Page:Eekhoud - The New Carthage.djvu/211

Rh your parliamentary airs before the empty cash-box and exhausted credit …"

'Your daughter! You had better talk about your daughter!" sneered Béjard, pulling and chewing his reddish whiskers with temper. "Do you reckon as nothing Madame's whims and her unreasonableness? Damn it! I had to resort to speculation and lucrative business to meet her harlot's luxury. My income as a ship-owner would never have been enough. But that was to be expected, after the splendid education you gave her!"

"Why did you take her away from me, then?" asked Dobouziez. "I was happy and proud to see her well-dressed, radiant, surrounded by things that were expensive, but to her taste. Oh! if I had had to pay only for her clothes and her pleasures, her jewels and little ornaments, monsieur, do you hear me, my funds would not be as low as they are now, since I have had to defray the bills of your political sport, and cover your stupid and extravagant expenses with my signature. You had better not talk to me about what it has cost me; wasters and spenders like you don't let me off so cheap. They take everything away from me; even my reputation!…"

And Dobouziez, exhausted, let himself fall into an armchair.

Béjard had been listening almost all the while, tramping up and down the floor, whistling softly at the most lashing truths.

Upstairs in the drawing rooms, the voice of Madame Béjard, low, rich and melancholy, continued to resound. And her voice stirred the manufacturer to the depths of his heart. For though his probity and his prudence as a business man suffered because he had