On reaching home he wrote a line to the Countess Olenska, asking at what hour of the next day she could receive him, and despatched it by a messenger-boy, who returned presently with a word to the effect that she was going to Skuytercliff the next morning to stay over Sunday with the van der Luydens, but that he would find her alone that evening after dinner.  The note was written on a rather untidy half-sheet, without date or address, but her hand was firm and free.  He was amused at the idea of her week-ending in the stately solitude of Skuytercliff, but immediately afterward felt that there, of all places, she would most feel the chill of minds rigorously averted from the “unpleasant.”

He was at Mr. Letterblair’s punctually at seven, glad of the pretext for excusing himself soon after dinner.  He had formed his own opinion from the papers entrusted to him, and did not especially want to go into the matter with his senior partner.  Mr. Letterblair was a widower, and they dined alone, copiously and slowly, in a dark shabby room hung with yellowing prints of “The Death of Chatham” and “The Coronation of Napoleon.”  On the sideboard, between fluted Sheraton knife-cases, stood a decanter of Haut Brion, and another of the old Lanning port (the gift of a client), which the wastrel Tom Lanning had sold off a year or two before his mysterious and discreditable death in San Francisco—­an incident less publicly humiliating to the family than the sale of the cellar.

After a velvety oyster soup came shad and cucumbers, then a young broiled turkey with corn fritters, followed by a canvas-back with currant jelly and a celery mayonnaise.  Mr. Letterblair, who lunched on a sandwich and tea, dined deliberately and deeply, and insisted on his guest’s doing the same.  Finally, when the closing rites had been accomplished, the cloth was removed, cigars were lit, and Mr. Letterblair, leaning back in his chair and pushing the port westward, said, spreading his back agreeably to the coal fire behind him:  “The whole family are against a divorce.  And I think rightly.”

Archer instantly felt himself on the other side of the argument.  “But why, sir?  If there ever was a case—­”

“Well—­what’s the use?  She’s here—­he’s there; the Atlantic’s between them.  She’ll never get back a dollar more of her money than what he’s voluntarily returned to her:  their damned heathen marriage settlements take precious good care of that.  As things go over there, Olenski’s acted generously:  he might have turned her out without a penny.”

The young man knew this and was silent.

“I understand, though,” Mr. Letterblair continued, “that she attaches no importance to the money.  Therefore, as the family say, why not let well enough alone?”

Archer had gone to the house an hour earlier in full agreement with Mr. Letterblair’s view; but put into words by this selfish, well-fed and supremely indifferent old man it suddenly became the Pharisaic voice of a society wholly absorbed in barricading itself against the unpleasant.