Page 630 - the-portrait-of-a-lady

But what makes it so unnatural? Could any one in the world
be more loveable than Miss Osmond?’
‘No one, possibly. But love has nothing to do with good
reasons.’
‘I don’t agree with you. I’m delighted to have good rea-
sons.’
‘Of course you are. If you were really in love you wouldn’t
care a straw for them.’
‘Ah, really in love-really in love!’ Lord Warburton ex-
claimed, folding his arms, leaning back his head and
stretching himself a little. ‘You must remember that I’m for-
ty-two years old. I won’t pretend I’m as I once ‘Well, if you’re
sure,’ said Isabel, ‘it’s all right.’
He answered nothing; he sat there, with his head back,
looking before him. Abruptly, however, he changed his
position; he turned quickly to his friend. ‘Why are you so
unwilling, so sceptical?’
She met his eyes, and for a moment they looked straight
at each other. If she wished to be satisfied she saw something
that satisfied her; she saw in his expression the gleam of an
idea that she was uneasy on her own account-that she was
perhaps even in fear. It showed a suspicion, not a hope, but
such as it was it told her what she wanted to know. Not for
an instant should he suspect her of detecting in his proposal
of marrying her stepdaughter an implication of increased
nearness to herself, or of thinking it, on such a betrayal,
ominous. In that brief, extremely personal gaze, however,
deeper meanings passed between them than they were con-
scious of at the moment.

630 The Portrait of a Lady