She replied gently: "Very well, my dear, we will not take it; it will be a million less in our pockets, that is all."
Georges paced the room and uttered his thoughts aloud, thus speaking to his wife without addressing her:
"Yes, a million—so much the worse. He did not think when making his will what a breach of etiquette he was committing. He did not realize in what a false, ridiculous position he was placing me. He should have left half of it to me—that would have made matters right."
He seated himself, crossed his legs and began to twist the ends of his mustache, as was his custom when annoyed, uneasy, or pondering over a weighty question.
Madeleine took up a piece of embroidery upon which she worked occasionally, and said: "I have nothing to say. You must decide."
It was some time before he replied; then he said hesitatingly: "The world would never understand how it was that Vaudrec constituted you his sole heiress and that I allowed it. To accept that legacy would be to avow guilty relations on your part and an infamous lack of self-respect on mine. Do you know how the acceptance of it might be interpreted? We should have to find some adroit means of palliating it. We should have to give people to suppose, for instance, that he divided his fortune between us, giving half to you and half to me."
She said: "I do not see how that can be done, since there is a formal will."
He replied: "Oh, that is very simple. We have no children; you can therefore deed me part of the inheritance. In that way we can silence malignant tongues."
She answered somewhat impatiently: "I do not see how we can silence malignant tongues since the will is there, signed by Vaudrec."
He said angrily: "Do you need to exhibit it, or affix it to the door? You are absurd! We will say that the fortune was left us jointly by Count de Vaudrec. That is all. You cannot, moreover, accept the legacy without my authority; I will only consent on the condition of a partition which will prevent me from becoming a laughing-stock for the world."