I'm sorry for you; it will be a long time before
you're forty. But every gain's a loss of some kind; I often think that
after forty one can't really feel. The freshness, the quickness have
certainly gone. You'll keep them longer than most people; it will be a
great satisfaction to me to see you some years hence. I want to see
what life makes of you. One thing's certain- it can't spoil you. It
may pull you about horribly, but I defy it to break you up."
Isabel received this assurance as a young soldier, still panting
from a slight skirmish in which he has come off with honour, might
receive a pat on the shoulder from his colonel. Like such a
recognition of merit it seemed to come with authority. How could the
lightest word do less on the part of a person who was prepared to say,
of almost everything Isabel told her, "Oh, I've been in that, my dear;
it passes, like everything else." On many of her interlocutors
Madame Merle might have produced an irritating effect; it was
disconcertingly difficult to surprise her. But Isabel, though by no
means incapable of desiring to be effective, had not at present this
impulse. She was too sincere, too interested in her judicious
companion.
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