Page 60 - the-portrait-of-a-lady

‘It’s not yet a quarter to eight,’ said Ralph.
‘I must allow for his impatience,’ Mrs. Touchett an-
swered.
Ralph knew what to think of his father’s impatience; but,
making no rejoinder, he offered his mother his arm. This
put it in his power, as they descended together, to stop her a
moment on the middle landing of the staircase—the broad,
low, wide-armed staircase of time-blackened oak which was
one of the most striking features of Gardencourt. ‘You’ve no
plan of marrying her?’ he smiled.
‘Marrying her? I should be sorry to play her such a trick!
But apart from that, she’s perfectly able to marry herself.
She has every facility.’
‘Do you mean to say she has a husband picked out?’
‘I don’t know about a husband, but there’s a young man
in Boston-!’
Ralph went on; he had no desire to hear about the young
man in Boston. ‘As my father says, they’re always engaged!’
His mother had told him that he must satisfy his curi-
osity at the source, and it soon became evident he should
not want for occasion. He had a good deal of talk with his
young kinswoman when the two had been left together in
the drawing-room. Lord Warburton, who had ridden over
from his own house, some ten miles distant, remounted and
took his departure before dinner; and an hour after this meal
was ended Mr. and Mrs. Touchett, who appeared to have
quite emptied the measure of their forms, withdrew, under
the valid pretext of fatigue, to their respective apartments.
The young man spent an hour with his cousin; though she

60 The Portrait of a Lady