[Exit SERVANT.
SCENE II.
The PRESIDENT—MARSHALL KALB.
MARSHAL (hastily). I have just looked in, en passant, my dear friend! How are you? How do you get on? We are to have the grand opera Dido to-night! Such a conflagration!—a whole town will be in flames!—you will come to the blaze of course—eh?
PRESIDENT. I have conflagration enough in my own house, one that threatens the destruction of all I possess. Be seated, my dear marshal. You arrive very opportunely to give me your advice and assistance in a certain business which will either advance our fortunes or utterly ruin us both!
MARSHAL. Don't alarm me so, my dear friend!
PRESIDENT. As I said before, it must exalt or ruin us entirely! You know my project respecting the major and Lady Milford—you are not ignorant how necessary this union is to secure both our fortunes! Marshal, our plans threaten to come to naught. My son refuses to marry her!
MARSHAL. Refuses! Refuses to marry her? But, my goodness! I have published the news through the whole town. The union is the general topic of conversation.
PRESIDENT. Then you will be talked of by all the town as a spreader of false reports,—in short, Ferdinand loves another.
MARSHAL. Pooh! you are joking! As if that were an obstacle?