"Why, about—oh, you know very well! I told you the other evening!"
"That again!" he said, getting more and more worked up; "how foolish you are!"
"What, do you mean that you do not care for Madame de Nézel?" exclaimed Bijou.
"Madame de Nézel is a charming woman," he stammered out, in an embarrassed way. "She is an excellent friend whom I like very much, very much indeed, but not in the way you imagine."
"Ah! so much the worse for you; she is a widow, and she is rich; she would just have suited you. Well, then, you like someone else?"
"Yes."
"Someone you cannot marry?"
"Exactly."
"Why? isn't she rich enough?"
"Oh, no, it is not that; if she had not a farthing it would be all the same to me; it is the other way round, I am not rich enough for her, and then—she would not have me."