“ Oh I don’t think anything now!” Strether impatiently broke in: “that is but what I do think! I mean that originally, for her to have cared for him—”
“ There must have been stuff in him? Oh yes, there was stuff indeed, and much more of it than ever showed, I dare say, at home. Still, you know,” the young man in all fairness developed, “there was room for her, and that’s where she came in. She saw her chance and took it. That’s what strikes me as having been so fine. But of course,” he wound up, “he liked her first.”
“ Naturally,” said Strether.
“ I mean that they first met somehow and somewhere—I believe in some American house—and she, without in the least then intending it, made her impression. Then with time and opportunity he made his; and after that she was
