ervice, Mrs.
Pocock, at least," she wound up, "of giving me one of my much-too-rare
glimpses of this gentleman."

"I certainly should be sorry to deprive you of anything that seems so
much, as you describe it, your natural due. Mr. Strether and I are
very old friends," Sarah allowed, "but the privilege of his society
isn't a thing I shall quarrel about with any one."

"And yet, dear Sarah," he freely broke in, "I feel, when I hear you say
that, that you don't quite do justice to the important truth of the
extent to which--as you're also mine--I'm your natural due. I should
like much better," he laughed, "to see you fight for me."

She met him, Mrs. Pocock, on this, with an arrest of speech--with a
certain breathlessness, as he immediately fancied, on the score of a
freedom for which she wasn't quite prepared. It had flared up--for all
the harm he had intended by it--because, confoundedly, he didn't want
any more to be afraid about her than he wanted to be afraid about
Madame de Vionnet. He had never, naturally, called her anything but
Sarah at home, and though he had perhaps never quite so markedly
invoked her as his "dear," that was somehow partly because no occasion
had hitherto laid so effective a trap for it. But something admonished
him now that it was too late--unless indeed it were possibly too early;
and that he at any rate shouldn't have pleased Mrs. Pocock the more by
it. "Well, Mr. Strether--!" she murmured with vagueness, yet with
sharpness, while her crimson spot burned a trifle brighter and he was
aware that this must be for the present the limit of her response.
Madame de Vionnet had already, however, come to his aid, and Waymarsh,
as if for further participation, moved again back to them. It was true
that the aid rendered by Madame de Vionnet was questionable; it was a
sign that, for all one might confess to with her, and for all she might
complain of not enjoying, she could still insidiously show how much of
the material of conversation had accumulated between them.

"The real truth is, you know, that you sacrifice one without mercy to
dear old Maria. She leaves no room in your life for anybody else. Do
you know," she enquired of Mrs. Pocock, "about dear old Maria? The
worst is that Miss Gostrey is really a wonderful woman."

"Oh yes indeed," Strether answered for her, "Mrs. Pocock knows about
Miss Gostrey. Your mother, Sarah, must have told you about her; your
mother knows everything," h