[Modeste Mignon by Honore de Balzac]@TWC D-Link bookModeste Mignon CHAPTER XVII 1/15
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A THIRD SUITOR. "Those two young men," said Madame Latournelle, on the Saturday evening, "have no idea how many spies they have on their tracks.
We are eight in all, on the watch." "Don't say two young men, wife; say three!" cried little Latournelle, looking round him.
"Gobenheim is not here, so I can speak out." Modeste raised her head, and everybody, imitating Modeste, raised theirs and looked at the notary. "Yes, a third lover--and he is something like a lover--offers himself as a candidate." "Bah!" exclaimed the colonel. "I speak of no less a person," said Latournelle, pompously, "than Monsieur le Duc d'Herouville, Marquis de Saint-Sever, Duc de Nivron, Comte de Bayeux, Vicomte d'Essigny, grand equerry and peer of France, knight of the Spur and the Golden Fleece, grandee of Spain, and son of the last governor of Normandy.
He saw Mademoiselle Modeste at the time when he was staying with the Vilquins, and he regretted then--as his notary, who came from Bayeux yesterday, tells me--that she was not rich enough for him; for his father recovered nothing but the estate of Herouville on his return to France, and that is saddled with a sister. The young duke is thirty-three years old.
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