THE   AMBASSADORS
considerably beyond his custom. Thus it was that when, between
nine and ten, the tap of the knob of a walking-stick sounded on his
door, he had not yet made himself altogether presentable. Chad
Newsome's bright, deep voice, determined quickly enough, none
the less, the admission of the visitor. The little blue paper of the
evening before, plainly an object the more precious for its escape
from premature destruction, now lay on the sill of the open win-
dow, smoothed out afresh and kept from blowing away by the
superincumbent weight of his watch. Chad, looking about with
careless and competent criticism, as he looked wherever he went,
immediately espied it and permitted himself to fix it for a moment
rather hard. After which he turned his eyes to his host. " It has
come then at last?"
Strether paused in the act of pinning his necktie. "Then you
know—?   You've had one too?"
"No, I've had nothing, and I only know what I see. I see that
thing and I guess. Well," he added, " it comes as pat as in a play,
for I've precisely turned up this morning—as I would have done
yesterday, but it was impossible—to take you."
" To take me ?"   Strether had turned again to his glass.
" Back, at last, as I promised. I'm ready—I've really been ready
this month. I've only been waiting for you—as was perfectly
right. But you're better now; you're safe—I see that for myself;
you've got all your good. You're looking, this morning, as fit as a
flea."
Strether, at his glass, finished dressing; consulting that witness
moreover on this last opinion. Was he looking preternaturally fit?
There was something in it perhaps for Chad's wonderful eye, but
he had felt himself, for hours, rather in pieces. Such a judgment,
however, was after all but a contribution to his resolve; it testified
unwittingly to his wisdom. He was still firmer, apparently—since
it shone in him as a light—than he had flattered himself. His
firmness indeed was slightly compromised, as he faced about to
his friend, by the way this very personage looked—though the case
would of course have been worse had not the secret of personal
magnificence been at every hour Chad's unfailing possession.
There he was in all the pleasant morning freshness of it—strong
and sleek and gay, easy and fragrant and fathomless, with happy
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