'What's that?' exclaimed the Comte de Croisnel. 'You talk nonsense, Roland. M. le marquis is hardly past forty. He is in his prime.' 'Without question, mon pere. For me, I was merely offering proof that he can preserve his prime unlimitedly.' 'He is not a subject for mockery, Roland.' 'Quite the contrary; for reverence!' 'Another than you, my boy, and he would march you out.' 'I am to imagine, then, that his hand continues firm?' 'Imagine to the extent of your capacity; but remember that respect is always owing to your own family, and deliberate before you draw on yourself such a chastisement as mercy from an accepted member of it.' Roland bowed and drummed on his knee. The conversation had been originated by Renee for the enlightenment of Nevil and as a future protection to herself. Now that it had disclosed its burden she could look at him no more, and when her father addressed her significantly: 'Marquise, you did me the honour to consent to accompany me to the Church of the Frari this afternoon?' she felt her self-accusation of coquettry biting under her bosom like a thing alive. Roland explained the situation to Nevil. 'It is the mania with us, my dear Nevil, to marry our girls young to established men. Your established man carries usually all the signs, visible to the multitude or not, of the stages leading to that eminence. We cannot, I believe, unless we have the good fortune to boast the paternity of Hercules, disconnect ourselves from the steps we have mounted; not even, the priests inform us, if we are ascending to heaven; we carry them beyond the grave. However, it seems that our excellent marquis contrives to keep them concealed, and he is ready to face marriage--the Grandest Inquisitor, next to Death. Two furious matchmakers--our country, beautiful France, abounds in them--met one day; they were a comtesse and a baronne, and they settled the alliance. The bell was rung, and Renee came out of school. There is this to be said: she has no mother; the sooner a girl without a mother has a husband the better. That we are all agreed upon. I have no personal objection to the marquis; he has never been in any great scandals. He is Norman, and has estates in Normandy, Dauphiny, Touraine; he is hospitable, luxurious. Renee will have a fine hotel in Paris. But I am eccentric: I have read in our old Fabliaux of December and May. Say the marquis is November, say October; he is still some distance removed from the plump Spring month. And we in our family have wits and passions. In fine, a bud of a rose in an old gentleman's button-hole! it is a challenge to the whole world of youth; and if the bud should leap? Enough of this matter, friend Nevil; but sometimes a friend must allow himself to be bothered. I have perfect confidence in my sister, you see; I simply protest against her being exposed to . . . You know men. I protest, that is, in the privacy of my cigar-case, for I have no chance elsewhere.