Page:The Golden Bowl (Scribner, New York, 1909), Volume 1.djvu/329

THE PRINCE definitely began with, it had soon irrepressibly shaped itself. It was the meaning of the question she had put to him as soon as they were alone—even though indeed, as from not quite understanding, he had not then directly replied; it was the meaning of everything else, down to the conscious quaintness of her rickety "growler" and the conscious humility of her toneless dress. It had helped him a little, the question of these eccentricities, to let her immediate appeal pass without an answer. He could ask her instead what had become of her carriage and why above all she wasn't using it in such weather.

"It's just because of the weather," she explained. "It's my little idea. It makes me feel as I used to when I could do as I liked."