VI

He allowed several days to pass without going back; it was of a sublime
suitability to appear to regard his friend's frankness during their last
interview as a general invitation. The sacrifice cost him a great
effort, for hopeless passions are exactly not the most patient; and he
had moreover a constant fear that if, as he believed, deep within the
circle round which he could only hover, the hour of supreme explanations
had come, the magic of her magnanimity might convert M. de Mauves.
Vicious men, it was abundantly recorded, had been so converted as to be
acceptable to God, and the something divine in this lady's composition
would sanctify any means she should choose to employ. Her means, he kept
repeating, were no business of his, and the essence of his admiration
ought to be to allow her to do as she liked; but he felt as if he should
turn away into a world out of which most of the joy had departed if she
should like, after all, to see nothing more in his interest in her than
might be repaid by mere current social coin.

When at last he went back he found to his vexation that he was to run
the gauntlet of Madame Clairin's officious hospitality. It was one of
the first mornings of perfect summer, and the drawing-room, through the
open windows, was flooded with such a confusion of odours and bird-notes
as might warrant the hope that Madame de Mauves would renew with him for
an hour or two the exploration of the forest. Her sister-in-law,
however, whose hair was not yet dressed, emerged like a brassy discord
in a maze of melody. At the same moment the servant returned with his
mistress's regrets; she begged to be excused, she was indisposed and
unable to see Mr. Longmore. The young man knew just how disappointed he
looked and just what Madame Clairin thought of it, and this