"
"When, uncle?"
"To-morrow."
"But, my dear uncle, I am not committed to anything?"
"Nothing whatever, and you may bombard him, set fire to him, and leave
him to founder like an old hulk if you choose. He won't be the first,
I fancy?"
"You ARE kind, uncle!"
As soon as the Count got home he put on his glasses, quietly took the
card out of his pocket, and read, "Maximilien Longueville, Rue de
Sentier."
"Make yourself happy, my dear niece," he said to Emilie, "you may hook
him with any easy conscience; he belongs to one of our historical
families, and if he is not a peer of France, he infallibly will be."
"How do you know so much?"
"That is my secret."
"Then do you know his name?"
The old man bowed his gray head, which was not unlike a gnarled
oak-stump, with a few leaves fluttering about it, withered by autumnal
frosts; and his niece immediately began to try the ever-new power of
her coquettish arts. Long familiar with the secret of cajoling the old
man, she lavished on him the most childlike caresses, the tenderest
names; she even went so far as to kiss him to induce him to divulge so
important a secret. The old man, who spent his life in playing off
these scenes on his niece, often paying for them with a present of
jewelry, or by giving her his box at the opera, this time amused
himself with her entreaties, and, above all, her caresses. But as he
spun out this pleasure too long, Emilie grew angry, passed from
coaxing to sarcasm and sulks; then, urged by curiosity, she recovered
herself.
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