What her claim, as she made it, represented for him--that he couldn't help betraying, if only as a consequence of the effect of the word itself, her repeated distinct "know, know," on his nerves.

She was capable of being sorry for his nerves at a time when he should need them for dining out, pompously, rather responsibly, without his heart in it; yet she was not to let that prevent her using, with all economy, so precious a chance for supreme clearness.

"I didn't force this upon you, you must recollect, and it probably wouldn't have happened for you if you hadn't come in." "Ah," said the Prince, "I was liable to come in, you know." "I didn't think you were this evening." "And why not ?" "Well," she answered, "you have many liabilities--of different sorts." With which she recalled what she had said to Fanny Assingham.

"And then you're so deep." It produced in his features, in spite of his control of them, one of those quick plays of expression, the shade of a grimace, that testified as nothing else did to his race.

"It's you, cara, who are deep." Which, after an instant, she had accepted from him; she could so feel at last that it was true.