Vanderbank gave a headshake that was both restrictive and indulgent. “I must live into it a little. Your offer has been before me only these few minutes, and it’s too soon for me to commit myself to anything whatever. Except,” he added gallantly, “to my gratitude.”
Mr. Longdon, at this, on the divan, got up, as Vanderbank had previously done, under the spring of emotion; only, unlike Vanderbank, he still stood there, his hands in his pockets and his face, a little paler, directed straight. There was disappointment in him even before he spoke. “You’ve no strong enough impulse—?”
His friend met him with admirable candour. “Wouldn’t it seem that if I had I would by this time have taken the jump?”
“Without waiting, you mean, for anybody’s money?” Mr. Longdon cultivated for a little a doubt. “Of course she has struck one as—till now—tremendously young.”
Vanderbank looked about once more for matches and occupied a time with relighting. “Till now—yes. But it’s not,” he pursued, “only because she’s so young that—for each of us, and for dear old Mitchy too—she’s so interesting.” Mr. Longdon had restlessly stepped down, and Vanderbank’s eyes followed him till he stopped again. “I make out that in spite of what you said to begin with you’re conscious of a certain pressure.”
“In the matter of time? Oh yes, I do want it DONE. That,” Nanda’s patron simply explained, “is why I myself put on the screw.” He spoke with the ring of impatience. “I want her got out.”
“‘Out’?”
“Out of her mother’s house.”
Vanderbank laughed though—more immediately—he had coloured. “Why, her mother’s house is just where I see her!”
“Precisely; and if it only weren’t we might get on faster.”