THE WINGS OF THE DOVE
"She had nothing to ask of me—nothing, that is, but not to stay any longer. She did, to that extent, want to see me. She had supposed, at first—after he had been with her—that I had seen the propriety of taking myself off. Then, since I hadn't—seeing my propriety as I did in another way—she found, days later, that I was still there. This," said Densher, "affected her."
"Of course it affected her."
Again she struck him, for all her dignity, as glib. "If it was, somehow, for her I was still staying, she wished that to end, she wished me to know how little there was need of it. And, as a manner of farewell, she wished herself to tell me so."
"And she did tell you so?"
"Face-to-face, yes. Personally, as she desired."
"And as you of course did."
"No, Kate," he returned with all their mutual consideration; "not as I did. I hadn't desired it in the least."
"You only went to oblige her?"
"To oblige her. And of course also to oblige you."
"Oh, for myself, certainly, I'm glad."
"'Glad?'" he echoed vaguely the way it rang out.
"I mean you did quite the right thing. You did it especially in having stayed. But that was all?" Kate went on. "That you mustn't wait?"
"That was really all—and in perfect kindness."
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