Page 539 - the-portrait-of-a-lady

She just hesitated. ‘Yes-a good deal.’
‘I don’t mean for the worse, of course; and yet how can I
say for the better?’
‘I think I shall have no scruple in saying that to you,’ she
bravely returned.
‘Ah well, for me-it’s a long time. It would be a pity there
shouldn’t be something to show for it.’ They sat down and
she asked him about his sisters, with other enquiries of a
somewhat perfunctory kind. He answered her questions as
if they interested him, and in a few moments she saw-or be-
lieved she saw-that he would press with less of his whole
weight than of yore. Time had breathed upon his heart and,
without chilling it, given it a relieved sense of having taken
the air. Isabel felt her usual esteem for Time rise at a bound.
Her friend’s manner was certainly that of a contented man,
one who would rather like people, or like her at least, to
know him for such.
‘There’s something I must tell you without more delay,’
he resumed.
‘I’ve brought Ralph Touchett with me.’
‘Brought him with you?’ Isabel’s surprise was great.
‘He’s at the hotel; he was too tired to come out and has
gone to bed.’
‘I’ll go to see him,’ she immediately said.
‘That’s exactly what I hoped you’d do. I had an idea you
hadn’t seen much of him since your marriage, that in fact
your relations were a-a little more formal. That’s why I hes-
itated-like an awkward Briton.’
‘I’m as fond of Ralph as ever,’ Isabel answered. ‘But why

539