise this union of her own! She had other employment, however, and Ralph was welcome to
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relieve her of the care. Isabel was prepared to be most patient and most indulgent. He must have
seen that, and this made it the more odd he should say nothing. After three days had elapsed
without his speaking our young woman wearied of waiting; dislike it as he would, he might at least
go through the form. We, who know more about poor Ralph than his cousin, may easily believe
that during the hours that followed his arrival at Palazzo Crescentini he had privately gone through
many forms. His mother had literally greeted him with the great news, which had been even more
