Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 2 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/146

THE AMERICAN "I shall never go over and see it," she answered with a smile.

"Well, why should n't you?"

"We don't travel; especially so far."

"But you go away sometimes; you don't always stay right here?"

"I go away in summer—a little way, to the country."

"He wanted to ask her something more, something personal and going rather far—he hardly knew what. "Don't you find it rather lifeless here," he said; "so far from the street?" Rather "lonesome" he was going to say, but he deflected nervously, for discretion, and then felt his term an aggravation.

"Yes, it's very lifeless, if you mean very quiet; but that's exactly what we like."

"Ah, that's exactly what you like," he repeated. He was touched by her taking it so.

"Besides, I've lived here all my life."

"Lived here all your life," Newman found he could but echo.

"I was born here, and my father was born here before me, and my grandfather and my great-grandfathers. Were they not, Valentin?—and she appealed to her brother.

"Yes, it seems a condition of our being born at all," the young man smiled as he rose and threw the remnant of his cigarette into the fire. He remained leaning against the chimney-piece, and an observer would have guessed that he wished to take a better look at their guest, whom he covertly examined while he stroked his moustache. 116