“Because I don’t want to.”
Chad thought. “Don’t desire her presence here?”
Strether faced the question, and his answer was the more emphatic. “Don’t put it off, my dear boy, on me!”
“Well—I see what you mean. I’m sure you’d behave beautifully but you don’t want to see her. So I won’t play you that trick.’
“Ah,” Strether declared, “I shouldn’t call it a trick. You’ve a perfect right, and it would be perfectly straight of you.” Then he added in a different tone: “You’d have moreover, in the person of Madame de Vionnet, a very interesting relation prepared for her.”
Their eyes, on this proposition, continued to meet, but Chad’s pleasant and bold, never flinched for a moment. He got up at last and he said something with which Strether was struck. “She wouldn’t understand her, but that makes no difference. Madame de Vionnet would like to see her. She’d like to be charming to her. She believes she could work it.”
Strether thought a moment, affected by this, but finally turning away. “She couldn’t!”
“You’re quite sure?” Chad asked.
“Well, risk it if you like!”
Strether, who uttered this with serenity, had urged a plea for their now getting into the air; but the young man still waited. “Have you sent your answer?”