“Well, now, don’t you think,” said Mr. Manning in an almost coaxing tone of voice, “that you are rather young yet to consider so important a question as the choosing of your future wife?”
“Exceedingly young,” said Eugene in an equally reasonable voice. “I am taking a part that is quite unusual, yet it suits me; for I am leaving this country, perhaps not to return for many years, therefore I beg you to grant me your best attention.”
Mr. Manning stared at the curé, whom he was almost forgetting in his interest in Eugene. What kind of a man was this who, after he had attained to years of maturity, suffered a child to go about making himself ridiculous?
The curé, blissfully unconscious of this thought, and not understanding a word of what he said or of what Eugene said, sat gazing tranquilly out through the door of the reception-room at the magnificence of two parlors across the hall. He, a poor priest, had never been in so handsome a house in his life. The stone château of the de Vargas, which was large, bare, and comfortless, could not be compared with this mansion. As a young man, he had gone from the cottage of his peasant father and mother to a seminary, and from thence to Paris for a few months, where he lived the life of a student. He had seen the exterior of fine hotels and palaces, but never had his feet trodden such velvety carpets, never had his limbs pressed such soft furniture, never had he been received as a visitor in the home of such a one as this small amiable gentleman, who was probably a merchant prince in this strange new country, and who talked to his young friend with brevity, and yet without the smallest tincture of haughtiness.
The curé beamed amiably at Mr. Manning, and not a suspicion of envy found lodgment in his gentle breast. He was delighted to see a man in possession of so much luxury. “I felicitate you, sir,” he murmured when Mr. Manning briefly asked him what relation he bore to Eugene.
“He cannot understand you, sir,” interposed Eugene, “unless you speak French or slow American.”
Mr. Manning made a gesture that significantly commended the curé to the pleasant company of his own thoughts. He was not the man to talk “slow American” when a few quick sentences would dispose of the business in hand.
“So you wish me to seriously consider your proposal, little boy,” he said, again confronting Eugene.
“I do, sir.”
“Well, then, give me your reasons for breaking through the custom of this country, which I suppose you know is not to arrange marriages until the contracting parties are of age.”