“Oh,” said the doctor, dryly, “if that is the question, it is very simple—I will give you a plan to get out of the affair. You will go and get acquainted with some rich man; you will do everything you can to gain his confidence; and when you have succeeded, you will plunder him.”
George shook his head. “I am not in any mood for joking.”
“I am not joking,” replied his adviser. “Rob that man, assassinate him even—that would be no worse crime than you would commit in taking a young girl in good health in order to get a portion of her dowry, when at the same time you would have to expose her to the frightful consequences of the disease which you would give her.”
“Frightful consequences?” echoed George.
“Consequences of which death would not be the most frightful.”
“But, sir, you were saying to me just now—”
“Just now I did not tell you everything. Even reduced, suppressed a little by our remedies, the disease remains mysterious, menacing, and in its sum, sufficiently grave. So it would be an infamy to expose your fiancee in order to avoid an inconvenience, however great that might be.”
But George was still not to be convinced. Was it certain that this misfortune would befall Henriette, even with the best attention?
Said the other: “I do not wish to lie to you. No, it is not absolutely certain, it is probable. And there is another truth which I wish to tell you now: our remedies are not infallible. In a certain number of cases—a very small number, scarcely five per cent—they have remained without effect. You might be one of those exceptions, your wife might be one. What then?”
“I will employ a word you used just now, yourself. We should have to expect the worst catastrophes.”