Anatole, having taken off his overcoat, sat with arms akimbo before a table on a corner of which he smilingly and absent-mindedly fixed his large and handsome eyes.

He regarded his whole life as a continual round of amusement which someone for some reason had to provide for him.

And he looked on this visit to a churlish old man and a rich and ugly heiress in the same way.

All this might, he thought, turn out very well and amusingly.

" And why not marry her if she really has so much money? That never does any harm," thought Anatole.