Having so well learnt the way, he had lately made the pilgrimage more than once by himself--had quite stolen off, taking an unnoticed chance and making no point of speaking of the adventure when restored to his friends.
His great friend, for that matter, was still absent, as well as remarkably silent; even at the end of three weeks Miss Gostrey hadn't come back.

She wrote to him from Mentone, admitting that he must judge her grossly inconsequent--perhaps in fact for the time odiously faithless; but asking for patience, for a deferred sentence, throwing herself in short on his generosity.

For her too, she could assure him, life was complicated--more complicated than he could have guessed; she had moreover made certain of him--certain of not wholly missing him on her return--before her disappearance.

If furthermore she didn't burden him with letters it was frankly because of her sense of the other great commerce he had to carry on.

He himself, at the end of a fortnight, had written twice, to show how his generosity could be trusted; but he reminded himself in each case of Mrs.Newsome's epistolary manner at the times when Mrs.Newsome kept off delicate ground.