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sidered it for a while. At last he said: ‘Isabel’s a sweet young
thing; but do you think she’s so good as that?’
‘She’s as good as her best opportunities,’ Ralph re-
turned.
‘Well,’ Mr. Touchett declared, ‘she ought to get a great
many opportunities for sixty thousand pounds.’
‘I’ve no doubt she will.’
‘Of course I’ll do what you want,’ said the old man. ‘I
only want to understand it a little.’
‘Well, dear daddy, don’t you understand it now?’ his son
caressingly asked. ‘If you don’t we won’t take any more trou-
ble about it. We’ll leave it alone.’
Mr. Touchett lay a long time still. Ralph supposed he had
given up the attempt to follow. But at last, quite lucidly, he
began again. ‘Tell me this first. Doesn’t it occur to you that
a young lady with sixty thousand pounds may fall a victim
to the fortune-hunters?’
‘She’ll hardly fall a victim to more than one.’
‘Well, one’s too many.’
‘Decidedly. That’s a risk, and it has entered into my cal-
culation. I think it’s appreciable, but I think it’s small, and
I’m prepared to take it.’
Poor Mr. Touchett’s acuteness had passed into perplex-
ity, and his perplexity now passed into admiration. ‘Well,
you have gone into it!’ he repeated. ‘But I don’t see what
good you’re to get of it.’
Ralph leaned over his father’s pillows and gently
smoothed them; he was aware their talk had been unduly
prolonged. ‘I shall get just the good I said a few moments

260 The Portrait of a Lady