I have thought since that perhaps the incident had its comic side, but at the time, I assure you, I could see in it nothing to laugh at.
I mentioned the fact to my friend not without asperity and then, controlling his mirth as best he could, he said to me:
"But, my dear fellow, do you really want to marry?"
At this I entirely lost my temper.
'"You are completely idiotic," I said. "If I did not want to marry, and what is more marry at once, within the next fortnight, do you imagine that I should have spent three days reading love letters from women I have never set eyes on?"
'"Calm yourself and listen to me," he replied. "I have a cousin who lives in Geneva.
She is Swiss, du reste, and she belongs to a family of the greatest respectability in the republic. Her morals are without reproach, she is of a suitable age, a spinster, for she has spent the last fifteen years nursing an invalid mother who has lately died, she is well educated and par dessus le marchГ© she is not ugly."
'"It sounds as though she were a paragon," I said.
'"I do not say that, but she has been well brought up and would become the position you have to offer her."
'"There is one thing you forget.
What inducement would there be for her to give up her friends and her accustomed life to accompany in exile a man of forty-nine who is by no means a beauty?"'
Monsieur le Gouverneur broke off his narrative and shrugging his shoulders so emphatically that his head almost sank between them, turned to us.
'I am ugly. I admit it.
I am of an ugliness that does not inspire terror or respect, but only ridicule, and that is the worst ugliness of all.
When people see me for the first time they do not shrink with horror, there would evidently be something flattering in that, they burst out laughing.
Listen, when the admirable Mr Wilkins showed me his animals this morning, Percy, the orang-utan, held out his arms and but for the bars of the cage would have clasped me to his bosom as a long lost brother.
Once indeed when I was at the Jardin des Plantes in Paris and was told that one of the anthropoid apes had escaped I made my way to the exit as quickly as I could for fear that, mistaking me for the refugee, they would seize me and, notwithstanding my expostulations, shut me up in the monkey house.'
'Voyons, mon ami,' said Madame his wife, in her deep slow voice, 'you are talking even greater nonsense than usual.
I do not say that you are an Apollo, in your position it is unnecessary that you should be, but you have dignity, you have poise, you are what any woman would call a fine man.'
'I will resume my story.
When I made this remark to my friend he replied:
"One can never tell with women.
There is something about marriage that wonderfully attracts them.
There would be no harm in asking her.
After all it is regarded as a compliment by a woman to be asked in marriage.
She can but refuse."
'"But I do not know your cousin and I do not see how I am to make her acquaintance.
I cannot go to her house, ask to see her and when I am shown into the drawing-room say: Voila , I have come to ask you to marry me.
She would think I was a lunatic and scream for help.
Besides, I am a man of an extreme timidity, and I could never take such a step."
'"I will tell you what to do," said my friend. "Go to Geneva and take her a box of chocolates from me.
She will be glad to have news of me and will receive you with pleasure.
You can have a little talk and then if you do not like the look of her you take your leave and no harm is done.
If on the other hand-you do, we can go into the matter and you can make a formal demand for her hand."
'I was desperate.
It seemed the only thing to do.
We went to a shop at once and bought an enormous box of chocolates and that night I took the train to Geneva.
No sooner had I arrived than I sent her a letter to say that I was the bearer of a gift from her cousin and much wished to give myself the pleasure of delivering it in person.
Within an hour I received her reply to the effect that she would be pleased to receive me at four o'clock in the afternoon.
I spent the interval before my mirror and seventeen times I tied and retied my tie.
As the clock struck four I presented myself at the door of her house and was immediately ushered into the drawing-room.
She was waiting for me.
Her cousin said she was not ugly.
Imagine my surprise to see a young woman, enfin a woman still young, of a noble presence, with the dignity of Juno, the features of Venus, and in her expression the intelligence of Minerva.'
'You are too absurd,' said Madame. 'But by now these gentlemen know that one cannot believe all you say.'
'I swear to you that I do not exaggerate.
I was so taken aback that I nearly dropped the box of chocolates.
But I said to myself: La garde meurt mais ne se rend pas.
I presented the box of chocolates. I gave her news of her cousin.
I found her amiable.