"Why, two months, or whatever the time was, ago, did you so suddenly dash off?
The reason you afterwards gave me for having kept away three weeks wasn't the real one." She recalled.

"I never supposed you believed it was.

Yet," she continued, "if you didn't guess it that was just what helped you." He looked away from her on this; he indulged, so far as space permitted, in one of his slow absences.

"I've often thought of it, but never to feel that I could guess it.

And you see the consideration with which I've treated you in never asking till now." "Now then why DO you ask ?" "To show you how I miss you when you're not here, and what it does for me." "It doesn't seem to have done," she laughed, "all it might! However," she added, "if you've really never guessed the truth I'll tell it you." "I've never guessed it," Strether declared.
"Never ?" "Never." "Well then I dashed off, as you say, so as not to have the confusion of being there if Marie de Vionnet should tell you anything to my detriment." He looked as if he considerably doubted.