I have heard a lot of scandal and have received heaps of anonymous letters about you." Serge gave a start of indignation.
"Don't be uneasy," continued the mistress.

"I did not heed the tales, and I burned the letters.

Some said you were a dissolute man, capable of anything to gain your object.

Others insinuated that you were not a Prince, that you were not a Pole, but the son of a Russian coachman and a little dressmaker of Les Ternes; that you had lived at the expense of Mademoiselle Anna Monplaisir, the star of the Varietes Theatre, and that you were bent on marrying to pay your debts with my daughter's money." Panine, pale as death, rose up and said, in a stifled voice: "Madame!" "Sit down, my dear child," interrupted the mistress.

"If I tell you these things, it is because I have the proofs that they are untrue.
Otherwise, I would not have given myself the trouble to talk to you about them.