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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Secrets of the Princesse de Cadignan by Honore de Balzac: only spent her own fortune, which was very considerable, but she has
made others waste millions. How? why? by what means? No one knows; she
doesn't know herself. I myself saw her swallow up, some thirteen years
ago, the entire fortune of a charming young fellow, and that of an old
notary, in twenty months."
"Thirteen years ago!" exclaimed d'Arthez,--"why, how old is she now?"
"Didn't you see, at dinner," replied Rastignac, laughing, "her son,
the Duc de Maufrigneuse. That young man is nineteen years old;
nineteen and seventeen make--"
"Thirty-six!" cried the amazed author. "I gave her twenty."
"She'll accept them," said Rastignac; "but don't be uneasy, she will
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