“Well, I can be serious when it is necessary.”

“Let’s begin with your debts.  Their payment is not yet completed, but enough has been done to enable us to foresee the end.  It is certain that you will have, after all debts are paid, from three to four hundred thousand francs.”

Hector had never, in his wildest hopes, expected such success.

“Why, I’m going to be rich,” exclaimed he joyously.

“No, not rich, but quite above want.  There is, too, a mode in which you can regain your lost position.”

“A mode? what?”

Sauvresy paused a moment, and looked steadily at his friend.

“You must marry,” said he at last.

This seemed to surprise Hector, but not disagreeably.

“I, marry?  It’s easier to give that advice than to follow it.”

“Pardon me—­you ought to know that I do not speak rashly.  What would you say to a young girl of good family, pretty, well brought up, so charming that, excepting my own wife, I know of no one more attractive, and who would bring with her a dowry of a million?”

“Ah, my friend, I should say that I adore her!  And do you know such an angel?”

“Yes, and you too, for the angel is Mademoiselle Laurence Courtois.”

Hector’s radiant face overclouded at this name, and he made a discouraged gesture.

“Never,” said he.  “That stiff and obstinate old merchant, Monsieur Courtois, would never consent to give his daughter to a man who has been fool enough to waste his fortune.”

Sauvresy shrugged his shoulders.

“Now, there’s what it is to have eyes, and not see.  Know that this Courtois, whom you think so obstinate, is really the most romantic of men, and an ambitious old fellow to boot.  It would seem to him a grand good speculation to give his daughter to the Count Hector de Tremorel, cousin of the Duke of Samblemeuse, the relative of the Commarins, even though you hadn’t a sou.  What wouldn’t he give to have the delicious pleasure of saying, Monsieur the Count, my son-in-law; or my daughter, Madame the Countess Hector!  And you aren’t ruined, you know, you are going to have an income of twenty thousand francs, and perhaps enough more to raise your capital to a million.”

Hector was silent.  He had thought his life ended, and now, all of a sudden, a splendid perspective unrolled itself before him.  He might then rid himself of the patronizing protection of his friend; he would be free, rich, would have a better wife, as he thought, than Bertha; his house would outshine Sauvresy’s.  The thought of Bertha crossed his mind, and it occurred to him that he, might thus escape a lover who although beautiful and loving, was proud and bold, and whose domineering temper began to be burdensome to him.

“I may say,” said he, seriously to his friend, “that I have always thought Monsieur Courtois an excellent and honorable man, and Mademoiselle Laurence seems to me so accomplished a young lady, that a man might be happy in marrying her even without a dowry.”