Page 562 - the-portrait-of-a-lady

‘The doctor’s consent will spoil it. I never have it when I
can help it.’
‘What then does Mrs. Osmond think?’ Ralph’s friend de-
manded.
‘I’ve not told her. She’ll probably say that Rome’s too cold
and even offer to go with me to Catania. She’s capable of
that.’
‘In your place I should like it.’
‘Her husband won’t like it.’
‘Ah well, I can fancy that; though it seems to me you’re
not bound to mind his likings. They’re his affair.’
‘I don’t want to make any more trouble between them,’
said Ralph.
‘Is there so much already?’
‘There’s complete preparation for it. Her going off with
me would make the explosion. Osmond isn’t fond of his
wife’s cousin.’
‘Then of course he’d make a row. But won’t he make a
row if you stop here?’
‘That’s what I want to see. He made one the last time I
was in Rome, and then I thought it my duty to disappear.
Now I think it’s my duty to stop and defend her.’
‘My dear Touchett, your defensive powers-!’ Lord War-
burton began with a smile. But he saw something in his
companion’s face that checked him.
‘Your duty, in these premises, seems to me rather a nice
question,’ he observed instead.
Ralph for a short time answered nothing. ‘It’s true my
defensive powers are small,’ he returned at last; ‘but as my

562 The Portrait of a Lady