“As usual, you and I are of the same opinion, father.”
“You can say that I have otherwise disposed of Cecile’s hand, and that will cut short all preposterous pretensions like that of Antonin Goulard. Little Vinet may offer himself, and he is preferable to the others who are smelling after the dot; he has talent, and shrewdness, and he belongs to the Chargeboeufs by his mother; but he has too much character not to rule his wife, and he is young enough to make himself loved. You would perish between two sentiments—for I know you by heart, my child.”
“I shall be much embarrassed this evening at the Marions’ to know what to say,” remarked Severine.
“Well, then, my dear,” said her father, “send Madame Marion to me; I’ll talk to her.”
“I knew, father, that you were thinking of our future, but I had no idea you expected it to be so brilliant,” said Madame Beauvisage, taking the hands of the old man and kissing them.
“I have pondered the matter so deeply,” said Grevin, “that in 1831 I bought the Beauseant mansion in Paris, which you have probably seen.”
Madame de Beauvisage made a movement of surprise on hearing this secret, until then so carefully kept, but she did not interrupt her father.
“It will be my wedding present,” he went on. “In 1832 I let it for seven years to an Englishman for twenty-four thousand francs a year,—a pretty stroke of business; for it only cost me three hundred and twenty-five thousand francs, of which I thus recover nearly two hundred thousand. The lease ends in July of this year.”
Severine kissed her father on the forehead and on both cheeks. This last revelation so magnified her future that she was well-nigh dazzled.
“I shall advise my father,” she said to herself, as she recrossed the bridge, “to give only the reversion of that property to his grandchildren, and let me have the life-interest in it. I have no idea of letting my daughter and son-in-law turn me out of doors; they must live with me.”