“The very best age imaginable. One’s happiness in life is assured when one finds a good partner and marries young, as I did. What kind of attitude does he show with regard to Geneviève?”
“He treats her like a sister, neither more nor less.”
“Not the slightest sign of flirtation?”
“I believe she has a faint liking for him, but I know nothing about his feelings for her.”
“Ask Amélie a few discreet questions.”
“I will think of it.”
Marcel’s mind was occupied with things entirely different. He thought of everything except marriage. His return home appeared very pleasant, for he was very fond of his parents. Perhaps the exile’s son, more than another, possessed a liking for home. He had so often heard his father and uncle regret the old home at Metz, their friends and customs of former times, that the bonds which attached him to his father’s house were very strong, and when away from them all something essential seemed to be lacking in his life. Doubtless this something was his father’s affectionate chiding and his mother’s consoling smile.
Since his return he spent almost the whole of his time out of the office; went out very little at nights, and worked away at a task known to no one except Uncle Graff. M. Baradier, greatly troubled at the turn of events the Explosives had taken, expressed his anxiety to no one but his partner. Uncle Graff, however, calmly replied—
“We must keep wide-awake, but we need not exaggerate the danger. Everything will come out right in the end, that I am sure of.”
“Eh! Do you expect a miracle?” murmured Baradier. “These Explosives shares continue to go down, in spite of all our efforts. Yesterday there was a rumour out on the Bourse that a patent had just been taken, in Germany, England, and France, by an Englishman named Dalgetty, for some marvellous powder or other superior to dynamite. They go so far as to state that this substance is so manageable and harmless, in spite of its destructive power, that they expect to make use of it for engine power. That would mean the suppression of steam, gas and petroleum. A complete revolution. If a quarter of all this is true we are ruined! Doubtless it is an application of Trémont’s formulæ, and Dalgetty is the dummy of the villains who stole them.”