"You see I have come back," he said. "I have come to try again."
"It would be ridiculous," said M. de Bellegarde, "to pretend that we are
glad to see you or that we don't question the taste of your visit."
"Oh, don't talk about taste," said Newman, with a laugh, "or that will
bring us round to yours! If I consulted my taste I certainly shouldn't
come to see you. Besides, I will make as short work as you please.
Promise me to raise the blockade--to set Madame de Cintre at
liberty--and I will retire instantly."
"We hesitated as to whether we would see you," said Madame de
Bellegarde; "and we were on the point of declining the honor. But it
seemed to me that we should act with civility, as we have always done,
and I wished to have the satisfaction of informing you that there are
certain weaknesses that people of our way of feeling can be guilty of
but once."
"You may be weak but once, but you will be audacious many times,
madam," Newman answered. "I didn't come however, for conversational
purposes. I came to say this, simply: that if you will write immediately
to your daughter that you withdraw your opposition to her marriage, I
will take care of the rest. You don't want her to turn nun--you know
more about the horrors of it than I do. Marrying a commercial person is
better than that.
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