"
"I, monsieur?"
"Yes, beautiful, noble creature!" cried Crevel. "You have indeed been
too wretched!"
"Monsieur, be silent and go--or speak to me as you ought."
"Do you know, madame, how Master Hulot and I first made acquaintance?
--At our mistresses', madame."
"Oh, monsieur!"
"Yes, madame, at our mistresses'," Crevel repeated in a melodramatic
tone, and leaving his position to wave his right hand.
"Well, and what then?" said the Baroness coolly, to Crevel's great
amazement.
Such mean seducers cannot understand a great soul.
"I, a widower five years since," Crevel began, in the tone of a man
who has a story to tell, "and not wishing to marry again for the sake
of the daughter I adore, not choosing either to cultivate any such
connection in my own establishment, though I had at the time a very
pretty lady-accountant. I set up, 'on her own account,' as they say, a
little sempstress of fifteen--really a miracle of beauty, with whom I
fell desperately in love. And in fact, madame, I asked an aunt of my
own, my mother's sister, whom I sent for from the country, to live
with the sweet creature and keep an eye on her, that she might behave
as well as might be in this rather--what shall I say--shady?--no,
delicate position.
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