Reading the Work 5
Back in Part Two, Rodolphe eventually got bored with Emma's romanticism and left her. Emma has also amassed a large amount of debt from Monsieur L'Heureux (heureux=happy, ironically). So, in Part Three, Emma has rekindled her affair with Leon from Part One. Charles's father has died, so in his grief, he agrees (stupidly) to send Emma to Rouen with Leon to sign some papers. This essentially gives Emma and Leon a three-day honeymoon. All the while, Emma is gaining more debt and L'Heureux convinces her to borrow more money from him to pay it off. Charles's mother becomes suspicious, but Charles is blind to the truth. He doesn't realize that Emma's "weekly piano lessons" are just a way for her to see Leon in Rouen. However, Leon, much like Rodolphe, begins to tire of her company.
Emma's morals have completely gone out the window. She is borrowing more than she can afford, and hanging out with shady people to try to rectify this situation. She also appears to be delusional (along with Leon), as they believe themselves to be characters in a romance novel. I'm not sure if this a break in the fourth wall, or possibly a comment by Flaubert on the excessive romanticism of the 19th century. Emma lives in a time where her only power is sex, but she wants more. She wants to be surrounded by wealth and beauty, but her only means of attaining them is, in fact, sex. However, she refuses to acknowledge this. She continues to delude herself, thinking that romance will save her.