Page 577 - the-portrait-of-a-lady

ing asked their visitor to excuse him, left the room.
‘I came to see you, thinking you would have come in; and
as you hadn’t I waited for you,’ Madame Merle said.
‘Didn’t he ask you to sit down?’ Isabel asked with a
smile.
Madame Merle looked about her. ‘Ah, it’s very true; I was
going away.’
‘You must stay now.’
‘Certainly. I came for a reason; I’ve something on my
mind.’
‘I’ve told you that before,’ Isabel said-”that it takes some-
thing extraordinary to bring you to this house.’
‘And you know what I’ve told you; that whether I come
or whether I stay away, I’ve always the same motive-the af-
fection I bear you.’
‘Yes, you’ve told me that.’
‘You look just now as if you didn’t believe it,’ said Ma-
dame Merle.
‘Ah,’ Isabel answered, ‘the profundity of your motives,
that’s the last thing I doubt!’
‘You doubt sooner of the sincerity of my words.’
Isabel shook her head gravely. ‘I know you’ve always been
kind to me.’
‘As often as you would let me. You don’t always take it;
then one has to let you alone. It’s not to do you a kindness,
however, that I’ve come to-day; it’s quite another affair. I’ve
come to get rid of a trouble of my own-to make it over to
you. I’ve been talking to your husband about it.’
‘I’m surprised at that; he doesn’t like troubles.’

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