Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 1 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/156

 Gloriani had possessed himself of the photograph again and was looking at it curiously. "Ah, you 'll have been young, par exemple—you 'll have been young!" he exclaimed with almost confessed envy. "It 's the only case I 've ever known of genius in the cradle."

The two sculptors continued to play with paradox after dinner, and Rowland left them at it where, in a corner of the drawing-room, the vague white presence of Roderick's Eve, above them in the shaded lamplight, might have been that of the guardian angel of the young idealist. Singleton was listening to Madame Grandoni, and Rowland took his place on the sofa near Miss Blanchard. They had a good deal of familiar desultory talk; every now and then Madame Grandoni turned round at them. Miss Blanchard at last asked Rowland certain questions about Roderick—who he was, where he came from, whether it was true, as she had heard, that Rowland had discovered him and brought him out at his own expense. Rowland answered her questions; to the last he gave a vague affirmative. Finally, after a pause, looking at him, "You 're most awfully splendid, you know to be so generous," Miss Blanchard said. The tribute was offered with extreme directness, but it brought to Rowland's sense neither delight nor confusion. He had heard something like it, and yet so unlike, before; he suddenly remembered the grave sincerity with which Mary Garland had told him he was generous while he strolled with her in the woods on the day of Roderick's picnic. They had 122