Adeline had risen during the night, being anxious concerning her husband; but on learning that he had gone to his apartment very late, she decided not to disturb his rest, and waited until he should be awake to tell him what had taken place in the evening between herself and Dufresne, whom she hoped to make known to him as he really was.

Edouard woke and went downstairs to breakfast. Adeline was waiting for him; she reproached him gently for his indifference of the night before; but he hardly listened to her; he was distraught, preoccupied, and complained of a violent headache which he hoped to get rid of by going out. Adeline detained him, informing him that she had something of great importance to say. Amazed by his wife’s tone, Edouard instinctively resumed his seat and requested her to hurry because business required his attention. The servants were dismissed and Adeline repeated to her husband her conversation with Dufresne on the previous evening.

Edouard listened at first with indifference; but soon displeasure and impatience were depicted upon his face.

“Well, my dear,” said Adeline, after she had told him everything, “what do you think now of your sincere friend?”

“I think—I think that you make a crime of a trifle, and a matter of importance of something that amounts to nothing.”

“What! my dear——”

“Certainly; a declaration to a woman! mon Dieu! is that such a rare thing, for heaven’s sake, a thing for which it is necessary to make so much fuss? Every day pretty women receive declarations addressed to them in jest, to which they attach no more importance than they deserve. But you take fright at a word! a simple compliment seems to you an attempt at seduction! you shouldn’t take things so! But I know you: you don’t like—more than that, you detest Dufresne. For a long time you have been trying to ruin him in my estimation, and you seize this pretext for accomplishing your purpose; but I warn you, madame, that you will not succeed.”

“Is it possible, monsieur? do you accuse me, do you suspect me of being capable of deceiving you?”

“Or of being deceived? How do you know that Dufresne did not talk all that nonsense to you to make sport of you, and to be revenged for your hatred, which he perceives very plainly?”

“Was it for that purpose too that he tried to carry his audacity so far as to kiss me?”

“Kiss you! Well, I admit that he was wrong to kiss you against your will, and I shall scold him for it. But a kiss is not a thing which should irritate you to this point!”

“You do not intend then, monsieur, to cease to receive Monsieur Dufresne in your house?”

“Most assuredly, madame, I do not intend to make myself unhappy, to make myself ridiculous, and to cause people to point their fingers at me as a jealous husband, simply because somebody ventured to embrace you in jest! That would be utterly absurd! But calm yourself, I will forbid Dufresne to mention his passion to you again!”

“What, Edouard, you laugh! You think so little of what I have told you?”

“I do what it is my duty to do, and I know how to behave.”

“Alas! you no longer love me, I see. Formerly you were more jealous.”

“One may love without being jealous; and besides—but it is getting late, and I have business that I must attend to.”

“What about that rich shipowner for whom you gave the party?”

“He was not able to come.”

“So all your expense was useless?”

“Useless! No, indeed; I was very warmly congratulated on my party. It will do me a great deal of good in the sequel, and I am delighted that I gave it.—I must leave you, for I have not a moment of my own.”

Edouard hurried away to Dufresne. That gentleman seemed a little disturbed at sight of him, but he soon recovered himself; it was not to talk about what his wife had told him that Murville was so eager to be with him, but to talk about the lovely woman with whom he had played ÉcartÉ the night before, to find out who she was and what position she held in society; in a word, it was to dilate without reserve upon desires and hopes which he did not shrink from disclosing to his friend.

Dufresne gratified Edouard’s curiosity by informing him that Madame de GÉran was the widow of a general, that she was absolutely her own mistress, that she had some means but possessed the art of spending money rapidly, because she was exceedingly fond of pleasure. Dufresne took pains to add that many men paid court to the young widow, but that she received their homage with indifference, treated love as a joke and made sport of the flames she kindled, and that her conquest seemed to be difficult of accomplishment.

All that he learned added to Edouard’s newly-born passion. What joy to carry off the palm from so many rivals,—and Madame de GÉran had looked at him and treated him in such a way as to justify him in forming hopes. The fact was that she had turned his head; and Dufresne, who had no difficulty in reading the weak and fickle Murville’s heart, seized the opportunity to broach the subject of his interview with Adeline, taking pains to represent the thing as a mere pleasantry, which he did not expect would be so severely reprehended.

“Yes, yes, I know,” said Edouard; “my wife spoke to me about it this morning.”

“Ah! she told you——”

“That you were a monster, a villain, a false friend!”

“Indeed!”

“And much more too! for I warn you that she is furiously angry with you. But never fear—I will pacify her; she will see that she took the thing in the wrong way when she learns that you mentioned it first.”

“I am truly sorry that I amused myself by—But after all, your wife is a very strange woman!”

“It’s her mother, Madame Germeuil, who has stuffed her head with romantic ideas.”

“Certainly no one would ever think that she was educated in Paris.”

“Oh! she will have to form herself in good society. Would you believe that she expressed a purpose not to receive you again?”

“If my presence is unpleasant to Madame Murville, I shall be careful to avoid her.”

“Nonsense! that is just what I don’t propose to have, or I shall be angry with you. I mean that you shall come to the house more than ever; that is my desire and it must suffice. Are you not friendly enough to me to overlook my wife’s eccentric character?”

“Oh! my attachment to you has no bounds!”

“Dear Dufresne!—Look you, to prove how much confidence I have in you, and how little heed I pay to my wife’s fairy tales, I am going to confide a secret to you, and I rely on your friendship to help me in the matter.”

“I am entirely devoted to you—speak.”

“My friend, I love, I adore, I am mad over Madame de GÉran.”

“Is it possible? Why, you have only known her since last night.”

“That is long enough to make me love her.—What would you have—we cannot control those things. It’s a caprice, a weakness, whatever you choose to call it! But I have lost my head.”

“You, Murville—such a reasonable man! and married, too!”

“Oh! my dear fellow, are married men any more virtuous than bachelors? You know very well that the contrary is true; a man can’t stick to his wife forever.”

“If your wife should think as you do!”

“Oh! so far as that is concerned, I am not alarmed; my wife is virtue personified, and she does no more than her duty; for a woman—that’s a very different matter.”

“As to the consequences, yes; but morally, and even according to the law of nature, I consider that the fault is absolutely identical.”

“You are joking! At all events, aren’t the consequences everything? Is the absurdity of it the same? Will any one ever laugh at a wife whose husband has mistresses? No, nothing is ever said then, because it is considered a very common occurrence; but if a wife makes her husband a cuckold——”

“That is a very common occurrence too.”

“For all that, people laugh at the poor husband and point their fingers at him!—Besides, what harm can come of the husband’s infidelity? None at all. The fair ones who have yielded to him won’t go about boasting of it! With a woman it is just the opposite; her lovers always ruin her reputation, either by their words, or by their actions, which never escape the eyes of curiosity and calumny. In fact, a woman who finds her husband in another woman’s arms can only complain and weep; while a man who surprises his wife in flagrante delicto has a right to punish the culprit; so you see, my dear fellow, that the offence is not the same, as the punishment is different.”

“I see that it was we men who made the laws, and that we treated ourselves very well.”

“Are you going to preach to me too? Really, Dufresne, you are almost as savagely virtuous as my wife.”

“No, my dear fellow, you don’t know me yet. But before assisting you, I wanted to find out whether you had fully weighed the consequences of this intrigue.”

“I have weighed and calculated everything. I love Madame de GÉran, and I wish to be loved in return. I feel that there is no sacrifice of which I am not capable to attain my object. Do you understand?”

“Oh! very well. Since your mind is made up, I will second you; but of course you won’t reproach me for leading you on.”

“No, no! On the contrary, I beg you to assist me, and to help me to conceal this intrigue from my wife’s eyes.”

“Don’t be alarmed—leave all that to me. I will answer for all. When will you call on Madame de GÉran?”

“This evening. They play cards there, of course?”

“Yes, and for rather high stakes.”

“The devil! The fact is that I haven’t any money. That party drained me dry.”

“It is very easy to obtain some. Consols are at a very high premium. Sell. They cannot fail to drop before long; then, as we shall have speculated in something else, and you will probably be in funds, you can buy in again. You see, it is a good thing to do from a business standpoint.”

“True, you are right. But the consols are in my wife’s name.”

“Can’t you get her to sign by telling her that you are engaged in a magnificent operation?”

“Oh, yes! she will sign, I am sure; she’ll sign whatever I want her to.”

“Take advantage of her compliant disposition to sell your consols; I tell you again, they are on the point of falling, and in a few days you will be able to buy the same amount with much less money. If it will be any more convenient for you, I will see to the business for you.”

“You will confer a great favor on me, for I am still rather a bungler in business, and but for you I should often be embarrassed.”

“Don’t be afraid. Act boldly. I assure you that your party last night added immensely to your credit. If you needed thirty thousand francs, you could easily obtain them.”

“You delight me. I will go back to my wife. Wait for me at the cafÉ; I will be there very soon with the papers in question.”

“I will go there. Be on your guard with your wife.”

“Do you take me for a child?—I won’t say adieu, my dear Dufresne.”

Edouard hastened home and went up to Adeline’s apartment, where he found her with her child in her arms. At sight of her husband, who was not accustomed to come home during the day, a soothing hope made her heart beat fast; she thought that it was love that led him back to her, and a smile of happiness embellished her lovely features.

Edouard was speechless in her presence; he was embarrassed, he was conscious of a painful sensation; he felt that he was guilty toward her, but he did not choose to admit it even to himself.

“Is it you, my dear?” said Adeline in the sweetest of tones; “how happy I am when I see you! It happens so rarely now!—Come and kiss your daughter.”

Edouard walked mechanically toward them and kissed the child with a distraught air, heedless of her infantile graces. He stood like one in a dream, unable to decide how to broach the subject that had brought him there.

“You seem distressed,” said Adeline; “is anything troubling you? For heaven’s sake, let me share your trouble—you have no more loving, more sincere friend than your wife.”

“I know it, my dear Adeline, but nothing is troubling me. No, I am preoccupied, because I am thinking of a very important transaction in which I shall make a great deal of money.”

“Always schemes, speculations—and never love, repose and happiness!”

“Oh! when we are rich—why, then—But I have a request to make of you; I want to ask you to sign a paper—it has to do with an operation that will be very profitable.”

“Are you certain of that, my dear?”

“Yes, perfectly certain; it was——”

Edouard was going to say that it was Dufresne who gave him that assurance, but he reflected that that would not be the best way to convince his wife, and he checked himself. Having taken from his desk all the papers that he required, he drew up a document by which his wife assented to the transfer of her consols, and with a trembling hand presented the pen to Adeline. She, trustful and submissive, signed the paper which he put before her, without even reading it.

“That is all right,” said Murville as he put the papers in his pocket. “Now I must hurry to the Bourse, to conclude this important affair.”

He kissed Adeline and hurried from the room. She realized that it was not to see her that he had come home; but her heart made excuses for him; she believed him to be entirely engrossed by business.

“He loves nobody but me,” she said to herself; “that is the main thing. I must forgive this love of work, and this perfectly natural desire to enrich his wife and children.”

Poor Adeline! she did not know what use her husband proposed to make of the money that he was in such haste to obtain.