You cannot marry off a girl as beautiful as Miss Hortense today without a dowry, Crevel replied.

It's like a luxury horse that requires too much costly care to have many buyers.

In your situation, you can marry your daughter in only three ways: with my help, which you do not want! one; by finding a sixty-year-old man, very rich, with no children, who would like to have some, it's difficult, but it can happen.