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“Well, monsieur?” said Madame Firmiani, giving him one of those clear, lucid glances in which we men can never see anything because they question us too much.

“Well, madame,” returned the old man, “do you know what some one came to tell me in the depths of my province? That my nephew had ruined himself for you, and that the poor fellow was living in a garret while you were in silk and gold. Forgive my rustic sincerity; it may be useful for you to know of these calumnies.”

“Stop, monsieur,” said Madame Firmiani, with an imperative gesture; “I know all that. You are too polite to continue this subject if I request you to leave it, and too gallant–in the old-fashioned sense of the word,” she added with a slight tone of irony–“not to agree that you have no right to question me. It would be ridiculous in me to defend myself. I trust that you will have a sufficiently good opinion of my character to believe in the profound contempt which, I assure you, I feel for money,–although I was married, without any fortune, to a man of immense wealth. It is nothing to me whether your nephew is rich or poor; if I have received him in my house, and do now receive him, it is because I consider him worthy to be counted among my friends. All my friends, monsieur, respect each other; they know that I have not philosophy enough to admit into my house those I do not esteem; this may argue a want of charity; but my guardian-angel has maintained in me to this day a profound aversion for tattle, and also for dishonesty.”

Through the ring of her voice was slightly raised during the first part of this answer, the last words were said with the ease and self-possession of Celimene bantering the Misanthrope.

“Madame,” said Monsieur de Bourbonne, in a voice of some emotion, “I am an old man; I am almost Octave’s father, and I ask your pardon most humbly for the question that I shall now venture to put to you, giving you my word of honor as a loyal gentleman that your answer shall die here,”–laying his hand upon his heart, with an old-fashioned gesture that was truly religious. “Are these rumors true; do you love Octave?”

“Monsieur,” she replied, “to any other man I should answer that question only by a look; but to you, and because you are indeed almost the father of Monsieur de Camps, I reply by asking what you would think of a woman if to such a question she answered you? To avow our love for him we love, when he loves us–ah! that may be; but even when we are certain of being loved forever, believe me, monsieur, it is an effort for us, and a reward to him. To say to another!–“

She did not end her sentence, but rose, bowed to the old man, and withdrew into her private apartments, the doors of which, opening and closing behind her, had a language of their own to his sagacious ears.

“Ah! the mischief!” thought he; “what a woman! she is either a sly one or an angel”; and he got into his hired coach, the horses of which were stamping on the pavement of the silent courtyard, while the coachman was asleep on his box after cursing for the hundredth time his tardy customer.

The next morning about eight o’clock the old gentleman mounted the stairs of a house in the rue de l’Observance where Octave de Camps was living. If there was ever an astonished man it was the young professor when he beheld his uncle. The door was unlocked, his lamp still burning; he had been sitting up all night.

“You rascal!” said Monsieur de Bourbonne, sitting down in the nearest chair; “since when is it the fashion to laugh at uncles who have twenty-six thousand francs a year from solid acres to which we are the sole heir? Let me tell you that in the olden time we stood in awe of such uncles as that. Come, speak up, what fault have you to find with me? Haven’t I played my part as uncle properly? Did I ever require you to respect me? Have I ever refused you money? When did I shut the door in your face on pretence that you had come to look after my health? Haven’t you had the most accommodating and the least domineering uncle that there is in France,–I won’t say Europe, because that might be too presumptuous. You write to me, or you don’t write,–no matter, I live on pledged affection, and I am making you the prettiest estate in all Touraine, the envy of the department. To be sure, I don’t intend to let you have it till the last possible moment, but that’s an excusable little fancy, isn’t it? And what does monsieur himself do? –sells his own property and lives like a lackey!–“