"How curious he is!" said the viscount, addressing D'Harville. "I wish to wean myself from Paris, since I must so soon quit it." "Ah! yes, this beautiful whim to attach yourself to the legation of France at Gerolstein. None of your nonsense and stuff about diplomacy; you will never go there. My wife says so, and everybody repeats it." "I assure you that Madame de Lucenay is mistaken, like every one else." "She told you before me that it was a folly!" "I have committed so many in my lifetime!" "Elegant and charming follies, very well, so as to ruin yourself, as they say, by your Sardanapalus's magnificence--I admit that; but to go and bury yourself in such a hole of a court as Gerolstein! Come, now, this is folly, and you are too sensible to do a stupid thing." "Take care, my dear Lucenay; in abusing this German court you will have a quarrel with D'Harville, the intimate friend of the grand duke, who, besides, received me most kindly the other night at the embassade of----where I was presented to him." "Really! my dear Henry," said D'Harville, "if you knew the grand duke as I know him, you would comprehend that Saint Remy could have no repugnance to go and pass some time at Gerolstein," "I believe you, marquis, although, your grand duke is said to be proudly original; but that doesn't prevent that a beau like Saint Remy, the finest flower among blossoms, cannot live, excepting at Paris; his value is only known at Paris." The other guests had just arrived, when Joseph entered, and said a few words in a low tone to his master. "Gentlemen, will you allow me," said the marquis; "it is the jeweler who brings me some diamonds to choose for my wife--a surprise. You know, Lucenay, you and I being husbands of the old schools." "Oh! if you talk of a surprise," cried the duke, "my wife gave me one yesterday; a famous one, I tell you." "Some splendid present?" "She asked me for a hundred thousand francs." "And as you are a magnifico, you--" "Lent them! they will be mortgaged on her Arnonville farm--short accounts make long friends. But never mind; to lend in two hours one hundred thousand francs to some one who wants them, is generous and rare. Is it not, spendthrift? You who are an expert at loans," said the Duke de Lucenay, laughing, without dreaming of the bearing of his speech. Notwithstanding his audacity, the viscount at first slightly blushed, but he said with effrontery, "One hundred thousand francs! enormous. How can a woman ever have need of such an amount. With men that's another story." "I don't know what she wanted with the money. It is all the same to me. Some bills, probably some urgent creditors; that's her look-out. And, besides, you well know, my dear Saint Remy, that in lending her my money, it would have been in the worst taste in the world to ask what she wanted it for."