She fairly glowed with hope. “And by the same token such a piece of poetic justice! Quite the loveliest it would be, I think, one had ever heard of.” So, for some time more, they sat confronted. “I don’t quite see your difficulty,” he said at last. “I do happen to know, I confess, that Nanda herself extremely desires the execution of your project.” His friend’s smile betrayed no surprise at this effect of her eloquence. “You’re bad at dodging. Nanda’s desire is inevitably to stop off for herself every question of any one but Vanderbank. If she wants me to succeed in arranging with Mr. Mitchett can you ask for a plainer sign of her private predicament? But you’ve signs enough, I see”--she caught herself up: “we may take them all for granted. I’ve known perfectly from the first that the only difficulty would come from her mother--but also that that would be stiff.” The movement with which Mr. Longdon removed his glasses might have denoted a certain fear to participate in too much of what the Duchess had known. “I’ve not been ignorant that Mrs. Brookenham favours Mr. Mitchett.” But he was not to be let off with that. “Then you’ve not been blind, I suppose, to her reason for doing so.” He might not have been blind, but his vision, at this, scarce showed sharpness, and it determined in his interlocutress the shortest of short cuts. “She favours Mr. Mitchett because she wants ‘old Van’ herself.” He was evidently conscious of looking at her hard. “In what sense--herself?” “Ah you must supply the sense; I can give you only the fact--and it’s the fact that concerns us. Voyons” she almost impatiently broke out; “don’t try to create unnecessary obscurities by being unnecessarily modest. Besides, I’m not touching your modesty. Supply any sense whatever that may miraculously satisfy your fond English imagination: I don’t insist in the least on a bad one. She does want him herself--that’s all I say. ‘Pourquoi faires’ you ask--or rather, being too shy, don’t ask, but would like to if you dared or didn’t fear I’d be shocked. I CAN’T be shocked, but frankly I can’t tell you either. The situation belongs, I think, to an order I don’t understand. I understand either one thing or the other--I understand taking a man up or letting him alone. But I don’t really get at Mrs. Brook. You must judge at any rate for yourself. Vanderbank could of course tell you if he would--but it wouldn’t be right that he should. So the one thing we have to do with is that she’s in fact against us. I can only work Mitchy through Petherton, but Mrs. Brook can work him straight. On the other hand that’s the way you, my dear man, can work Vanderbank.” One thing evidently beyond the rest, as a result of this vivid demonstration, disengaged itself to our old friend’s undismayed sense, but his consternation needed a minute or two to produce it. “I can absolutely assure you that Mr. Vanderbank entertains no sentiment for Mrs. Brookenham--!”