“My friend,” she said, “if they are people with twenty-five thousand francs a year and a carriage, I shall never dare to receive them.”
“Why not, pray, my dear love? I am an author, and genius goes before wealth. Isn’t that so, Henri?”
“It ought to be so, at all events.”
“But, my dear, I am not an author, I have no genius——”
“That doesn’t follow, my dear love; one is often found without the other.”
“At all events, I shall not dare, or I shall not be able—you yourself say that we must not make acquaintances which will entail expense.”
It seemed to me that Marguerite was getting mixed up; I fancied that I could see her making signals to her husband; but he was trying to compose the concluding lines of a quatrain, and was not listening to Marguerite. I comforted the little woman by telling her that she was under no obligation to receive Monsieur Roquencourt and his niece.
“But you will go to see them?” she asked.
“Yes, I don’t see what should prevent me.”
“No, of course not. But you see, according to what I have heard of this young lady, who does not choose to marry, I have an idea that she is a flirt.”