"Oh, I know what I say. I've counted the cost. What with
gratuities and extras, it costs us now fully a thousand francs a
month, and three horses and a coachman won't cost you more. And
what a difference! I shall no longer be obliged to blush for the
skinny horses the stable-keeper sends me, nor to endure the
insolence of his men. The first outlay frightened me a little;
but that is made now, and I am delighted. We will save it in
something else."
"In laces, no doubt," thought Mademoiselle Marguerite. She was
intensely exasperated, and on regaining her chamber she said to
herself, for the tenth time, "What do they take me for? Do they
think me an idiot to flaunt the millions they have stolen from my
father--that they have stolen from me--before my eyes in this
fashion? A common thief would take care not to excite suspicion by
a foolish expenditure of the fruits of his knavery, but they--they
have lost their senses."
Madame Leon was already in bed, and when Mademoiselle Marguerite
was satisfied that she was asleep, she took her letter from her
trunk, and added this post-script: "P. S.--It is impossible to
retain the shadow of a doubt, M. and Madame de Fondege have spent
certainly twenty thousand francs to-day. This audacity must arise
from a conviction that no proofs of the crime they have committed
exist. Still they continue to talk to me about their son,
Lieutenant Gustave.
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