“Are they both yours to renounce? France may be, but is the property? It is scarcely worth mentioning; but, is it yet?”

“I had no intention, in the words I used, to claim it yet. If it passed to me from you, tomorrow⁠—”

“Which I have the vanity to hope is not probable.”

“⁠—or twenty years hence⁠—”

“You do me too much honour,” said the Marquis; “still, I prefer that supposition.”

“⁠—I would abandon it, and live otherwise and elsewhere. It is little to relinquish. What is it but a wilderness of misery and ruin!”

“Hah!” said the Marquis, glancing round the luxurious room.