Wharton, Edith — The Age of Innocence [709]

The young man, who was dining out, thrust the note into his pocket, smiling a little at the Frenchness of the “to you.” After dinner he went to a play; and it was not until his return home, after midnight, that he drew Madame Olenska’s missive out again and re-read it slowly a number of times. There were several ways of answering it, and he gave considerable thought to each one during the watches of an agitated night. That on which, when morning came, he finally decided was to pitch some clothes into a portmanteau and jump on board a boat that was leaving that very afternoon for St. Augustine. — Wharton, Edith, The Age of Innocence, 709

Note

The quiet comedy of Archer ‘smiling a little at the Frenchness of the ‘to you” before the night’s agitation — and the anticlimactic resolution being flight to St. Augustine — shows Wharton managing tone as a controlled release valve. The ‘watches of an agitated night’ giving way to packing a portmanteau is a small, precise portrait of decision as evasion.