Still, she accepted it without rebellion, although
it was in a tone of heart-broken anguish that she replied:
"Perhaps I have no right to tell you the truth. I hope the future
will prove that I am wrong. However, you are without resources,
and you have no profession. Pray Heaven that you may never know
what it is to be hungry and to have no bread."
For some time already the ingenious young man had shown
unmistakable signs of impatience. This gloomy prediction
irritated him beyond endurance.
"All this is empty talk," he interrupted. "I don't mean to work,
for it's not at all in my line. Still, I don't expect to want for
anything! That's plain enough, I hope."
Madame d'Argeles did not wince. "What do you mean to do then?"
she asked, coldly. "I don't understand you."
He shrugged his shoulders impatiently. "Are we to keep up this
farce for ever?" he petulantly exclaimed. "It doesn't take with
me. You know what I mean as well as I do. Why do you talk to me
about dying of starvation? What about the fortune?"
"What fortune?"
"Eh? why, my uncle's, of course! Your brother's, the Count de
Chalusse."
Now M. Wilkie's visit, manner, assurance, wheedling, and
contradictions were all explained. That maternal confidence which
is so strong in the hearts of mothers vanished from Madame
d'Argeles's for ever. The depths of selfishness and cunning she
discerned in Wilkie's mind appalled her.
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