Mme. de Marville wished to make matters even. Her request, made aloud,
in defiance of all rules of good taste, sounded so much like an
attempt to repay at once the balance due to the poor cousin, that Pons
flushed red, like a girl found out in fault. The grain of sand was a
little too large; for some moments he could only let it work in his
heart. Cecile, a red-haired young woman, with a touch of pedantic
affectation, combined her father's ponderous manner with a trace of
her mother's hardness. She went and left poor Pons face to face with
the terrible Presidente.

"How nice she is, my little Lili!" said the mother. She still called
her Cecile by this baby name.

"Charming!" said Pons, twirling his thumbs.

"I _cannot_ understand these times in which we live," broke out the
Presidente. "What is the good of having a President of the Court of
Appeal in Paris and a Commander of the Legion of Honor for your
father, and for a grandfather the richest wholesale silk merchant in
Paris, a deputy, and a millionaire that will be a peer of France some
of these days?"

The President's zeal for the new Government had, in fact, recently
been rewarded with a commander's ribbon--thanks to his friendship with
Popinot, said the envious. Popinot himself, modest though he was, had,
as has been seen, accepted the title of count, "for his son's sake,"
he told his numerous friends.

"Men look for nothing but money nowadays," said Cousin Pons. "No one
thinks anything of you unless you are rich, and--"