Page 388 - madame-bovary

‘What brings you here?’
‘Do I disturb you?’
‘No; but—‘ And he admitted that his landlord didn’t like
his having ‘women’ there.
‘I must speak to you,’ she went on.
Then he took down the key, but she stopped him.
‘No, no! Down there, in our home!’
And they went to their room at the Hotel de Boulogne.
On arriving she drank off a large glass of water. She was
very pale. She said to him—
‘Leon, you will do me a service?’
And, shaking him by both hands that she grasped tightly,
she added
‘Listen, I want eight thousand francs.’
‘But you are mad!’
‘Not yet.’
And thereupon, telling him the story of the distraint, she
explained her distress to him; for Charles knew nothing of
it; her mother-in-law detested her; old Rouault could do
nothing; but he, Leon, he would set about finding this in-
dispensable sum.
‘How on earth can I?’
‘What a coward you are!’ she cried.
Then he said stupidly, ‘You are exaggerating the difficul-
ty. Perhaps, with a thousand crowns or so the fellow could
be stopped.’
All the greater reason to try and do something; it was
impossible that they could not find three thousand francs.
Besides, Leon, could be security instead of her.