"Is that your opinion, Mlle de Saint-Geneix?" rejoined the Duke. "O, I have no opinion on the subject," she replied. "I know nothing of life beyond a certain limit, but I should be led in this instance to believe with your mother rather than with you. I have known misery, and if I have suffered it was in seeing its weight upon those whom I loved. There is no need, therefore, of extending and complicating one's life when it is already so perplexing. That would be to go in search of despair." "Bless me! everything is relative," exclaimed the Duke. "That which is the misery of some is the opulence of others. Would you not be very rich with an income of twelve thousand francs?" "Certainly," replied Caroline, without remembering and perhaps even without knowing that to be the exact amount of her questioner's yearly allowance. "Well, then," continued the Duke, who endeavored to inspire a hope with one word that he might crush it with the next,--still intent upon his plan of agitating this placid or timid heart,--"if any one should offer you such a modest competence as that, together with a sincere love?" "I could not accept," Caroline rejoined. "I have four children to support and rear; no husband would accept such a past as that." "She is charming," cried the Marchioness; "she speaks of her past like a widow." "Ah! I did not speak of the widow, my poor sister. With myself and an old woman-servant, who is attached to us, and who shall share the last morsel of bread in the house, we are seven, neither more nor less. Now do you know the young man to marry with his twelve thousand francs a year? I think decidedly he would make a very bad bargain." Caroline always spoke of her situation with an unaffected cheerfulness, which showed the sincerity of her nature. "Well, in point of fact, you are right," said the Duke. "You will get through life better all alone with your fine, brave spirit. I believe, indeed, that you and I are the only persons in the world who are really philosophers. I regard poverty as nothing when one is responsible only to his own free will, and I must say that I was never before so happy as I am now." "So much the better, my son," said the Marchioness, with an almost imperceptible shade of reproach, which the Duke, however, perceived in an instant, for he hastened to add,-- "I shall be completely happy the day my brother makes the marriage in question, and he will make it, will he not, dear mother?" Caroline was on the point of going to examine the clock. "No, no, it is not slow; it is just right," said the Marchioness. "We have no secrets from you hereafter, dear little one, and you must know that I have to-day received good news relative to a great project which I have for my son. If I have not made use of your pretty hand in negotiating this matter, it is for reasons altogether different from that of distrust. Here, read us this letter, of which my elder son as yet knows nothing."