Page:The Ambassadors (London, Methuen & Co., 1903).djvu/150

144 The effect of Strether's talk about them with Miss Gostrey had been quite to consecrate his reluctance to pry; some thing in the very air of Chad's silence—judged in the light of that talk—offered it to him as a reserve he could markedly match. It shrouded them about with he scarce knew what—a consideration, a distinction; he was in the presence, at any rate—so far as it placed him there—of ladies, and the one thing that was definite for him was that they themselves should be, to the extent of his responsibility, in the presence of a gentleman. Was it because they were very beautiful, very clever, or even very good—was it for one of these reasons that Chad was, so to speak, nursing his effect? Did he wish to spring them, in the Woollett phrase, with a fuller force—to confound his critic, slight though as yet the criticism, with some form of merit exquisitely incalculable? The most he had, at all events, asked of his companion was whether the persons in question were French, and that inquiry had been but a proper comment on the sound of their name. "Yes. That is, no!" had been Chad's reply, but he had immediately added that their English was the most charming in the world, so that if Strether were wanting an excuse for not getting on with them he wouldn't in the least find one. Never, in fact, had Strether—in the mood into which the place had quickly launched him—felt for himself less the need of an excuse. Those he might have found would have been at the worst all for the others, the people before him, in whose liberty to be as they were he was aware that he positively rejoiced. His fellow-guests were multiplying, and these things, their liberty, their intensity, their variety, their conditions at large, were in fusion in the admirable medium of the scene.

The place itself was a great impression—a small pavilion, clear-faced and sequestered, an effect of polished parquet, of fine white panel and spare, sallow gilt, of decoration delicate and rare, in the heart of the Faubourg St.-Germain and on the edge of a cluster of gardens attached to old, noble houses. Far back from streets and unsuspected by crowds, reached by a long passage and a quiet court, it was as striking to the unprepared mind, he immediately saw, as a treasure dug up; giving him,