This judicious plan, rapidly
conceived and partly executed, might fail through some trick of chance
which meddles with all things here below.
After dinner that evening, Felix brought the conversation round to the
masked balls of the Opera, remarking that Marie had never been to one,
and proposing that she should accompany him the following evening.
"I'll find you some one to 'intriguer,'" he said.
"Ah! I wish you would," she replied.
"To do the thing well, a woman ought to fasten upon some good prey, a
celebrity, a man of enough wit to give and take. There's Nathan; will
you have him? I know, through a friend of Florine, certain secrets of
his which would drive him crazy."
"Florine?" said the countess. "Do you mean the actress?"
Marie had already heard that name from the lips of the watchman
Quillet; it now shot like a flash of lightning through her soul.
"Yes, his mistress," replied the count. "What is there so surprising
in that?"
"I thought Monsieur Nathan too busy to have a mistress. Do authors
have time to make love?"
"I don't say they love, my dear, but they are forced to _lodge_
somewhere, like other men, and when they haven't a home of their own
they _lodge_ with their mistresses; which may seem to you rather
loose, but it is far more agreeable than lodging in a prison."
Fire was less red than Marie's cheeks.
"Will you have him for a victim? I can help you to terrify him,"
continued the count, not looking at his wife's face.
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