than
you do; do not commit this folly; you will be sorry for it one day. Be
reasonable. I don't advise you to leave Marguerite, but live with her
as you did at the beginning. Let her find the means to get out of this
difficulty. The duke will come back in a little while. The Comte de
N., if she would take him, he told me yesterday even, would pay all her
debts, and give her four or five thousand francs a month. He has two
hundred thousand a year. It would be a position for her, while you
will certainly be obliged to leave her. Don't wait till you are ruined,
especially as the Comte de N. is a fool, and nothing would prevent your
still being Marguerite's lover. She would cry a little at the beginning,
but she would come to accustom herself to it, and you would thank me
one day for what you had done. Imagine that Marguerite is married, and
deceive the husband; that is all. I have already told you all this
once, only at that time it was merely advice, and now it is almost a
necessity."

What Prudence said was cruelly true.

"This is how it is," she went on, putting away the papers she had just
shown me; "women like Marguerite always foresee that some one will love
them, never that they will love; otherwise they would put aside money,
and at thirty they could afford the luxury of having a lover for
nothing. If I had only known once what I know now! In short, say nothing
to Marguerite, and bring her back to Paris. You have lived with her
alone for four or five months; that is quite enough. Shut your eyes now;
that is all that any one asks of you. At the end of a fortnight she will
take the Comte de N., and she will save up during the winter, and next
summer you will begin over again. That is how things are done, my dear
fellow!"

And Prudence appeared to be enchanted with her advice, which I refused
indignantly.

Not only my love and my dignity would not let me act thus, but I was
certain that, feeling as she did now, Marguerite would die rather than
accept another lover.

"Enough joking," I said to Prudence; "tell me exactly how much
Marguerite is in need of."

"I have told you: thirty thousand francs."

"And when does she require this sum?"

"Before the end of two months."

"She shall have it."

Prudence shrugged her shoulders.

"I will give it to you," I continued, "but you must swear to me that you
will not tell Marguerite that I have given it to you."

"Don't be afraid."

"And if she sends you anythin