"It's not her encouraging Warburton that I complain of; it's her
sending him away. I want particularly to see him. Do you suppose
she thought I would make him faithless?" the Countess continued
with audacious insistence. "However, she's only keeping him, one
can feel that. The house is full of him there; he's quite in the
air. Oh yes, he has left traces; I'm sure I shall see him yet."

"Well," said Henrietta after a little, with one of those
inspirations which had made the fortune of her letters to the
Interviewer, "perhaps he'll be more successful with you than with
Isabel!"

When she told her friend of the offer she had made Ralph Isabel
replied that she could have done nothing that would have pleased
her more. It had always been her faith that at bottom Ralph and
this young woman were made to understand each other. "I don't
care whether he understands me or not," Henrietta declared. "The
great thing is that he shouldn't die in the cars."

"He won't do that," Isabel said, shaking her head with an
extension of faith.

"He won't if I can help it. I see you want us all to go. I don't
know what you want to do."

"I want to be alone," said Isabel.

"You won't be that so long as you've so much company at home."