Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 2 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/175

THE AMERICAN moving through every social office open to the genius of woman, or in other words through the whole range of exquisite hospitality. If it might be hospitality to him it would be well; if it might be hospitality for him it would be still better. She was so high yet so slight, so active yet so still, so elegant yet so simple, so present yet so withdrawn! It was this unknown quantity that figured for him as a mystery; it was what she was off the stage, as he might feel, that interested him most of all. He could not have told you what warrant he had for talking of mysteries; if it had been his habit to express himself in poetic figures he might have said that in observing her he seemed to see the vague circle sometimes attending the partly-filled disc of the moon. It was not that she was effaced, and still less that she was "shy"; she was, on the contrary, as distinct as the big figure on a banknote and of as straightforward a profession. But he was sure she had qualities as yet unguessed even by herself and that it was kept for Christopher Newman to bring out.

He had abstained for several reasons from saying some of these things to her brother. One reason was that before proceeding to any act he was always circumspect, conjectural, contemplative; he had little eagerness, as became a man who felt that whenever he really began to move he walked with long steps. And then it just pleased, it occupied and excited him, not to give his case, as he would have said, prematurely away. But one day Valentine—as Newman conveniently sounded the name—had been dining with him on the boulevard and their sociability was such 145