Shocks, however, from these quite different depths, were not what he saw reason to apprehend; what he rather seemed to himself not yet to have measured was something that, seeking a name for it, he would have called the quantity of confidence reposed in him. He had stood still, at many a moment of the previous month, with the thought, freshly determined or renewed, of the general expectationto define it roughlyof which he was the subject. What was singular was that it seemed not so much an expectation of anything in particular as a large, bland, blank assumption of merits almost beyond notation, of essential quality and value. It was as if he had been some old embossed coin, of a purity of gold no longer used, stamped with glorious arms, mediaeval, wonderful, of which the worth in mere modern change, sovereigns and half crowns, would be great enough, but as to which, since there were finer ways of using it, such taking to pieces was superfluous. That was the image for the security in which it was open to him to rest; he was to constitute a possession, yet was to escape being reduced to his component parts. What would this mean but that, practically, he was never to be tried or tested? What would it mean but that, if they didnt change him, they really wouldnt knowhe wouldnt know himselfhow many pounds, shillings and pence he had to give? These at any rate, for the present, were unanswerable questions; all that was before him was that he was invested with attributes. He was taken seriously. Lost there in the white mist was the seriousness in them that made them so take him. It was even in Mrs. Assingham, in spite of her having, as she had frequently shown, a more mocking spirit. All he could say as yet was that he had done nothing, so far as to break any charm. What should he do if he were to ask her frankly this afternoon what was, morally speaking, behind their veil. It would come to asking what they expected him to do. She would answer him probably: Oh, you know, its what we expect you to be! on which he would have no resource but to deny his knowledge. Would that break the spell, his saying he had no idea? What idea in fact could he have? He also took himself seriouslymade a point of it; but it wasnt simply a question of fancy and pretension. His own estimate he saw ways, at one time and another, of dealing with: but theirs, sooner or later, say what they might, would put him to the practical proof. As the practical proof, accordingly, would naturally be proportionate to the cluster of his attributes, one arrived at a scale that he was not, honestly, the man to calculate. Who but a billionaire could say what was fair exchange for a billion? That measure was the shrouded object, but he felt really, as his cab stopped in Cadogan Place, a little nearer the shroud. He promised himself, virtually, to give the latter a twitch.
II
Theyre not good days, you know, he had said to Fanny Assingham after declaring himself grateful for finding her, and then, with his cup of tea, putting her in possession of the latest newsthe documents signed an hour ago, de part et dautre, and the telegram from his backers, who had reached Paris the morning before, and who, pausing there a little, poor dears, seemed to think the whole thing a tremendous lark. Were very simple folk, mere country cousins compared with you, he had also observed, and Paris, for my sister and her husband, is the end of the world. London therefore will be more or less another planet. It has always been, as with so many of us, quite their Mecca, but this is their first real caravan; theyve mainly known old England as a shop for articles in india-rubber and leather, in which theyve dressed themselves as much as possible. Which all means, however, that youll see them, all of them, wreathed in smiles. We must be very easy with them. Maggies too wonderfulher preparations are on a scale! She insists on taking in the sposi and my uncle. The others will come to me. Ive been engaging their rooms at the hotel, and, with all those solemn signatures of an hour ago, that brings the case home to me.
Do you mean youre afraid? his hostess had amusedly asked.
Terribly afraid. Ive now but to wait to see the monster come. Theyre not good days; theyre neither one thing nor the other. Ive really got nothing, yet Ive everything to lose. One doesnt know what still may happen.
The way she laughed at him was for an instant almost irritating; it came out, for his fancy, from behind the white curtain. It was a sign, that is, of her deep serenity, which worried instead of soothing him. And to be soothed, after all, to be tided over, in his mystic impatience, to be told what he could understand and believethat was what he had come for. Marriage then, said Mrs. Assingham, is what you call the monster? I admit its a fearful thing at the best; but, for heavens sake, if thats what youre thinking of, dont run away from it.
Ah, to run away from it would be to run away from you, the Prince replied; and Ive already told you often enough how I depend on you to see me through. He so liked the way she took this, from the corner of her sofa, that he gave his sincerityfor it WAS sincerityfuller expression. Im starting on the great voyageacross the unknown sea; my ships all rigged and appointed, the cargos stowed away and the company complete. But what seems the matter with me is that I cant sail alone; my ship must be one of a pair, must have, in the waste of waters, awhat do you call it?a consort. I dont ask you to stay on board with me, but I must keep your sail in sight for orientation. I dont in the least myself know, I assure you, the points of the compass. But with a lead I can perfectly follow. You MUST be my lead.
How can you be sure, she asked, where I should take you?
Why, from your having brought me safely thus far. I should never have got here without you. Youve provided the ship itself, and, if youve not quite seen me aboard, youve attended me, ever so kindly, to the dock. Your own vessel is, all conveniently, in the next berth, and you cant desert me now.
She showed him again her amusement, which struck him even as excessive, as if, to his surprise, he made her also a little nervous; she treated him in fine as if he were not uttering truths, but making pretty figures for her diversion. My vessel, dear Prince? she smiled. What vessel, in the world, have I? This little house is all our ship, Bobs and mineand thankful we are, now, to have it. Weve wandered far, living, as you may say, from hand to mouth, without rest for the soles of our feet. But the time has come for us at last to draw in.
He made at this, the young man, an indignant protest. You talk about restits too selfish!when youre just launching me on adventures?
She shook her head with her kind lucidity. Not adventuresheaven forbid! Youve had yoursas Ive had mine; and my idea has been, all along, that we should neither of us begin again. My own last, precisely, has been doing for you all you so prettily mention. But it consists simply in having conducted you to rest. You talk about ships, but theyre not the comparison. Your tossings are overyoure practically IN port. The port, she concluded, of the Golden Isles.
He looked about, to put himself more in relation with the place; then, after an hesitation, seemed to speak certain words instead of certain others. Oh, I know where I AM! I do decline to be left, but what I came for, of course, was to thank you. If to-day has seemed, for the first time, the end of preliminaries, I feel how little there would have been any at all without you. The first were wholly yours.
She showed him again her amusement, which struck him even as excessive, as if, to his surprise, he made her also a little nervous; she treated him in fine as if he were not uttering truths, but making pretty figures for her diversion. My vessel, dear Prince? she smiled. What vessel, in the world, have I? This little house is all our ship, Bobs and mineand thankful we are, now, to have it. Weve wandered far, living, as you may say, from hand to mouth, without rest for the soles of our feet. But the time has come for us at last to draw in.
He made at this, the young man, an indignant protest. You talk about restits too selfish!when youre just launching me on adventures?
She shook her head with her kind lucidity. Not adventuresheaven forbid! Youve had yoursas Ive had mine; and my idea has been, all along, that we should neither of us begin again. My own last, precisely, has been doing for you all you so prettily mention. But it consists simply in having conducted you to rest. You talk about ships, but theyre not the comparison. Your tossings are overyoure practically IN port. The port, she concluded, of the Golden Isles.
He looked about, to put himself more in relation with the place; then, after an hesitation, seemed to speak certain words instead of certain others. Oh, I know where I AM! I do decline to be left, but what I came for, of course, was to thank you. If to-day has seemed, for the first time, the end of preliminaries, I feel how little there would have been any at all without you. The first were wholly yours.
Well, said Mrs. Assingham, they were remarkably easy. Ive seen them, Ive HAD them, she smiled, more difficult. Everything, you must feel, went of itself. So, you must feel, everything still goes.
The Prince quickly agreed. Oh, beautifully! But you had the conception.
Ah, Prince, so had you!
He looked at her harder a moment. You had it first. You had it most.
She returned his look as if it had made her wonder. I LIKED it, if thats what you mean. But you liked it surely yourself. I protest, that I had easy work with you. I had only at lastwhen I thought it was timeto speak for you.
All that is quite true. But youre leaving me, all the same, youre leaving meyoure washing your hands of me, he went on. However, that wont be easy; I wont BE left. And he had turned his eyes about again, taking in the pretty room that she had just described as her final refuge, the place of peace for a world-worn couple, to which she had lately retired with Bob. I shall keep this spot in sight. Say what you will, I shall need you. Im not, you know, he declared, going to give you up for anybody.
If youre afraidwhich of course youre notare you trying to make me the same? she asked after a moment.
He waited a minute too, then answered her with a question. You say you liked it, your undertaking to make my engagement possible. It remains beautiful for me that you did; its charming and unforgettable. But, still more, its mysterious and wonderful. WHY, you dear delightful woman, did you like it?
I scarce know what to make, she said, of such an inquiry. If you havent by this time found out yourself, what meaning can anything I say have for you? Dont you really after all feel, she added while nothing came from himarent you conscious every minute, of the perfection of the creature of whom Ive put you into possession?
Every minutegratefully conscious. But thats exactly the ground of my question. It wasnt only a matter of your handing me overit was a matter of your handing her. It was a matter of HER fate still more than of mine. You thought all the good of her that one woman can think of another, and yet, by your account, you enjoyed assisting at her risk.
She had kept her eyes on him while he spoke, and this was what, visibly, determined a repetition for her. Are you trying to frighten me?
Ah, thats a foolish viewI should be too vulgar. You apparently cant understand either my good faith or my humility. Im awfully humble, the young man insisted; thats the way Ive been feeling to-day, with everything so finished and ready. And you wont take me for serious.
She continued to face him as if he really troubled her a little. Oh, you deep old Italians!
There you are, he returnedits what I wanted you to come to. Thats the responsible note.
Yes, she went onif youre humble you MUST be dangerous.
She had a pause while he only smiled; then she said: I dont in the least want to lose sight of you. But even if I did I shouldnt think it right.
Thank you for thatits what I needed of you. Im sure, after all, that the more youre with me the more I shall understand. Its the only thing in the world I want. Im excellent, I really think, all roundexcept that Im stupid. I can do pretty well anything I SEE. But Ive got to see it first. And he pursued his demonstration. I dont in the least mind its having to be shown mein fact I like that better. Therefore it is that I want, that I shall always want, your eyes. Through THEM I wish to lookeven at any risk of their showing me what I maynt like. For then, he wound up, I shall know. And of that I shall never be afraid.
She might quite have been waiting to see what he would come to, but she spoke with a certain impatience. What on earth are you talking about?
But he could perfectly say: Of my real, honest fear of being off some day, of being wrong, WITHOUT knowing it. Thats what I shall always trust you forto tell me when I am. Nowith you people its a sense. We havent got itnot as you have. Therefore! But he had said enough. Ecco! he simply smiled.
It was not to be concealed that he worked upon her, but of course she had always liked him. I should be interested, she presently remarked, to see some sense you dont possess.
Well, he produced one on the spot. The moral, dear Mrs. Assingham. I mean, always, as you others consider it. Ive of course something that in our poor dear backward old Rome sufficiently passes for it. But its no more like yours than the tortuous stone staircasehalf-ruined into the bargain!in some castle of our quattrocento is like the `lightning elevator in one of Mr. Ververs fifteen-storey buildings. Your moral sense works by steamit sends you up like a rocket. Ours is slow and steep and unlighted, with so many of the steps missing thatwell, that its as short, in almost any case, to turn round and come down again.
Trusting, Mrs. Assingham smiled, to get up some other way?
Yesor not to have to get up at all. However, he added, I told you that at the beginning.
Machiavelli! she simply exclaimed.
You do me too much honour. I wish indeed I had his genius. However, if you really believe I have his perversity you wouldnt say it. But its all right, he gaily enough concluded; I shall always have you to come to.
On this, for a little, they sat face to face; after which, without comment, she asked him if he would have more tea. All she would give him, he promptly signified; and he developed, making her laugh, his idea that the tea of the English race was somehow their morality, made, with boiling water, in a little pot, so that the more of it one drank the more moral one would become. His drollery served as a transition, and she put to him several questions about his sister and the others, questions as to what Bob, in particular, Colonel Assingham, her husband, could do for the arriving gentlemen, whom, by the Princes leave, he would immediately go to see. He was funny, while they talked, about his own people too, whom he described, with anecdotes of their habits, imitations of their manners and prophecies of their conduct, as more rococo than anything Cadogan Place would ever have known. This, Mrs. Assingham professed, was exactly what would endear them to her, and that, in turn, drew from her visitor a fresh declaration of all the comfort of his being able so to depend on her. He had been with her, at this point, some twenty minutes; but he had paid her much longer visits, and he stayed now as if to make his attitude prove his appreciation. He stayed moreoverTHAT was really the sign of the hourin spite of the nervous unrest that had brought him and that had in truth much rather fed on the scepticism by which she had apparently meant to soothe it. She had not soothed him, and there arrived, remarkably, a moment when the cause of her failure gleamed out. He had not frightened her, as she called ithe felt that; yet she was herself not at ease. She had been nervous, though trying to disguise it; the sight of him, following on the announcement of his name, had shown her as disconcerted. This conviction, for the young man, deepened and sharpened; yet with the effect, too, of making him glad in spite of it. It was as if, in calling, he had done even better than he intended. For it was somehow IMPORTANTthat was what it wasthat there should be at this hour something the matter with Mrs. Assingham, with whom, in all their acquaintance, so considerable now, there had never been the least little thing the matter. To wait thus and watch for it was to know, of a truth, that there was something the matter with HIM; since strangely, with so little to go uponhis heart had positively begun to beat to the tune of suspense. It fairly befell at last, for a climax, that they almost ceased to pretendto pretend, that is, to cheat each other with forms. The unspoken had come up, and there was a crisisneither could have said how long it lastedduring which they were reduced, for all interchange, to looking at each other on quite an inordinate scale. They might at this moment, in their positively portentous stillness, have been keeping it up for a wager, sitting for their photograph or even enacting a tableau-vivant.