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sending him choice extracts, humorous and other, from the
American journals, of which she received several by every
post and which she always perused with a pair of scissors
in her hand. The articles she cut out she placed in an enve-
lope addressed to Mr. Goodwood, which she left with her
own hand at his hotel. He never asked her a question about
Isabel: hadn’t he come five thousand miles to see for him-
self? He was thus not in the least authorized to think Mrs.
Osmond unhappy; but the very absence of authorization
operated as an irritant, ministered to the harshness with
which, in spite of his theory that he had ceased to care, he
now recognized that, so far as she was concerned, the future
had nothing more for him. He had not even the satisfac-
tion of knowing the truth; apparently he could not even be
trusted to respect her if she were unhappy. He was hopeless,
helpless, useless. To this last character she had called his at-
tention by her ingenious plan for making him leave Rome.
He had no objection whatever to doing what he could for
her cousin, but it made him grind his teeth to think that of
all the services she might have asked of him this was the one
she had been eager to select. There had been no danger of
her choosing one that would have kept him in Rome.
To-night what he was chiefly thinking of was that he was
to leave-her to-morrow and that he had gained nothing by
coming but the knowledge that he was as little wanted as
ever. About herself he had gained no knowledge; she was
imperturbable, inscrutable, impenetrable. He felt the old
bitterness, which he had tried so hard to swallow, rise again
in his throat, and he knew there are disappointments that

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