Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 1 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/322

 "My dear Miss Light!" Rowland murmured remonstrantly.

She gave an almost harsh little laugh. "You don't want to hear! you don't want to have to think about that!"

"Have I a right to? You need n't justify yourself."

She turned upon him a moment the quickened light of her beautiful eyes, then fell to musing again. "Is there not some novel or some play," she asked at last, "in which a beautiful wicked woman who has ensnared a young man sees his father come to her and beg her to let him go?"

"I seem to remember many—and that the wicked woman generally weeps and makes the sacrifice."

"Well, I 'll try at least to weep. But tell me," she continued, "shall you consider—admitting your proposition—that in ceasing to be nice to Mr. Hudson, so that he may go about his business, I do something magnanimous, heroic, sublime, something with a fine name like that?"

Rowland, elated with the prospect of gaining his point, was about to reply that she would deserve the finest name in the world; but he instantly suspected that this tone would n't please her. Besides, it would n't express his meaning. "You do something I shall greatly respect," he contented himself with saying.

She made no answer and in a moment she beckoned to her maid. "What have I to do to-day?" she asked.

Assunta meditated. "Eh, it's a very busy day! Fortunately I 've a better memory than the 288