"Hullo! Back?" queried Paul. "What happened, Gussie?"
No answer.
"Oh come on," said Paul, "what did she say? Did you get rid of her easily?"
"All this fuss about beastly females," muttered Strether. Then he flung himself back in his chair and half bellowed: "She wasn't there!"
Paul could have screamed. It was irresistibly comic, but he maintained his composure by an effort. "Not there!" he exclaimed. "What do you mean?"
The other explained. Paul suggested that she might have been kept at home. Hadn't he, Strether, left the Bridge a bit too soon? Strether emphatically thought not, and gloom descended upon him. What if she wrote again? What if the porters spotted her hanging around? What if—but further speculation was cut off, the wooden stairs betraying approaching visitors. Manning and Donaldson came in together.
"Hullo, Gus Strether," cried the latter noisily, "where've you been? We've been searching the place for you."
"Shut up," growled Strether suspiciously.
Manning smiled at both of them. "What a bally row you do make, Donaldson," he said. "Can you give us some coffee, Kestern? Look here, I thought those verses of yours the other night jolly good."
The talk drifted into literature, but ten minutes later there was a further knock on the door. "Come in," called Paul.