Richard.
Is it true?
Lionnette.
Paid or not paid, here are the title-deeds. (Putting them on the table, and beginning to totter.) Then I possess, too, over and above all my paid debts—for they are paid—I am possessor, also, of a million in gold, quite new: it is superb to look at.
Richard.
Sit down, you look as if you were going to fall. You are quite pale; the blood has rushed to your heart.
Lionnette (with a great effort).
Do not be afraid, I am quite strong. I cannot eternally keep a million in gold ... however beautiful it may be ... it is an incumbrance, and then it might be stolen from me ... and money ... is everything in this world! Without reckoning that in cash this million will yield nothing ... and I want it to produce something.... I should like, then, to place it out in the best way possible. You must place it for me in safety, where it cannot be touched, like the little income that remains to the Count; so that I, too, may not want bread in my old age. I am such a spendthrift. I count entirely on you for that.
Richard.
And where is this million?