The tidings he brought her on this second occasion were moreover such as would help him to make surer still.
She showed at first none the less as only amused.

"You say there are two?
An attachment to them both then would, I suppose, almost necessarily be innocent." Our friend took the point, but he had his clue.

"Mayn't he be still in the stage of not quite knowing which of them, mother or daughter, he likes best ?" She gave it more thought.

"Oh it must be the daughter--at his age." "Possibly.

Yet what do we know," Strether asked, "about hers?
She may be old enough." "Old enough for what ?" "Why to marry Chad.