another quote
I'm almost done The Moving Toyshop (even 200 page books take me way too long to read). Apropos of nothing:
'There's a German story about a very rich and very beautiful young woman who was surrounded by suitors. But whenever she made up her mind to marry one of them, she was suddenly afraid that he only wanted her for her money, and the fear was so strong that it drove her to break the engagement. Then one day when she was in Italy she met a young merchant, and the two fell in love with one another. Yet even real love wasn't strong enough to drive out the old obsession, and she decided to test him. She said that she had a fiancé in German, that all her own money had gone, and that her fiancé needed ten thousand guilders to set him up in business (ten thousand guilders, she knew, was all the fortune the young merchant possessed). Well, he gave her the money for love of her, and she made him promise to come to Germany on a certain day to see her married. Then she went happily home, because, without knowing it, he'd emerged triumphantly from her test, and she gave orders for the house to be splendidly decorated for his coming. He never came, because she'd tried him too far. He went instead to the wars, and was killed.'
'And her?'
'She died an old maid.'
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