Mme. Vauquer (nee de Conflans) is an elderly person, who for the pastforty years has kept a lodging-house in the Rue Nueve-Sainte-Genevieve,in the district that lies between the Latin Quarter and the FaubourgSaint-Marcel. Her house (known in the neighborhood as the MaisonVauquer) receives men and women, old and young, and no word has everbeen breathed against her respectable establishment; but, at the sametime, it must be said that as a matter of fact no young woman has beenunder her roof for thirty years, and that if a young man stays there forany length of time it is a sure sign that his allowance must be of theslenderest. In 1819, however, the time when this drama opens, there wasan almost penniless young girl among Mme. Vauquer's boarders.That word drama has been somewhat discredited of late; it has beenoverworked and twisted to strange uses in these days of dolorousliterature; but it must do service again here, not because this story isdramatic in the restricted sense of the word, but because some tears mayperhaps be shed intra et extra muros before it is over.Will any one without the walls of Paris understand it? It is open todoubt. The only audience who could appreciate the results of closeobservation, the careful reproduction of minute detail and local color,are dwellers between the heights of Montrouge and Montmartre, in a valeof crumbling stucco watered by streams of black mud, a vale of sorrowswhich are real and joys too often hollow; but this audience is soaccustomed to terrible sensations, that only some unimaginable andwell-neigh impossible woe could produce any lasting impression there.Now and again there are tragedies so awful and so grand by reason of thecomplication of virtues and vices that bring them about, that egotismand selfishness are forced to pause and are moved to pity; but theimpression that they receive is like a luscious fruit, soon consumed.Civilization, like the car of Juggernaut, is scarcely stayed perceptiblyin its progress by a heart less easy to break than the others that liein its course; this also is broken, and Civilization continues on hercourse triumphant. And you, too, will do the like; you who with thisbook in your white hand will sink back among the cushions of yourarmchair, and say to yourself, "Perhaps this may amuse me." You willread the story of Father Goriot's secret woes, and, dining thereafterwith an unspoiled appetite, will lay the blame of your insensibilityupon the writer, and accuse him of exaggeration, of writing romances.Ah! once for all, this drama is neither a fiction nor a romance! All istrue,--so true, that every one can discern the elements of the tragedyin his own house, perhaps in his own heart.The lodging-house is Mme. Vauquer's own property. It is still standingin the lower end of the Rue Nueve-Sainte-Genevieve, just where the roadslopes so sharply down to the Rue de l'Arbalete, that wheeled trafficseldom passes that way, because it is so stony and steep. This positionis sufficient to account for the silence prevalent in the streets shutin between the dome of the Pantheon and the dome of the Val-de-Grace,two conspicuous public buildings which give a yellowish tone to thelandscape and darken the whole district that lies beneath the shadow oftheir leaden-hued cupolas.In that district the pavements are clean and dry, there is neither mudnor water in the gutters, grass grows in the chinks of the walls. Themost heedless passer-by feels the depressing influences of a place wherethe sound of wheels creates a sensation; there is a grim look about thehouses, a suggestion of a jail about those high garden walls. A Parisianstraying into a suburb apparently composed of lodging-houses and publicinstitutions would see poverty and dullness, old age lying down to die,and joyous youth condemned to drudgery. It is the ugliest quarter ofParis, and, it may be added, the least known. But, before all things,the Rue Nueve-Sainte-Genevieve is like a bronze frame for a picture forwhich the mind cannot be too well prepared by the contemplation of sadhues and sober images. Even so, step by step the daylight decreases,and the cicerone's droning voice grows hollower as the traveler descendsinto the Catacombs. The comparison holds good! Who shall say which ismore ghastly, the sight of the bleached skulls or of dried-up humanhearts?
The front of the lodging-house is at right angles to the road, andlooks out upon a little garden, so that you see the side of the housein section, as it were, from the Rue Nueve-Sainte-Genevieve. Beneath thewall of the house front there lies a channel, a fathom wide, paved withcobble-stones, and beside it runs a graveled walk bordered by geraniumsand oleanders and pomegranates set in great blue and white glazedearthenware pots. Access into the graveled walk is afforded by a door,above which the words MAISON VAUQUER may be read, and beneath, in rathersmaller letters, "Lodgings for both sexes, etc."During the day a glimpse into the garden is easily obtained through awicket to which a bell is attached. On the opposite wall, at the furtherend of the graveled walk, a green marble arch was painted once upona time by a local artist, and in this semblance of a shrine a statuerepresenting Cupid is installed; a Parisian Cupid, so blistered anddisfigured that he looks like a candidate for one of the adjacenthospitals, and might suggest an allegory to lovers of symbolism. Thehalf-obliterated inscription on the pedestal beneath determines the dateof this work of art, for it bears witness to the widespread enthusiasmfelt for Voltaire on his return to Paris in 1777:"Whoe'er thou art, thy master see;He is, or was, or ought to be."At night the wicket gate is replaced by a solid door. The little gardenis no wider than the front of the house; it is shut in between the wallof the street and the partition wall of the neighboring house. A mantleof ivy conceals the bricks and attracts the eyes of passers-by to aneffect which is picturesque in Paris, for each of the walls is coveredwith trellised vines that yield a scanty dusty crop of fruit, andfurnish besides a subject of conversation for Mme. Vauquer and herlodgers; every year the widow trembles for her vintage.A straight path beneath the walls on either side of the garden leads toa clump of lime-trees at the further end of it; line-trees, as Mme.Vauquer persists in calling them, in spite of the fact that she was a deConflans, and regardless of repeated corrections from her lodgers.The central space between the walls is filled with artichokes androws of pyramid fruit-trees, and surrounded by a border of lettuce,pot-herbs, and parsley. Under the lime-trees there are a fewgreen-painted garden seats and a wooden table, and hither, during thedog-days, such of the lodgers as are rich enough to indulge in a cupof coffee come to take their pleasure, though it is hot enough to roasteggs even in the shade.The house itself is three stories high, without counting the atticsunder the roof. It is built of rough stone, and covered with theyellowish stucco that gives a mean appearance to almost every house inParis. There are five windows in each story in the front of the house;all the blinds visible through the small square panes are drawn up awry,so that the lines are all at cross purposes. At the side of the housethere are but two windows on each floor, and the lowest of all areadorned with a heavy iron grating.Behind the house a yard extends for some twenty feet, a space inhabitedby a happy family of pigs, poultry, and rabbits; the wood-shed issituated on the further side, and on the wall between the wood-shed andthe kitchen window hangs the meat-safe, just above the place where thesink discharges its greasy streams. The cook sweeps all the refuseout through a little door into the Rue Nueve-Sainte-Genevieve, andfrequently cleanses the yard with copious supplies of water, under painof pestilence.The house might have been built on purpose for its present uses. Accessis given by a French window to the first room on the ground floor, asitting-room which looks out upon the street through the two barredwindows already mentioned. Another door opens out of it into thedining-room, which is separated from the kitchen by the well of thestaircase, the steps being constructed partly of wood, partly of tiles,which are colored and beeswaxed. Nothing can be more depressing thanthe sight of that sitting-room. The furniture is covered with horse hairwoven in alternate dull and glossy stripes. There is a round table inthe middle, with a purplish-red marble top, on which there stands, byway of ornament, the inevitable white china tea-service, covered witha half-effaced gilt network. The floor is sufficiently uneven, thewainscot rises to elbow height, and the rest of the wall space isdecorated with a varnished paper, on which the principal scenes fromTelemaque are depicted, the various classical personages beingcolored. The subject between the two windows is the banquet given byCalypso to the son of Ulysses, displayed thereon for the admiration ofthe boarders, and has furnished jokes these forty years to the youngmen who show themselves superior to their position by making fun of thedinners to which poverty condemns them. The hearth is always so cleanand neat that it is evident that a fire is only kindled there on greatoccasions; the stone chimney-piece is adorned by a couple of vasesfilled with faded artificial flowers imprisoned under glass shades, oneither side of a bluish marble clock in the very worst taste.The first room exhales an odor for which there is no name in thelanguage, and which should be called the odeur de pension. The dampatmosphere sends a chill through you as you breathe it; it has a stuffy,musty, and rancid quality; it permeates your clothing; after-dinnerscents seem to be mingled in it with smells from the kitchen andscullery and the reek of a hospital. It might be possible to describeit if some one should discover a process by which to distil from theatmosphere all the nauseating elements with which it is charged by thecatarrhal exhalations of every individual lodger, young or old. Yet,in spite of these stale horrors, the sitting-room is as charming andas delicately perfumed as a boudoir, when compared with the adjoiningdining-room.The paneled walls of that apartment were once painted some color, nowa matter of conjecture, for the surface is incrusted with accumulatedlayers of grimy deposit, which cover it with fantastic outlines. Acollection of dim-ribbed glass decanters, metal discs with a satin sheenon them, and piles of blue-edged earthenware plates of Touraine warecover the sticky surfaces of the sideboards that line the room. In acorner stands a box containing a set of numbered pigeon-holes, in whichthe lodgers' table napkins, more or less soiled and stained with wine,are kept. Here you see that indestructible furniture never met withelsewhere, which finds its way into lodging-houses much as the wrecks ofour civilization drift into hospitals for incurables. You expect in suchplaces as these to find the weather-house whence a Capuchin issues onwet days; you look to find the execrable engravings which spoil yourappetite, framed every one in a black varnished frame, with a giltbeading round it; you know the sort of tortoise-shell clock-case, inlaidwith brass; the green stove, the Argand lamps, covered with oil anddust, have met your eyes before. The oilcloth which covers the longtable is so greasy that a waggish externe will write his name on thesurface, using his thumb-nail as a style. The chairs are broken-downinvalids; the wretched little hempen mats slip away from under yourfeet without slipping away for good; and finally, the foot-warmers aremiserable wrecks, hingeless, charred, broken away about the holes. Itwould be impossible to give an idea of the old, rotten, shaky, cranky,worm-eaten, halt, maimed, one-eyed, rickety, and ramshackle condition ofthe furniture without an exhaustive description, which would delaythe progress of the story to an extent that impatient people would notpardon. The red tiles of the floor are full of depressions brought aboutby scouring and periodical renewings of color. In short, there isno illusory grace left to the poverty that reigns here; it is dire,parsimonious, concentrated, threadbare poverty; as yet it has not sunkinto the mire, it is only splashed by it, and though not in rags as yet,its clothing is ready to drop to pieces.This apartment is in all its glory at seven o'clock in the morning,when Mme. Vauquer's cat appears, announcing the near approach of hismistress, and jumps upon the sideboards to sniff at the milk in thebowls, each protected by a plate, while he purrs his morning greeting tothe world. A moment later the widow shows her face; she is tricked outin a net cap attached to a false front set on awry, and shuffles intothe room in her slipshod fashion. She is an oldish woman, with a bloatedcountenance, and a nose like a parrot's beak set in the middle ofit; her fat little hands (she is as sleek as a church rat) and hershapeless, slouching figure are in keeping with the room that reeks ofmisfortune, where hope is reduced to speculate for the meaneststakes. Mme. Vauquer alone can breathe that tainted air without beingdisheartened by it. Her face is as fresh as a frosty morning in autumn;there are wrinkles about the eyes that vary in their expression fromthe set smile of a ballet-dancer to the dark, suspicious scowl ofa discounter of bills; in short, she is at once the embodiment andinterpretation of her lodging-house, as surely as her lodging-houseimplies the existence of its mistress. You can no more imagine the onewithout the other, than you can think of a jail without a turnkey. Theunwholesome corpulence of the little woman is produced by the life sheleads, just as typhus fever is bred in the tainted air of a hospital.The very knitted woolen petticoat that she wears beneath a skirt madeof an old gown, with the wadding protruding through the rents in thematerial, is a sort of epitome of the sitting-room, the dining-room,and the little garden; it discovers the cook, it foreshadows thelodgers--the picture of the house is completed by the portrait of itsmistress.Mme. Vauquer at the age of fifty is like all women who "have seen a dealof trouble." She has the glassy eyes and innocent air of a traffickerin flesh and blood, who will wax virtuously indignant to obtain a higherprice for her services, but who is quite ready to betray a Georges ora Pichegru, if a Georges or a Pichegru were in hiding and still to bebetrayed, or for any other expedient that may alleviate her lot. Still,"she is a good woman at bottom," said the lodgers who believed thatthe widow was wholly dependent upon the money that they paid her, andsympathized when they heard her cough and groan like one of themselves.What had M. Vauquer been? The lady was never very explicit on this head.How had she lost her money? "Through trouble," was her answer. He hadtreated her badly, had left her nothing but her eyes to cry over hiscruelty, the house she lived in, and the privilege of pitying nobody,because, so she was wont to say, she herself had been through everypossible misfortune.Sylvie, the stout cook, hearing her mistress' shuffling footsteps,hastened to serve the lodgers' breakfasts. Beside those who lived in thehouse, Mme. Vauquer took boarders who came for their meals; but theseexternes usually only came to dinner, for which they paid thirtyfrancs a month.At the time when this story begins, the lodging-house contained seveninmates. The best rooms in the house were on the first story, Mme.Vauquer herself occupying the least important, while the rest were letto a Mme. Couture, the widow of a commissary-general in the service ofthe Republic. With her lived Victorine Taillefer, a schoolgirl, to whomshe filled the place of mother. These two ladies paid eighteen hundredfrancs a year.The two sets of rooms on the second floor were respectively occupied byan old man named Poiret and a man of forty or thereabouts, the wearerof a black wig and dyed whiskers, who gave out that he was a retiredmerchant, and was addressed as M. Vautrin. Two of the four rooms onthe third floor were also let--one to an elderly spinster, a Mlle.Michonneau, and the other to a retired manufacturer of vermicelli,Italian paste and starch, who allowed the others to address him as"Father Goriot." The remaining rooms were allotted to various birds ofpassage, to impecunious students, who like "Father Goriot" and Mlle.Michonneau, could only muster forty-five francs a month to pay for theirboard and lodging. Mme. Vauquer had little desire for lodgers of thissort; they ate too much bread, and she only took them in default ofbetter.At that time one of the rooms was tenanted by a law student, a young manfrom the neighborhood of Angouleme, one of a large family who pinchedand starved themselves to spare twelve hundred francs a year for him.Misfortune had accustomed Eugene de Rastignac, for that was his name, towork. He belonged to the number of young men who know as children thattheir parents' hopes are centered on them, and deliberately preparethemselves for a great career, subordinating their studies from thefirst to this end, carefully watching the indications of the course ofevents, calculating the probable turn that affairs will take, that theymay be the first to profit by them. But for his observant curiosity, andthe skill with which he managed to introduce himself into the salonsof Paris, this story would not have been colored by the tones oftruth which it certainly owes to him, for they are entirely due to hispenetrating sagacity and desire to fathom the mysteries of an appallingcondition of things, which was concealed as carefully by the victim asby those who had brought it to pass.Above the third story there was a garret where the linen was hung todry, and a couple of attics. Christophe, the man-of-all-work, slept inone, and Sylvie, the stout cook, in the other. Beside the seven inmatesthus enumerated, taking one year with another, some eight law or medicalstudents dined in the house, as well as two or three regular comers wholived in the neighborhood. There were usually eighteen people at dinner,and there was room, if need be, for twenty at Mme. Vauquer's table; atbreakfast, however, only the seven lodgers appeared. It was almost likea family party. Every one came down in dressing-gown and slippers,and the conversation usually turned on anything that had happenedthe evening before; comments on the dress or appearance of the dinnercontingent were exchanged in friendly confidence.These seven lodgers were Mme. Vauquer's spoiled children. Among themshe distributed, with astronomical precision, the exact proportion ofrespect and attention due to the varying amounts they paid for theirboard. One single consideration influenced all these human beings throwntogether by chance. The two second-floor lodgers only paid seventy-twofrancs a month. Such prices as these are confined to the FaubourgSaint-Marcel and the district between La Bourbe and the Salpetriere;and, as might be expected, poverty, more or less apparent, weighed uponthem all, Mme. Couture being the sole exception to the rule.The dreary surroundings were reflected in the costumes of the inmates ofthe house; all were alike threadbare. The color of the men's coats wereproblematical; such shoes, in more fashionable quarters, are only to beseen lying in the gutter; the cuffs and collars were worn and frayed atthe edges; every limp article of clothing looked like the ghost of itsformer self. The women's dresses were faded, old-fashioned, dyed andre-dyed; they wore gloves that were glazed with hard wear, much-mendedlace, dingy ruffles, crumpled muslin fichus. So much for theirclothing; but, for the most part, their frames were solid enough; theirconstitutions had weathered the storms of life; their cold, hard faceswere worn like coins that have been withdrawn from circulation, butthere were greedy teeth behind the withered lips. Dramas brought to aclose or still in progress are foreshadowed by the sight of such actorsas these, not the dramas that are played before the footlights andagainst a background of painted canvas, but dumb dramas of life,frost-bound dramas that sere hearts like fire, dramas that do not endwith the actors' lives.Mlle. Michonneau, that elderly young lady, screened her weak eyes fromthe daylight by a soiled green silk shade with a rim of brass, an objectfit to scare away the Angel of Pity himself. Her shawl, with its scanty,draggled fringe, might have covered a skeleton, so meagre and angularwas the form beneath it. Yet she must have been pretty and shapely once.What corrosive had destroyed the feminine outlines? Was it trouble,or vice, or greed? Had she loved too well? Had she been a second-handclothes dealer, a frequenter of the backstairs of great houses, or hadshe been merely a courtesan? Was she expiating the flaunting triumphsof a youth overcrowded with pleasures by an old age in which she wasshunned by every passer-by? Her vacant gaze sent a chill through you;her shriveled face seemed like a menace. Her voice was like the shrill,thin note of the grasshopper sounding from the thicket when winter is athand. She said that she had nursed an old gentleman, ill of catarrh ofthe bladder, and left to die by his children, who thought that he hadnothing left. His bequest to her, a life annuity of a thousand francs,was periodically disputed by his heirs, who mingled slander with theirpersecutions. In spite of the ravages of conflicting passions, her faceretained some traces of its former fairness and fineness of tissue, somevestiges of the physical charms of her youth still survived.M. Poiret was a sort of automaton. He might be seen any day sailing likea gray shadow along the walks of the Jardin des Plantes, on his head ashabby cap, a cane with an old yellow ivory handle in the tips of histhin fingers; the outspread skirts of his threadbare overcoat failedto conceal his meagre figure; his breeches hung loosely on his shrunkenlimbs; the thin, blue-stockinged legs trembled like those of a drunkenman; there was a notable breach of continuity between the dingy whitewaistcoat and crumpled shirt frills and the cravat twisted about athroat like a turkey gobbler's; altogether, his appearance set peoplewondering whether this outlandish ghost belonged to the audacious raceof the sons of Japhet who flutter about on the Boulevard Italien. Whatdevouring kind of toil could have so shriveled him? What devouringpassions had darkened that bulbous countenance, which would have seemedoutrageous as a caricature? What had he been? Well, perhaps he had beenpart of the machinery of justice, a clerk in the office to which theexecutioner sends in his accounts,--so much for providing black veilsfor parricides, so much for sawdust, so much for pulleys and cord forthe knife. Or he might have been a receiver at the door of a publicslaughter-house, or a sub-inspector of nuisances. Indeed, the manappeared to have been one of the beasts of burden in our great socialmill; one of those Parisian Ratons whom their Bertrands do not even knowby sight; a pivot in the obscure machinery that disposes of misery andthings unclean; one of those men, in short, at sight of whom we areprompted to remark that, "After all, we cannot do without them."Stately Paris ignores the existence of these faces bleached by moral orphysical suffering; but, then, Paris is in truth an ocean that no linecan plumb. You may survey its surface and describe it; but no matter hownumerous and painstaking the toilers in this sea, there will always belonely and unexplored regions in its depths, caverns unknown, flowersand pearls and monsters of the deep overlooked or forgotten by thedivers of literature. The Maison Vauquer is one of these curiousmonstrosities.Two, however, of Mme. Vauquer's boarders formed a striking contrast tothe rest. There was a sickly pallor, such as is often seen in anaemicgirls, in Mlle. Victorine Taillefer's face; and her unvarying expressionof sadness, like her embarrassed manner and pinched look, was inkeeping with the general wretchedness of the establishment in the RueNueve-Saint-Genevieve, which forms a background to this picture; but herface was young, there was youthfulness in her voice and elasticityin her movements. This young misfortune was not unlike a shrub, newlyplanted in an uncongenial soil, where its leaves have already begunto wither. The outlines of her figure, revealed by her dress of thesimplest and cheapest materials, were also youthful. There was the samekind of charm about her too slender form, her faintly colored face andlight-brown hair, that modern poets find in mediaeval statuettes; and asweet expression, a look of Christian resignation in the dark gray eyes.She was pretty by force of contrast; if she had been happy, she wouldhave been charming. Happiness is the poetry of woman, as the toiletteis her tinsel. If the delightful excitement of a ball had made the paleface glow with color; if the delights of a luxurious life had broughtthe color to the wan cheeks that were slightly hollowed already; if lovehad put light into the sad eyes, then Victorine might have ranked amongthe fairest; but she lacked the two things which create woman a secondtime--pretty dresses and love-letters.A book might have been made of her story. Her father was persuaded thathe had sufficient reason for declining to acknowledge her, and allowedher a bare six hundred francs a year; he had further taken measuresto disinherit his daughter, and had converted all his real estate intopersonalty, that he might leave it undivided to his son. Victorine'smother had died broken-hearted in Mme. Couture's house; and thelatter, who was a near relation, had taken charge of the little orphan.Unluckily, the widow of the commissary-general to the armies of theRepublic had nothing in the world but her jointure and her widow'spension, and some day she might be obliged to leave the helpless,inexperienced girl to the mercy of the world. The good soul, therefore,took Victorine to mass every Sunday, and to confession once a fortnight,thinking that, in any case, she would bring up her ward to be devout.She was right; religion offered a solution of the problem of theyoung girl's future. The poor child loved the father who refused toacknowledge her. Once every year she tried to see him to deliver hermother's message of forgiveness, but every year hitherto she had knockedat that door in vain; her father was inexorable. Her brother, her onlymeans of communication, had not come to see her for four years, and hadsent her no assistance; yet she prayed to God to unseal her father'seyes and to soften her brother's heart, and no accusations mingled withher prayers. Mme. Couture and Mme. Vauquer exhausted the vocabularyof abuse, and failed to find words that did justice to the banker'siniquitous conduct; but while they heaped execrations on themillionaire, Victorine's words were as gentle as the moan of the woundeddove, and affection found expression even in the cry drawn from her bypain.Eugene de Rastignac was a thoroughly southern type; he had a faircomplexion, blue eyes, black hair. In his figure, manner, and his wholebearing it was easy to see that he had either come of a noble family,or that, from his earliest childhood, he had been gently bred. If hewas careful of his wardrobe, only taking last year's clothes intodaily wear, still upon occasion he could issue forth as a young man offashion. Ordinarily he wore a shabby coat and waistcoat, the limp blackcravat, untidily knotted, that students affect, trousers that matchedthe rest of his costume, and boots that had been resoled.Vautrin (the man of forty with the dyed whiskers) marked a transitionstage between these two young people and the others. He was the kind ofman that calls forth the remark: "He looks a jovial sort!" He hadbroad shoulders, a well-developed chest, muscular arms, and strongsquare-fisted hands; the joints of his fingers were covered with tuftsof fiery red hair. His face was furrowed by premature wrinkles; therewas a certain hardness about it in spite of his bland and insinuatingmanner. His bass voice was by no means unpleasant, and was in keepingwith his boisterous laughter. He was always obliging, always in goodspirits; if anything went wrong with one of the locks, he would soonunscrew it, take it to pieces, file it, oil and clean and set it inorder, and put it back in its place again; "I am an old hand at it,"he used to say. Not only so, he knew all about ships, the sea, France,foreign countries, men, business, law, great houses and prisons,--therewas nothing that he did not know. If any one complained rather more thanusual, he would offer his services at once. He had several times lentmoney to Mme. Vauquer, or to the boarders; but, somehow, those whom heobliged felt that they would sooner face death than fail to repay him; acertain resolute look, sometimes seen on his face, inspired fear of him,for all his appearance of easy good-nature. In the way he spat there wasan imperturbable coolness which seemed to indicate that this was aman who would not stick at a crime to extricate himself from a falseposition. His eyes, like those of a pitiless judge, seemed to go tothe very bottom of all questions, to read all natures, all feelings andthoughts. His habit of life was very regular; he usually went out afterbreakfast, returning in time for dinner, and disappeared for the restof the evening, letting himself in about midnight with a latch key, aprivilege that Mme. Vauquer accorded to no other boarder. But then hewas on very good terms with the widow; he used to call her "mamma," andput his arm round her waist, a piece of flattery perhaps not appreciatedto the full! The worthy woman might imagine this to be an easy feat;but, as a matter of fact, no arm but Vautrin's was long enough toencircle her.It was a characteristic trait of his generously to pay fifteen francs amonth for the cup of coffee with a dash of brandy in it, which he tookafter dinner. Less superficial observers than young men engulfed by thewhirlpool of Parisian life, or old men, who took no interest in anythingthat did not directly concern them, would not have stopped short at thevaguely unsatisfactory impression that Vautrin made upon them. He knewor guessed the concerns of every one about him; but none of them hadbeen able to penetrate his thoughts, or to discover his occupation. Hehad deliberately made his apparent good-nature, his unfailing readinessto oblige, and his high spirits into a barrier between himself and therest of them, but not seldom he gave glimpses of appalling depthsof character. He seemed to delight in scourging the upper classes ofsociety with the lash of his tongue, to take pleasure in convicting itof inconsistency, in mocking at law and order with some grim jest worthyof Juvenal, as if some grudge against the social system rankled in him,as if there were some mystery carefully hidden away in his life.Mlle. Taillefer felt attracted, perhaps unconsciously, by the strengthof the one man, and the good looks of the other; her stolen glances andsecret thoughts were divided between them; but neither of them seemedto take any notice of her, although some day a chance might alter herposition, and she would be a wealthy heiress. For that matter, there wasnot a soul in the house who took any trouble to investigate the variouschronicles of misfortunes, real or imaginary, related by the rest. Eachone regarded the others with indifference, tempered by suspicion; it wasa natural result of their relative positions. Practical assistance notone could give, this they all knew, and they had long since exhaustedtheir stock of condolence over previous discussions of their grievances.They were in something the same position as an elderly couple who havenothing left to say to each other. The routine of existence kept them incontact, but they were parts of a mechanism which wanted oil. There wasnot one of them but would have passed a blind man begging in the street,not one that felt moved to pity by a tale of misfortune, not one whodid not see in death the solution of the all-absorbing problem of miserywhich left them cold to the most terrible anguish in others.The happiest of these hapless beings was certainly Mme. Vauquer, whoreigned supreme over this hospital supported by voluntary contributions.For her, the little garden, which silence, and cold, and rain, anddrought combined to make as dreary as an Asian steppe, was a pleasantshaded nook; the gaunt yellow house, the musty odors of a back shop hadcharms for her, and for her alone. Those cells belonged to her. She fedthose convicts condemned to penal servitude for life, and her authoritywas recognized among them. Where else in Paris would they have foundwholesome food in sufficient quantity at the prices she charged them,and rooms which they were at liberty to make, if not exactly elegant orcomfortable, at any rate clean and healthy? If she had committed someflagrant act of injustice, the victim would have borne it in silence.Such a gathering contained, as might have been expected, the elementsout of which a complete society might be constructed. And, as in aschool, as in the world itself, there was among the eighteen men andwomen who met round the dinner table a poor creature, despised byall the others, condemned to be the butt of all their jokes. At thebeginning of Eugene de Rastignac's second twelvemonth, this figuresuddenly started out into bold relief against the background of humanforms and faces among which the law student was yet to live foranother two years to come. This laughing-stock was the retiredvermicelli-merchant, Father Goriot, upon whose face a painter, like thehistorian, would have concentrated all the light in his picture.How had it come about that the boarders regarded him with ahalf-malignant contempt? Why did they subject the oldest among theirnumber to a kind of persecution, in which there was mingled some pity,but no respect for his misfortunes? Had he brought it on himself by someeccentricity or absurdity, which is less easily forgiven or forgottenthan more serious defects? The question strikes at the root of many asocial injustice. Perhaps it is only human nature to inflict sufferingon anything that will endure suffering, whether by reason of its genuinehumility, or indifference, or sheer helplessness. Do we not, one andall, like to feel our strength even at the expense of some one or ofsomething? The poorest sample of humanity, the street arab, will pullthe bell handle at every street door in bitter weather, and scramble upto write his name on the unsullied marble of a monument.In the year 1813, at the age of sixty-nine or thereabouts, "FatherGoriot" had sold his business and retired--to Mme. Vauquer's boardinghouse. When he first came there he had taken the rooms now occupied byMme. Couture; he had paid twelve hundred francs a year like a man towhom five louis more or less was a mere trifle. For him Mme. Vauquer hadmade various improvements in the three rooms destined for his use, inconsideration of a certain sum paid in advance, so it was said, for themiserable furniture, that is to say, for some yellow cotton curtains, afew chairs of stained wood covered with Utrecht velvet, several wretchedcolored prints in frames, and wall papers that a little suburban tavernwould have disdained. Possibly it was the careless generosity with whichFather Goriot allowed himself to be overreached at this period of hislife (they called him Monsieur Goriot very respectfully then) that gaveMme. Vauquer the meanest opinion of his business abilities; she lookedon him as an imbecile where money was concerned.Goriot had brought with him a considerable wardrobe, the gorgeousoutfit of a retired tradesman who denies himself nothing. Mme. Vauquer'sastonished eyes beheld no less than eighteen cambric-fronted shirts, thesplendor of their fineness being enhanced by a pair of pins each bearinga large diamond, and connected by a short chain, an ornament whichadorned the vermicelli-maker's shirt front. He usually wore a coat ofcorn-flower blue; his rotund and portly person was still further setoff by a clean white waistcoat, and a gold chain and seals which dangledover that broad expanse. When his hostess accused him of being "a bitof a beau," he smiled with the vanity of a citizen whose foible isgratified. His cupboards (ormoires, as he called them in the populardialect) were filled with a quantity of plate that he brought with him.The widow's eyes gleamed as she obligingly helped him to unpack thesoup ladles, table-spoons, forks, cruet-stands, tureens, dishes,and breakfast services--all of silver, which were duly arranged uponshelves, besides a few more or less handsome pieces of plate, allweighing no inconsiderable number of ounces; he could not bring himselfto part with these gifts that reminded him of past domestic festivals."This was my wife's present to me on the first anniversary of ourwedding day," he said to Mme. Vauquer, as he put away a little silverposset dish, with two turtle-doves billing on the cover. "Poor dear! shespent on it all the money she had saved before we were married. Doyou know, I would sooner scratch the earth with my nails for a living,madame, than part with that. But I shall be able to take my coffee outof it every morning for the rest of my days, thank the Lord! I am not tobe pitied. There's not much fear of my starving for some time to come."Finally, Mme. Vauquer's magpie's eye had discovered and read certainentries in the list of shareholders in the funds, and, after a roughcalculation, was disposed to credit Goriot (worthy man) with somethinglike ten thousand francs a year. From that day forward Mme. Vauquer(nee de Conflans), who, as a matter of fact, had seen forty-eightsummers, though she would only own to thirty-nine of them--Mme. Vauquerhad her own ideas. Though Goriot's eyes seemed to have shrunk in theirsockets, though they were weak and watery, owing to some glandularaffection which compelled him to wipe them continually, she consideredhim to be a very gentlemanly and pleasant-looking man. Moreover, thewidow saw favorable indications of character in the well-developedcalves of his legs and in his square-shaped nose, indications stillfurther borne out by the worthy man's full-moon countenance and lookof stupid good-nature. This, in all probability, was a strongly-buildanimal, whose brains mostly consisted in a capacity for affection. Hishair, worn in ailes de pigeon, and duly powdered every morning by thebarber from the Ecole Polytechnique, described five points on his lowforehead, and made an elegant setting to his face. Though his mannerswere somewhat boorish, he was always as neat as a new pin and he tookhis snuff in a lordly way, like a man who knows that his snuff-box isalways likely to be filled with maccaboy, so that when Mme. Vauquer laydown to rest on the day of M. Goriot's installation, her heart, like alarded partridge, sweltered before the fire of a burning desire to shakeoff the shroud of Vauquer and rise again as Goriot. She would marryagain, sell her boarding-house, give her hand to this fine flower ofcitizenship, become a lady of consequence in the quarter, and ask forsubscriptions for charitable purposes; she would make little Sundayexcursions to Choisy, Soissy, Gentilly; she would have a box at thetheatre when she liked, instead of waiting for the author's tickets thatone of her boarders sometimes gave her, in July; the whole Eldorado ofa little Parisian household rose up before Mme. Vauquer in herdreams. Nobody knew that she herself possessed forty thousand francs,accumulated sou by sou, that was her secret; surely as far as moneywas concerned she was a very tolerable match. "And in other respects,I am quite his equal," she said to herself, turning as if to assureherself of the charms of a form that the portly Sylvie found moulded indown feathers every morning.For three months from that day Mme. Veuve Vauquer availed herself ofthe services of M. Goriot's coiffeur, and went to some expense over hertoilette, expense justifiable on the ground that she owed it to herselfand her establishment to pay some attention to appearances when suchhighly-respectable persons honored her house with their presence. Sheexpended no small amount of ingenuity in a sort of weeding process ofher lodgers, announcing her intention of receiving henceforward none butpeople who were in every way select. If a stranger presented himself,she let him know that M. Goriot, one of the best known and mosthighly-respected merchants in Paris, had singled out her boarding-housefor a residence. She drew up a prospectus headed MAISON VAUQUER, inwhich it was asserted that hers was "one of the oldest and most highlyrecommended boarding-houses in the Latin Quarter." "From the windowsof the house," thus ran the prospectus, "there is a charming view ofthe Vallee des Gobelins (so there is--from the third floor), and abeautiful garden, extending down to an avenue of lindens at thefurther end." Mention was made of the bracing air of the place and itsquiet situation.It was this prospectus that attracted Mme. la Comtesse de l'Ambermesnil,a widow of six and thirty, who was awaiting the final settlement of herhusband's affairs, and of another matter regarding a pension due to heras the wife of a general who had died "on the field of battle." On thisMme. Vauquer saw to her table, lighted a fire daily in the sitting-roomfor nearly six months, and kept the promise of her prospectus, evengoing to some expense to do so. And the Countess, on her side, addressedMme. Vauquer as "my dear," and promised her two more boarders, theBaronne de Vaumerland and the widow of a colonel, the late Comte dePicquoisie, who were about to leave a boarding-house in the Marais,where the terms were higher than at the Maison Vauquer. Both theseladies, moreover, would be very well to do when the people at theWar Office had come to an end of their formalities. "But Governmentdepartments are always so dilatory," the lady added.After dinner the two widows went together up to Mme. Vauquer's room, andhad a snug little chat over some cordial and various delicacies reservedfor the mistress of the house. Mme. Vauquer's ideas as to Goriot werecordially approved by Mme. de l'Ambermesnil; it was a capital notion,which for that matter she had guessed from the very first; in heropinion the vermicelli maker was an excellent man."Ah! my dear lady, such a well-preserved man of his age, as sound as myeyesight--a man who might make a woman happy!" said the widow.The good-natured Countess turned to the subject of Mme. Vauquer's dress,which was not in harmony with her projects. "You must put yourself on awar footing," said she.After much serious consideration the two widows went shoppingtogether--they purchased a hat adorned with ostrich feathers and a capat the Palais Royal, and the Countess took her friend to the Magasin dela Petite Jeannette, where they chose a dress and a scarf. Thus equippedfor the campaign, the widow looked exactly like the prize animal hungout for a sign above an a la mode beef shop; but she herself was so muchpleased with the improvement, as she considered it, in her appearance,that she felt that she lay under some obligation to the Countess; and,though by no means open-handed, she begged that lady to accept a hatthat cost twenty francs. The fact was that she needed the Countess'services on the delicate mission of sounding Goriot; the countess mustsing her praises in his ears. Mme. de l'Ambermesnil lent herself verygood-naturedly to this manoeuvre, began her operations, and succeeded inobtaining a private interview; but the overtures that she made, with aview to securing him for herself, were received with embarrassment, notto say a repulse. She left him, revolted by his coarseness."My angel," said she to her dear friend, "you will make nothing of thatman yonder. He is absurdly suspicious, and he is a mean curmudgeon, anidiot, a fool; you would never be happy with him."After what had passed between M. Goriot and Mme. de l'Ambermesnil, theCountess would no longer live under the same roof. She left the nextday, forgot to pay for six months' board, and left behind her wardrobe,cast-off clothing to the value of five francs. Eagerly and persistentlyas Mme. Vauquer sought her quondam lodger, the Comtesse de l'Ambermesnilwas never heard of again in Paris. The widow often talked of thisdeplorable business, and regretted her own too confiding disposition. Asa matter of fact, she was as suspicious as a cat; but she was like manyother people, who cannot trust their own kin and put themselves at themercy of the next chance comer--an odd but common phenomenon, whosecauses may readily be traced to the depths of the human heart.Perhaps there are people who know that they have nothing more to lookfor from those with whom they live; they have shown the emptiness oftheir hearts to their housemates, and in their secret selves they areconscious that they are severely judged, and that they deserve tobe judged severely; but still they feel an unconquerable craving forpraises that they do not hear, or they are consumed by a desire toappear to possess, in the eyes of a new audience, the qualities whichthey have not, hoping to win the admiration or affection of strangers atthe risk of forfeiting it again some day. Or, once more, there are othermercenary natures who never do a kindness to a friend or a relationsimply because these have a claim upon them, while a service done to astranger brings its reward to self-love. Such natures feel but littleaffection for those who are nearest to them; they keep their kindnessfor remoter circles of acquaintance, and show most to those who dwell onits utmost limits. Mme. Vauquer belonged to both these essentially mean,false, and execrable classes."If I had been there at the time," Vautrin would say at the end of thestory, "I would have shown her up, and that misfortune would not havebefallen you. I know that kind of phiz!"Like all narrow natures, Mme. Vauquer was wont to confine her attentionto events, and did not go very deeply into the causes that brought themabout; she likewise preferred to throw the blame of her own mistakes onother people, so she chose to consider that the honest vermicelli makerwas responsible for her misfortune. It had opened her eyes, so she said,with regard to him. As soon as she saw that her blandishments were invain, and that her outlay on her toilette was money thrown away, she wasnot slow to discover the reason of his indifference. It became plainto her at once that there was some other attraction, to use her ownexpression. In short, it was evident that the hope she had so fondlycherished was a baseless delusion, and that she would "never makeanything out of that man yonder," in the Countess' forcible phrase.The Countess seemed to have been a judge of character. Mme. Vauquer'saversion was naturally more energetic than her friendship, for herhatred was not in proportion to her love, but to her disappointedexpectations. The human heart may find here and there a resting-placeshort of the highest height of affection, but we seldom stop in thesteep, downward slope of hatred. Still, M. Goriot was a lodger, andthe widow's wounded self-love could not vent itself in an explosion ofwrath; like a monk harassed by the prior of his convent, she was forcedto stifle her sighs of disappointment, and to gulp down her craving forrevenge. Little minds find gratification for their feelings, benevolentor otherwise, by a constant exercise of petty ingenuity. The widowemployed her woman's malice to devise a system of covert persecution.She began by a course of retrenchment--various luxuries which had foundtheir way to the table appeared there no more."No more gherkins, no more anchovies; they have made a fool of me!" shesaid to Sylvie one morning, and they returned to the old bill of fare.The thrifty frugality necessary to those who mean to make their way inthe world had become an inveterate habit of life with M. Goriot. Soup,boiled beef, and a dish of vegetables had been, and always would be, thedinner he liked best, so Mme. Vauquer found it very difficult to annoya boarder whose tastes were so simple. He was proof against her malice,and in desperation she spoke to him and of him slightingly before theother lodgers, who began to amuse themselves at his expense, and sogratified her desire for revenge.Towards the end of the first year the widow's suspicions had reachedsuch a pitch that she began to wonder how it was that a retired merchantwith a secure income of seven or eight thousand livres, the owner ofsuch magnificent plate and jewelry handsome enough for a kept mistress,should be living in her house. Why should he devote so small aproportion of his money to his expenses? Until the first year was nearlyat an end, Goriot had dined out once or twice every week, but theseoccasions came less frequently, and at last he was scarcely absent fromthe dinner-table twice a month. It was hardly expected that Mme. Vauquershould regard the increased regularity of her boarder's habits withcomplacency, when those little excursions of his had been so much to herinterest. She attributed the change not so much to a gradual diminutionof fortune as to a spiteful wish to annoy his hostess. It is one of themost detestable habits of a Liliputian mind to credit other people withits own malignant pettiness.Unluckily, towards the end of the second year, M. Goriot's conduct gavesome color to the idle talk about him. He asked Mme. Vauquer to give hima room on the second floor, and to make a corresponding reduction inher charges. Apparently, such strict economy was called for, that he didwithout a fire all through the winter. Mme. Vauquer asked to be paid inadvance, an arrangement to which M. Goriot consented, and thenceforwardshe spoke of him as "Father Goriot."What had brought about this decline and fall? Conjecture was keen, butinvestigation was difficult. Father Goriot was not communicative; inthe sham countess' phrase he was "a curmudgeon." Empty-headed people whobabble about their own affairs because they have nothing else to occupythem, naturally conclude that if people say nothing of their doings itis because their doings will not bear being talked about; so the highlyrespectable merchant became a scoundrel, and the late beau was an oldrogue. Opinion fluctuated. Sometimes, according to Vautrin, who cameabout this time to live in the Maison Vauquer, Father Goriot was a manwho went on 'Change and dabbled (to use the sufficiently expressivelanguage of the Stock Exchange) in stocks and shares after he had ruinedhimself by heavy speculation. Sometimes it was held that he was one ofthose petty gamblers who nightly play for small stakes until they win afew francs. A theory that he was a detective in the employ of the HomeOffice found favor at one time, but Vautrin urged that "Goriot was notsharp enough for one of that sort." There were yet other solutions;Father Goriot was a skinflint, a shark of a money-lender, a manwho lived by selling lottery tickets. He was by turns all the mostmysterious brood of vice and shame and misery; yet, however vile hislife might be, the feeling of repulsion which he aroused in others wasnot so strong that he must be banished from their society--he paidhis way. Besides, Goriot had his uses, every one vented his spleen orsharpened his wit on him; he was pelted with jokes and belabored withhard words. The general consensus of opinion was in favor of a theorywhich seemed the most likely; this was Mme. Vauquer's view. Accordingto her, the man so well preserved at his time of life, as sound as hereyesight, with whom a woman might be very happy, was a libertine who hadstrange tastes. These are the facts upon which Mme. Vauquer's slanderswere based.Early one morning, some few months after the departure of the unluckyCountess who had managed to live for six months at the widow's expense,Mme. Vauquer (not yet dressed) heard the rustle of a silk dress anda young woman's light footstep on the stair; some one was going toGoriot's room. He seemed to expect the visit, for his door stood ajar.The portly Sylvie presently came up to tell her mistress that a girl toopretty to be honest, "dressed like a goddess," and not a speck of mudon her laced cashmere boots, had glided in from the street like a snake,had found the kitchen, and asked for M. Goriot's room. Mme. Vauquerand the cook, listening, overheard several words affectionately spokenduring the visit, which lasted for some time. When M. Goriot wentdownstairs with the lady, the stout Sylvie forthwith took her basketand followed the lover-like couple, under pretext of going to do hermarketing."M. Goriot must be awfully rich, all the same, madame," she reportedon her return, "to keep her in such style. Just imagine it! There was asplendid carriage waiting at the corner of the Place de l'Estrapade, andshe got into it."While they were at dinner that evening, Mme. Vauquer went to the windowand drew the curtain, as the sun was shining into Goriot's eyes."You are beloved of fair ladies, M. Goriot--the sun seeks you out," shesaid, alluding to his visitor. "Peste! you have good taste; she wasvery pretty.""That was my daughter," he said, with a kind of pride in his voice, andthe rest chose to consider this as the fatuity of an old man who wishesto save appearances.A month after this visit M. Goriot received another. The same daughterwho had come to see him that morning came again after dinner, this timein evening dress. The boarders, in deep discussion in the dining-room,caught a glimpse of a lovely, fair-haired woman, slender, graceful, andmuch too distinguished-looking to be a daughter of Father Goriot's."Two of them!" cried the portly Sylvie, who did not recognize the ladyof the first visit.A few days later, and another young lady--a tall, well-moulded brunette,with dark hair and bright eyes--came to ask for M. Goriot."Three of them!" said Sylvie.Then the second daughter, who had first come in the morning to see herfather, came shortly afterwards in the evening. She wore a ball dress,and came in a carriage."Four of them!" commented Mme. Vauquer and her plump handmaid. Sylviesaw not a trace of resemblance between this great lady and the girl inher simple morning dress who had entered her kitchen on the occasion ofher first visit.At that time Goriot was paying twelve hundred francs a year to hislandlady, and Mme. Vauquer saw nothing out of the common in the factthat a rich man had four or five mistresses; nay, she thought it veryknowing of him to pass them off as his daughters. She was not at allinclined to draw a hard-and-fast line, or to take umbrage at his sendingfor them to the Maison Vauquer; yet, inasmuch as these visits explainedher boarder's indifference to her, she went so far (at the end of thesecond year) as to speak of him as an "ugly old wretch." When at lengthher boarder declined to nine hundred francs a year, she asked him veryinsolently what he took her house to be, after meeting one of theseladies on the stairs. Father Goriot answered that the lady was hiseldest daughter."So you have two or three dozen daughters, have you?" said Mme. Vauquersharply."I have only two," her boarder answered meekly, like a ruined man who isbroken in to all the cruel usage of misfortune.
Towards the end of the third year Father Goriot reduced his expensesstill further; he went up to the third story, and now paid forty-fivefrancs a month. He did without snuff, told his hairdresser that he nolonger required his services, and gave up wearing powder. When Goriotappeared for the first time in this condition, an exclamation ofastonishment broke from his hostess at the color of his hair--a dingyolive gray. He had grown sadder day by day under the influence of somehidden trouble; among all the faces round the table, his was themost woe-begone. There was no longer any doubt. Goriot was an elderlylibertine, whose eyes had only been preserved by the skill of thephysician from the malign influence of the remedies necessitated by thestate of his health. The disgusting color of his hair was a result ofhis excesses and of the drugs which he had taken that he might continuehis career. The poor old man's mental and physical condition affordedsome grounds for the absurd rubbish talked about him. When his outfitwas worn out, he replaced the fine linen by calico at fourteen sousthe ell. His diamonds, his gold snuff-box, watch-chain and trinkets,disappeared one by one. He had left off wearing the corn-flower bluecoat, and was sumptuously arrayed, summer as well as winter, in a coarsechestnut-brown coat, a plush waistcoat, and doeskin breeches. He grewthinner and thinner; his legs were shrunken, his cheeks, once so puffedout by contented bourgeois prosperity, were covered with wrinkles, andthe outlines of the jawbones were distinctly visible; there were deepfurrows in his forehead. In the fourth year of his residence in the RueNeuve-Sainte-Genevieve he was no longer like his former self. The halevermicelli manufacturer, sixty-two years of age, who had looked scarceforty, the stout, comfortable, prosperous tradesman, with an almostbucolic air, and such a brisk demeanor that it did you good to look athim; the man with something boyish in his smile, had suddenly sunk intohis dotage, and had become a feeble, vacillating septuagenarian.The keen, bright blue eyes had grown dull, and faded to a steel-graycolor; the red inflamed rims looked as though they had shed tears ofblood. He excited feelings of repulsion in some, and of pity in others.The young medical students who came to the house noticed the droopingof his lower lip and the conformation of the facial angle; and, afterteasing him for some time to no purpose, they declared that cretinismwas setting in.One evening after dinner Mme. Vauquer said half banteringly to him, "Sothose daughters of yours don't come to see you any more, eh?" meaning toimply her doubts as to his paternity; but Father Goriot shrank as if hishostess had touched him with a sword-point."They come sometimes," he said in a tremulous voice."Aha! you still see them sometimes?" cried the students. "Bravo, FatherGoriot!"The old man scarcely seemed to hear the witticisms at his expense thatfollowed on the words; he had relapsed into the dreamy state of mindthat these superficial observers took for senile torpor, due to his lackof intelligence. If they had only known, they might have been deeplyinterested by the problem of his condition; but few problems were moreobscure. It was easy, of course, to find out whether Goriot had reallybeen a vermicelli manufacturer; the amount of his fortune was readilydiscoverable; but the old people, who were most inquisitive as to hisconcerns, never went beyond the limits of the Quarter, and lived inthe lodging-house much as oysters cling to a rock. As for the rest, thecurrent of life in Paris daily awaited them, and swept them away withit; so soon as they left the Rue Neuve-Sainte-Genevieve, they forgot theexistence of the old man, their butt at dinner. For those narrow souls,or for careless youth, the misery in Father Goriot's withered faceand its dull apathy were quite incompatible with wealth or any sort ofintelligence. As for the creatures whom he called his daughters, allMme. Vauquer's boarders were of her opinion. With the faculty for severelogic sedulously cultivated by elderly women during long evenings ofgossip till they can always find an hypothesis to fit all circumstances,she was wont to reason thus:"If Father Goriot had daughters of his own as rich as those ladies whocame here seemed to be, he would not be lodging in my house, on thethird floor, at forty-five francs a month; and he would not go aboutdressed like a poor man."No objection could be raised to these inferences. So by the end ofthe month of November 1819, at the time when the curtain rises on thisdrama, every one in the house had come to have a very decided opinion asto the poor old man. He had never had either wife or daughter; excesseshad reduced him to this sluggish condition; he was a sort of humanmollusk who should be classed among the capulidoe, so one of the dinnercontingent, an employe at the Museum, who had a pretty wit of his own.Poiret was an eagle, a gentleman, compared with Goriot. Poiret wouldjoin the talk, argue, answer when he was spoken to; as a matter offact, his talk, arguments, and responses contributed nothing to theconversation, for Poiret had a habit of repeating what the others saidin different words; still, he did join in the talk; he was alive, andseemed capable of feeling; while Father Goriot (to quote the Museumofficial again) was invariably at zero degrees--Reaumur.Eugene de Rastignac had just returned to Paris in a state of mind notunknown to young men who are conscious of unusual powers, and to thosewhose faculties are so stimulated by a difficult position, that for thetime being they rise above the ordinary level.Rastignac's first year of study for the preliminary examinations in lawhad left him free to see the sights of Paris and to enjoy some of itsamusements. A student has not much time on his hands if he sets himselfto learn the repertory of every theatre, and to study the ins and outsof the labyrinth of Paris. To know its customs; to learn the language,and become familiar with the amusements of the capital, he must exploreits recesses, good and bad, follow the studies that please him best, andform some idea of the treasures contained in galleries and museums.At this stage of his career a student grows eager and excited about allsorts of follies that seem to him to be of immense importance. He hashis hero, his great man, a professor at the College de France, paidto talk down to the level of his audience. He adjusts his cravat, andstrikes various attitudes for the benefit of the women in the firstgalleries at the Opera-Comique. As he passes through all thesesuccessive initiations, and breaks out of his sheath, the horizons oflife widen around him, and at length he grasps the plan of society withthe different human strata of which it is composed.If he begins by admiring the procession of carriages on sunny afternoonsin the Champs-Elysees, he soon reaches the further stage of envyingtheir owners. Unconsciously, Eugene had served his apprenticeship beforehe went back to Angouleme for the long vacation after taking his degreesas bachelor of arts and bachelor of law. The illusions of childhood hadvanished, so also had the ideas he brought with him from the provinces;he had returned thither with an intelligence developed, with loftierambitions, and saw things as they were at home in the old manor house.His father and mother, his two brothers and two sisters, with an agedaunt, whose whole fortune consisted in annuities, lived on the littleestate of Rastignac. The whole property brought in about three thousandfrancs; and though the amount varied with the season (as must alwaysbe the case in a vine-growing district), they were obliged to spare anunvarying twelve hundred francs out of their income for him. He sawhow constantly the poverty, which they had generously hidden from him,weighed upon them; he could not help comparing the sisters, who hadseemed so beautiful to his boyish eyes, with women in Paris, who hadrealized the beauty of his dreams. The uncertain future of the wholefamily depended upon him. It did not escape his eyes that not a crumbwas wasted in the house, nor that the wine they drank was made from thesecond pressing; a multitude of small things, which it is useless tospeak of in detail here, made him burn to distinguish himself, and hisambition to succeed increased tenfold.He meant, like all great souls, that his success should be owingentirely to his merits; but his was pre-eminently a southerntemperament, the execution of his plans was sure to be marred by thevertigo that seizes on youth when youth sees itself alone in a wide sea,uncertain how to spend its energies, whither to steer its course, howto adapt its sails to the winds. At first he determined to fling himselfheart and soul into his work, but he was diverted from this purpose bythe need of society and connections; then he saw how great an influencewomen exert in social life, and suddenly made up his mind to go outinto this world to seek a protectress there. Surely a clever andhigh-spirited young man, whose wit and courage were set off to advantageby a graceful figure and the vigorous kind of beauty that readilystrikes a woman's imagination, need not despair of finding aprotectress. These ideas occurred to him in his country walks with hissisters, whom he had once joined so gaily. The girls thought him verymuch changed.His aunt, Mme. de Marcillac, had been presented at court, and had movedamong the brightest heights of that lofty region. Suddenly the youngman's ambition discerned in those recollections of hers, which had beenlike nursery fairy tales to her nephews and nieces, the elements ofa social success at least as important as the success which he hadachieved at the Ecole de Droit. He began to ask his aunt about thoserelations; some of the old ties might still hold good. After muchshaking of the branches of the family tree, the old lady came to theconclusion that of all persons who could be useful to her nephew amongthe selfish genus of rich relations, the Vicomtesse de Beauseant wasthe least likely to refuse. To this lady, therefore, she wrote in theold-fashioned style, recommending Eugene to her; pointing out toher nephew that if he succeeded in pleasing Mme. de Beauseant, theVicomtesse would introduce him to other relations. A few days after hisreturn to Paris, therefore, Rastignac sent his aunt's letter to Mme.de Beauseant. The Vicomtesse replied by an invitation to a ball forthe following evening. This was the position of affairs at the MaisonVauquer at the end of November 1819.A few days later, after Mme. de Beauseant's ball, Eugene came in at twoo'clock in the morning. The persevering student meant to make up for thelost time by working until daylight. It was the first time that he hadattempted to spend the night in this way in that silent quarter. Thespell of a factitious energy was upon him; he had beheld the pomp andsplendor of the world. He had not dined at the Maison Vauquer; theboarders probably would think that he would walk home at daybreak fromthe dance, as he had done sometimes on former occasions, after a fete atthe Prado, or a ball at the Odeon, splashing his silk stockings thereby,and ruining his pumps.It so happened that Christophe took a look into the street beforedrawing the bolts of the door; and Rastignac, coming in at thatmoment, could go up to his room without making any noise, followed byChristophe, who made a great deal. Eugene exchanged his dress suit for ashabby overcoat and slippers, kindled a fire with some blocks of patentfuel, and prepared for his night's work in such a sort that the faintsounds he made were drowned by Christophe's heavy tramp on the stairs.Eugene sat absorbed in thought for a few moments before plunging intohis law books. He had just become aware of the fact that the Vicomtessede Beauseant was one of the queens of fashion, that her house wasthought to be the pleasantest in the Faubourg Saint-Germain. And notonly so, she was, by right of her fortune, and the name she bore, one ofthe most conspicuous figures in that aristocratic world. Thanks to theaunt, thanks to Mme. de Marcillac's letter of introduction, the poorstudent had been kindly received in that house before he knew the extentof the favor thus shown to him. It was almost like a patent of nobilityto be admitted to those gilded salons; he had appeared in the mostexclusive circle in Paris, and now all doors were open for him. Eugenehad been dazzled at first by the brilliant assembly, and had scarcelyexchanged a few words with the Vicomtesse; he had been content to singleout a goddess among this throng of Parisian divinities, one of thosewomen who are sure to attract a young man's fancy.The Comtesse Anastasie de Restaud was tall and gracefully made; shehad one of the prettiest figures in Paris. Imagine a pair of great darkeyes, a magnificently moulded hand, a shapely foot. There was a fieryenergy in her movements; the Marquis de Ronquerolles had called her "athoroughbred," "a pure pedigree," these figures of speech have replacedthe "heavenly angel" and Ossianic nomenclature; the old mythology oflove is extinct, doomed to perish by modern dandyism. But for Rastignac,Mme. Anastasie de Restaud was the woman for whom he had sighed. He hadcontrived to write his name twice upon the list of partners upon herfan, and had snatched a few words with her during the first quadrille."Where shall I meet you again, Madame?" he asked abruptly, and the tonesof his voice were full of the vehement energy that women like so well."Oh, everywhere!" said she, "in the Bois, at the Bouffons, in my ownhouse."With the impetuosity of his adventurous southern temper, he did all hecould to cultivate an acquaintance with this lovely countess, making thebest of his opportunities in the quadrille and during a waltz that shegave him. When he told her that he was a cousin of Mme. de Beauseant's,the Countess, whom he took for a great lady, asked him to call at herhouse, and after her parting smile, Rastignac felt convinced that hemust make this visit. He was so lucky as to light upon some one who didnot laugh at his ignorance, a fatal defect among the gilded and insolentyouth of that period; the coterie of Maulincourts, Maximes de Trailles,de Marsays, Ronquerolles, Ajuda-Pintos, and Vandenesses who shone therein all the glory of coxcombry among the best-dressed women of fashionin Paris--Lady Brandon, the Duchesse de Langeais, the Comtesse deKergarouet, Mme. de Serizy, the Duchesse de Carigliano, the ComtesseFerraud, Mme. de Lanty, the Marquise d'Aiglemont, Mme. Firmiani,the Marquise de Listomere and the Marquise d'Espard, the Duchesse deMaufrigneuse and the Grandlieus. Luckily, therefore, for him, the novicehappened upon the Marquis de Montriveau, the lover of the Duchesse deLangeais, a general as simple as a child; from him Rastignac learnedthat the Comtesse lived in the Rue du Helder.Ah, what it is to be young, eager to see the world, greedily on thewatch for any chance that brings you nearer the woman of your dreams,and behold two houses open their doors to you! To set foot in theVicomtesse de Beauseant's house in the Faubourg Saint-Germain; to fallon your knees before a Comtesse de Restaud in the Chaussee d'Antin;to look at one glance across a vista of Paris drawing-rooms, consciousthat, possessing sufficient good looks, you may hope to find aid andprotection there in a feminine heart! To feel ambitious enough to spurnthe tight-rope on which you must walk with the steady head of an acrobatfor whom a fall is impossible, and to find in a charming woman the bestof all balancing poles.He sat there with his thoughts for a while, Law on the one hand, andPoverty on the other, beholding a radiant vision of a woman rise abovethe dull, smouldering fire. Who would not have paused and questionedthe future as Eugene was doing? who would not have pictured it full ofsuccess? His wondering thoughts took wings; he was transported outof the present into that blissful future; he was sitting by Mme. deRestaud's side, when a sort of sigh, like the grunt of an overburdenedSt. Joseph, broke the silence of the night. It vibrated through thestudent, who took the sound for a death groan. He opened his doornoiselessly, went out upon the landing, and saw a thin streak of lightunder Father Goriot's door. Eugene feared that his neighbor had beentaken ill; he went over and looked through the keyhole; the old manwas busily engaged in an occupation so singular and so suspicious thatRastignac thought he was only doing a piece of necessary serviceto society to watch the self-styled vermicelli maker's nocturnalindustries.The table was upturned, and Goriot had doubtless in some way secured asilver plate and cup to the bar before knotting a thick rope round them;he was pulling at this rope with such enormous force that they werebeing crushed and twisted out of shape; to all appearance he meant toconvert the richly wrought metal into ingots."Peste! what a man!" said Rastignac, as he watched Goriot's musculararms; there was not a sound in the room while the old man, with the aidof the rope, was kneading the silver like dough. "Was he then, indeed,a thief, or a receiver of stolen goods, who affected imbecility anddecrepitude, and lived like a beggar that he might carry on his pursuitsthe more securely?" Eugene stood for a moment revolving these questions,then he looked again through the keyhole.Father Goriot had unwound his coil of rope; he had covered the tablewith a blanket, and was now employed in rolling the flattened massof silver into a bar, an operation which he performed with marvelousdexterity."Why, he must be as strong as Augustus, King of Poland!" said Eugene tohimself when the bar was nearly finished.Father Goriot looked sadly at his handiwork, tears fell from hiseyes, he blew out the dip which had served him for a light while hemanipulated the silver, and Eugene heard him sigh as he lay down again."He is mad," thought the student."Poor child!" Father Goriot said aloud. Rastignac, hearing thosewords, concluded to keep silence; he would not hastily condemn hisneighbor. He was just in the doorway of his room when a strange soundfrom the staircase below reached his ears; it might have been madeby two men coming up in list slippers. Eugene listened; two men therecertainly were, he could hear their breathing. Yet there had been nosound of opening the street door, no footsteps in the passage. Suddenly,too, he saw a faint gleam of light on the second story; it came from M.Vautrin's room."There are a good many mysteries here for a lodging-house!" he said tohimself.He went part of the way downstairs and listened again. The rattle ofgold reached his ears. In another moment the light was put out, andagain he distinctly heard the breathing of two men, but no sound of adoor being opened or shut. The two men went downstairs, the faint soundsgrowing fainter as they went."Who is there?" cried Mme. Vauquer out of her bedroom window."I, Mme. Vauquer," answered Vautrin's deep bass voice. "I am coming in.""That is odd! Christophe drew the bolts," said Eugene, going back to hisroom. "You have to sit up at night, it seems, if you really mean to knowall that is going on about you in Paris."These incidents turned his thought from his ambitious dreams; he betookhimself to his work, but his thought wandered back to Father Goriot'ssuspicious occupation; Mme. de Restaud's face swam again and againbefore his eyes like a vision of a brilliant future; and at last he laydown and slept with clenched fists. When a young man makes up his mindthat he will work all night, the chances are that seven times out often he will sleep till morning. Such vigils do not begin before we areturned twenty.The next morning Paris was wrapped in one of the dense fogs that throwthe most punctual people out in their calculations as to the time; eventhe most business-like folk fail to keep their appointments in suchweather, and ordinary mortals wake up at noon and fancy it is eighto'clock. On this morning it was half-past nine, and Mme. Vauquerstill lay abed. Christophe was late, Sylvie was late, but the two satcomfortably taking their coffee as usual. It was Sylvie's custom to takethe cream off the milk destined for the boarders' breakfast for herown, and to boil the remainder for some time, so that madame should notdiscover this illegal exaction."Sylvie," said Christophe, as he dipped a piece of toast into thecoffee, "M. Vautrin, who is not such a bad sort, all the same, had twopeople come to see him again last night. If madame says anything, mindyou say nothing about it.""Has he given you something?""He gave me a five-franc piece this month, which is as good as saying,'Hold your tongue.'""Except him and Mme. Couture, who doesn't look twice at every penny,there's no one in the house that doesn't try to get back with the lefthand all that they give with the right at New Year," said Sylvie."And, after all," said Christophe, "what do they give you? A miserablefive-franc piece. There is Father Goriot, who has cleaned his shoeshimself these two years past. There is that old beggar Poiret, who goeswithout blacking altogether; he would sooner drink it than put it on hisboots. Then there is that whipper-snapper of a student, who gives me acouple of francs. Two francs will not pay for my brushes, and he sellshis old clothes, and gets more for them than they are worth. Oh! they'rea shabby lot!""Pooh!" said Sylvie, sipping her coffee, "our places are the best in theQuarter, that I know. But about that great big chap Vautrin, Christophe;has any one told you anything about him?""Yes. I met a gentleman in the street a few days ago; he said to me,'There's a gentleman in your place, isn't there? a tall man that dyeshis whiskers?' I told him, 'No, sir; they aren't dyed. A gay fellowlike him hasn't the time to do it.' And when I told M. Vautrin aboutit afterwards, he said, 'Quite right, my boy. That is the way toanswer them. There is nothing more unpleasant than to have your littleweaknesses known; it might spoil many a match.'""Well, and for my part," said Sylvie, "a man tried to humbug me at themarket wanting to know if I had seen him put on his shirt. Such bosh!There," she cried, interrupting herself, "that's a quarter to tenstriking at the Val-de-Grace, and not a soul stirring!""Pooh! they are all gone out. Mme. Couture and the girl went out ateight o'clock to take the wafer at Saint-Etienne. Father Goriot startedoff somewhere with a parcel, and the student won't be back from hislecture till ten o'clock. I saw them go while I was sweeping the stairs;Father Goriot knocked up against me, and his parcel was as hard as iron.What is the old fellow up to, I wonder? He is as good as a plaything forthe rest of them; they can never let him alone; but he is a good man,all the same, and worth more than all of them put together. He doesn'tgive you much himself, but he sometimes sends you with a message toladies who fork out famous tips; they are dressed grandly, too.""His daughters, as he calls them, eh? There are a dozen of them.""I have never been to more than two--the two who came here.""There is madame moving overhead; I shall have to go, or she will raisea fine racket. Just keep an eye on the milk, Christophe; don't let thecat get at it."Sylvie went up to her mistress' room."Sylvie! How is this? It's nearly ten o'clock, and you let me sleep likea dormouse! Such a thing has never happened before.""It's the fog; it is that thick, you could cut it with a knife.""But how about breakfast?""Bah! the boarders are possessed, I'm sure. They all cleared out beforethere was a wink of daylight.""Do speak properly, Sylvie," Mme. Vauquer retorted; "say a blink ofdaylight.""Ah, well, madame, whichever you please. Anyhow, you can have breakfastat ten o'clock. La Michonnette and Poiret have neither of them stirred.There are only those two upstairs, and they are sleeping like the logsthey are.""But, Sylvie, you put their names together as if----""As if what?" said Sylvie, bursting into a guffaw. "The two of them makea pair.""It is a strange thing, isn't it, Sylvie, how M. Vautrin got in lastnight after Christophe had bolted the door?""Not at all, madame. Christophe heard M. Vautrin, and went down andundid the door. And here are you imagining that----?""Give me my bodice, and be quick and get breakfast ready. Dish up therest of the mutton with the potatoes, and you can put the stewed pearson the table, those at five a penny."A few moments later Mme. Vauquer came down, just in time to see the catknock down a plate that covered a bowl of milk, and begin to lap in allhaste."Mistigris!" she cried.The cat fled, but promptly returned to rub against her ankles."Oh! yes, you can wheedle, you old hypocrite!" she said. "Sylvie!Sylvie!""Yes, madame; what is it?""Just see what the cat has done!""It is all that stupid Christophe's fault. I told him to stop and laythe table. What has become of him? Don't you worry, madame; FatherGoriot shall have it. I will fill it up with water, and he won't knowthe difference; he never notices anything, not even what he eats.""I wonder where the old heathen can have gone?" said Mme. Vauquer,setting the plates round the table."Who knows? He is up to all sorts of tricks.""I have overslept myself," said Mme. Vauquer."But madame looks as fresh as a rose, all the same."The door bell rang at that moment, and Vautrin came through thesitting-room, singing loudly:"'Tis the same old story everywhere,A roving heart and a roving glance.."Oh! Mamma Vauquer! good-morning!" he cried at the sight of his hostess,and he put his arm gaily round her waist."There! have done----""'Impertinence!' Say it!" he answered. "Come, say it! Now, isn't thatwhat you really mean? Stop a bit, I will help you to set the table. Ah!I am a nice man, am I not?"For the locks of brown and the golden hairA sighing lover..."Oh! I have just seen something so funny----.... led by chance.""What?" asked the widow."Father Goriot in the goldsmith's shop in the Rue Dauphine at half-pasteight this morning. They buy old spoons and forks and gold lace there,and Goriot sold a piece of silver plate for a good round sum. It hadbeen twisted out of shape very neatly for a man that's not used to thetrade.""Really? You don't say so?""Yes. One of my friends is expatriating himself; I had been to see himoff on board the Royal Mail steamer, and was coming back here. I waitedafter that to see what Father Goriot would do; it is a comical affair.He came back to this quarter of the world, to the Rue des Gres, and wentinto a money-lender's house; everybody knows him, Gobseck, a stuck-uprascal, that would make dominoes out of his father's bones, a Turk,a heathen, an old Jew, a Greek; it would be a difficult matter to robhim, for he puts all his coin into the Bank.""Then what was Father Goriot doing there?""Doing?" said Vautrin. "Nothing; he was bent on his own undoing. He is asimpleton, stupid enough to ruin himself by running after----""There he is!" cried Sylvie."Christophe," cried Father Goriot's voice, "come upstairs with me."Christophe went up, and shortly afterwards came down again."Where are you going?" Mme. Vauquer asked of her servant."Out on an errand for M. Goriot.""What may that be?" said Vautrin, pouncing on a letter in Christophe'shand. "Mme. la Comtesse Anastasie de Restaud," he read. "Where are yougoing with it?" he added, as he gave the letter back to Christophe."To the Rue du Helder. I have orders to give this into her handsmyself.""What is there inside it?" said Vautrin, holding the letter up to thelight. "A banknote? No." He peered into the envelope. "A receiptedaccount!" he cried. "My word! 'tis a gallant old dotard. Off with you,old chap," he said, bringing down a hand on Christophe's head, andspinning the man round like a thimble; "you will have a famous tip."By this time the table was set. Sylvie was boiling the milk, Mme.Vauquer was lighting a fire in the stove with some assistance fromVautrin, who kept humming to himself:"The same old story everywhere,A roving heart and a roving glance."When everything was ready, Mme. Couture and Mlle. Taillefer came in."Where have you been this morning, fair lady?" said Mme. Vauquer,turning to Mme. Couture."We have just been to say our prayers at Saint-Etienne du Mont. To-dayis the day when we must go to see M. Taillefer. Poor little thing! Sheis trembling like a leaf," Mme. Couture went on, as she seated herselfbefore the fire and held the steaming soles of her boots to the blaze."Warm yourself, Victorine," said Mme. Vauquer."It is quite right and proper, mademoiselle, to pray to Heaven to softenyour father's heart," said Vautrin, as he drew a chair nearer to theorphan girl; "but that is not enough. What you want is a friend whowill give the monster a piece of his mind; a barbarian that has threemillions (so they say), and will not give you a dowry; and a pretty girlneeds a dowry nowadays.""Poor child!" said Mme. Vauquer. "Never mind, my pet, your wretch of afather is going just the way to bring trouble upon himself."Victorine's eyes filled with tears at the words, and the widow checkedherself at a sign from Mme. Couture."If we could only see him!" said the Commissary-General's widow; "if Icould speak to him myself and give him his wife's last letter! Ihave never dared to run the risk of sending it by post; he knew myhandwriting----""'Oh woman, persecuted and injured innocent!'" exclaimed Vautrin,breaking in upon her. "So that is how you are, is it? In a few days'time I will look into your affairs, and it will be all right, you shallsee.""Oh! sir," said Victorine, with a tearful but eager glance at Vautrin,who showed no sign of being touched by it, "if you know of any wayof communicating with my father, please be sure and tell him that hisaffection and my mother's honor are more to me than all the money in theworld. If you can induce him to relent a little towards me, I will prayto God for you. You may be sure of my gratitude----""The same old story everywhere," sang Vautrin, with a satiricalintonation. At this juncture, Goriot, Mlle. Michonneau, and Poiret camedownstairs together; possibly the scent of the gravy which Sylvie wasmaking to serve with the mutton had announced breakfast. The sevenpeople thus assembled bade each other good-morning, and took theirplaces at the table; the clock struck ten, and the student's footstepwas heard outside."Ah! here you are, M. Eugene," said Sylvie; "every one is breakfastingat home to-day."The student exchanged greetings with the lodgers, and sat down besideGoriot."I have just met with a queer adventure," he said, as he helped himselfabundantly to the mutton, and cut a slice of bread, which Mme. Vauquer'seyes gauged as usual."An adventure?" queried Poiret."Well, and what is there to astonish you in that, old boy?" Vautrinasked of Poiret. "M. Eugene is cut out for that kind of thing."Mlle. Taillefer stole a timid glance at the young student."Tell us about your adventure!" demanded M. Vautrin."Yesterday evening I went to a ball given by a cousin of mine, theVicomtesse de Beauseant. She has a magnificent house; the rooms are hungwith silk--in short, it was a splendid affair, and I was as happy as aking---""Fisher," put in Vautrin, interrupting."What do you mean, sir?" said Eugene sharply."I said 'fisher,' because kingfishers see a good deal more fun thankings.""Quite true; I would much rather be the little careless bird than aking," said Poiret the ditto-ist, "because----""In fact"--the law-student cut him short--"I danced with one of thehandsomest women in the room, a charming countess, the most exquisitecreature I have ever seen. There was peach blossom in her hair, and shehad the loveliest bouquet of flowers--real flowers, that scented theair----but there! it is no use trying to describe a woman glowing withthe dance. You ought to have seen her! Well, and this morning I met thisdivine countess about nine o'clock, on foot in the Rue de Gres. Oh! howmy heart beat! I began to think----""That she was coming here," said Vautrin, with a keen look at thestudent. "I expect that she was going to call on old Gobseck, amoney-lender. If ever you explore a Parisian woman's heart, you willfind the money-lender first, and the lover afterwards. Your countess iscalled Anastasie de Restaud, and she lives in the Rue du Helder."The student stared hard at Vautrin. Father Goriot raised his head at thewords, and gave the two speakers a glance so full of intelligence anduneasiness that the lodgers beheld him with astonishment."Then Christophe was too late, and she must have gone to him!" criedGoriot, with anguish in his voice."It is just as I guessed," said Vautrin, leaning over to whisper in Mme.Vauquer's ear.Goriot went on with his breakfast, but seemed unconscious of what he wasdoing. He had never looked more stupid nor more taken up with his ownthoughts than he did at that moment."Who the devil could have told you her name, M. Vautrin?" asked Eugene."Aha! there you are!" answered Vautrin. "Old Father Goriot there knew itquite well! and why should I not know it too?""M. Goriot?" the student cried."What is it?" asked the old man. "So she was very beautiful, was she,yesterday night?""Who?""Mme. de Restaud.""Look at the old wretch," said Mme. Vauquer, speaking to Vautrin; "howhis eyes light up!""Then does he really keep her?" said Mlle. Michonneau, in a whisper tothe student."Oh! yes, she was tremendously pretty," Eugene answered. Father Goriotwatched him with eager eyes. "If Mme. de Beauseant had not been there,my divine countess would have been the queen of the ball; none of theyounger men had eyes for any one else. I was the twelfth on her list,and she danced every quadrille. The other women were furious. She musthave enjoyed herself, if ever creature did! It is a true sayingthat there is no more beautiful sight than a frigate in full sail, agalloping horse, or a woman dancing.""So the wheel turns," said Vautrin; "yesterday night at a duchess'ball, this morning in a money-lender's office, on the lowest rung of theladder--just like a Parisienne! If their husbands cannot afford to payfor their frantic extravagance, they will sell themselves. Or ifthey cannot do that, they will tear out their mothers' hearts to findsomething to pay for their splendor. They will turn the world upsidedown. Just a Parisienne through and through!"Father Goriot's face, which had shone at the student's words like thesun on a bright day, clouded over all at once at this cruel speech ofVautrin's."Well," said Mme. Vauquer, "but where is your adventure? Did you speakto her? Did you ask her if she wanted to study law?""She did not see me," said Eugene. "But only think of meeting one of theprettiest women in Paris in the Rue des Gres at nine o'clock! She couldnot have reached home after the ball till two o'clock this morning.Wasn't it queer? There is no place like Paris for this sort ofadventures.""Pshaw! much funnier things than that happen here!" exclaimed Vautrin.Mlle. Taillefer had scarcely heeded the talk, she was so absorbed by thethought of the new attempt that she was about to make. Mme. Couture madea sign that it was time to go upstairs and dress; the two ladies wentout, and Father Goriot followed their example."Well, did you see?" said Mme. Vauquer, addressing Vautrin and the restof the circle. "He is ruining himself for those women, that is plain.""Nothing will ever make me believe that that beautiful Comtesse deRestaud is anything to Father Goriot," cried the student."Well, and if you don't," broke in Vautrin, "we are not set onconvincing you. You are too young to know Paris thoroughly yet; later onyou will find out that there are what we call men with a passion----"Mlle. Michonneau gave Vautrin a quick glance at these words. They seemedto be like the sound of a trumpet to a trooper's horse. "Aha!" saidVautrin, stopping in his speech to give her a searching glance, "so wehave had our little experiences, have we?"The old maid lowered her eyes like a nun who sees a statue."Well," he went on, "when folk of that kind get a notion into theirheads, they cannot drop it. They must drink the water from someparticular spring--it is stagnant as often as not; but they will selltheir wives and families, they will sell their own souls to the devil toget it. For some this spring is play, or the stock-exchange, or music,or a collection of pictures or insects; for others it is some woman whocan give them the dainties they like. You might offer these last all thewomen on earth--they would turn up their noses; they will have the onlyone who can gratify their passion. It often happens that the womandoes not care for them at all, and treats them cruelly; they buy theirmorsels of satisfaction very dear; but no matter, the fools are nevertired of it; they will take their last blanket to the pawnbroker's togive their last five-franc piece to her. Father Goriot here is one ofthat sort. He is discreet, so the Countess exploits him--just the way ofthe gay world. The poor old fellow thinks of her and of nothing else.In all other respects you see he is a stupid animal; but get him onthat subject, and his eyes sparkle like diamonds. That secret is notdifficult to guess. He took some plate himself this morning to themelting-pot, and I saw him at Daddy Gobseck's in the Rue des Gres. Andnow, mark what follows--he came back here, and gave a letter for theComtesse de Restaud to that noodle of a Christophe, who showed us theaddress; there was a receipted bill inside it. It is clear that it wasan urgent matter if the Countess also went herself to the old moneylender. Father Goriot has financed her handsomely. There is no need totack a tale together; the thing is self-evident. So that shows you, sirstudent, that all the time your Countess was smiling, dancing, flirting,swaying her peach-flower crowned head, with her gown gathered into herhand, her slippers were pinching her, as they say; she was thinking ofher protested bills, or her lover's protested bills.""You have made me wild to know the truth," cried Eugene; "I will go tocall on Mme. de Restaud to-morrow.""Yes," echoed Poiret; "you must go and call on Mme. de Restaud.""And perhaps you will find Father Goriot there, who will take paymentfor the assistance he politely rendered."Eugene looked disgusted. "Why, then, this Paris of yours is a slough.""And an uncommonly queer slough, too," replied Vautrin. "The mudsplashes you as you drive through it in your carriage--you are arespectable person; you go afoot and are splashed--you are a scoundrel.You are so unlucky as to walk off with something or other belongingto somebody else, and they exhibit you as a curiosity in the Place duPalais-de-Justice; you steal a million, and you are pointed out in everysalon as a model of virtue. And you pay thirty millions for the policeand the courts of justice, for the maintenance of law and order! Apretty slate of things it is!""What," cried Mme. Vauquer, "has Father Goriot really melted down hissilver posset-dish?""There were two turtle-doves on the lid, were there not?" asked Eugene."Yes, that there were.""Then, was he fond of it?" said Eugene. "He cried while he was breakingup the cup and plate. I happened to see him by accident.""It was dear to him as his own life," answered the widow."There! you see how infatuated the old fellow is!" cried Vautrin. "Thewoman yonder can coax the soul out of him."The student went up to his room. Vautrin went out, and a few momentslater Mme. Couture and Victorine drove away in a cab which Sylvie hadcalled for them. Poiret gave his arm to Mlle. Michonneau, and they wenttogether to spend the two sunniest hours of the day in the Jardin desPlantes."Well, those two are as good as married," was the portly Sylvie'scomment. "They are going out together to-day for the first time. Theyare such a couple of dry sticks that if they happen to strike againsteach other they will draw sparks like flint and steel.""Keep clear of Mlle. Michonneau's shawl, then," said Mme. Vauquer,laughing; "it would flare up like tinder."At four o'clock that evening, when Goriot came in, he saw, by the lightof two smoky lamps, that Victorine's eyes were red. Mme. Vauquer waslistening to the history of the visit made that morning to M. Taillefer;it had been made in vain. Taillefer was tired of the annual applicationmade by his daughter and her elderly friend; he gave them a personalinterview in order to arrive at an understanding with them."My dear lady," said Mme. Couture, addressing Mme. Vauquer, "justimagine it; he did not even ask Victorine to sit down, she was standingthe whole time. He said to me quite coolly, without putting himself in apassion, that we might spare ourselves the trouble of going there; thatthe young lady (he would not call her his daughter) was injuring hercause by importuning him (importuning! once a year, the wretch!); thatas Victorine's mother had nothing when he married her, Victorine oughtnot to expect anything from him; in fact, he said the most cruel things,that made the poor child burst out crying. The little thing threwherself at her father's feet and spoke up bravely; she said that sheonly persevered in her visits for her mother's sake; that she wouldobey him without a murmur, but that she begged him to read her poor deadmother's farewell letter. She took it up and gave it to him, saying themost beautiful things in the world, most beautifully expressed; I do notknow where she learned them; God must have put them into her head, forthe poor child was inspired to speak so nicely that it made me cry likea fool to hear her talk. And what do you think the monster was doing allthe time? Cutting his nails! He took the letter that poor Mme. Tailleferhad soaked with tears, and flung it on to the chimney-piece. 'That isall right,' he said. He held out his hands to raise his daughter, butshe covered them with kisses, and he drew them away again. Scandalous,isn't it? And his great booby of a son came in and took no notice of hissister.""What inhuman wretches they must be!" said Father Goriot."And then they both went out of the room," Mme. Couture went on, withoutheeding the worthy vermicelli maker's exclamation; "father and son bowedto me, and asked me to excuse them on account of urgent business! Thatis the history of our call. Well, he has seen his daughter at any rate.How he can refuse to acknowledge her I cannot think, for they are asalike as two peas."The boarders dropped in one after another, interchanging greetings andempty jokes that certain classes of Parisians regard as humorous andwitty. Dulness is their prevailing ingredient, and the whole pointconsists in mispronouncing a word or a gesture. This kind of argot isalways changing. The essence of the jest consists in some catchwordsuggested by a political event, an incident in the police courts, astreet song, or a bit of burlesque at some theatre, and forgotten in amonth. Anything and everything serves to keep up a game of battledoreand shuttlecock with words and ideas. The diorama, a recent invention,which carried an optical illusion a degree further than panoramas, hadgiven rise to a mania among art students for ending every word withrama. The Maison Vauquer had caught the infection from a young artistamong the boarders."Well, Monsieur-r-r Poiret," said the employe from the Museum, "howis your health-orama?" Then, without waiting for an answer, he turned toMme. Couture and Victorine with a "Ladies, you seem melancholy.""Is dinner ready?" cried Horace Bianchon, a medical student, and afriend of Rastignac's; "my stomach is sinking usque ad talones.""There is an uncommon frozerama outside," said Vautrin. "Make roomthere, Father Goriot! Confound it, your foot covers the whole front ofthe stove.""Illustrious M. Vautrin," put in Bianchon, "why do you say frozerama?It is incorrect; it should be frozenrama.""No, it shouldn't," said the official from the Museum; "frozerama isright by the same rule that you say 'My feet are froze.'""Ah! ah!""Here is his Excellency the Marquis de Rastignac, Doctor of the Law ofContraries," cried Bianchon, seizing Eugene by the throat, and almostthrottling him."Hallo there! hallo!"Mlle. Michonneau came noiselessly in, bowed to the rest of the party,and took her place beside the three women without saying a word."That old bat always makes me shudder," said Bianchon in a low voice,indicating Mlle. Michonneau to Vautrin. "I have studied Gall's system,and I am sure she has the bump of Judas.""Then you have seen a case before?" said Vautrin."Who has not?" answered Bianchon. "Upon my word, that ghastly old maidlooks just like one of the long worms that will gnaw a beam through,give them time enough.""That is the way, young man," returned he of the forty years and thedyed whiskers:"The rose has lived the life of a rose--A morning's space.""Aha! here is a magnificent soupe-au-rama," cried Poiret as Christophecame in bearing the soup with cautious heed."I beg your pardon, sir," said Mme. Vauquer; "it is soupe aux choux."All the young men roared with laughter."Had you there, Poiret!""Poir-r-r-rette! she had you there!""Score two points to Mamma Vauquer," said Vautrin."Did any of you notice the fog this morning?" asked the official."It was a frantic fog," said Bianchon, "a fog unparalleled, doleful,melancholy, sea-green, asthmatical--a Goriot of a fog!""A Goriorama," said the art student, "because you couldn't see a thingin it.""Hey! Milord Gaoriotte, they air talking about yoo-o-ou!"Father Goriot, seated at the lower end of the table, close to the doorthrough which the servant entered, raised his face; he had smelt at ascrap of bread that lay under his table napkin, an old trick acquired inhis commercial capacity, that still showed itself at times."Well," Madame Vauquer cried in sharp tones, that rang above the rattleof spoons and plates and the sound of other voices, "and is thereanything the matter with the bread?""Nothing whatever, madame," he answered; "on the contrary, it is made ofthe best quality of corn; flour from Etampes.""How could you tell?" asked Eugene."By the color, by the flavor.""You knew the flavor by the smell, I suppose," said Mme. Vauquer. "Youhave grown so economical, you will find out how to live on the smell ofcooking at last.""Take out a patent for it, then," cried the Museum official; "you wouldmake a handsome fortune.""Never mind him," said the artist; "he does that sort of thing to deludeus into thinking that he was a vermicelli maker.""Your nose is a corn-sampler, it appears?" inquired the official."Corn what?" asked Bianchon."Corn-el.""Corn-et.""Corn-elian.""Corn-ice.""Corn-ucopia.""Corn-crake.""Corn-cockle.""Corn-orama."The eight responses came like a rolling fire from every part of theroom, and the laughter that followed was the more uproarious becausepoor Father Goriot stared at the others with a puzzled look, like aforeigner trying to catch the meaning of words in a language which hedoes not understand."Corn?..." he said, turning to Vautrin, his next neighbor."Corn on your foot, old man!" said Vautrin, and he drove Father Goriot'scap down over his eyes by a blow on the crown.The poor old man thus suddenly attacked was for a moment too bewilderedto do anything. Christophe carried off his plate, thinking that he hadfinished his soup, so that when Goriot had pushed back his cap from hiseyes his spoon encountered the table. Every one burst out laughing. "Youare a disagreeable joker, sir," said the old man, "and if you take anyfurther liberties with me----""Well, what then, old boy?" Vautrin interrupted."Well, then, you shall pay dearly for it some day----""Down below, eh?" said the artist, "in the little dark corner where theyput naughty boys.""Well, mademoiselle," Vautrin said, turning to Victorine, "you areeating nothing. So papa was refractory, was he?""A monster!" said Mme. Couture."Mademoiselle might make application for aliment pending her suit; sheis not eating anything. Eh! eh! just see how Father Goriot is staring atMlle. Victorine."The old man had forgotten his dinner, he was so absorbed in gazing atthe poor girl; the sorrow in her face was unmistakable,--the slightedlove of a child whose father would not recognize her."We are mistaken about Father Goriot, my dear boy," said Eugene in a lowvoice. "He is not an idiot, nor wanting in energy. Try your Gall systemon him, and let me know what you think. I saw him crush a silver dishlast night as if it had been made of wax; there seems to be somethingextraordinary going on in his mind just now, to judge by his face. Hislife is so mysterious that it must be worth studying. Oh! you may laugh,Bianchon; I am not joking.""The man is a subject, is he?" said Bianchon; "all right! I will dissecthim, if he will give me the chance.""No; feel his bumps.""Hm!--his stupidity might perhaps be contagious."
The next day Rastignac dressed himself very elegantly, and about threeo'clock in the afternoon went to call on Mme. de Restaud. On the waythither he indulged in the wild intoxicating dreams which fill a younghead so full of delicious excitement. Young men at his age takeno account of obstacles nor of dangers; they see success in everydirection; imagination has free play, and turns their lives into aromance; they are saddened or discouraged by the collapse of one of thevisionary schemes that have no existence save in their heated fancy. Ifyouth were not ignorant and timid, civilization would be impossible.Eugene took unheard-of pains to keep himself in a spotless condition,but on his way through the streets he began to think about Mme. deRestaud and what he should say to her. He equipped himself with wit,rehearsed repartees in the course of an imaginary conversation, andprepared certain neat speeches a la Talleyrand, conjuring up a series ofsmall events which should prepare the way for the declaration on whichhe had based his future; and during these musings the law student wasbespattered with mud, and by the time he reached the Palais Royal he wasobliged to have his boots blacked and his trousers brushed."If I were rich," he said, as he changed the five-franc piece he hadbrought with him in case anything might happen, "I would take a cab,then I could think at my ease."At last he reached the Rue du Helder, and asked for the Comtesse deRestaud. He bore the contemptuous glances of the servants, who had seenhim cross the court on foot, with the cold fury of a man who knows thathe will succeed some day. He understood the meaning of their glances atonce, for he had felt his inferiority as soon as he entered the court,where a smart cab was waiting. All the delights of life in Parisseemed to be implied by this visible and manifest sign of luxury andextravagance. A fine horse, in magnificent harness, was pawing theground, and all at once the law student felt out of humor with himself.Every compartment in his brain which he had thought to find so full ofwit was bolted fast; he grew positively stupid. He sent up his nameto the Countess, and waited in the ante-chamber, standing on one footbefore a window that looked out upon the court; mechanically he leanedhis elbow against the sash, and stared before him. The time seemed long;he would have left the house but for the southern tenacity of purposewhich works miracles when it is single-minded."Madame is in her boudoir, and cannot see any one at present, sir,"said the servant. "She gave me no answer; but if you will go into thedining-room, there is some one already there."Rastignac was impressed with a sense of the formidable power of thelackey who can accuse or condemn his masters by a word; he coolly openedthe door by which the man had just entered the ante-chamber, meaning,no doubt, to show these insolent flunkeys that he was familiar with thehouse; but he found that he had thoughtlessly precipitated himself intoa small room full of dressers, where lamps were standing, and hot-waterpipes, on which towels were being dried; a dark passage and a backstaircase lay beyond it. Stifled laughter from the ante-chamber added tohis confusion."This way to the drawing-room, sir," said the servant, with theexaggerated respect which seemed to be one more jest at his expense.Eugene turned so quickly that he stumbled against a bath. By good luck,he managed to keep his hat on his head, and saved it from immersion inthe water; but just as he turned, a door opened at the further end ofthe dark passage, dimly lighted by a small lamp. Rastignac heard voicesand the sound of a kiss; one of the speakers was Mme. de Restaud,the other was Father Goriot. Eugene followed the servant through thedining-room into the drawing-room; he went to a window that lookedout into the courtyard, and stood there for a while. He meant to knowwhether this Goriot was really the Goriot that he knew. His heartbeat unwontedly fast; he remembered Vautrin's hideous insinuations. Awell-dressed young man suddenly emerged from the room almost as Eugeneentered it, saying impatiently to the servant who stood at the door: "Iam going, Maurice. Tell Madame la Comtesse that I waited more than halfan hour for her."Whereupon this insolent being, who, doubtless, had a right to beinsolent, sang an Italian trill, and went towards the window whereEugene was standing, moved thereto quite as much by a desire to see thestudent's face as by a wish to look out into the courtyard."But M. le Comte had better wait a moment longer; madame is disengaged,"said Maurice, as he returned to the ante-chamber.Just at that moment Father Goriot appeared close to the gate; he hademerged from a door at the foot of the back staircase. The worthy soulwas preparing to open his umbrella regardless of the fact that the greatgate had opened to admit a tilbury, in which a young man with a ribbonat his button-hole was seated. Father Goriot had scarcely time to startback and save himself. The horse took fright at the umbrella, swerved,and dashed forward towards the flight of steps. The young man lookedround in annoyance, saw Father Goriot, and greeted him as he went outwith constrained courtesy, such as people usually show to a money-lenderso long as they require his services, or the sort of respect they feelit necessary to show for some one whose reputation has been blown upon,so that they blush to acknowledge his acquaintance. Father Goriot gavehim a little friendly nod and a good-natured smile. All this happenedwith lightning speed. Eugene was so deeply interested that he forgotthat he was not alone till he suddenly heard the Countess' voice."Oh! Maxime, were you going away?" she said reproachfully, with a shadeof pique in her manner. The Countess had not seen the incident nor theentrance of the tilbury. Rastignac turned abruptly and saw her standingbefore him, coquettishly dressed in a loose white cashmere gown withknots of rose-colored ribbon here and there; her hair was carelesslycoiled about her head, as is the wont of Parisian women in the morning;there was a soft fragrance about her--doubtless she was fresh froma bath;--her graceful form seemed more flexible, her beauty moreluxuriant. Her eyes glistened. A young man can see everything at aglance; he feels the radiant influence of woman as a plant discerns andabsorbs its nutriment from the air; he did not need to touch her handsto feel their cool freshness. He saw faint rose tints through thecashmere of the dressing gown; it had fallen slightly open, givingglimpses of a bare throat, on which the student's eyes rested. TheCountess had no need of the adventitious aid of corsets; her girdledefined the outlines of her slender waist; her throat was a challengeto love; her feet, thrust into slippers, were daintily small. As Maximetook her hand and kissed it, Eugene became aware of Maxime's existence,and the Countess saw Eugene."Oh! is that you M. de Rastignac? I am very glad to see you," she said,but there was something in her manner that a shrewd observer would havetaken as a hint to depart.Maxime, as the Countess Anastasie had called the young man with thehaughty insolence of bearing, looked from Eugene to the lady, and fromthe lady to Eugene; it was sufficiently evident that he wished to be ridof the latter. An exact and faithful rendering of the glance might begiven in the words: "Look here, my dear; I hope you intend to send thislittle whipper-snapper about his business."The Countess consulted the young man's face with an intentsubmissiveness that betrays all the secrets of a woman's heart, andRastignac all at once began to hate him violently. To begin with, thesight of the fair carefully arranged curls on the other's comelyhead had convinced him that his own crop was hideous; Maxime's boots,moreover, were elegant and spotless, while his own, in spite of allhis care, bore some traces of his recent walk; and, finally, Maxime'sovercoat fitted the outline of his figure gracefully, he looked like apretty woman, while Eugene was wearing a black coat at half-past two.The quick-witted child of the Charente felt the disadvantage at which hewas placed beside this tall, slender dandy, with the clear gaze andthe pale face, one of those men who would ruin orphan children withoutscruple. Mme. de Restaud fled into the next room without waiting forEugene to speak; shaking out the skirts of her dressing-gown in herflight, so that she looked like a white butterfly, and Maxime hurriedafter her. Eugene, in a fury, followed Maxime and the Countess, andthe three stood once more face to face by the hearth in the largedrawing-room. The law student felt quite sure that the odious Maximefound him in the way, and even at the risk of displeasing Mme. deRestaud, he meant to annoy the dandy. It had struck him all at once thathe had seen the young man before at Mme. de Beauseant's ball; he guessedthe relation between Maxime and Mme. de Restaud; and with the youthfulaudacity that commits prodigious blunders or achieves signal success, hesaid to himself, "This is my rival; I mean to cut him out."Rash resolve! He did not know that M. le Comte Maxime de Trailles wouldwait till he was insulted, so as to fire first and kill his man. Eugenewas a sportsman and a good shot, but he had not yet hit the bulls's eyetwenty times out of twenty-two. The young Count dropped into a low chairby the hearth, took up the tongs, and made up the fire so violently andso sulkily, that Anastasie's fair face suddenly clouded over. She turnedto Eugene, with a cool, questioning glance that asked plainly, "Why doyou not go?" a glance which well-bred people regard as a cue to maketheir exit.Eugene assumed an amiable expression."Madame," he began, "I hastened to call upon you----"He stopped short. The door opened, and the owner of the tilbury suddenlyappeared. He had left his hat outside, and did not greet the Countess;he looked meditatively at Rastignac, and held out his hand to Maximewith a cordial "Good morning," that astonished Eugene not a little. Theyoung provincial did not understand the amenities of a triple alliance."M. de Restaud," said the Countess, introducing her husband to the lawstudent.Eugene bowed profoundly."This gentleman," she continued, presenting Eugene to her husband,"is M. de Rastignac; he is related to Mme. la Vicomtesse de Beauseantthrough the Marcillacs; I had the pleasure of meeting him at her lastball."Related to Mme. la Vicomtesse de Beauseant through the Marcillacs!These words, on which the countess threw ever so slight an emphasis, byreason of the pride that the mistress of a house takes in showingthat she only receives people of distinction as visitors in her house,produced a magical effect. The Count's stiff manner relaxed at once ashe returned the student's bow."Delighted to have an opportunity of making your acquaintance," he said.Maxime de Trailles himself gave Eugene an uneasy glance, and suddenlydropped his insolent manner. The mighty name had all the power of afairy's wand; those closed compartments in the southern brain flew openagain; Rastignac's carefully drilled faculties returned. It was as if asudden light had pierced the obscurity of this upper world of Paris, andhe began to see, though everything was indistinct as yet. Mme. Vauquer'slodging-house and Father Goriot were very far remote from his thoughts."I thought that the Marcillacs were extinct," the Comte de Restaud said,addressing Eugene."Yes, they are extinct," answered the law student. "My great-uncle, theChevalier de Rastignac, married the heiress of the Marcillac family.They had only one daughter, who married the Marechal de Clarimbault,Mme. de Beauseant's grandfather on the mother's side. We are the youngerbranch of the family, and the younger branch is all the poorer becausemy great-uncle, the Vice-Admiral, lost all that he had in the King'sservice. The Government during the Revolution refused to admit ourclaims when the Compagnie des Indes was liquidated.""Was not your great-uncle in command of the Vengeur before 1789?""Yes.""Then he would be acquainted with my grandfather, who commanded theWarwick."Maxime looked at Mme. de Restaud and shrugged his shoulders, as whoshould say, "If he is going to discuss nautical matters with thatfellow, it is all over with us." Anastasie understood the glance that M.de Trailles gave her. With a woman's admirable tact, she began to smileand said:"Come with me, Maxime; I have something to say to you. We will leaveyou two gentlemen to sail in company on board the Warwick and theVengeur."She rose to her feet and signed to Maxime to follow her, mirth andmischief in her whole attitude, and the two went in the direction of theboudoir. The morganatic couple (to use a convenient German expressionwhich has no exact equivalent) had reached the door, when the Countinterrupted himself in his talk with Eugene."Anastasie!" he cried pettishly, "just stay a moment, dear; you knowvery well that----""I am coming back in a minute," she interrupted; "I have a commissionfor Maxime to execute, and I want to tell him about it."She came back almost immediately. She had noticed the inflection in herhusband's voice, and knew that it would not be safe to retire to theboudoir; like all women who are compelled to study their husbands'characters in order to have their own way, and whose business it isto know exactly how far they can go without endangering a goodunderstanding, she was very careful to avoid petty collisions indomestic life. It was Eugene who had brought about this untowardincident; so the Countess looked at Maxime and indicated the law studentwith an air of exasperation. M. de Trailles addressed the Count, theCountess, and Eugene with the pointed remark, "You are busy, I do notwant to interrupt you; good-day," and he went."Just wait a moment, Maxime!" the Count called after him."Come and dine with us," said the Countess, leaving Eugene and herhusband together once more. She followed Maxime into the littledrawing-room, where they sat together sufficiently long to feel surethat Rastignac had taken his leave.The law student heard their laughter, and their voices, and the pausesin their talk; he grew malicious, exerted his conversational powers forM. de Restaud, flattered him, and drew him into discussions, to theend that he might see the Countess again and discover the nature of herrelations with Father Goriot. This Countess with a husband and a lover,for Maxime clearly was her lover, was a mystery. What was the secret tiethat bound her to the old tradesman? This mystery he meant to penetrate,hoping by its means to gain a sovereign ascendency over this fairtypical Parisian."Anastasie!" the Count called again to his wife."Poor Maxime!" she said, addressing the young man. "Come, we must resignourselves. This evening----""I hope, Nasie," he said in her ear, "that you will give orders not toadmit that youngster, whose eyes light up like live coals when he looksat you. He will make you a declaration, and compromise you, and then youwill compel me to kill him.""Are you mad, Maxime?" she said. "A young lad of a student is, on thecontrary, a capital lightning-conductor; is not that so? Of course, Imean to make Restaud furiously jealous of him."Maxime burst out laughing, and went out, followed by the Countess, whostood at the window to watch him into his carriage; he shook his whip,and made his horse prance. She only returned when the great gate hadbeen closed after him."What do you think, dear?" cried the Count, her husband, "thisgentleman's family estate is not far from Verteuil, on the Charente; hisgreat-uncle and my grandfather were acquainted.""Delighted to find that we have acquaintances in common," said theCountess, with a preoccupied manner."More than you think," said Eugene, in a low voice."What do you mean?" she asked quickly."Why, only just now," said the student, "I saw a gentleman go out atthe gate, Father Goriot, my next door neighbor in the house where I amlodging."At the sound of this name, and the prefix that embellished it, theCount, who was stirring the fire, let the tongs fall as though they hadburned his fingers, and rose to his feet."Sir," he cried, "you might have called him 'Monsieur Goriot'!"The Countess turned pale at first at the sight of her husband'svexation, then she reddened; clearly she was embarrassed, her answerwas made in a tone that she tried to make natural, and with an air ofassumed carelessness:"You could not know any one who is dearer to us both..."She broke off, glanced at the piano as if some fancy had crossed hermind, and asked, "Are you fond of music, M. de Rastignac?""Exceedingly," answered Eugene, flushing, and disconcerted by a dimsuspicion that he had somehow been guilty of a clumsy piece of folly."Do you sing?" she cried, going to the piano, and, sitting down beforeit, she swept her fingers over the keyboard from end to end. R-r-r-rah!"No, madame."The Comte de Restaud walked to and fro."That is a pity; you are without one great means of success.--Ca-ro,ca-a-ro, ca-a-a-ro, non du-bi-ta-re," sang the Countess.Eugene had a second time waved a magic wand when he uttered Goriot'sname, but the effect seemed to be entirely opposite to that produced bythe formula "related to Mme. de Beauseant." His position was notunlike that of some visitor permitted as a favor to inspect a privatecollection of curiosities, when by inadvertence he comes into collisionwith a glass case full of sculptured figures, and three or four heads,imperfectly secured, fall at the shock. He wished the earth would openand swallow him. Mme. de Restaud's expression was reserved and chilly,her eyes had grown indifferent, and sedulously avoided meeting those ofthe unlucky student of law."Madame," he said, "you wish to talk with M. de Restaud; permit me towish you good-day----"The Countess interrupted him by a gesture, saying hastily, "Whenever youcome to see us, both M. de Restaud and I shall be delighted to see you."Eugene made a profound bow and took his leave, followed by M. deRestaud, who insisted, in spite of his remonstrances, on accompanyinghim into the hall."Neither your mistress nor I are at home to that gentleman when hecalls," the Count said to Maurice.As Eugene set foot on the steps, he saw that it was raining."Come," said he to himself, "somehow I have just made a mess of it, Ido not know how. And now I am going to spoil my hat and coat into thebargain. I ought to stop in my corner, grind away at law, and neverlook to be anything but a boorish country magistrate. How can I gointo society, when to manage properly you want a lot of cabs, varnishedboots, gold watch chains, and all sorts of things; you have to wearwhite doeskin gloves that cost six francs in the morning, and primrosekid gloves every evening? A fig for that old humbug of a Goriot!"When he reached the street door, the driver of a hackney coach, who hadprobably just deposited a wedding party at their door, and asked nothingbetter than a chance of making a little money for himself without hisemployer's knowledge, saw that Eugene had no umbrella, remarked hisblack coat, white waistcoat, yellow gloves, and varnished boots, andstopped and looked at him inquiringly. Eugene, in the blind desperationthat drives a young man to plunge deeper and deeper into an abyss, as ifhe might hope to find a fortunate issue in its lowest depths, noddedin reply to the driver's signal, and stepped into the cab; a few straypetals of orange blossom and scraps of wire bore witness to its recentoccupation by a wedding party."Where am I to drive, sir?" demanded the man, who, by this time, hadtaken off his white gloves."Confound it!" Eugene said to himself, "I am in for it now, and at leastI will not spend cab-hire for nothing!--Drive to the Hotel Beauseant,"he said aloud."Which?" asked the man, a portentous word that reduced Eugene toconfusion. This young man of fashion, species incerta, did not know thatthere were two Hotels Beauseant; he was not aware how rich he was inrelations who did not care about him."The Vicomte de Beauseant, Rue----""De Grenelle," interrupted the driver, with a jerk of his head. "Yousee, there are the hotels of the Marquis and Comte de Beauseant in theRue Saint-Dominique," he added, drawing up the step."I know all about that," said Eugene, severely.--"Everybody is laughingat me to-day, it seems!" he said to himself, as he deposited his hat onthe opposite seat. "This escapade will cost me a king's ransom, but,at any rate, I shall call on my so-called cousin in a thoroughlyaristocratic fashion. Goriot has cost me ten francs already, the oldscoundrel. My word! I will tell Mme. de Beauseant about my adventure;perhaps it may amuse her. Doubtless she will know the secret of thecriminal relation between that handsome woman and the old rat without atail. It would be better to find favor in my cousin's eyes than tocome in contact with that shameless woman, who seems to me to have veryexpensive tastes. Surely the beautiful Vicomtesse's personal interestwould turn the scale for me, when the mere mention of her name producessuch an effect. Let us look higher. If you set yourself to carry theheights of heaven, you must face God."The innumerable thoughts that surged through his brain might be summedup in these phrases. He grew calmer, and recovered something of hisassurance as he watched the falling rain. He told himself that thoughhe was about to squander two of the precious five-franc pieces thatremained to him, the money was well laid out in preserving his coat,boots, and hat; and his cabman's cry of "Gate, if you please," almostput him in spirits. A Swiss, in scarlet and gold, appeared, the greatdoor groaned on its hinges, and Rastignac, with sweet satisfaction,beheld his equipage pass under the archway and stop before the flightof steps beneath the awning. The driver, in a blue-and-red greatcoat,dismounted and let down the step. As Eugene stepped out of the cab, heheard smothered laughter from the peristyle. Three or four lackeyswere making merry over the festal appearance of the vehicle. Inanother moment the law student was enlightened as to the cause of theirhilarity; he felt the full force of the contrast between his equipageand one of the smartest broughams in Paris; a coachman, with powderedhair, seemed to find it difficult to hold a pair of spirited horses, whostood chafing the bit. In Mme. de Restaud's courtyard, in the Chausseed'Antin, he had seen the neat turnout of a young man of six-and-twenty;in the Faubourg Saint-Germain he found the luxurious equipage of a manof rank; thirty thousand francs would not have purchased it."Who can be here?" said Eugene to himself. He began to understand,though somewhat tardily, that he must not expect to find many women inParis who were not already appropriated, and that the capture of oneof these queens would be likely to cost something more than bloodshed."Confound it all! I expect my cousin also has her Maxime."He went up the steps, feeling that he was a blighted being. The glassdoor was opened for him; the servants were as solemn as jackasses underthe curry comb. So far, Eugene had only been in the ballroom on theground floor of the Hotel Beauseant; the fete had followed so closely onthe invitation, that he had not had time to call on his cousin, and hadtherefore never seen Mme. de Beauseant's apartments; he was about tobehold for the first time a great lady among the wonderful and elegantsurroundings that reveal her character and reflect her daily life.He was the more curious, because Mme. de Restaud's drawing-room hadprovided him with a standard of comparison.At half-past four the Vicomtesse de Beauseant was visible. Five minutesearlier she would not have received her cousin, but Eugene knew nothingof the recognized routine of various houses in Paris. He was conductedup the wide, white-painted, crimson-carpeted staircase, between thegilded balusters and masses of flowering plants, to Mme. de Beauseant'sapartments. He did not know the rumor current about Mme. de Beauseant,one of the biographies told, with variations, in whispers, every eveningin the salons of Paris.For three years past her name had been spoken of in connection withthat of one of the most wealthy and distinguished Portuguese nobles,the Marquis d'Ajuda-Pinto. It was one of those innocent liaisons whichpossess so much charm for the two thus attached to each other thatthey find the presence of a third person intolerable. The Vicomte deBeauseant, therefore, had himself set an example to the rest of theworld by respecting, with as good a grace as might be, this morganaticunion. Any one who came to call on the Vicomtesse in the early days ofthis friendship was sure to find the Marquis d'Ajuda-Pinto there. As,under the circumstances, Mme. de Beauseant could not very well shut herdoor against these visitors, she gave them such a cold reception, andshowed so much interest in the study of the ceiling, that no one couldfail to understand how much he bored her; and when it became known inParis that Mme. de Beauseant was bored by callers between two and fouro'clock, she was left in perfect solitude during that interval. Shewent to the Bouffons or to the Opera with M. de Beauseant and M.d'Ajuda-Pinto; and M. de Beauseant, like a well-bred man of the world,always left his wife and the Portuguese as soon as he had installedthem. But M. d'Ajuda-Pinto must marry, and a Mlle. de Rochefide was theyoung lady. In the whole fashionable world there was but one person whoas yet knew nothing of the arrangement, and that was Mme. de Beauseant.Some of her friends had hinted at the possibility, and she had laughedat them, believing that envy had prompted those ladies to try to makemischief. And now, though the bans were about to be published, andalthough the handsome Portuguese had come that day to break the news tothe Vicomtesse, he had not found courage as yet to say one word abouthis treachery. How was it? Nothing is doubtless more difficult than thenotification of an ultimatum of this kind. There are men who feel moreat their ease when they stand up before another man who threatens theirlives with sword or pistol than in the presence of a woman who, aftertwo hours of lamentations and reproaches, falls into a dead swoon andrequires salts. At this moment, therefore, M. d'Ajuda-Pinto was onthorns, and anxious to take his leave. He told himself that in someway or other the news would reach Mme. de Beauseant; he would write, itwould be much better to do it by letter, and not to utter the words thatshould stab her to the heart.So when the servant announced M. Eugene de Rastignac, the Marquisd'Ajuda-Pinto trembled with joy. To be sure, a loving woman shows evenmore ingenuity in inventing doubts of her lover than in varying themonotony of his happiness; and when she is about to be forsaken, sheinstinctively interprets every gesture as rapidly as Virgil's courserdetected the presence of his companion by snuffing the breeze. It wasimpossible, therefore, that Mme. de Beauseant should not detect thatinvoluntary thrill of satisfaction; slight though it was, it wasappalling in its artlessness.Eugene had yet to learn that no one in Paris should present himself inany house without first making himself acquainted with the whole historyof its owner, and of its owner's wife and family, so that he may avoidmaking any of the terrible blunders which in Poland draw forth thepicturesque exclamation, "Harness five bullocks to your cart!" probablybecause you will need them all to pull you out of the quagmire intowhich a false step has plunged you. If, down to the present day, ourlanguage has no name for these conversational disasters, it is probablybecause they are believed to be impossible, the publicity given in Paristo every scandal is so prodigious. After the awkward incident at Mme. deRestaud's, no one but Eugene could have reappeared in his characterof bullock-driver in Mme. de Beauseant's drawing-room. But if Mme. deRestaud and M. de Trailles had found him horribly in the way, M. d'Ajudahailed his coming with relief."Good-bye," said the Portuguese, hurrying to the door, as Eugene madehis entrance into a dainty little pink-and-gray drawing-room, whereluxury seemed nothing more than good taste."Until this evening," said Mme. de Beauseant, turning her head to givethe Marquis a glance. "We are going to the Bouffons, are we not?""I cannot go," he said, with his fingers on the door handle.Mme. de Beauseant rose and beckoned to him to return. She did notpay the slightest attention to Eugene, who stood there dazzled by thesparkling marvels around him; he began to think that this was some storyout of the Arabian Nights made real, and did not know where to hidehimself, when the woman before him seemed to be unconscious of hisexistence. The Vicomtesse had raised the forefinger of her right hand,and gracefully signed to the Marquis to seat himself beside her. TheMarquis felt the imperious sway of passion in her gesture; he came backtowards her. Eugene watched him, not without a feeling of envy."That is the owner of the brougham!" he said to himself. "But is itnecessary to have a pair of spirited horses, servants in livery, andtorrents of gold to draw a glance from a woman here in Paris?"The demon of luxury gnawed at his heart, greed burned in his veins, histhroat was parched with the thirst of gold.He had a hundred and thirty francs every quarter. His father, mother,brothers, sisters, and aunt did not spend two hundred francs a monthamong them. This swift comparison between his present condition and theaims he had in view helped to benumb his faculties."Why not?" the Vicomtesse was saying, as she smiled at the Portuguese."Why cannot you come to the Italiens?""Affairs! I am to dine with the English Ambassador.""Throw him over."When a man once enters on a course of deception, he is compelled toadd lie to lie. M. d'Ajuda therefore said, smiling, "Do you lay yourcommands on me?""Yes, certainly.""That was what I wanted to have you say to me," he answered, dissemblinghis feelings in a glance which would have reassured any other woman.He took the Vicomtesse's hand, kissed it, and went.Eugene ran his fingers through his hair, and constrained himself to bow.He thought that now Mme. de Beauseant would give him her attention;but suddenly she sprang forward, rushed to a window in the gallery, andwatched M. d'Ajuda step into his carriage; she listened to the orderthat he gave, and heard the Swiss repeat it to the coachman:"To M. de Rochefide's house."Those words, and the way in which M. d'Ajuda flung himself back in thecarriage, were like a lightning flash and a thunderbolt for her; shewalked back again with a deadly fear gnawing at her heart. The mostterrible catastrophes only happen among the heights. The Vicomtessewent to her own room, sat down at a table, and took up a sheet of daintynotepaper."When, instead of dining with the English Ambassador,"she wrote, "you go to the Rochefides, you owe me anexplanation, which I am waiting to hear."She retraced several of the letters, for her hand was trembling so thatthey were indistinct; then she signed the note with an initial C for"Claire de Bourgogne," and rang the bell."Jacques," she said to the servant, who appeared immediately, "takethis note to M. de Rochefide's house at half-past seven and ask for theMarquis d'Ajuda. If M. d'Ajuda is there, leave the note without waitingfor an answer; if he is not there, bring the note back to me.""Madame la Vicomtess, there is a visitor in the drawing-room.""Ah! yes, of course," she said, opening the door.Eugene was beginning to feel very uncomfortable, but at last theVicomtesse appeared; she spoke to him, and the tremulous tones of hervoice vibrated through his heart."Pardon me, monsieur," she said; "I had a letter to write. Now I amquite at liberty."She scarcely knew what she was saying, for even as she spoke shethought, "Ah! he means to marry Mlle. de Rochefide? But is he stillfree? This evening the marriage shall be broken off, or else... Butbefore to-morrow I shall know.""Cousin..." the student replied."Eh?" said the Countess, with an insolent glance that sent a coldshudder through Eugene; he understood what that "Eh?" meant; he hadlearned a great deal in three hours, and his wits were on the alert. Hereddened:"Madame..." he began; he hesitated a moment, and then went on."Pardon me; I am in such need of protection that the nearest scrap ofrelationship could do me no harm."Mme. de Beauseant smiled but there was sadness in her smile; even nowshe felt forebodings of the coming pain, the air she breathed was heavywith the storm that was about to burst."If you knew how my family are situated," he went on, "you would love toplay the part of a beneficent fairy godmother who graciously clears theobstacles from the path of her protege.""Well, cousin," she said, laughing, "and how can I be of service toyou?""But do I know even that? I am distantly related to you, and thisobscure and remote relationship is even now a perfect godsend to me. Youhave confused my ideas; I cannot remember the things that I meant to sayto you. I know no one else here in Paris.... Ah! if I could only ask youto counsel me, ask you to look upon me as a poor child who would faincling to the hem of your dress, who would lay down his life for you.""Would you kill a man for me?""Two," said Eugene."You, child. Yes, you are a child," she said, keeping back the tearsthat came to her eyes; "you would love sincerely.""Oh!" he cried, flinging up his head.The audacity of the student's answer interested the Vicomtesse in him.The southern brain was beginning to scheme for the first time. BetweenMme. de Restaud's blue boudoir and Mme. de Beauseant's rose-coloreddrawing-room he had made a three years' advance in a kind of law whichis not a recognized study in Paris, although it is a sort of higherjurisprudence, and, when well understood, is a highroad to success ofevery kind."Ah! that is what I meant to say!" said Eugene. "I met Mme. de Restaudat your ball, and this morning I went to see her."You must have been very much in the way," said Mme. de Beauseant,smiling as she spoke."Yes, indeed. I am a novice, and my blunders will set every one againstme, if you do not give me your counsel. I believe that in Paris it isvery difficult to meet with a young, beautiful, and wealthy woman offashion who would be willing to teach me, what you women can explain sowell--life. I shall find a M. de Trailles everywhere. So I have come toyou to ask you to give me a key to a puzzle, to entreat you to tell mewhat sort of blunder I made this morning. I mentioned an old man----""Madame la Duchess de Langeais," Jacques cut the student short; Eugenegave expression to his intense annoyance by a gesture."If you mean to succeed," said the Vicomtesse in a low voice, "in thefirst place you must not be so demonstrative.""Ah! good morning, dear," she continued, and rising and crossing theroom, she grasped the Duchess' hands as affectionately as if they hadbeen sisters; the Duchess responded in the prettiest and most graciousway."Two intimate friends!" said Rastignac to himself. "Henceforward I shallhave two protectresses; those two women are great friends, no doubt, andthis newcomer will doubtless interest herself in her friend's cousin.""To what happy inspiration do I owe this piece of good fortune, dearAntoinette?" asked Mme. de Beauseant."Well, I saw M. d'Ajuda-Pinto at M. de Rochefide's door, so I thoughtthat if I came I should find you alone."Mme. de Beauseant's mouth did not tighten, her color did not rise, herexpression did not alter, or rather, her brow seemed to clear as theDuchess uttered those deadly words."If I had known that you were engaged----" the speaker added, glancingat Eugene."This gentleman is M. Eugene de Rastignac, one of my cousins," said theVicomtesse. "Have you any news of General de Montriveau?" she continued."Serizy told me yesterday that he never goes anywhere now; has he beento see you to-day?"It was believed that the Duchess was desperately in love with M. deMontriveau, and that he was a faithless lover; she felt the question inher very heart, and her face flushed as she answered:"He was at the Elysee yesterday.""In attendance?""Claire," returned the Duchess, and hatred overflowed in the glances shethrew at Mme. de Beauseant; "of course you know that M. d'Ajuda-Pintois going to marry Mlle. de Rochefide; the bans will be publishedto-morrow."This thrust was too cruel; the Vicomtesse's face grew white, but sheanswered, laughing, "One of those rumors that fools amuse themselveswith. What should induce M. d'Ajuda to take one of the noblest namesin Portugal to the Rochefides? The Rochefides were only ennobledyesterday.""But Bertha will have two hundred thousand livres a year, they say.""M. d'Ajuda is too wealthy to marry for money.""But, my dear, Mlle. de Rochefide is a charming girl.""Indeed?""And, as a matter of fact, he is dining with them to-day; the thingis settled. It is very surprising to me that you should know so littleabout it."Mme. de Beauseant turned to Rastignac. "What was the blunder that youmade, monsieur?" she asked. "The poor boy is only just launched into theworld, Antoinette, so that he understands nothing of all this thatwe are speaking of. Be merciful to him, and let us finish our talkto-morrow. Everything will be announced to-morrow, you know, andyour kind informal communication can be accompanied by officialconfirmation."The Duchess gave Eugene one of those insolent glances that measure a manfrom head to foot, and leave him crushed and annihilated."Madame, I have unwittingly plunged a dagger into Mme. de Restaud'sheart; unwittingly--therein lies my offence," said the student of law,whose keen brain had served him sufficiently well, for he had detectedthe biting epigrams that lurked beneath this friendly talk. "Youcontinue to receive, possibly you fear, those who know the amount ofpain that they deliberately inflict; but a clumsy blunderer who has noidea how deeply he wounds is looked upon as a fool who does not know howto make use of his opportunities, and every one despises him."Mme. de Beauseant gave the student a glance, one of those glances inwhich a great soul can mingle dignity and gratitude. It was like balmto the law student, who was still smarting under the Duchess' insolentscrutiny; she had looked at him as an auctioneer might look at somearticle to appraise its value."Imagine, too, that I had just made some progress with the Comte deRestaud; for I should tell you, madame," he went on, turning to theDuchess with a mixture of humility and malice in his manner, "that asyet I am only a poor devil of a student, very much alone in the world,and very poor----""You should not tell us that, M. de Rastignac. We women never care aboutanything that no one else will take.""Bah!" said Eugene. "I am only two-and-twenty, and I must make up mymind to the drawbacks of my time of life. Besides, I am confessingmy sins, and it would be impossible to kneel in a more charmingconfessional; you commit your sins in one drawing-room, and receiveabsolution for them in another."The Duchess' expression grew colder, she did not like the flippant toneof these remarks, and showed that she considered them to be in badtaste by turning to the Vicomtesse with--"This gentleman has only justcome----"Mme. de Beauseant began to laugh outright at her cousin and at theDuchess both."He has only just come to Paris, dear, and is in search of some one whowill give him lessons in good taste.""Mme. la Duchesse," said Eugene, "is it not natural to wish to beinitiated into the mysteries which charm us?" ("Come, now," he said tohimself, "my language is superfinely elegant, I'm sure.")"But Mme. de Restaud is herself, I believe, M. de Trailles' pupil," saidthe Duchess."Of that I had no idea, madame," answered the law student, "so I rashlycame between them. In fact, I got on very well with the lady's husband,and his wife tolerated me for a time until I took it into my head totell them that I knew some one of whom I had just caught a glimpse as hewent out by a back staircase, a man who had given the Countess a kiss atthe end of a passage.""Who was it?" both women asked together."An old man who lives at the rate of two louis a month in the FaubourgSaint-Marceau, where I, a poor student, lodge likewise. He is a trulyunfortunate creature, everybody laughs at him--we all call him 'FatherGoriot.'""Why, child that you are," cried the Vicomtesse, "Mme. de Restaud was aMlle. Goriot!""The daughter of a vermicelli manufacturer," the Duchess added; "andwhen the little creature went to Court, the daughter of a pastry-cookwas presented on the same day. Do you remember, Claire? The King beganto laugh, and made some joke in Latin about flour. People--what wasit?--people----""Ejusdem farinoe," said Eugene."Yes, that was it," said the Duchess."Oh! is that her father?" the law student continued, aghast."Yes, certainly; the old man had two daughters; he dotes on them, so tospeak, though they will scarcely acknowledge him.""Didn't the second daughter marry a banker with a German name?" theVicomtesse asked, turning to Mme. de Langeais, "a Baron de Nucingen? Andher name is Delphine, is it not? Isn't she a fair-haired woman who hasa side-box at the Opera? She comes sometimes to the Bouffons, and laughsloudly to attract attention."The Duchess smiled and said:"I wonder at you, dear. Why do you take so much interest in people ofthat kind? One must have been as madly in love as Restaud was, to beinfatuated with Mlle. Anastasie and her flour sacks. Oh! he will notfind her a good bargain! She is in M. de Trailles' hands, and he willruin her.""And they do not acknowledge their father!" Eugene repeated."Oh! well, yes, their father, the father, a father," replied theVicomtesse, "a kind father who gave them each five or six hundredthousand francs, it is said, to secure their happiness by marryingthem well; while he only kept eight or ten thousand livres a year forhimself, thinking that his daughters would always be his daughters,thinking that in them he would live his life twice over again, thatin their houses he should find two homes, where he would be lovedand looked up to, and made much of. And in two years' time both hissons-in-law had turned him out of their houses as if he were one of thelowest outcasts."Tears came into Eugene's eyes. He was still under the spell of youthfulbeliefs, he had just left home, pure and sacred feelings had beenstirred within him, and this was his first day on the battlefield ofcivilization in Paris. Genuine feeling is so infectious that for amoment the three looked at each other in silence."Eh, mon Dieu!" said Mme. de Langeais; "yes, it seems very horrible,and yet we see such things every day. Is there not a reason for it?Tell me, dear, have you ever really thought what a son-in-law is? Ason-in-law is the man for whom we bring up, you and I, a dear littleone, bound to us very closely in innumerable ways; for seventeen yearsshe will be the joy of her family, its 'white soul,' as Lamartine says,and suddenly she will become its scourge. When HE comes and takes herfrom us, his love from the very beginning is like an axe laid to theroot of all the old affection in our darling's heart, and all the tiesthat bound her to her family are severed. But yesterday our littledaughter thought of no one but her mother and father, as we had nothought that was not for her; by to-morrow she will have become ahostile stranger. The tragedy is always going on under our eyes. On theone hand you see a father who has sacrificed himself to his son, andhis daughter-in-law shows him the last degree of insolence. On the otherhand, it is the son-in-law who turns his wife's mother out of the house.I sometimes hear it said that there is nothing dramatic about society inthese days; but the Drama of the Son-in-law is appalling, to say nothingof our marriages, which have come to be very poor farces. I can explainhow it all came about in the old vermicelli maker's case. I think Irecollect that Foriot----""Goriot, madame.""Yes, that Moriot was once President of his Section during theRevolution. He was in the secret of the famous scarcity of grain, andlaid the foundation of his fortune in those days by selling flour forten times its cost. He had as much flour as he wanted. My grandmother'ssteward sold him immense quantities. No doubt Noriot shared the plunderwith the Committee of Public Salvation, as that sort of person alwaysdid. I recollect the steward telling my grandmother that she might liveat Grandvilliers in complete security, because her corn was as good asa certificate of civism. Well, then, this Loriot, who sold corn tothose butchers, has never had but one passion, they say--he idolizes hisdaughters. He settled one of them under Restaud's roof, and grafted theother into the Nucingen family tree, the Baron de Nucingen being a richbanker who had turned Royalist. You can quite understand that so long asBonaparte was Emperor, the two sons-in-law could manage to put up withthe old Ninety-three; but after the restoration of the Bourbons, M. deRestaud felt bored by the old man's society, and the banker was stillmore tired of it. His daughters were still fond of him; they wanted'to keep the goat and the cabbage,' so they used to see Joriot wheneverthere was no one there, under pretence of affection. 'Come to-day, papa,we shall have you all to ourselves, and that will be much nicer!'and all that sort of thing. As for me, dear, I believe that love hassecond-sight: poor Ninety-three; his heart must have bled. He saw thathis daughters were ashamed of him, that if they loved their husbandshis visits must make mischief. So he immolated himself. He made thesacrifice because he was a father; he went into voluntary exile. Hisdaughters were satisfied, so he thought that he had done the best thinghe could; but it was a family crime, and father and daughters wereaccomplices. You see this sort of thing everywhere. What could this oldDoriot have been but a splash of mud in his daughters' drawing-rooms? Hewould only have been in the way, and bored other people, besides beingbored himself. And this that happened between father and daughters mayhappen to the prettiest woman in Paris and the man she loves the best;if her love grows tiresome, he will go; he will descend to the basesttrickery to leave her. It is the same with all love and friendship. Ourheart is a treasury; if you pour out all its wealth at once, you arebankrupt. We show no more mercy to the affection that reveals its utmostextent than we do to another kind of prodigal who has not a penny left.Their father had given them all he had. For twenty years he had givenhis whole heart to them; then, one day, he gave them all his fortunetoo. The lemon was squeezed; the girls left the rest in the gutter.""The world is very base," said the Vicomtesse, plucking at the threadsof her shawl. She did not raise her head as she spoke; the words thatMme. de Langeais had meant for her in the course of her story had cuther to the quick."Base? Oh, no," answered the Duchess; "the world goes its own way, thatis all. If I speak in this way, it is only to show that I am not dupedby it. I think as you do," she said, pressing the Vicomtesse's hand."The world is a slough; let us try to live on the heights above it."She rose to her feet and kissed Mme. de Beauseant on the forehead asshe said: "You look very charming to-day, dear. I have never seen such alovely color in your cheeks before."Then she went out with a slight inclination of the head to the cousin."Father Goriot is sublime!" said Eugene to himself, as he remembered howhe had watched his neighbor work the silver vessel into a shapeless massthat night.Mme. de Beauseant did not hear him; she was absorbed in her ownthoughts. For several minutes the silence remained unbroken till thelaw student became almost paralyzed with embarrassment, and was equallyafraid to go or stay or speak a word."The world is basely ungrateful and ill-natured," said the Vicomtesseat last. "No sooner does a trouble befall you than a friend is readyto bring the tidings and to probe your heart with the point of adagger while calling on you to admire the handle. Epigrams and sarcasmsalready! Ah! I will defend myself!"She raised her head like the great lady that she was, and lightningsflashed from her proud eyes."Ah!" she said, as she saw Eugene, "are you there?""Still," he said piteously."Well, then, M. de Rastignac, deal with the world as it deserves. Youare determined to succeed? I will help you. You shall sound the depthsof corruption in woman; you shall measure the extent of man's pitifulvanity. Deeply as I am versed in such learning, there were pages in thebook of life that I had not read. Now I know all. The more cold-bloodedyour calculations, the further you will go. Strike ruthlessly; you willbe feared. Men and women for you must be nothing more than post-horses;take a fresh relay, and leave the last to drop by the roadside; in thisway you will reach the goal of your ambition. You will be nothing here,you see, unless a woman interests herself in you; and she must be youngand wealthy, and a woman of the world. Yet, if you have a heart, lockit carefully away like a treasure; do not let any one suspect it, or youwill be lost; you would cease to be the executioner, you would takethe victim's place. And if ever you should love, never let your secretescape you! Trust no one until you are very sure of the heart to whichyou open your heart. Learn to mistrust every one; take every precautionfor the sake of the love which does not exist as yet. Listen,Miguel"--the name slipped from her so naturally that she did notnotice her mistake--"there is something still more appalling than theingratitude of daughters who have cast off their old father and wishthat he were dead, and that is a rivalry between two sisters. Restaudcomes of a good family, his wife has been received into their circle;she has been presented at court; and her sister, her wealthy sister,Mme. Delphine de Nucingen, the wife of a great capitalist, is consumedwith envy, and ready to die of spleen. There is gulf set between thesisters--indeed, they are sisters no longer--the two women who refuseto acknowledge their father do not acknowledge each other. So Mme. deNucingen would lap up all the mud that lies between the Rue Saint-Lazareand the Rue de Grenelle to gain admittance to my salon. She fanciedthat she should gain her end through de Marsay; she has made herselfde Marsay's slave, and she bores him. De Marsay cares very little abouther. If you will introduce her to me, you will be her darling, herBenjamin; she will idolize you. If, after that, you can love her, do so;if not, make her useful. I will ask her to come once or twice to one ofmy great crushes, but I will never receive her here in the morning. Iwill bow to her when I see her, and that will be quite sufficient.You have shut the Comtesse de Restaud's door against you by mentioningFather Goriot's name. Yes, my good friend, you may call at her housetwenty times, and every time out of the twenty you will find that sheis not at home. The servants have their orders, and will not admit you.Very well, then, now let Father Goriot gain the right of entry into hersister's house for you. The beautiful Mme. de Nucingen will give thesignal for a battle. As soon as she singles you out, other women willbegin to lose their heads about you, and her enemies and rivals andintimate friends will all try to take you from her. There are women whowill fall in love with a man because another woman has chosen him; likethe city madams, poor things, who copy our millinery, and hope therebyto acquire our manners. You will have a success, and in Paris success iseverything; it is the key of power. If the women credit you with wit andtalent, the men will follow suit so long as you do not undeceive themyourself. There will be nothing you may not aspire to; you will goeverywhere, and you will find out what the world is--an assemblage offools and knaves. But you must be neither the one nor the other. I amgiving you my name like Ariadne's clue of thread to take with you intothe labyrinth; make no unworthy use of it," she said, with a queenlyglance and curve of her throat; "give it back to me unsullied. And now,go; leave me. We women also have our battles to fight.""And if you should ever need some one who would gladly set a match to atrain for you----""Well?" she asked.He tapped his heart, smiled in answer to his cousin's smile, and went.It was five o'clock, and Eugene was hungry; he was afraid lest he shouldnot be in time for dinner, a misgiving which made him feel that it waspleasant to be borne so quickly across Paris. This sensation of physicalcomfort left his mind free to grapple with the thoughts that assailedhim. A mortification usually sends a young man of his age into a furiousrage; he shakes his fist at society, and vows vengeance when his beliefin himself is shaken. Just then Rastignac was overwhelmed by the words,"You have shut the Countess' door against you.""I shall call!" he said to himself, "and if Mme. de Beauseant is right,if I never find her at home--I... well, Mme. de Restaud shall meet mein every salon in Paris. I will learn to fence and have some pistolpractice, and kill that Maxime of hers!""And money?" cried an inward monitor. "How about money, where is thatto come from?" And all at once the wealth displayed in the Countess deRestaud's drawing-room rose before his eyes. That was the luxury whichGoriot's daughter had loved too well, the gilding, the ostentatioussplendor, the unintelligent luxury of the parvenu, the riotousextravagance of a courtesan. Then the attractive vision suddenly wentunder an eclipse as he remembered the stately grandeur of the Hotel deBeauseant. As his fancy wandered among these lofty regions in the greatworld of Paris, innumerable dark thoughts gathered in his heart; hisideas widened, and his conscience grew more elastic. He saw the world asit is; saw how the rich lived beyond the jurisdiction of law and publicopinion, and found in success the ultima ratio mundi."Vautrin is right, success is virtue!" he said to himself.
Arrived in the Rue Neuve-Sainte-Genevieve, he rushed up to his room forten francs wherewith to satisfy the demands of the cabman, and wentin to dinner. He glanced round the squalid room, saw the eighteenpoverty-stricken creatures about to feed like cattle in their stalls,and the sight filled him with loathing. The transition was too sudden,and the contrast was so violent that it could not but act as a powerfulstimulant; his ambition developed and grew beyond all social bounds. Onthe one hand, he beheld a vision of social life in its most charmingand refined forms, of quick-pulsed youth, of fair, impassioned facesinvested with all the charm of poetry, framed in a marvelous setting ofluxury or art; and, on the other hand, he saw a sombre picture, the miryverge beyond these faces, in which passion was extinct and nothing wasleft of the drama but the cords and pulleys and bare mechanism. Mme. deBeauseant's counsels, the words uttered in anger by the forsaken lady,her petulant offer, came to his mind, and poverty was a ready expositor.Rastignac determined to open two parallel trenches so as to insuresuccess; he would be a learned doctor of law and a man of fashion.Clearly he was still a child! Those two lines are asymptotes, and willnever meet."You are very dull, my lord Marquis," said Vautrin, with one of theshrewd glances that seem to read the innermost secrets of another mind."I am not in the humor to stand jokes from people who call me 'my lordMarquis,'" answered Eugene. "A marquis here in Paris, if he is not theveriest sham, ought to have a hundred thousand livres a year at least;and a lodger in the Maison Vauquer is not exactly Fortune's favorite."Vautrin's glance at Rastignac was half-paternal, half-contemptuous."Puppy!" it seemed to say; "I should make one mouthful of him!" Then heanswered:"You are in a bad humor; perhaps your visit to the beautiful Comtesse deRestaud was not a success.""She has shut her door against me because I told her that her fatherdined at our table," cried Rastignac.Glances were exchanged all round the room; Father Goriot looked down."You have sent some snuff into my eye," he said to his neighbor, turninga little aside to rub his hand over his face."Any one who molests Father Goriot will have henceforward to reckon withme," said Eugene, looking at the old man's neighbor; "he is worth allthe rest of us put together.--I am not speaking of the ladies," headded, turning in the direction of Mlle. Taillefer.Eugene's remarks produced a sensation, and his tone silenced thedinner-table. Vautrin alone spoke. "If you are going to champion FatherGoriot, and set up for his responsible editor into the bargain, youhad need be a crack shot and know how to handle the foils," he said,banteringly."So I intend," said Eugene."Then you are taking the field to-day?""Perhaps," Rastignac answered. "But I owe no account of myself to anyone, especially as I do not try to find out what other people do of anight."Vautrin looked askance at Rastignac."If you do not mean to be deceived by the puppets, my boy, you mustgo behind and see the whole show, and not peep through holes in thecurtain. That is enough," he added, seeing that Eugene was about to flyinto a passion. "We can have a little talk whenever you like."There was a general feeling of gloom and constraint. Father Goriot wasso deeply dejected by the student's remark that he did not notice thechange in the disposition of his fellow-lodgers, nor know that he hadmet with a champion capable of putting an end to the persecution."Then, M. Goriot sitting there is the father of a countess," said Mme.Vauquer in a low voice."And of a baroness," answered Rastignac."That is about all he is capable of," said Bianchon to Rastignac; "Ihave taken a look at his head; there is only one bump--the bump ofPaternity; he must be an eternal father."Eugene was too intent on his thoughts to laugh at Bianchon's joke. Hedetermined to profit by Mme. de Beauseant's counsels, and was askinghimself how he could obtain the necessary money. He grew grave. The widesavannas of the world stretched before his eyes; all things lay beforehim, nothing was his. Dinner came to an end, the others went, and he wasleft in the dining-room."So you have seen my daughter?" Goriot spoke tremulously, and the soundof his voice broke in upon Eugene's dreams. The young man took theelder's hand, and looked at him with something like kindness in hiseyes."You are a good and noble man," he said. "We will have some talk aboutyour daughters by and by."He rose without waiting for Goriot's answer, and went to his room. Therehe wrote the following letter to his mother:--"My Dear Mother,--Can you nourish your child from your breastagain? I am in a position to make a rapid fortune, but I wanttwelve hundred francs--I must have them at all costs. Say nothingabout this to my father; perhaps he might make objections, andunless I have the money, I may be led to put an end to myself, andso escape the clutches of despair. I will tell you everything whenI see you. I will not begin to try to describe my presentsituation; it would take volumes to put the whole story clearlyand fully. I have not been gambling, my kind mother, I owe no onea penny; but if you would preserve the life that you gave me, youmust send me the sum I mention. As a matter of fact, I go to seethe Vicomtesse de Beauseant; she is using her influence for me; Iam obliged to go into society, and I have not a penny to lay outon clean gloves. I can manage to exist on bread and water, or gowithout food, if need be, but I cannot do without the tools withwhich they cultivate the vineyards in this country. I mustresolutely make up my mind at once to make my way, or stick in themire for the rest of my days. I know that all your hopes are seton me, and I want to realize them quickly. Sell some of your oldjewelry, my kind mother; I will give you other jewels very soon. Iknow enough of our affairs at home to know all that such asacrifice means, and you must not think that I would lightly askyou to make it; I should be a monster if I could. You must thinkof my entreaty as a cry forced from me by imperative necessity.Our whole future lies in the subsidy with which I must begin myfirst campaign, for life in Paris is one continual battle. If youcannot otherwise procure the whole of the money, and are forced tosell our aunt's lace, tell her that I will send her some stillhandsomer," and so forth.He wrote to ask each of his sisters for their savings--would theydespoil themselves for him, and keep the sacrifice a secret from thefamily? To his request he knew that they would not fail to respondgladly, and he added to it an appeal to their delicacy by touching thechord of honor that vibrates so loudly in young and high-strung natures.Yet when he had written the letters, he could not help feelingmisgivings in spite of his youthful ambition; his heart beat fast, andhe trembled. He knew the spotless nobleness of the lives buried away inthe lonely manor house; he knew what trouble and what joy his requestwould cause his sisters, and how happy they would be as they talkedat the bottom of the orchard of that dear brother of theirs in Paris.Visions rose before his eyes; a sudden strong light revealed hissisters secretly counting over their little store, devising some girlishstratagem by which the money could be sent to him incognito, essaying,for the first time in their lives, a piece of deceit that reached thesublime in its unselfishness."A sister's heart is a diamond for purity, a deep sea of tenderness!" hesaid to himself. He felt ashamed of those letters.What power there must be in the petitions put up by such hearts;how pure the fervor that bears their souls to Heaven in prayer! Whatexquisite joy they would find in self-sacrifice! What a pang for hismother's heart if she could not send him all that he asked for! And thisnoble affection, these sacrifices made at such terrible cost, were toserve as the ladder by which he meant to climb to Delphine de Nucingen.A few tears, like the last grains of incense flung upon the sacredalter fire of the hearth, fell from his eyes. He walked up and down,and despair mingled with his emotion. Father Goriot saw him through thehalf-open door."What is the matter, sir?" he asked from the threshold."Ah! my good neighbor, I am as much a son and brother as you are afather. You do well to fear for the Comtesse Anastasie; there is one M.Maxime de Trailles, who will be her ruin."Father Goriot withdrew, stammering some words, but Eugene failed tocatch their meaning.The next morning Rastignac went out to post his letters. Up to the lastmoment he wavered and doubted, but he ended by flinging them into thebox. "I shall succeed!" he said to himself. So says the gambler; so saysthe great captain; but the three words that have been the salvation ofsome few, have been the ruin of many more.A few days after this Eugene called at Mme. de Restaud's house; she wasnot at home. Three times he tried the experiment, and three times hefound her doors closed against him, though he was careful to choose anhour when M. de Trailles was not there. The Vicomtesse was right.The student studied no longer. He put in an appearance at lecturessimply to answer to his name, and after thus attesting his presence,departed forthwith. He had been through a reasoning process familiar tomost students. He had seen the advisability of deferring his studiesto the last moment before going up for his examinations; he made up hismind to cram his second and third years' work into the third year, whenhe meant to begin to work in earnest, and to complete his studies in lawwith one great effort. In the meantime he had fifteen months in which tonavigate the ocean of Paris, to spread the nets and set the lines thatwould bring him a protectress and a fortune. Twice during that week hesaw Mme. de Beauseant; he did not go to her house until he had seen theMarquis d'Ajuda drive away.Victory for yet a few more days was with the great lady, the most poeticfigure in the Faubourg Saint-Germain; and the marriage of the Marquisd'Ajuda-Pinto with Mlle. de Rochefide was postponed. The dread of losingher happiness filled those days with a fever of joy unknown before,but the end was only so much the nearer. The Marquis d'Ajuda and theRochefides agreed that this quarrel and reconciliation was a veryfortunate thing; Mme. de Beauseant (so they hoped) would graduallybecome reconciled to the idea of the marriage, and in the end would bebrought to sacrifice d'Ajuda's morning visits to the exigencies of aman's career, exigencies which she must have foreseen. In spite of themost solemn promises, daily renewed, M. d'Ajuda was playing a part,and the Vicomtesse was eager to be deceived. "Instead of taking a leapheroically from the window, she is falling headlong down the staircase,"said her most intimate friend, the Duchesse de Langeais. Yet thisafter-glow of happiness lasted long enough for the Vicomtesse to be ofservice to her young cousin. She had a half-superstitious affection forhim. Eugene had shown her sympathy and devotion at a crisis when a womansees no pity, no real comfort in any eyes; when if a man is ready withsoothing flatteries, it is because he has an interested motive.Rastignac made up his mind that he must learn the whole of Goriot'sprevious history; he would come to his bearings before attempting toboard the Maison de Nucingen. The results of his inquiries may be givenbriefly as follows:--In the days before the Revolution, Jean-Joachim Goriot was simply aworkman in the employ of a vermicelli maker. He was a skilful, thriftyworkman, sufficiently enterprising to buy his master's business whenthe latter fell a chance victim to the disturbances of 1789. Goriotestablished himself in the Rue de la Jussienne, close to the CornExchange. His plain good sense led him to accept the position ofPresident of the Section, so as to secure for his business theprotection of those in power at that dangerous epoch. This prudent stephad led to success; the foundations of his fortune were laid in the timeof the Scarcity (real or artificial), when the price of grain of allkinds rose enormously in Paris. People used to fight for bread at thebakers' doors; while other persons went to the grocers' shops and boughtItalian paste foods without brawling over it. It was during this yearthat Goriot made the money, which, at a later time, was to give himall the advantage of the great capitalist over the small buyer; he had,moreover, the usual luck of average ability; his mediocrity was thesalvation of him. He excited no one's envy, it was not even suspectedthat he was rich till the peril of being rich was over, and all hisintelligence was concentrated, not on political, but on commercialspeculations. Goriot was an authority second to none on all questionsrelating to corn, flour, and "middlings"; and the production, storage,and quality of grain. He could estimate the yield of the harvest, andforesee market prices; he bought his cereals in Sicily, and importedRussian wheat. Any one who had heard him hold forth on the regulationsthat control the importation and exportation of grain, who had seen hisgrasp of the subject, his clear insight into the principles involved,his appreciation of weak points in the way that the system worked,would have thought that here was the stuff of which a minister is made.Patient, active, and persevering, energetic and prompt in action, hesurveyed his business horizon with an eagle eye. Nothing there took himby surprise; he foresaw all things, knew all that was happening, andkept his own counsel; he was a diplomatist in his quick comprehensionof a situation; and in the routine of business he was as patient andplodding as a soldier on the march. But beyond this business horizon hecould not see. He used to spend his hours of leisure on the threshold ofhis shop, leaning against the framework of the door. Take him fromhis dark little counting-house, and he became once more the rough,slow-witted workman, a man who cannot understand a piece of reasoning,who is indifferent to all intellectual pleasures, and falls asleep atthe play, a Parisian Dolibom in short, against whose stupidity otherminds are powerless.Natures of this kind are nearly all alike; in almost all of them youwill find some hidden depth of sublime affection. Two all-absorbingaffections filled the vermicelli maker's heart to the exclusion of everyother feeling; into them he seemed to put all the forces of his nature,as he put the whole power of his brain into the corn trade. He hadregarded his wife, the only daughter of a rich farmer of La Brie, with adevout admiration; his love for her had been boundless. Goriot hadfelt the charm of a lovely and sensitive nature, which, in its delicatestrength, was the very opposite of his own. Is there any instinct moredeeply implanted in the heart of man than the pride of protection, aprotection which is constantly exerted for a fragile and defencelesscreature? Join love thereto, the warmth of gratitude that all generoussouls feel for the source of their pleasures, and you have theexplanation of many strange incongruities in human nature.After seven years of unclouded happiness, Goriot lost his wife. It wasvery unfortunate for him. She was beginning to gain an ascendency overhim in other ways; possibly she might have brought that barren soilunder cultivation, she might have widened his ideas and given otherdirections to his thoughts. But when she was dead, the instinct offatherhood developed in him till it almost became a mania. All theaffection balked by death seemed to turn to his daughters, and he foundfull satisfaction for his heart in loving them. More or less brilliantproposals were made to him from time to time; wealthy merchants orfarmers with daughters vied with each other in offering inducementsto him to marry again; but he determined to remain a widower. Hisfather-in-law, the only man for whom he felt a decided friendship, gaveout that Goriot had made a vow to be faithful to his wife's memory. Thefrequenters of the Corn Exchange, who could not comprehend this sublimepiece of folly, joked about it among themselves, and found a ridiculousnickname for him. One of them ventured (after a glass over a bargain)to call him by it, and a blow from the vermicelli maker's fist sent himheadlong into a gutter in the Rue Oblin. He could think of nothing elsewhen his children were concerned; his love for them made him fidgetyand anxious; and this was so well known, that one day a competitor, whowished to get rid of him to secure the field to himself, told Goriotthat Delphine had just been knocked down by a cab. The vermicelli makerturned ghastly pale, left the Exchange at once, and did not return forseveral days afterwards; he was ill in consequence of the shock and thesubsequent relief on discovering that it was a false alarm. This time,however, the offender did not escape with a bruised shoulder; at acritical moment in the man's affairs, Goriot drove him into bankruptcy,and forced him to disappear from the Corn Exchange.As might have been expected, the two girls were spoiled. With an incomeof sixty thousand francs, Goriot scarcely spent twelve hundred onhimself, and found all his happiness in satisfying the whims of the twogirls. The best masters were engaged, that Anastasie and Delphinemight be endowed with all the accomplishments which distinguish a goodeducation. They had a chaperon--luckily for them, she was a womanwho had good sense and good taste;--they learned to ride; they had acarriage for their use; they lived as the mistress of a rich old lordmight live; they had only to express a wish, their father would hastento give them their most extravagant desires, and asked nothing of themin return but a kiss. Goriot had raised the two girls to the level ofthe angels; and, quite naturally, he himself was left beneath them. Poorman! he loved them even for the pain that they gave him.When the girls were old enough to be married, they were left free tochoose for themselves. Each had half her father's fortune as her dowry;and when the Comte de Restaud came to woo Anastasie for her beauty,her social aspirations led her to leave her father's house for a moreexalted sphere. Delphine wished for money; she married Nucingen, abanker of German extraction, who became a Baron of the Holy RomanEmpire. Goriot remained a vermicelli maker as before. His daughtersand his sons-in-law began to demur; they did not like to see him stillengaged in trade, though his whole life was bound up with his business.For five years he stood out against their entreaties, then he yielded,and consented to retire on the amount realized by the sale of hisbusiness and the savings of the last few years. It was this capitalthat Mme. Vauquer, in the early days of his residence with her, hadcalculated would bring in eight or ten thousand livres in a year. He hadtaken refuge in her lodging-house, driven there by despair when he knewthat his daughters were compelled by their husbands not only to refuseto receive him as an inmate in their houses, but even to see him no moreexcept in private.This was all the information which Rastignac gained from a M. Muretwho had purchased Goriot's business, information which confirmedthe Duchesse de Langeais' suppositions, and herewith the preliminaryexplanation of this obscure but terrible Parisian tragedy comes to anend.Towards the end of the first week in December Rastignac received twoletters--one from his mother, and one from his eldest sister. His heartbeat fast, half with happiness, half with fear, at the sight of thefamiliar handwriting. Those two little scraps of paper contained lifeor death for his hopes. But while he felt a shiver of dread as heremembered their dire poverty at home, he knew their love for him sowell that he could not help fearing that he was draining their verylife-blood. His mother's letter ran as follows:--"MY DEAR CHILD,--I am sending you the money that you asked for.Make a good use of it. Even to save your life I could not raise solarge a sum a second time without your father's knowledge, andthere would be trouble about it. We should be obliged to mortgagethe land. It is impossible to judge of the merits of schemes ofwhich I am ignorant; but what sort of schemes can they be, thatyou should fear to tell me about them? Volumes of explanationwould not have been needed; we mothers can understand at a word,and that word would have spared me the anguish of uncertainty. Ido not know how to hide the painful impression that your letterhas made upon me, my dear son. What can you have felt when youwere moved to send this chill of dread through my heart? It musthave been very painful to you to write the letter that gave me somuch pain as I read it. To what courses are you committed? You aregoing to appear to be something that you are not, and your wholelife and success depends upon this? You are about to see a societyinto which you cannot enter without rushing into expense that youcannot afford, without losing precious time that is needed foryour studies. Ah! my dear Eugene, believe your mother, crookedways cannot lead to great ends. Patience and endurance are the twoqualities most needed in your position. I am not scolding you; Ido not want any tinge of bitterness to spoil our offering. I amonly talking like a mother whose trust in you is as great as herforesight for you. You know the steps that you must take, and I,for my part, know the purity of heart, and how good yourintentions are; so I can say to you without a doubt, 'Go forward,beloved!' If I tremble, it is because I am a mother, but myprayers and blessings will be with you at every step. Be verycareful, dear boy. You must have a man's prudence, for it lieswith you to shape the destinies of five others who are dear toyou, and must look to you. Yes, our fortunes depend upon you, andyour success is ours. We all pray to God to be with you in allthat you do. Your aunt Marcillac has been most generous beyondwords in this matter; she saw at once how it was, even down toyour gloves. 'But I have a weakness for the eldest!' she saidgaily. You must love your aunt very much, dear Eugene. I shallwait till you have succeeded before telling you all that she hasdone for you, or her money would burn your fingers. You, who areyoung, do not know what it is to part with something that is apiece of your past! But what would we not sacrifice for yoursakes? Your aunt says that I am to send you a kiss on the foreheadfrom her, and that kiss is to bring you luck again and again, shesays. She would have written you herself, the dear kind-heartedwoman, but she is troubled with the gout in her fingers just now.Your father is very well. The vintage of 1819 has turned outbetter than we expected. Good-bye, dear boy; I will say nothingabout your sisters, because Laure is writing to you, and I mustlet her have the pleasure of giving you all the home news. Heavensend that you may succeed! Oh! yes, dear Eugene, you must succeed.I have come, through you, to a knowledge of a pain so sharp that Ido not think I could endure it a second time. I have come to knowwhat it is to be poor, and to long for money for my children'ssake. There, good-bye! Do not leave us for long without news ofyou; and here, at the last, take a kiss from your mother."By the time Eugene had finished the letter he was in tears. He thoughtof Father Goriot crushing his silver keepsake into a shapeless massbefore he sold it to meet his daughter's bill of exchange."Your mother has broken up her jewels for you," he said to himself;"your aunt shed tears over those relics of hers before she sold themfor your sake. What right have you to heap execrations on Anastasie? Youhave followed her example; you have selfishly sacrificed others to yourown future, and she sacrifices her father to her lover; and of you two,which is the worse?"He was ready to renounce his attempts; he could not bear to takethat money. The fires of remorse burned in his heart, and gave himintolerable pain, the generous secret remorse which men seldom take intoaccount when they sit in judgment upon their fellow-men; but perhapsthe angels in heaven, beholding it, pardon the criminal whom our justicecondemns. Rastignac opened his sister's letter; its simplicity andkindness revived his heart."Your letter came just at the right time, dear brother. Agathe andI had thought of so many different ways of spending our money,that we did not know what to buy with it; and now you have comein, and, like the servant who upset all the watches that belongedto the King of Spain, you have restored harmony; for, really andtruly, we did not know which of all the things we wanted we wantedmost, and we were always quarreling about it, never thinking, dearEugene, of a way of spending our money which would satisfy uscompletely. Agathe jumped for you. Indeed, we have been like twomad things all day, 'to such a prodigious degree' (as aunt wouldsay), that mother said, with her severe expression, 'Whatever canbe the matter with you, mesdemoiselles?' I think if we had beenscolded a little, we should have been still better pleased. Awoman ought to be very glad to suffer for one she loves! I,however, in my inmost soul, was doleful and cross in the midst ofall my joy. I shall make a bad wife, I am afraid, I am too fond ofspending. I had bought two sashes and a nice little stiletto forpiercing eyelet-holes in my stays, trifles that I really did notwant, so that I have less than that slow-coach Agathe, who is soeconomical, and hoards her money like a magpie. She had twohundred francs! And I have only one hundred and fifty! I am nicelypunished; I could throw my sash down the well; it will be painfulto me to wear it now. Poor dear, I have robbed you. And Agathe wasso nice about it. She said, 'Let us send the three hundred andfifty francs in our two names!' But I could not help telling youeverything just as it happened.""Do you know how we managed to keep your commandments? We took ourglittering hoard, we went out for a walk, and when once fairly onthe highway we ran all the way to Ruffec, where we handed over thecoin, without more ado, to M. Grimbert of the Messageries Royales.We came back again like swallows on the wing. 'Don't you thinkthat happiness has made us lighter?' Agathe said. We said allsorts of things, which I shall not tell you, Monsieur le Parisien,because they were all about you. Oh, we love you dearly, dearbrother; it was all summed up in those few words. As for keepingthe secret, little masqueraders like us are capable of anything(according to our aunt), even of holding our tongues. Our motherhas been on a mysterious journey to Angouleme, and the aunt wentwith her, not without solemn councils, from which we were shutout, and M. le Baron likewise. They are silent as to the weightypolitical considerations that prompted their mission, andconjectures are rife in the State of Rastignac. The Infantas areembroidering a muslin robe with open-work sprigs for her Majestythe Queen; the work progresses in the most profound secrecy. Therebe but two more breadths to finish. A decree has gone forth thatno wall shall be built on the side of Verteuil, but that a hedgeshall be planted instead thereof. Our subjects may sustain somedisappointment of fruit and espaliers, but strangers will enjoya fair prospect. Should the heir-presumptive lackpocket-handkerchiefs, be it known unto him that the dowager Ladyof Marcillac, exploring the recesses of her drawers and boxes(known respectively as Pompeii and Herculaneum), having brought tolight a fair piece of cambric whereof she wotted not, the PrincessesAgathe and Laure place at their brother's disposal their thread,their needles, and hands somewhat of the reddest. The two youngPrinces, Don Henri and Don Gabriel, retain their fatal habits ofstuffing themselves with grape-jelly, of teasing their sisters, oftaking their pleasure by going a-bird-nesting, and of cuttingswitches for themselves from the osier-beds, maugre the laws ofthe realm. Moreover, they list not to learn naught, wherefore thePapal Nuncio (called of the commonalty, M. le Cure) threateneththem with excommunication, since that they neglect the sacredcanons of grammatical construction for the construction of othercanon, deadly engines made of the stems of elder.""Farewell, dear brother, never did letter carry so many wishes foryour success, so much love fully satisfied. You will have a greatdeal to tell us when you come home! You will tell me everything,won't you? I am the oldest. From something the aunt let fall, wethink you must have had some success.""Something was said of a lady, but nothing more was said...""Of course not, in our family! Oh, by-the-by, Eugene, would yourather that we made that piece of cambric into shirts for youinstead of pocket-handkerchiefs? If you want some really niceshirts at once, we ought to lose no time in beginning upon them;and if the fashion is different now in Paris, send us one for apattern; we want more particularly to know about the cuffs. Good-bye! Good-bye! Take my kiss on the left side of your forehead, onthe temple that belongs to me, and to no one else in the world. Iam leaving the other side of the sheet for Agathe, who hassolemnly promised not to read a word that I have written; but, allthe same, I mean to sit by her side while she writes, so as to bequite sure that she keeps her word.--Your loving sister,"LAURE DE RASTIGNAC.""Yes!" said Eugene to himself. "Yes! Success at all costs now! Richescould not repay such devotion as this. I wish I could give them everysort of happiness! Fifteen hundred and fifty francs," he went on after apause. "Every shot must go to the mark! Laure is right. Trust a woman!I have only calico shirts. Where some one else's welfare is concerned, ayoung girl becomes as ingenious as a thief. Guileless where she herselfis in question, and full of foresight for me,--she is like a heavenlyangel forgiving the strange incomprehensible sins of earth."The world lay before him. His tailor had been summoned and sounded, andhad finally surrendered. When Rastignac met M. de Trailles, he had seenat once how great a part the tailor plays in a young man's career; atailor is either a deadly enemy or a staunch friend, with an invoicefor a bond of friendship; between these two extremes there is, alack! nomiddle term. In this representative of his craft Eugene discovered a manwho understood that his was a sort of paternal function for young menat their entrance into life, who regarded himself as a stepping-stonebetween a young man's present and future. And Rastignac in gratitudemade the man's fortune by an epigram of a kind in which he excelled at alater period of his life."I have twice known a pair of trousers turned out by him make a match oftwenty thousand livres a year!"Fifteen hundred francs, and as many suits of clothes as he chose toorder! At that moment the poor child of the South felt no more doubts ofany kind. The young man went down to breakfast with the indefinable airwhich the consciousness of the possession of money gives to youth. Nosooner are the coins slipped into a student's pocket than his wealth,in imagination at least, is piled into a fantastic column, which affordshim a moral support. He begins to hold up his head as he walks; he isconscious that he has a means of bringing his powers to bear on a givenpoint; he looks you straight in the face; his gestures are quick anddecided; only yesterday he was diffident and shy, any one might havepushed him aside; to-morrow, he will take the wall of a prime minister.A miracle has been wrought in him. Nothing is beyond the reach ofhis ambition, and his ambition soars at random; he is light-hearted,generous, and enthusiastic; in short, the fledgling bird has discoveredthat he has wings. A poor student snatches at every chance pleasuremuch as a dog runs all sorts of risks to steal a bone, cracking it andsucking the marrow as he flies from pursuit; but a young man who canrattle a few runaway gold coins in his pocket can take his pleasuredeliberately, can taste the whole of the sweets of secure possession; hesoars far above earth; he has forgotten what the word poverty means;all Paris is his. Those are days when the whole world shines radiantwith light, when everything glows and sparkles before the eyes of youth,days that bring joyous energy that is never brought into harness, daysof debts and of painful fears that go hand in hand with every delight.Those who do not know the left bank of the Seine between the RueSaint-Jacques and the Rue des Saints-Peres know nothing of life."Ah! if the women of Paris but knew," said Rastignac, as he devouredMme. Vauquer's stewed pears (at five for a penny), "they would come herein search of a lover."Just then a porter from the Messageries Royales appeared at the door ofthe room; they had previously heard the bell ring as the wicket openedto admit him. The man asked for M. Eugene de Rastignac, holding out twobags for him to take, and a form of receipt for his signature. Vautrin'skeen glance cut Eugene like a lash."Now you will be able to pay for those fencing lessons and go to theshooting gallery," he said."Your ship has come in," said Mme. Vauquer, eyeing the bags.Mlle. Michonneau did not dare to look at the money, for fear her eyesshould betray her cupidity."You have a kind mother," said Mme. Couture."You have a kind mother, sir," echoed Poiret."Yes, mamma has been drained dry," said Vautrin, "and now you can haveyour fling, go into society, and fish for heiresses, and dance withcountesses who have peach blossom in their hair. But take my advice,young man, and don't neglect your pistol practice."Vautrin struck an attitude, as if he were facing an antagonist.Rastignac, meaning to give the porter a tip, felt in his pockets andfound nothing. Vautrin flung down a franc piece on the table."Your credit is good," he remarked, eyeing the student, and Rastignacwas forced to thank him, though, since the sharp encounter of wits atdinner that day, after Eugene came in from calling on Mme. de Beauseant,he had made up his mind that Vautrin was insufferable. For a week, infact, they had both kept silence in each other's presence, and watchedeach other. The student tried in vain to account to himself for thisattitude.An idea, of course, gains in force by the energy with which itis expressed; it strikes where the brain sends it, by a law asmathematically exact as the law that determines the course of a shellfrom a mortar. The amount of impression it makes is not to be determinedso exactly. Sometimes, in an impressible nature, the idea works havoc,but there are, no less, natures so robustly protected, that this sortof projectile falls flat and harmless on skulls of triple brass,as cannon-shot against solid masonry; then there are flaccid andspongy-fibred natures into which ideas from without sink like spentbullets into the earthworks of a redoubt. Rastignac's head was somethingof the powder-magazine order; the least shock sufficed to bring about anexplosion. He was too quick, too young, not to be readily accessibleto ideas; and open to that subtle influence of thought and feeling inothers which causes so many strange phenomena that make an impressionupon us of which we are all unconscious at the time. Nothing escaped hismental vision; he was lynx-eyed; in him the mental powers of perception,which seem like duplicates of the senses, had the mysterious powerof swift projection that astonishes us in intellects of a highorder--slingers who are quick to detect the weak spot in any armor.In the past month Eugene's good qualities and defects had rapidlydeveloped with his character. Intercourse with the world and theendeavor to satisfy his growing desires had brought out his defects.But Rastignac came from the South side of the Loire, and had the goodqualities of his countrymen. He had the impetuous courage of the South,that rushes to the attack of a difficulty, as well as the southernimpatience of delay or suspense. These traits are held to be defects inthe North; they made the fortune of Murat, but they likewise cut shorthis career. The moral would appear to be that when the dash and boldnessof the South side of the Loire meets, in a southern temperament, withthe guile of the North, the character is complete, and such a man willgain (and keep) the crown of Sweden.Rastignac, therefore, could not stand the fire from Vautrin's batteriesfor long without discovering whether this was a friend or a foe. He feltas if this strange being was reading his inmost soul, and dissectinghis feelings, while Vautrin himself was so close and secretive thathe seemed to have something of the profound and unmoved serenity ofa sphinx, seeing and hearing all things and saying nothing. Eugene,conscious of that money in his pocket, grew rebellious."Be so good as to wait a moment," he said to Vautrin, as the latterrose, after slowly emptying his coffee-cup, sip by sip."What for?" inquired the older man, as he put on his large-brimmed hatand took up the sword-cane that he was wont to twirl like a man who willface three or four footpads without flinching."I will repay you in a m