Page:Teleny, or The Reverse of the Medal, t. II.djvu/141

 and then, either slight innuendoes or broad hints about the folly of men who ruin themselves for the corps de ballet, or about the bad taste of those who marry their own and other people's mistresses, but that was all.

"She knew that I was my own master, therefore she did not meddle with my own private life, but left me to do exactly what I liked. If I had a faux menage somewhere or other, so much the better or so much the worse for me. She was glad that I had the good taste to respect les convenances, and not to make a public affair of it. Only a man of forty-five who has made up his mind not to marry can brave public opinion, and keep a mistress ostentatiously.

"Moreover, it has occurred to me that, as she did not wish me to look too closely into the aim of her frequent little journeys, she left me full liberty to act at my own discretion."

"She was still a young woman at that time, was she not?"

"That entirely depends upon what you call a young woman. She was about thirty-seven or thirty-eight, and was exceedingly young-looking