Volume V Part 6 (1/2)
”How is Marcoline?” said he, as soon as he saw me
”Very well, and you needn't trouble yourself any ed, well dressed, and well fed, and sleeps with my niece's maid”
”I didn't know I had a niece”
”There are s you don't know In three or four days she will return to Venice”
”I hope, dear brother, that you will ask me to dine with you to-day”
”Not at all, dear brother I forbid you to set foot in my house, where your presence would be offensive to Marcoline, whom you must not see any more”
”Yes, I will; I will return to Venice, if I have to hang for it”
”What good would that be? She won't have you”
”She loves me”
”She beats you”
”She beats entle as a lamb when she sees me so well dressed You do not kno I suffer”
”I can partly guess, but I do not pity you, for you are an impious and cruel fool You have broken your vows, and have not hesitated to radation to satisfy your caprice What would you have done, I should like to know, if I had given you the cold shoulder instead of helping you?”
”I should have gone into the street, and begged forwith her”
”She would have beaten you, and would probably have appealed to the law to get rid of you”
”But ill you do forher”
”I will take you to France, and try to get you employed by some bishop”
”Employed! I was meant by nature to be employed by none but God”
”You proud fool! Marcoline rightly called you a whiner Who is your God?
How do you serve Him? You are either a hypocrite or an idiot Do you think that you, a priest, serve God by decoying an innocent girl away froion you do not even understand? Unhappy fool! do you think that with no talent, no theological learning, and no eloquence, you can be a Protestant minister Take care never to come to my house, or I will have you expelled from Genoa”
”Well, well, take me to Paris, and I will see what my brother Francis can do for ood! you shall go to Paris, and ill start from here in three or four days Eat and drink to your heart's content, but re I shall have my niece, my secretary, and my valet with me We shall travel by sea”
”The sea e away soot home I told Marcoline what had passed between us