Chapter 34

Summary

HIS purpose had been to see Chad the next day, and he had prefigured seeing him by an early call; having, in general, never stood on ceremony in respect to visits in the Boulevard Malesherbes. It had been more often natural for him to go there than for Chad to come to the small hotel, the attractions of which were scant; yet it nevertheless, at present, at the eleventh hour, did suggest itself to Strether to begin by giving the young man a chance. It struck him that, in the inevitable course, Chad would be “round,” as Waymarsh used to say—Waymarsh who already, somehow, seemed long ago. He hadn't come the day before, because it had been arranged between them that Mme. de Vionnet should see their friend first; but now that this passage had taken place he would present himself and their friend wouldn't have long to wait. Strether assumed, he became aware, on this reasoning, that the interesting parties to the arrangement would have met betimes, and that the more interesting of the two—as she was after all—would have communicated to the other the issue of her appeal. Chad would know without delay that his mother's messenger had been with her, and, though it was perhaps not quite easy to see how she could qualify what had occurred, he would at least have been sufficiently advised to feel he could go on. The day, however, brought, early or late, no word from him, and Strether felt, as the result of this, that a change had practically come over their intercourse. It was perhaps a premature judgment; or it only meant perhaps—how could he tell?—that the wonderful pair he protected had taken up again together the excursion he had accidentally checked. They might have gone back to the country, and gone back but with a long breath drawn; that indeed would best mark Chad's sense that violence had not awaited the presentation of Mme. de Vionnet's plea. At the end of the twenty-four hours, at the end of the fortyeight, there was still no demonstration; so that Strether filled up the time, as he had so often filled it before, by going to see Miss Gostrey.