As he looked at her purple-red gown, she seemed to him dyed in
blood.
"Madame, I do not accept the help of your experience and skill if
success is to cost anybody's life, or the least criminal act is to
come of it."
"You are a great baby, monsieur," replied the woman; "you wish to
remain blameless in your own eyes, while you want your enemy to be
overthrown."
Victorin shook his head in denial.
"Yes," she went on, "you want this Madame Marneffe to drop the prey
she has between her teeth. But how do you expect to make a tiger drop
his piece of beef? Can you do it by patting his back and saying, 'Poor
Puss'? You are illogical. You want a battle fought, but you object to
blows.--Well, I grant you the innocence you are so careful over. I
have always found that there was material for hypocrisy in honesty!
One day, three months hence, a poor priest will come to beg of you
forty thousand francs for a pious work--a convent to be rebuilt in the
Levant--in the desert.--If you are satisfied with your lot, give the
good man the money. You will pay more than that into the treasury. It
will be a mere trifle in comparison with what you will get, I can tell
you."
She rose, standing on the broad feet that seemed to overflow her satin
shoes; she smiled, bowed, and vanished.
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