And when the remark comes it's always something he has seen or felt for himself--never a bit banal THAT would be what one might have feared and what would kill me But never." She smoked again as she thus, with amused complacency, appreciated her acquisition.

"And never about you.

We keep clear of you.

We're wonderful.

But I'll tell you what he does do," she continued: "he tries to make me presents." "Presents ?" poor Strether echoed, conscious with a pang that HE hadn't yet tried that in any quarter.
"Why you see," she explained, "he's as fine as ever in the victoria; so that when I leave him, as I often do almost for hours--he likes it so--at the doors of shops, the sight of him there helps me, when I come out, to know my carriage away off in the rank.