Soon Duroa managed to conquer a girlfriend of the Forresty family, the charming lady de Marelle. Her daughter invented the eloquent courtesy eloquent, loaded with an ironic suggestion called Bell-Ami / dear friend /. It perfectly responds to the adventurous aspirations of the Duroa parvenue: "He imagined that an extraordinary love adventure suddenly made his dreams come true. She was married to the daughter of a banker or a noble magician who met in the streets and captivated at first glance ... "In a few phrases, Mopassan sums up the" male "philosophy of his" hero ": By the way, Duroa knew from experience that all women-whether they are secular ladies or mediocre actresses-experience a special attraction, some instantly emerging sympathy; but he did not know the women on whom his future depended, so he was losing patience as a horse stumbled.

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Duroa is progressing rapidly in a journalistic career following her "practical" guide to Forestry: "I will give you a first recommendation letter to the Head of the First Department of the Prefecture Police ... who will contact you with one of the clerks ... The Main is to learn how to get everything out of the people I send you ... and to go anywhere despite the closed doors ... Guided by his unwavering male self-confidence, Duroa manages to subdue his friend's wife, Madeleine Forrest, whom she acquainted with her inquisitive colleague Saint-Poten: "Oh, she's a skilled snare, that cunt. The lover is of an old connoisseur - Vojrek, Count de Vojrek, who gave her a dowry and married her ... To the deathbed of the drowning Forrest, Duroa concludes a "Relief Assistance" with his "wife" free from illusions, who quite frankly introduces him into the "new" secular morality: "Dear friend, for me the loved man is blunted by the number of the living. He becomes an idiot, not just an idiot, but a dangerous idiot. With the people who love me as a woman or say they are in love with me, I interrupt any close ties, first because they bother me, and then because I fear them as a mad dog that can fall into crisis. So I put them in a moral quarantine until their disease passes. Do not forget that. I know that love for you is just something like an appetite, whereas to me it is, on the contrary, a kind ... a kind of sacrifice of souls in which men do not believe. You hold the letter, and I - the spirit ... "

Not long after, Georges Duroa made a "marriage on account" with the widowed Madeleine and, thanks to her, devoted herself entirely to journalism and politics. He adopted a new name Du Roy de Cantel and soon became the political director of the newspaper La Vrancea. Duroa became an influential person in the editorial office and soon gained Mr. Walter's trust so he began to maintain and patronize him as "his own person": "La francese" was primarily a newspaper of money as his boss was a man of money: with the seal and his mandate he served as levers, "said Maupassan. He served with his kindness as a weapon, and maneuvered for a long time under the smiley mask of a good man; for their own work, whatever they were, only people who had discovered, experienced, selected - people who had felt they were self-conscious, daring and flexible. Duroa, whom he appointed Chronika Chief of Staff, seemed to him a priceless young man. Inspiring Madeleine urges her husband Durea to multiply her visits to the Walter's home: "Visit Mrs Walter, who loves you very much, and try to please her. There, your compliments will be right there, though she is a decent woman, understand me well - quite honest. Oh ... there's also no hope for prey. But if you do well, you can win something better. I know you're in a low position in the newspaper. But do not worry, they accept all their editors equally benevolent. Go to them, listen to me. " While Madeleine, a prolific careerist, wanders intriguingly about politicians and financiers in the "high circles", the loyal courtier, Belle-Ami, takes the siege of his protector's wife, Mrs. Walter, who soon succumbs to his staged "passionate" zeal. This conquest brings him fast transient satisfaction. Very soon he is again caught up in his usual boredom. To keep him close to him, his mistress dedicates him to his husband's dabs and allows his beloved to make a "big blow". profitable deal / on the Exchange.

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part 1

part 2

part 3

part 4