But let us also have it clear.

Can he, in the midst of such a preoccupation, or on the heels of it, have seriously cared for Jeanne ?--cared, I mean, as a young man at liberty would have cared ?" Well, Strether had mastered it.

"I think he can have thought it would be charming if he COULD care.

It would be nicer." "Nicer than being tied up to Marie ?" "Yes--than the discomfort of an attachment to a person he can never hope, short of a catastrophe, to marry.

And he was quite right," said Strether.