“You have certainly deserved all your good fortune.”
“Do you think so? I have only used my fortune—in subservience to my pleasures.”
“I wonder you do not have a regular mistress.”
“The reason is, that I like to be my own master. A mistress at my coat-tails would be more troublesome than a wife; she would be an obstacle to the numerous pleasant adventures I encounter at every town. For example, if I had a mistress I should not be able to take the charming Irene to the ball to-morrow.”
“You speak like a wise man.”
“Yes, though my wisdom is by no means of the austere kind.”
In the evening I went to the opera, and should no doubt have gone to the card-table if I had not seen Cesarino in the pit. I spent two delightful hours with him. He opened his heart to me, and begged me to plead for him with his sister to get her consent to his going to sea, for which he had a great longing. He said that he might make a large fortune by a judicious course of trading. After a temperate supper with my dear boy, I went to bed. The next morning the fine young officer, the Marchioness of Q——’s brother, came and asked me to give him a breakfast. He said he had communicated my proposal to his sister, and that she had replied that I must be making a fool of him, as it was not likely that a man who lived as I did would be thinking of marrying.
“I did not tell you that I aspired to the honour of marrying her.”
“No, and I did not say anything about marriage; but that’s what the girls are always aiming at.”
“I must go and disabuse her of the notion.”