proposed to the Countess Gemini that they should go into the garden, and the Countess, rising and shaking out her feathers, began to rustle toward the door. ‘Poor Miss Archer!’ she exclaimed, surveying the other group with expressive compassion. ‘She has been brought quite into the family.’

‘Miss Archer can certainly have nothing but sympathy for a family to which you belong,’ Mr Osmond answered, with a laugh which, though it had something of a mocking ring, had also a finer patience.

‘I don’t know what you mean by that! I’m sure she’ll see no harm in me but what you tell her. I’m better than he says, Miss Archer,’ the Countess went on. ‘I’m only rather an idiot and a bore. Is that all he has said? Ah then, you keep him in good-humour. Has he opened on one of his favourite subjects? I give you notice that there are two or three that he treats à fond.⁵ In that case you had better take off your bonnet.’

‘I don’t think I know what Mr Osmond’s favourite subjects are,’ said Isabel, who had risen to her feet.

The Countess assumed for an instant an attitude of intense meditation, pressing one of her hands, with the finger-tips gathered together, to her forehead. ‘I’ll tell you in a moment. One’s Machiavelli;⁶ the other’s Vittoria Colonna;⁷ the next is Metastasio.’⁸

‘Ah, with me,’ said Madame Merle, passing her arm into the Countess Gemini’s as if to guide her course to the garden, ‘Mr Osmond’s never so historical.’

‘Oh you,’ the Countess answered as they moved away, ‘you yourself are Machiavelli—you yourself are Vittoria Colonna!’

‘We shall hear next that poor Madame Merle is Metastasio!’ Gilbert Osmond resignedly sighed.

Isabel had got up on the assumption that they too were to go into the garden; but her host stood there with no apparent inclination to leave the room, his hands in the pockets of his jacket and his daughter, who had now locked her arm into one of his own, clinging to him and looking up while her eyes moved from his own face to Isabel’s. Isabel waited, with a certain unuttered contentedness, to have her movements directed; she liked Mr Osmond’s talk, his company: she had what always gave her a very private thrill, the consciousness of a new relation. Through the open doors of the great room she saw Madame Merle and the Countess stroll across the fine grass of the garden; then she turned, and her eyes wandered over the things scattered about her. The understanding had been that Mr Osmond should show her his treasures; his pictures and cabinets all looked like treasures. Isabel after a moment went toward one of the pictures to see it better; but just as she had done so he said to her abruptly: ‘Miss Archer, what do you think of my sister?’

She faced him with some surprise. ‘Ah, don’t ask me that—I’ve seen your sister too little.’

‘Yes, you’ve seen her very little; but you must have observed that there is not a great deal of her to see. What do you think of our family tone?’ he went on with his cool smile. ‘I should like to know how it strikes a fresh, unprejudiced mind. I know what you’re going to say—you’ve had almost no observation of it. Of course this is only a glimpse. But just take notice, in future, if you have a chance. I sometimes think we’ve got into a rather bad way, living off here among things and people not our own, without responsibilities or attachments, with nothing to hold us together or keep us up; marrying foreigners, forming artificial tastes, playing tricks with our natural mission. Let me add, though, that I say that much more for myself than for my sister. She’s a very honest lady—more so than she seems. She’s rather unhappy, and as she’s not of a serious turn she doesn’t tend to show it tragically: she shows it comically instead. She has got a horrid husband, though I’m not sure she makes the best of him. Of course, however, a horrid husband’s an awkward thing. Madame Merle gives her excellent advice, but it’s a good deal like giving a child a dictionary to learn language with. He can look out the words, but he can’t put them together. My sister needs a grammar, but unfortunately she’s not grammatical. Pardon my troubling you with these