e, at once, and apparently in the intended form
of a smile, the most extraordinary expression. "Ah, there it is!"

But her guest had already gone on. "And I'm absolutely certain that
Charlotte wouldn't either."

It kept the Princess, with her strange grimace, standing there.
"No--Charlotte wouldn't either. That's how they've had again to go
off together. They've been afraid not to--lest it should disturb me,
aggravate me, somehow work upon me. As I insisted that they must,
that we couldn't all fail--though father and Charlotte hadn't really
accepted; as I did this they had to yield to the fear that their showing
as afraid to move together would count for them as the greater danger:
which would be the danger, you see, of my feeling myself wronged. Their
least danger, they know, is in going on with all the things that I've
seemed to accept and that I've given no indication, at any moment, of
not accepting. Everything that has come up for them has come up, in
an extraordinary manner, without my having by a sound or a sign given
myself away--so that it's all as wonderful as you may conceive. They
move at any rate among the dangers I speak of--between that of their
doing too much and that of their not having any longer the confidence,
or the nerve, or whatever you may call it, to do enough." Her tone, by
this time, might have shown a strangeness to match her smile; which was
still more marked as she wound up. "And that's how I make them do what I
like!"

It had an effect on Mrs. Assingham, who rose with the deliberation that,
from point to point, marked the widening of her grasp. "My dear child,
you're amazing."

"Amazing--?"

"You're terrible."

Maggie thoughtfully shook her head. "No; I'm not terrible, and you don't
think me so. I do strike you as surprising, no doubt--but surprisingly
mild. Because--don't you see?--I AM mild. I can bear anything."

"Oh, 'bear'!" Mrs. Assingham fluted.

"For love," said the Princess.

Fanny hesitated. "Of your father?"

"For love," Maggie repeated.

It kept her friend watching. "Of your husband?"

"For love," Maggie said again.

It was, for the moment, as if the distinctness of this might have
determined in her companion a choice between two or three highly
different alternatives. Mrs. Assingham's rejoinder, at all
events--however much or however little it was a choice--was presently a
triumph. "Speaking with this love of your own then, have you undertaken
to convey to me