“I do not say you are to leave Paris to-night, or even to-morrow; perhaps a week—possibly a month—may be given you. But you are both too fond of gaieties, of clothes, of suppers and other dissipated things, and there are too many jewellers’ shops in Paris.” This thrust caused both of the culprits to quake. “So you must go to some retired place and economize.”
“I see,” replied de Meneval, who was thoroughly exasperated. “Having yourself practically run away from a quiet and respectable locality to these gay quarters, with young ladies of the ballet on every hand—” de Meneval pointed angrily to the red-and-gold young ladies on the walls—“now you wish to send my poor little wife off to some hole of a village, where one may exist but not live. I don’t speak of myself—I don’t care. It’s for her.”
“Very well,” answered Papa Bouchard, maliciously. “You may make that hole of a village a paradise steeped in dreamlike splendor to Léontine by your devoted and lover-like attentions to her. You can live over your honeymoon. Won’t you like that, Léontine?”
“Y—yes,” replied Léontine, dolefully.
“Some pretty rural place—all birds and flowers, eh? And a little dog. Doesn’t the prospect charm you?”
“Yes—only—for Victor——”
“Haven’t you just heard Victor say that all he needs to be perfectly happy are you and ballistics? So I suppose, Monsieur de Meneval, you will be revelling in rapture.”
“I suppose so,” replied de Meneval, gloomily. “Come, Léontine, shall I put you in the carriage? You won’t have many chances of going to the opera, poor child, after this.”
Léontine rose and said, coldly, “Good-night, Papa Bouchard.” There was no tweaking of his ear, no patting of his bald head this time. They went out like two sulky and disappointed children.
