I mean away from my eye." Before Chad could speak, however, he had taken himself up.

"I AM, certainly," he laughed, "prodigious." "Yes, you spoil us for all the stupid--!" This might have been, on Chad's part, in its extreme emphasis, almost too freely extravagant; but it was full, plainly enough, of the intention of comfort, it carried with it a protest against doubt and a promise, positively, of performance.

Picking up a hat in the vestibule he came out with his friend, came downstairs, took his arm, affectionately, as to help and guide him, treating him if not exactly as aged and infirm, yet as a noble eccentric who appealed to tenderness, and keeping on with him, while they walked, to the next corner and the next.

"You needn't tell me, you needn't tell me!"-- this again as they proceeded, he wished to make Strether feel.

What he needn't tell him was now at last, in the geniality of separation, anything at all it concerned him to know.