"I promise it," exclaimed Germain, who stood pondering. "Yet, sir, tell me one thing."
"Willingly."
"That should I decide to go, I am at least not to lose your affection."
"No, no, Germain, you have it for ever. Have no fear of that, whatever else. The heart of the father changes not towards the son. Nor shall ever your secret be lost through me. But, alas! I see you already resolving to do that that my honour, to which I refer every question, does not commend."
The old man turned away leaving him agitated and unable to answer. The tide of love swept over his miserable heart and the form of Cyrène rose in his thoughts. Her eyes turned the balance. How vast to him was their argument.
"I cannot," he exclaimed desperately.
The more he dwelt upon it the more he found this a settled point. Of us who think ourselves stronger, how many ever had such a temptation?
In a few hours he had left Eaux Tranquilles for Paris.
Dominique brought him to a house in the Quartier du Temple where there was an apartment which de Bailleul often occupied: there they installed themselves.
During the morning Germain would have in some obscure fencing or deportment master whose instructions he would adapt to suit himself. In the afternoon he would stroll off among the pleasure seekers who crowded the ramparts or the arcades of the Palais Royal, or would study the externals of high life in the Faubourg St Germain. His evenings were largely spent in the parterre of the opera.