ll me unhappy?"

Danglars, seeing his daughter smiling, and proud even to insolence,
could not entirely repress his brutal feelings, but they betrayed
themselves only by an exclamation. Under the fixed and inquiring gaze
levelled at him from under those beautiful black eyebrows, he prudently
turned away, and calmed himself immediately, daunted by the power of a
resolute mind. "Truly, my daughter," replied he with a smile, "you are
all you boast of being, excepting one thing; I will not too hastily tell
you which, but would rather leave you to guess it." Eugenie looked at
Danglars, much surprised that one flower of her crown of pride, with
which she had so superbly decked herself, should be disputed. "My
daughter," continued the banker, "you have perfectly explained to me the
sentiments which influence a girl like you, who is determined she will
not marry; now it remains for me to tell you the motives of a father
like me, who has decided that his daughter shall marry." Eugenie
bowed, not as a submissive daughter, but as an adversary prepared for a
discussion.

"My daughter," continued Danglars, "when a father asks his daughter to
choose a husband, he has always some reason for wishing her to marry.
Some are affected with the mania of which you spoke just now, that of
living again in their grandchildren. This is not my weakness, I tell you
at once; family joys have no charm for me. I may acknowledge this to
a daughter whom I know to be philosophical enough to understand my
indifference, and not to impute it to me as a crime."

"This is not to the purpose," said Eugenie; "let us speak candidly, sir;
I admire candor."

"Oh," said Danglars, "I can, when circumstances render it desirable,
adopt your system, although it may not be my general practice. I will
therefore proceed. I have proposed to you to marry, not for your sake,
for indeed I did not think of you in the least at the moment (you admire
candor, and will now be satisfied, I hope); but because it suited me
to marry you as soon as possible, on account of certain commercial
speculations I am desirous of entering into." Eugenie became uneasy.

"It is just as I tell you, I assure you, and you must not be angry with
me, for you have sought this disclosure. I do not willingly enter into
arithmetical explanations with an artist like you, who fears to enter my
study lest she should imbibe disagreeable or anti-poetic impressions and
sensations. But in that same banker's