MME. DUPONT. I’m afraid young M. Mairaut’s character—
DUPONT. His character! We know nothing about his character. He has one virtue which nothing can take away from him: he is his uncle’s nephew. And his uncle can get me work that will bring in ten thousand francs a year, besides being as rich as Crœsus.
MME. DUPONT. Still, are you sure that he is the right sort of husband for Julie?
DUPONT. He is the right sort of husband for Julie, and the right sort of son-in-law for me.
MME. DUPONT [dubiously] Well, you know more of these things than I do.
DUPONT [looks at his watch] Ten minutes past five. Now listen to me. We have very little time, but I feel the ideas surging through my brain with extraordinary clearness. It’s only in moments of emergency that I feel myself master of all my faculties, though I flatter myself I’m not altogether a fool at the worst of times. [He sits upon a chair, his hands leaning upon the back of it]. I will explain everything to you, so that you may make as few blunders as possible. We must get old Mairaut to agree that all the money, Julie’s and Antonin’s, shall be the joint property of them both.
MME. DUPONT. But there will be Julie’s dot.
DUPONT [pettishly] If you keep interrupting we shall never be done. The joint property of them both, on account of Uncle Maréchal’s money. Do you understand?
MME. DUPONT. Yes.