“Yes, she will be pretty,” replied Mademoiselle Rogron.
“You ought now to send her to a shop in Paris,” added the Colonel. “She would make a fortune. They look out for very pretty girls now in the milliners’ shops.”
“Is that really your advice?” asked Sylvie, in an anxious voice.
“Good! I have hit it!” thought the Colonel. “Vinet’s advice that Pierrette and I should marry by-and-by was only intended to place me in this old witch’s black-books.—Why,” he said aloud, “what do you expect to do with her? Do you not see a perfectly lovely girl, Bathilde de Chargeboeuf, of noble birth, well connected, and left to become an old maid. No one will have anything to say to her. Pierrette has nothing; she will never marry. Do you suppose that youth and beauty have any attraction for me, for instance?—for me, who, as Captain of Artillery in the Imperial Guard from the first day when the Emperor had a guard, have had my feet in every capital in Europe, and known the prettiest women in them all?—Youth and beauty—they are deuced common and silly. Don’t talk of them to me!”
“At eight-and-forty,” he went on, adding to his age, “when a man has gone through the retreat from Moscow and the dreadful campaign in France, his loins are a bit weary; I am an old fellow. Now, a wife like you would cosset me and take care of me; her fortune, added to my few thousand francs of pension, would secure me suitable comfort for my old age, and I should like her a thousand times better than a minx who would give me no end of trouble, who would be thirty and have her passions when I should be sixty and have the rheumatism. At my time of life we think of these things. And, between you and me, I may add that if I marry, I should hope to have no children.”
Sylvie’s face was transparent to the Colonel all through this speech, and her reply was enough to assure him of Vinet’s perfidy.
“So you are not in love with Pierrette?” she exclaimed.
“Bless me! Are you crazy, my dear Sylvie?” cried he. “When we have lost all our teeth, is it the time to crack nuts? Thank God, I still have my wits, and know myself.”
Sylvie would not then say more about herself; she thought herself very wily in using her brothers name.
“My brother,” said she, “had thought of your marrying her.”
“Your brother can never have had such a preposterous notion. A few days ago, to find out his secret, I told him that I was in love with Bathilde; he turned as white as your collar.”
“Is he in love with Bathilde?” said Sylvie.
“Madly! And Bathilde certainly loves only his money.”—(“One for you, Vinet,” thought Gouraud).—“What should have made him speak of Pierrette?—No, Sylvie,” he went on, taking her hand and pressing it with meaning, “since you have led to the subject”—he went close to her—“well”—he kissed her hand; he was a cavalry colonel, and had given proofs of courage—“know this: I want no wife but you. Though the marriage will look like a marriage for money, I feel true affection for you.”
“But it was I who wished that you should marry Pierrette; and if I were to give her my money—what then, Colonel?”
“But I do not want to have a wretched home, or to see, ten years hence, some young whippersnapper, such as Julliard, hovering round my wife, and writing verses to her in the newspaper. I am too much a man on that score; I will never marry a woman out of all proportion too young.”
“Well, Colonel, we will talk that over seriously,” said Sylvie, with a glance she thought amorous, and which was very like that of an ogress. Her cold, raw purple lips parted over her yellow teeth, and she fancied she was smiling.
“Here I am,” said Rogron, and he led away the Colonel, who bowed courteously to the old maid.
Gouraud was determined to hasten his marriage with Sylvie, and so become master of the house; promising himself that, through the influence he would acquire over Sylvie during the honeymoon, he would get rid both of Bathilde and of Céleste Habert. So, as they walked, he told Rogron that he had been making fun of him the other day; that he had no intentions of winning Bathilde’s heart, not being rich enough to take a wife who had no money. Then he confided his projects; he had long since chosen Sylvie for her admirable qualities; in short, he aspired to the honor of becoming his brother-in-law.
“Oh, Colonel! Oh, Baron! If only my consent were needed, it would be done as soon as legal delays should allow!” cried Rogron, delighted to find himself relieved of this terrible rival.
Sylvie spent the whole morning examining her own rooms to see if there were accommodation for a couple. She determined on building a second story for her brother, and having the first floor for herself and her husband; but she also promised herself, in accordance with the notions of every old maid, to put the Colonel to some tests, so as to judge of his heart and habits before making up her mind. She still had doubts, and wanted to make
