"It's true, nevertheless. Irene is intact."

Just then Irene came in with her father, who had aged to such an extent
that I should never have known him in the street. He came up to me and
embraced me, begging me to forget the past. "It is only you," he added,
"who can furnish me with funds to go to Cremona.

"I have several debts here, and am in some danger of imprisonment. Nobody
of any consequence comes to see me. My dear daughter is the only thing of
value which I still possess. I have just been trying to sell this
pinchbeck watch, and though I asked only six sequins, which is half what
it is worth, they would not give me more than two. When a man gets
unfortunate, everything is against him."

I took the watch, and gave the father six sequins for it, and then handed
it to Irene. She said with a smile that she could not thank me, as I only
gave her back her own, but she thanked me for the present I had made her
father.

"Here," said she seriously to the old man, "you can sell it again now."

This made me laugh. I gave the count ten sequins in addition, embraced
Irene, and said I must be gone, but that I would see them again in three
or four days.

Irene escorted me to the bottom of the stairs, and as she allowed me to
assure myself that she still possessed the rose of virginity, I gave her
another ten sequins, and told her that the first time she went alone to
the ball with me I would give her a hundred sequins. She said she would
consult her father.