'It has always been my conviction that you are a man singularly capable of managing your own affairs, and in my own sex I have fancied that I know a counterpart...'
'Yes?...' interrogated Trist in a semi-tone, divining that he was expected to do so.
'Brenda!' said Mrs. Wylie simply.
She had crossed her hands on her lap, and as her lips framed the girl's name, she raised her head slowly and fixed her pleasant, keen glance on him. He stood with his hands clasped behind his back, leaning lightly against the corner of the mantelpiece. The single gas-jet of the old-fashioned chandelier cast a most uncompromising light upon his face; his eyes were raised, and he seemed to be contemplating the invention of a new burner.
Without detracting anything from the scrutiny to which she was subjecting him, she continued speaking.
'Now...' she said with some energy, 'Brenda is miserable.'
For some seconds his face was perfectly motionless. His eyelids did not even move. It was a triumph of inscrutability. Then he moved his lips, pursing them up in a manner expressive of thoughtfulness and doubt combined.
'Why?'
'That,' replied Mrs. Wylie, turning away, 'is exactly what I want to know.'
Trist did not appear to be in a position to supply the required information. The conversation was becoming decidedly strained, and Mrs. Wylie, while feeling her sang-froid gradually warming, as it were, noticed that there was plenty of staying-power in her companion still. He did not at that moment look like a man about to be betrayed into a hasty exposition of his inward thoughts or feelings. On motives of prudence she therefore relieved the strain.