“Do you know what I wish?” he went on. “I wish Mrs. Newsome herself could have a look.”
She stared, missing a little his logic. “It would make a difference?”
Her tone was so earnest that as he continued to look about he laughed. “It might!”
“But you’ve told her, you tell me—”
“All about you? Yes, a wonderful story. But there’s all the indescribable—what one gets only on the spot.”
“Thank you!” she charmingly and sadly smiled.
“It’s all about me here,” he freely continued. “Mrs. Newsome feels things.”
But she seemed doomed always to come back to doubt. “No one feels so much as you. No—not any one.”
“So much the worse then for every one. It’s very easy.”
They were by this time in the antechamber, still alone together, as she hadn’t rung for a servant. The antechamber was high and square, grave and suggestive too, a little cold and slippery even in summer, and with a few old prints that were precious, Strether divined, on the walls. He stood in the middle, slightly lingering, vaguely directing his glasses, while, leaning against the door-post of the room, she gently pressed her cheek to the side of the recess. “You would have been a friend.”