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‘Why not—since I declined his offer absolutely?’
‘That doesn’t make him my companion. Besides, he’s an
Englishman.’
‘And pray isn’t an Englishman a human being?’ Isabel
asked.
‘Oh, those people? They’re not of my humanity, and I
don’t care what becomes of them.’
‘You’re very angry,’ said the girl. ‘We’ve discussed this
matter quite enough.’
‘Oh yes, I’m very angry. I plead guilty to that!’
She turned away from him, walked to the open window
and stood a moment looking into the dusky void of the
street, where a turbid gaslight alone represented social ani-
mation. For some time neither of these young persons spoke;
Caspar lingered near the chimney-piece with eyes gloomily
attached. She had virtually requested him to go—he knew
that; but at the risk of making himself odious he kept his
ground. She was too nursed a need to be easily renounced,
and he had crossed the sea all to wring from her some scrap
of a vow. Presently she left the window and stood again be-
fore him. ‘You do me very little justice—after my telling you
what I told you just now. I’m sorry I told you—since it mat-
ters so little to you.’
‘Ah,’ cried the young man, ‘if you were thinking of me
when you did it!’ And then he paused with the fear that she
might contradict so happy a thought.
‘I was thinking of you a little,’ said Isabel.
‘A little? I don’t understand. If the knowledge of what I
feel for you had any weight with you at all, calling it a ‘little’

222 The Portrait of a Lady