It IS clear you can
toddle alone!"
He received this tribute without elation. "I shan't be alone when
the Pococks have come."
Her eyebrows went up. "The Pococks are coming?"
"That, I mean, is what will happen--and happen as quickly as
possible--in consequence of Chad's cable. They'll simply embark.
Sarah will come to speak for her mother--with an effect different
from MY muddle."
Miss Gostrey more gravely wondered. "SHE then will take him back?"
"Very possibly--and we shall see. She must at any rate have the
chance, and she may be trusted to do all she can."
"And do you WANT that?"
"Of course," said Strether, "I want it. I want to play fair "
But she had lost for a moment the thread. "If it devolves on the
Pococks why do you stay?"
"Just to see that I DO play fair--and a little also, no doubt, that
they do." Strether was luminous as he had never been. "I came out
to find myself in presence of new facts--facts that have kept
striking me as less and less met by our old reasons. The matter's
perfectly simple. New reasons--reasons as new as the facts
themselves--are wanted; and of this our friends at Woollett--Chad's
and mine--were at the earliest moment definitely notified. If any
are producible Mrs.
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