But is not the house of Palma, Werbrust & Co.
half ruined by some speculation in Mexico or the Indies? I will clear
all this up."
"You speak a soliloquy as if you were on the stage, and seem to
account me a cipher," said the old admiral suddenly. "Don't you know
that if he is a gentleman, I have more than one bag in my hold that
will stop any leak in his fortune?"
"As to that, if he is a son of Longueville's, he will want nothing;
but," said Monsieur de Fontaine, shaking his head from side to side,
"his father has not even washed off the stains of his origin. Before
the Revolution he was an attorney, and the DE he has since assumed no
more belongs to him than half of his fortune."
"Pooh! pooh! happy those whose fathers were hanged!" cried the admiral
gaily.
Three or four days after this memorable day, on one of those fine
mornings in the month of November, which show the boulevards cleaned
by the sharp cold of an early frost, Mademoiselle de Fontaine, wrapped
in a new style of fur cape, of which she wished to set the fashion,
went out with two of her sisters-in-law, on whom she had been wont to
discharge her most cutting remarks. The three women were tempted to
the drive, less by their desire to try a very elegant carriage, and
wear gowns which were to set the fashion for the winter, than by their
wish to see a cape which a friend had observed in a handsome lace and
linen shop at the corner of the Rue de la Paix.
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