One thought disturbed the young engineer.
“Does she understand me seriously?” he thought.
She certainly did, as her subsequent remarks proved. He saw that the would-be sentimental old lady had an eye to business.
“Alas!” she sighed, “La Verberie cannot be saved by forty thousand francs; the principal and interest of the debt amount to sixty thousand.”
“Oh, either forty or sixty thousand is nothing worth speaking of.”
“Four thousand francs is not enough to support a lady respectably,” she said after a pause. “Everything is so dear in this section of the country! But with six thousand francs—yes, six thousand francs would make me happy!”
The young man thought that her demands were becoming excessive, but with the generosity of an ardent lover he said:
“The son-in-law of whom we are speaking cannot be very devoted to Mlle. Valentine, if the paltry sum of two thousand francs were objected to for an instant.”
“You promise too much!” muttered the countess.
“The imaginary son-in-law,” she finally added, “must be an honorable man who will fulfil his promises. I have my daughter’s happiness too much at heart to give her to a man who did not produce—what do you call them?—securities, guarantees.”