Page 279 - madame-bovary

So, with an embarrassed air, he asked if it were possible to
get them, adding that it would be for a year, at any inter-
est he wished. Lheureux ran off to his shop, brought back
the money, and dictated another bill, by which Bovary un-
dertook to pay to his order on the 1st of September next
the sum of one thousand and seventy francs, which, with
the hundred and eighty already agreed to, made just twelve
hundred and fifty, thus lending at six per cent in addition
to one-fourth for commission: and the things bringing him
in a good third at the least, this ought in twelve months to
give him a profit of a hundred and thirty francs. He hoped
that the business would not stop there; that the bills would
not be paid; that they would be renewed; and that his poor
little money, having thriven at the doctor’s as at a hospital,
would come back to him one day considerably more plump,
and fat enough to burst his bag.
Everything, moreover, succeeded with him. He was ad-
judicator for a supply of cider to the hospital at Neufchatel;
Monsieur Guillaumin promised him some shares in the
turf-pits of Gaumesnil, and he dreamt of establishing a new
diligence service between Arcueil and Rouen, which no
doubt would not be long in ruining the ramshackle van of
the ‘Lion d’Or,’ and that, travelling faster, at a cheaper rate,
and carrying more luggage, would thus put into his hands
the whole commerce of Yonville.
Charles several times asked himself by what means he
should next year be able to pay back so much money. He re-
flected, imagined expedients, such as applying to his father
or selling something. But his father would be deaf, and he—

Madame Bovary