It is worth while to be civil to a
man who has given his daughters eight hundred thousand francs apiece;
and they showed me every attention then--but it was all for my money.
Grand people are not great. I found that out by experience! I went to
the theatre with them in their carriage; I might stay as long as I
cared to stay at their evening parties. In fact, they acknowledged me
their father; publicly they owned that they were my daughters. But I
was always a shrewd one, you see, and nothing was lost upon me.
Everything went straight to the mark and pierced my heart. I saw quite
well that it was all sham and pretence, but there is no help for such
things as these. I felt less at my ease at their dinner-table than I
did downstairs here. I had nothing to say for myself. So these grand
folks would ask in my son-in-law's ear, 'Who may that gentleman be?'
--'The father-in-law with the money bags; he is very rich.'--'The
devil, he is!' they would say, and look again at me with the respect
due to my money. Well, if I was in the way sometimes, I paid dearly
for my mistakes. And besides, who is perfect? (My head is one sore!)
Dear Monsieur Eugene, I am suffering so now, that a man might die of
the pain; but it is nothing to be compared with the pain I endured when
Anastasie made me feel, for the first time, that I had said something
stupid.
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