'I supposed you wanted to, from your letters.'
'Then why did you think I would refuse?'
'Because that's the sort of thing women do.'
'Women—women! You know much about them!'
'I am learning something every day.'
'You haven't learned yet, apparently, to answer their letters. It's rather a surprise to me that you don't pretend not to have received mine.'
Ransom could smile now; the opportunity to vent the exasperation that had been consuming him almost restored his good humour. 'What could I say? You overwhelmed me. Besides, I did answer one of them.'
'One of them? You speak as if I had written you a dozen!' Mrs. Luna cried.
'I thought that was your contention—that you had done me the honour to address me so many. They were crushing, and when a man's crushed, it's all over.'
'Yes, you look as if you were in very small pieces! I am glad that I shall never see you again.'
'I can see now why you received me—to tell me that,' Ransom said.
'It is a kind of pleasure. I am going back to Europe.'
'Really? for Newton's education?'
'Ah, I wonder you can have the face to speak of that—after the way you deserted him!'
'Let us abandon the subject, then, and I will tell you what I want.'
'I don't in the least care what you want,' Mrs. Luna remarked. 'And you haven't even the grace to ask me where I am going—over there.'
'What difference does that make to me—once you leave these shores?'
Mrs. Luna rose to her feet. 'Ah, chivalry, chivalry!' she exclaimed. And she walked away to the window—one of the windows from which Ransom had first enjoyed, at Olive's solicitation, the view of the Back Bay. Mrs. Luna looked forth at it with little of the air of a person who was sorry to be about to lose it. 'I am determined you shall know where I am going,' she said in a moment. 'I am going to Florence.'
'Don't be afraid!' he replied. 'I shall go to Rome.'
'And you'll carry there more impertinence than has been seen there since the old emperors.'
'Were the emperors impertinent, in addition to their other vices? I am determined, on my side, that you shall know what I have come for,' Ransom said. 'I wouldn't ask you if I could ask any one else; but I am very hard pressed, and I don't know who can help me.'
Mrs. Luna turned on him a face of the frankest derision. 'Help you? Do you remember the last time I asked you to help me?'
'That evening at Mrs. Burrage's? Surely I wasn't wanting then; I remember urging on your acceptance a chair, so that you might stand on it, to see and to hear.'
'To see and to hear what, please? Your disgusting infatuation!'
'It's just about that I want to speak to you,' Ransom pursued. 'As you already know all about it, you have no new shock to receive, and I therefore venture to ask you——'
'Where tickets for her lecture to-night can be obtained? Is it possible she hasn't sent you one?'
'I assure you I didn't come to Boston to hear it,' said Ransom, with a sadness which Mrs. Luna evidently regarded as a refinement of outrage. 'What I should like to ascertain is where Miss Tarrant may be found at the present moment.'
'And do you think that's a delicate inquiry to make of
'I don't see why it shouldn't be, but I know you don't think it is, and that is why, as I say, I mention the matter to you only because I can imagine absolutely no one else who is in a position to assist me. I have been to the house of Miss Tarrant's parents, in Cambridge, but it is closed and empty, destitute of any sign of life. I went there first, on arriving this morning, and rang at this door only when my journey to Monadnoc Place had proved fruitless. Your sister's servant told me that Miss Tarrant was not staying here, but she added that Mrs. Luna was. No doubt you won't be pleased at having been spoken of as a sort of equivalent; and I didn't say to myself—or to the servant— that you would do as well; I only reflected that I could at least try you. I didn't even ask for Miss Chancellor, as I am sure she would give me no information whatever.'
Mrs. Luna listened to this candid account of the young man's proceedings with her head turned a little over her shoulder at him, and her eyes fixed as unsympathetically as possible upon his own. 'What you propose, then, as I understand it,' she said in a moment, 'is that I should betray my sister to you.'
'Worse than that; I propose that you should betray Miss Tarrant herself.'
'What do I care about Miss Tarrant? I don't know what you are talking about.'
'Haven't you really any idea where she is living? Haven't you seen her here? Are Miss Olive and she not constantly together?'
Mrs. Luna, at this, turned full round upon him, and, with folded arms and her head tossed back, exclaimed: 'Look here, Basil Ransom, I never thought you were a fool, but it strikes me that since we last met you have lost your wits!'
'There is no doubt of that,' Ransom answered, smiling.
'Do you mean to tell me you don't know everything about Miss Tarrant that can be known?'
