Page 185 - the-portrait-of-a-lady

separating myself.’
‘By separating yourself from what?’
‘From life. From the usual chances and dangers, from
what most people know and suffer.’
Lord Warburton broke into a smile that almost denoted
hope. ‘Why, my dear Miss Archer,’ he began to explain with
the most considerate eagerness, ‘I don’t offer you any exon-
eration from life or from any chances or dangers whatever. I
wish I could; depend upon it I would! For what do you take
me, pray? Heaven help me, I’m not the Emperor of China!
All I offer you is the chance of taking the common lot in
a comfortable sort of way. The common lot? Why, I’m de-
voted to the common lot! Strike an alliance with me, and I
promise you that you shall have plenty of it. You shall sep-
arate from nothing whatever—not even from your friend
Miss Stackpole.’
‘She’d never approve of it,’ said Isabel, trying to smile
and take advantage of this side-issue; despising herself too,
not a little, for doing so.
‘Are we speaking of Miss Stackpole?’ his lordship asked
impatiently. ‘I never saw a person judge things on such the-
oretic grounds.’
‘Now I suppose you’re speaking of me,’ said Isabel with
humility; and she turned away again, for she saw Miss Mo-
lyneux enter the gallery, accompanied by Henrietta and by
Ralph.
Lord Warburton’s sister addressed him with a certain ti-
midity and reminded him she ought to return home in time
for tea, as she was expecting company to partake of it. He

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