"Ah! it is an awful time for that,--the hour of your triumph and of my disgrace. Tell me that, but for my mother, you would have let me succumb. Yes, you must tell me that, and then I may forgive you for what you are doing." "Have I not already said so?" "Tell me so again! You hesitate? It is then a question of the family honor?" "Yes, it is that precisely, the family honor is in question." "And you do not expect me to love you to-day more than on any other day?" "I know," rejoined the Marquis, sadly, "that personally I am not made to be loved." The Duke felt himself completely conquered; he threw himself into his brother's arms. "Come!" he cried, "forgive me. You are a better man than I. I respect you, admire you, I almost worship you; I know, I feel that you are my best friend. My God! what is there that I can do for you? Do you love any woman? Shall I kill her husband? Do you want me to go to China and find some precious manuscript, in some pagoda, risking the _cangue_, and other pleasant things?" "You think of nothing but a discharge of obligations, Gaëtan. If you would only love me a little, I should be already paid a hundred times over." "Well, then, I do love you with all my heart," replied the Duke, embracing him violently; "and you see I am weeping like a child. Look here! Give me a little esteem in return; I will reform. I am still young. Why, the deuce take it all, at thirty-six one can't have been ruined altogether! A fellow is only a little used up. I will turn over a new leaf,--all the more because that is needed in my case. Well, then, so much the better! I will renew my youth, my health. I will go and pass the summer with you and my mother in the country; I will tell you stories; I will make you laugh again. Come! help me lay my plans, support me, lift me up, console me; for, after all, I don't know where I am, and I feel very unhappy." The Marquis had already noticed, without appearing to do so, the disappearance of the weapons which had been in sight an hour before. He had also read in his brother's face the fearful crisis through which he had passed. He knew furthermore that Gaëtan's moral courage would only bear a certain amount of strain. "Dress yourself now," he said, "and come to breakfast with me. We will chat; we will build air-castles. Who knows but I may convince you that, in certain cases, we begin to be rich on the very day we become poor?" V The Marquis conducted his brother to the Bois de Boulogne, which at that period was not a splendid English garden, but a charming grove of dreamy shade. It was one of the first days of April; the weather was magnificent; the thickets were covered with violets, and a thousand foolish tomtits were chattering around the first buds, while the citron-hued butterflies of those early beautiful days seemed, by their form, their color, and their undecided flight, like new leaves fluttering gently in the wind.