"He's a very bad man," said Mme Delisle. "Of noble family, rich, titled, young, and handsome, he is celebrated only for his follies. He throws away thousands on very questionable pleasures, and has the unpardonable fault, in my eyes of always ridiculing marriage."
"I can not forgive him for ridiculing marriage, mamma, but I can excuse him for not wishing to marry."
"My dear, a man who dislikes marriage is never a good man. A woman may from caprice or from many motives object to marrying, but a man, except when under the influence of hopeless affection—and men have rarely feeling enough for this—always must be a husband to be a good citizen."
"Ah, mamma, you have been so happy that you think all must be so; but you see many who are not."
"Mme Delisle," said the Princess Menzikoff, who unperceived had come round to her, "allow me to introduce you to my friend Alfred de Rougement. I must not call him count, he being what we call a democrat with a clean face and white kid-gloves."
"The princess is always satirical," replied M. de Rougement smiling; "and my harmless opposition to the government now in power, and which she honors with her patronage; is all her ground for so terrible an announcement."
Mme Delisle and Geraldine both started and colored, and when Alfred de Rougement proposed for the next dance, was accepted, though next minute the mother would gladly have found any excuse to have prevented her daughter from dancing. Alfred de Rougement was the very "bad man" whom she had the instant before been denouncing. But it was now too late. From that evening Geraldine never went to a ball without meeting Alfred. She received many invitations from most unexpected quarters, but as surely as she went she found her new admirer, who invited her to dance as often as he could without breaking the rules of etiquette. And yet he rarely spoke; the dance once over, he brought her back to her mother's side, and left her without saying a word, coming back when his turn came again with clockwork regularity. In their drives Mme Delisle and Geraldine were always sure to meet him. Scarcely was the carriage rolling up the Champs Elysées before he was on horseback within sight. He merely bowed as he passed, however, keeping constantly in sight without endeavoring to join them.
One evening, though invited to an early soirée and to a late ball, during dinner they changed their mind, and decided on going to the Opera at the very opening, to hear some favorite music which Geraldine very much admired. They had not yet risen from dessert when a note came from Alfred de Rougement, offering them his box, one of the best in the house!
"Why he is a regular Monte Christo," cried Mme Delisle impatiently. "How can he know our movements so well?"
"He must have bribed some one of the servants," replied Geraldine; "we talked just now of where we were going before they left the room."