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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Cousin Betty by Honore de Balzac: nothing to us.--Then, as you know, Hortense, she spoke to us of Madame
Marneffe, who, as she owes so much to the Baron, out of a sense of
honor, will take no interest. Hortense wanted to send her diamonds to
the Mont-de-Piete; they would have brought in a few thousand francs,
but we needed ten thousand. Those ten thousand francs were to be had
free of interest for a year!--I said to myself, 'Hortense will be none
the wiser; I will go and get them.'
"Then the woman asked me to dinner through my father-in-law, giving me
to understand that Lisbeth had spoken of the matter, and I should have
the money. Between Hortense's despair on one hand, and the dinner on
the other, I could not hesitate.--That is all.
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