"
He paused for a moment, mentally to scrutinize a brand-
new project which seemed, by some surreptitious agency,
to have already taken his fancy. It was a curious project;
there were attractive things about it, and objections to it
suggested themselves as well.
"I may decide," he began speaking again, still revolving
this hypothetical scheme in his thoughts--"I may want
to--well, here's what occurs to me as an off-chance.
I take an interest in your daughter, d'ye see? and it
seems a low-down sort of thing to me that she should be
so poor. Well, then--I might say to you, here's two
thousand a year, say, made over to you in your name, on the
understanding that you turn over half of it, say, to her.
She could take it from you, of course, as her father.
You could say you made it out of the Company. Of course
it might happen, later on, that I might like to have
a gentle hint dropped to her, d'ye see, as to where it
really came from. Mind, I don't say this is what is going
to be done. It merely occurred to me."
After waiting for a moment for some comment, he added
a second thought: "You'd have to set about making friends
with her, you know. In any case, you'd better begin
at that at once."
The General remained buried in reflection. He lighted
a cigarette, and poured out for himself still another
petit verre.
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