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Updated: July 3, 2025
If, as soon as this noble lover finds out how small your fortune is, he makes a sudden change in his behavior, and is cold and embarrassed, will you still marry him? shall you still esteem him?" "He would be another Francisque Althor," she said, with a gesture of bitter disgust. "Let me have the pleasure of producing that change of scene," said Butscha.
Exupere was to start the next morning for Paris to begin the study of law. This impending departure had induced Latournelle to propose him to his friend Dumay as an accomplice in the important conspiracy which these directions indicate. "Is Mademoiselle Modeste suspected of having a lover?" asked Butscha in a timid voice of Madame Latournelle.
"Yes," said Butscha, and he repeated Modeste's speech about disguises. Poor Ernest flung himself upon a bench and held his head in his hands. He could not keep back his tears, and he did not wish Butscha to see them; but the dwarf was the very man to guess his emotion. "What troubles you?" he asked. "She is right!" cried Ernest, springing up; "I am a wretch."
"How do you manage it, you silly fellow?" said Madame Latournelle, laughing. "Ah, madame!" said Butscha, "what you call my hump is the socket of my wings." "So that is the explanation of your seal, is it?" cried the notary. Butscha's seal was a star, and under it the words "Fulgens, sequar," "Shining One, I follow thee," the motto of the house of Chastillonest.
Madame Mignon's handkerchief slipped from her lap to the floor; Butscha precipitated himself upon it, picked it up, and as he returned it whispered in Modeste's ear, "Take care!" Modeste raised a pair of wondering eyes, whose puzzled glance filled the poor cripple with joy unspeakable. "She is not in love!" he whispered to himself, rubbing his hands till the skin was nearly peeled off.
During dinner, while the three were alone, Monsieur and Madame Latournelle and Butscha turned the problem over and over in their minds, and discussed every aspect of it. "If Modeste loved any one in Havre she would have shown some fear yesterday," said Madame Latournelle; "her lover, therefore, lives somewhere else."
"He is on his way home," said Madame Mignon; "but let us keep the secret to ourselves. When my husband learns how faithful Butscha has been to us, how he has shown us the warmest and the most disinterested friendship when others have given us the cold shoulder, he will not let you alone provide for him, Dumay.
"What an acrobat!" whispered Butscha to Latournelle, after listening to a magnificent tirade on the Catholic religion and the happiness of having a pious wife, served up in response to a remark by Madame Mignon.
"I?" answered Ernest; "no, I am going to bed." "Bah!" exclaimed Canalis, looking at him. "I don't know what to make of you." Breakfast was then served, and the poet naturally invited their visitor to stay and take it. Butscha complied, having seen in the expression of the valet's face the success of a trick in which we shall see the first fruits of his promise to Modeste.
"Did it come from you, Monsieur le duc?" she said, holding the sparkling handle toward him. "There was a card with it, saying, 'Guess if you can, and some asterisks. Francoise and Dumay credit Butscha with this charming surprise; but my dear Butscha is not rich enough to buy such rubies.
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