In other words he had come for his amusement.Isabel followed up this induction with a good deal of eagerness, and was delighted to have found a formula that would lay the ghost of this gentleman's ancient grievance.If he had come to Rome for his amusement this was exactly what she wanted; for if he cared for amusement he had got over his heartache.If he had got over his heartache everything was as it should be and her responsibilities were at an end.It was true that he took his recreation a little stiffly, but he had never been loose and easy and she had every reason to believe he was satisfied with what he saw.Henrietta was not in his confidence, though he was in hers, and Isabel consequently received no side-light upon his state of mind.He was open to little conversation on general topics; it came back to her that she had said of him once, years before, "Mr.Goodwood speaks a good deal, but he doesn't talk." He spoke a good deal now, but he talked perhaps as little as ever; considering, that is, how much there was in Rome to talk about.His arrival was not calculated to simplify her relations with her husband, for if Mr.Osmond didn't like her friends Mr.Goodwood had no claim upon his attention save as having been one of the first of them.There was nothing for her to say of him but that he was the very oldest; this rather meagre synthesis exhausted the facts.She had been obliged to introduce him to Gilbert; it was impossible she should not ask him to dinner, to her Thursday evenings, of which she had grown very weary, but to which her husband still held for the sake not so much of inviting people as of not inviting them.
To the Thursdays Mr.Goodwood came regularly, solemnly, rather early; he appeared to regard them with a good deal of gravity.
Isabel every now and then had a moment of anger; there was something so literal about him; she thought he might know that she didn't know what to do with him.But she couldn't call him stupid; he was not that in the least; he was only extraordinarily honest.To be as honest as that made a man very different from most people; one had to be almost equally honest with him.She made this latter reflection at the very time she was flattering herself she had persuaded him that she was the most light-hearted of women.He never threw any doubt on this point, never asked her any personal questions.He got on much better with Osmond than had seemed probable.Osmond had a great dislike to being counted on; in such a case he had an irresistible need of disappointing you.It was in virtue of this principle that he gave himself the entertainment of taking a fancy to a perpendicular Bostonian whom he had been depended upon to treat with coldness.He asked Isabel if Mr.Goodwood also had wanted to marry her, and expressed surprise at her not having accepted him.It would have been an excellent thing, like living under some tall belfry which would strike all the hours and make a queer vibration in the upper air.He declared he liked to talk with the great Goodwood; it wasn't easy at first, you had to climb up an interminable steep staircase, up to the top of the tower; but when you got there you had a big view and felt a little fresh breeze.Osmond, as we know, had delightful qualities, and he gave Caspar Goodwood the benefit of them all.Isabel could see that Mr.Goodwood thought better of her husband than he had ever wished to; he had given her the impression that morning in Florence of being inaccessible to a good impression.Gilbert asked him repeatedly to dinner, and Mr.Goodwood smoked a cigar with him afterwards and even desired to be shown his collections.Gilbert said to Isabel that he was very original; he was as strong and of as good a style as an English portmanteau-he had plenty of straps and buckles which would never wear out, and a capital patent lock.
Caspar Goodwood took to riding on the Campagna and devoted much time to this exercise; it was therefore mainly in the evening that Isabel saw him.She bethought herself of saying to him one day that if he were willing he could render her a service.And then she added smiling:
"I don't know, however, what right I have to ask a service of you.""You're the person in the world who has most right," he answered.
