“It is very smart indeed. As to that swine of a Laroche-Mathieu, just see if I don’t pay him out one of these days. Oh, the scoundrel, just let him look out for himself! He shall go through my hands.” Then he began to reflect, and went on, “We ought, though, to profit by all this.”
“You can still buy some of the loan,” said she; “it is only at seventy-two francs.”
He said, “Yes, but I have no money under my hand.”
She raised her eyes towards him, eyes full of entreaty, saying, “I have thought of that, darling, and if you were very nice, very nice, if you loved me a little, you would let me lend you some.”
He answered, abruptly and almost harshly, “As to that, no, indeed.”
She murmured, in an imploring voice: “Listen, there is something that you can do without borrowing money. I wanted to buy ten thousand francs’ worth of the loan to make a little nest-egg. Well, I will take twenty thousand, and you shall stand in for half. You understand that I am not going to hand the money over to Walter. So there is nothing to pay for the present. If it all succeeds, you gain seventy thousand francs. If not, you will owe me ten thousand, which you can pay when you please.”
He remarked, “No, I do not like such pains.”
Then she argued, in order to get him to make up his mind. She proved to him that he was really pledging his word for ten thousand francs, that he was running risks, and that she was not advancing him anything, since the actual outlay was made by Walter’s bank. She pointed out to him, besides, that it was he who had carried on in the Vie Francaise the whole of the political campaign that had rendered the scheme possible. He would be very foolish not to profit by it. He still hesitated, and she added, “But just reflect that in reality it is Walter who is advancing you