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THE COMEDY OF HUMAN LIFE
By H. DE BALZAC
SCENES FROM PARISIAN LIFE
LUCIEN DE RUBEMPRE
BEING THE THIRD AND LAST PART OF
LOST ILLUSIONS
BALZAC'S NOVELS.
Translated by Miss K. P. Wormeley.
Already Published:
PERE GORIOT.
DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS.
RISE AND FALL OF CESAR BIROTTEAU.
EUGENIE GRANDET.
COUSIN PONS.
THE COUNTRY DOCTOR.
THE TWO BROTHERS.
THE ALKAHEST.
MODESTE MIGNON.
THE MAGIC SKIN (Peau de Chagrin).
COUSIN BETTE.
LOUIS LAMBERT.
BUREAUCRACY (Les Employe's).
SERAPHITA.
SONS OF THE SOIL.
FAME AND SORROW.
THE LILY OF THE VALLEY.
URSULA.
AN HISTORICAL MYSTERY.
ALBERT SAVARUS.
BALZAC : A MEMOIR.
PIERRETTE.
THE CHOUANS.
LOST ILLUSIONS.
A GREAT MAN OF THE PROVINCES IN
PARIS.
THE BROTHERHOOD OF CONSOLATION.
THE VILLAGE RECTOR.
MEMOIRS OF TWO YOUNG MARRIED
WOMEN.
CATHERINE DE' MEDICI.
LUCIEN DE RUBEMPRE.
ROBERTS BROTHERS, Publishers,
BOSTON.
HONORE DE BALZAC
TRANSLATED BY '"
KATHARINE PRESCOTT WORMELEY
LUCIEN DE RUBEMPRE'
ROBERTS BROTHERS
3 SOMERSET STREET
BOSTON
1895
GIFT OF
M%u
Copyright, 1895,
By Roberts Brothers.
All rights reserved.
dmbersttg $«««:
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, U.S.A.
To His Highness Prince Alfonso Seraphino
di Porcia.
Let me place your name at the head of a work which is
essentially Parisian, although I thought it out while staying
with you lately. What can be more natural than to offer you
the flowers of rhetoric which budded in your garden, watered
with regrets which taught me the meaning of nostalgia, but
which you softened as we wandered about the boschetti beneath
those elms that recalled to me the Champs filyse'es? Perhaps
I shall thus atone for the crime of thinking of Paris beneath
the shadow of the Duomo, and of our muddy streets on the
clean and elegant pavements of the Porta Renza. When I
have certain books to publish which I hope to dedicate to
Milanese friends, I shall have the pleasure of selecting names
already dear to your old Italian romancers among those friends
whom I love, and to whose remembrance I beg you to recall
Your sincerely affectionate
DE BALZAC.
796254
NOTE.
This volume is abridged by the omission of episodes,
except so far as they are necessary to the main story.
K. P. W. /
CONTENTS.
PAGE
I. The Masked Ball 1
II. La Torpille 25
III. An Interior as well known to Some as
UNKNOWN TO OTHERS 48
IV. In which we learn how much of a Priest
there was in the abbe* don carlos
Herrera 62
V. Two Watch-dogs 77
VI. An Abyss opens beneath Esther's feet 89
VII. The Hotel de Grandlieu 106
VIII. False Debts, False Notes, and a Craven
Heart 123
IX. A Hundred Thousand Francs invested
in Asia 134
X. Profit and Loss 152
XI. Abdication 162
XII. Esther reappears on the Surface of
Paris 172
XIII. Things that may be Suffered on the
Threshold of a Door 185
Lucien de RubemprS.
XIV.
XV.
XVI.
XVII.
XVIII.
XIX.
XX.
XXI.
XXII.
XXIII.
XXIV.
XXV.
PAGE
One of Corentin's many Mouse-traps . 198
Farewell 215
Whither the Path op Evil led . . . 233
History Archaeological, Biographical,
Anecdotical, and Physiological, of
the Palais de Justice 246
How the two Accused Persons took
their Misfortune . 255
The Perplexities of an Examining
Judge and his Curtain Lectures . 264
Asia at Work 281
Diamond cut Diamond — which wins? . 296
A Message from the Dead 314
The Judge applies the Torture . . . 828
What Women can do in Paris . . . 341
How it ended 354
LUCIEN DE RUBEMPRE.
i.
THE MASKED BALL.
During the last Opera-ball of 1824, many masks
were attracted by the beauty of a young man who was
walking through the corridors and about the foyer with
the air of a person in quest of a woman whom unfore-
seen circumstances had kept at home. The secret of
this gait and manner, partly lagging, partly hurried, is
known only to old women and loungers emeriti. In
that immense rendezvous, the crowd takes little note
of the crowd ; interests are so intense that idleness
itself is preoccupied.
The young dandy was so absorbed in his restless
search that he did not notice his own success ; at
any rate he paid no attention to the soft words, the
admiring surprise, the spicy jests, the lively excla-
mations of certain masks. Though his beauty classed
him among those exceptional persons who come to the
masked balls of the Opera in search of adventure, and
who seem to await it as they awaited a lucky throw at
roulette when Frascati was alive, he seemed, one might
think, almost vulgarly sure of his evening. Perhaps
he was the hero of one of those mysteries with three
l
2 Lucien de Bubempre.
peirsoaages which compose, in truth, the whole of a
masked \>a\\, though known only to those who play
their- part in each. As for the young women who go
to these balls merely to say, "I have seen them," for
provincials, for inexperienced youths, for foreigners,
the Opera House on such nights must be a palace of
weariness and ennui. To them this black crowd, slow
yet hurried, going, coming, winding, turning, moving
npward and again descending, which can be likened
only to ants about their hill, is no more comprehen-
sible than the Bourse to a Breton peasant who never
heard of the Grand Livre.
With rare exceptions men in Paris never mask
themselves ; a man in domino is thought ridiculous.
In this the instinct of the nation is shown. Men who
wish to hide their happiness can go to the ball with-
out coming there, and masks who are absolutely
obliged to enter leave it as soon as possible. The
masked men are jealous husbands who have come to
spy upon their wives, or husbands engaged in some
love affair who do not choose that their wives shall spy
upon them, — two situations equally open to ridicule.
The young man was followed, though he seemed
not to know it, by a persistent mask, short and stout,
rolling himself along like a cask. To all habitues
of an Opera-ball this domino was a civil function-
ary, a broker, a banker, a notary, in short a bour-
geois of some kind, suspecting an infidelity. In the
highest society no one ever goes in search of humili-
ating testimony. Several masks had already pointed
out to one another with a laugh this enormous person ;
others had apostrophized him ; certain young men had
Lucien de Rubempre. 3
twitted him ; but the carriage of his shoulders and his
cool bearing showed a marked disdain for such random
shots. He went where the young man led him, as
the hunted wild-boar goes, indifferent to the balls
that whistle about his ears or the hounds that are
yelping after him.
Although at the opening of a masked ball pleasure
and anxiety wear the same livery — the illustrious
black robe of Venice — and all seems mere confu-
sion, the different circles of which Parisian society
is composed soon meet, recognize, and observe one
another. There are certain elementary signs so clear
to initiates that these hieroglyphs of personal interests
are as legible as an amusing novel. To a well-versed
eye, therefore, this stout mask could not possibly be
en bonne fortune, or he would infallibly have worn
some prearranged sign, red, white, or green, signifi-
cant of happiness previously agreed upon. Was he
in quest of vengeance? After a while, seeing how
closely the mask followed the man who was evidently
bent on a love-affair, certain idlers began to take
note of the beautiful face around which happiness
had placed its divine halo.
The young man interested the mind ; as he went
and came he aroused curiosity. All things about him
gave signs of a life of elegance. According to a fatal
law of our epoch, there was little difference, either
physical or moral, between the most distinguished and
best-trained son of a duke and peer and this fasci-
nating young man, whom poverty had lately gripped
with her iron hands in the midst of Paris. Beauty
and youth must have masked in him profound abysses,
4 Lucien de Eubempre.
as in other young men who seek to play a part in
Paris without possessing the needful means, youths
who risk all for all by sacrificing to the most courted
god of the regal city, — Chance. Nevertheless, his
dress and manners were irreproachable, and he trod
the classic precincts of the foyer as though he knew
them well. Who has not remarked that there, as in
all other zones of Paris, a habit of behavior shows
what you are, what you do, whence you come, and
what you desire?
44 Oh ! what a handsome young man ! We can turn
round here and look at him," said a mask whom any
habitue would have recognized as a well-bred woman.
•" Don't you remember him?" replied the gentleman
who accompanied her. " Madame du Chatelet once
presented him to you."
" You don't mean that son of an apothecary she was
in love with, who became a journalist, — the lover of
Mademoiselle Coralie ? "
M I thought him fallen too low ever to rise again ;
I don't understand how he has managed to re-appear
in Parisian society," said Comte Sixte du Chatelet.
1 'He has the air of a prince," said the mask, " and
that actress with whom he lived could never have
given it to him. My cousin, who invented him, was
never able to disinfect him wholly. I should like to
know the mistress of this Sarginus. Tell me some-
thing of his life that I may go and mystify him."
The couple who then followed the young man, whis-
pering in each other's ear, were instantly and particu-
larly observed by the mask with the square shoulders.
"Dear Monsieur Chardon," said the prefect of the
Lucien de Rubempre. 5
Charente, taking the young dandy by the arm, " I
present to you a lady who desires to renew her
acquaintance with you."
"Dear Comte Chatelet," replied the young man,
"this lady makes me feel how ridiculous was the
name you give me. An ordinance of the king has
restored to me the name of my maternal ancestors,
the Rubempr£s. Though the newspapers have an-
nounced the fact, it concerns so insignificant a per-
sonage that I do not blush to recall it to my friends,
my enemies, and all indifferent persons. Class your-
self as you please, but I am certain you will not dis-
approve of a measure to which your wife, when she
was only Madame de Bargeton, advised me." (This
neat retort, which made the lady smile, sent a nervous
thrill through the prefect of the Charente.) "Please
tell her," added Lucien, "that I now bear gules, a
bull savage argent, in a field vert."
"Savage argent! " repeated Chatelet.
" Madame la marquise will explain to you, if you don't
know it, why this ancient coat-of-arms is better than
the chamberlain's key and the golden bees of the Empire
which are in yours, to the great despair of Madame
Chatelet, nee Negrepelisse d'Espard," said Lucien,
sharply.
"As you have recognized me I cannot mystify you
now, but also I cannot express to you how you mystify
me," said the Marquise d'Espard, in a low voice,
amazed at the cool self-possession and insolence ac^
quired by the man she had formerly despised.
" Permit me therefore, madame, to retain the only
chance I have of occupying your thoughts by remain-
6 Lucien de Rubempre.
ing in that mysterious twilight," he replied, with the
smile of a man who has no intention of compromising
an assured happiness.
The marquise could not restrain a displeased gesture
at finding herself, as they say in England, cut by
Lucien 's formality.
" I congratulate you on your change of condition,"
said the Comte du Chatelet.
"I receive your congratulations with the spirit in
which you offer them," replied Lucien, bowing to the
marquise with much grace.
" Conceited puppy ! " said the count in a low voice
to Madame d'Espard ; " he has succeeded at last in
acquiring ancestors."
" Conceit in young men, when practised upon us, is
almost always the sign of some very high-placed hap-
piness ; in men of your age it means ill-fortune. I
should like to know which woman of our world has
taken this fine birdling under her protection ; it might
give me some chance of amusement to-night. My
anonymous note is doubtless a bit of malice done by
some rival, for it concerns this young man ; his im-
pertinence may have been dictated to him. Watch
him. I '11 take the arm of the Due de Navarreins, and
you will know where to find me."
Just as Madame d'Espard was about to join her
relation, the stout mask stepped between her and the
duke and whispered in her ear : —
" Lucien loves you ; he wrote that note. Your pre-
fect is his greatest enemy ; how then, could he explain
himself before him ? "
The unknown personage walked away, leaving
Lucien de Rubempre. 7
Madame d'Espard the victim of a twofold surprise.
She knew of no one able to play the part assumed by
the mask ; she feared some trap, and went away by
herself and sat down. Comte Sixte du Chatelet,
whom Lucien had, as we have seen, deprived of his
ambitious du with a malice which showed a predeter-
mined vengeance, followed the handsome dandy at a
distance, and presently met a young man to whom he
thought he could safely unbosom himself.
"Well, Rastignac, have you seen Lucien? he has
come to life again, with a new skin."
" If I were as handsome a fellow as he, I 'd be still
richer than he," replied the young man, in an airy tone,
though shrewd and expressive of Attic sarcasm.
" No," said the voice of the stout mask in his ear,
returning a hundred sarcasms for one in the mere man-
ner with which he accented the monosyllable.
Rastignac, who was not a man to bear an insult,
stood as if struck by lightning ; then he suffered him-
self to be led to the recess of a window by an iron
hand, which he felt he was unable to shake off.
44 Young cock, hatched in Mother Vauquer's hen-
yard, whose heart failed you in grasping the millions
of old Taillefer when the worst of the work was
done, let me tell you, for your personal safety, that
if you don't behave towards Lucien as to a brother
whom you love, you are in our hands while we are not
in yours. Silence and obedience, or I'll enter your
game and knock over your ninepins. Lucien de Ru-
bempre is protected by the greatest power of the
present day, the Church. Choose between life and
death. Answer me ! "
8 Lucien de Rubempre.
Rastignac's brain swam like that of a man sleeping
in a forest who wakes to see a lioness beside him. He
was afraid, and there were no witnesses ; the most
courageous men will yield to fear when that is the case.
44 None but he could know — or dare," he muttered
to himself.
The mask pressed his hand as if to prevent him from
finishing his sentence.
44 Act as if it were he" he said.
Rastignac then behaved like a millionnaire on a high-
way when a brigand points a pistol at his head; he
capitulated.
44 My dear count," he said to du Chatelet, to whom
he returned, " if you value your position, treat Lucien
de Rubempre as a man whom you will one day see in a
much higher place than your own."
The mask made an almost imperceptible gesture of
satisfaction, and started again on Lucien's traces.
44 My dear fellow, you have rather rapidly changed
your opinion about him," replied the prefect, naturally
astonished.
44 As rapidly as some of the Centre, who have voted
with the Right," replied Rastignac to the prefect-deputy,
whose vote had been lacking to the Ministry within
a week or two.
44 Are there such things as opinions in these days? "
remarked des Lupeaulx, who was listening to them.
" What are you discussing?"
44 The Sieur de Rubempre, whom Rastignac wants
me to believe is really a personage," said the deputy
to the secretary-general.
44 My dear count," replied des Lupeaulx, gravely,
Lucien de Bubempre. 9
" Monsieur de Rubempre is a young man of the highest
merit ; and so influentially protected that I should con-
sider myself very fortunate in being able to renew my
acquaintance with him."
" He is certain to tumble into the pitfall of the roues
of the epoch," said Rastignac.
The speakers turned toward a corner where a number
of the wits of the day, men more or less celebrated
and some of them distinguished, were collected. These
gentlemen were contributing their observations, their
bon mots, and their malicious wit to the common
fund, endeavoring to amuse themselves, or awaiting
the advent of some amusement. In this group, which
was oddly composed, were a number of men with
whom Lucien had formerly had relations, made up of
ostensibly good services and concealed evil ones.
" Well, Lucien, my boy, my dear fellow ! so here
we are, mended and done up as good as new. Where
do we come from ? Did we vault upon our new horse
by means of the gifts that were sent from Florine's
boudoir? Bravo, my boy!" said Blondet, releasing
Finot's arm to take Lucien familiarly round the body
and press him to his heart.
Andoche Finot was the proprietor of a review for
which Lucien had once worked almost gratis ; and
which Blondet still enriched by the wisdom of his
counsels, the depth of hi3 views, and his occasional
collaboration. Finot and Blondet personified Bertrand
and Raton, — with this difference, that while La Fon-
taine's cat only ended by knowing itself duped, Blon-
det, knowing it all along, still served Finot. This
brilliant free lance of the pen was, in truth, and for
10 Lucien de Rubempre.
a long time, a slave. Finot concealed a brutal will
beneath a heavy exterior and a sluggish stupidity
rubbed with intellect as a ship's biscuit is rubbed with
garlic. He knew how to harvest what he gleaned of
ideas and money in the broad field of the dissipated
life led by men of letters and men in politics. Blondet,
to his great misfortune, kept his intellect in the pay of
his laziness and his vices. Constantly overtaken by
want, he belonged to the poor clan of eminent men
who can do much for the good of others, and nothing
for their own, — Aladdins who allow their lamps to
be borrowed from them. These admirable counsellors
have keen and just minds when not dragged away by
personal interests. With them it is the heart, and not
the arm, which acts. Hence the inconsistencies of
their moral sense, and the blame which inferior minds
often cast upon them. Blondet would share his purse
with the comrade he had wounded the night before ;
he would dine, drink, and sleep with another whom
he stabbed with his pen the next day. His amusing
paradoxes seemed to justify everything. Accepting
the whole world as a jest, he did not choose to be
taken seriously himself. Young, beloved, almost cele-
brated, and happy, he gave no thought, as Finot did,
to acquiring the fortune necessary for middle life.
The most difficult courage of all is, perhaps, that
which Lucien needed at this moment to cut Blondet
as he had already cut Madame d'Espard and du Cha-
telet. Unhappily, in him the delights of vanity hin-
dered the exercise of pride, which is certainly the
active principle of many great things. His vanity bad
triumphed in the preceding encounter ; he had shown
Lucien de Eubempre. 11
himself rich, disdainful, and happy to persons who
had formerly disdained him when poor and miserable.
But now, could a poet, like an aged diplomatist, rebuff
to their faces two self-styled friends, who had helped
him in his poverty, and with whom he had consorted
in the dark days of his distress ? Like a soldier who
does not know when and where to use his courage,
Lucien did what many another man in Paris has done ;
he compromised himself once more by accepting the
shake of Finot's hand, and by not refusing Blondet's
caress. Whoever has been or is concerned with jour-
nalism is under the cruel necessity of bowing to men
whom he despises, of smiling upon his best enemy, of
compromising with fetid vileness, and dirtying his
fingers in the endeavor to pay his aggressors in their
own coin. He gets habituated to seeing evil and letting
it pass ; he begins by condoning it, and finally commits
it. In course of time the soul, constantly stained by
shameful transactions, dwindles ; that instrument of
noble thought corrodes, its worn-out hinges turn of
themselves. Alceste becomes Philinte, character is
enervated, talents degenerate, and faith in noble
works takes wing. He who began by taking pride
in his own pages spends himself as he goes along
in wretched articles which his conscience tells him,
sooner or later, are so many wicked actions. He
came, like Lousteau, like Vernou, intending to be a
great and useful writer, he finds himself an impotent
penny-a-liner. Consequently, we cannot too highly
honor men who keep their character to the level of
their talents, and who, like d'Arthez, know how to
walk with unfaltering step among the rocks and reefs
of a literary life.
12 Lucien de Rubempre.
Lucien found nothing to say in reply to Blondet,
whose easy wit always exercised upon hira an irre-
sistible fascination, the ascendency of a corrupter
over his pupil. Blondet held, moreover, a good posi-
tion in society, owing to his intimacy with the Com-
tesse de Montcornet.
" Have you inherited from an uncle?" asked Gen-
eral de Montcornet, jesting.
" Like you, I hold folly at arm's length," replied
Lucien in the same tone.
"Has monsieur set up a review, or some sort of
journal?" asked Andoche Finot, with the blustering
impertinence of a man who lives on the brains of
others.
" Better than that," replied Lucien, whose vanity,
stung by the superiority assumed by the editor-in-chief,
brought him suddenly back to a sense of his new
position.
u What is it, my dear fellow?"
"I have a Cause."
"Cause, Lucien?" said Vernou, smiling.
u Ah! Finot, you are distanced by this fellow; I
always predicted it. Lucien has talent ; you did n't
make the most of it ; you let him go to the dogs.
Repent, you fat blockhead ! " cried Blondet.
Penetrating as musk, Blondet saw more than one
secret in Lucien's tone and gesture and manner ; while
soothing him, however, he tightened by his words the
curb-chain of the bit. He resolved to know the secret
of Lucien's return to Paris, his projects, and his means
of existence.
" Down on your knees before a superiority you can
Lucien de Bubempre. 13
never attain, though you are Finot," he continued.
" Admit him instantly to the membership of strong
men to whom the future belongs ; he 's one of us !
Witty and handsome, is he not bound to succeed by
your quibuscumque viisf Behold him here in his
strong Milan armor, his doughty dagger half drawn,
his banner flying ! Tudieu ! Lucien, where did you
steal that pretty waistcoat? Nothing but love can
lind such stuffs as that. Have we a home? Just now
I 'm anxious to know the addresses of my friends, for
I have n't where to lay my head. Finot turned me out
to-night on the vulgar pretext of a love affair."
"My dear fellow," replied Lucien, "I've put in
practice a maxim which is sure to lead to a tranqnil
life: Fuge, late, tace! I leave you."
"But I don't leave you until you pay me a sacred
debt, — that little supper, hein?" said Blondet, who
was rather given to good eating and got himself in-
vited by his friends when money lacked.
"What supper?" asked Lucien, with a gesture of
impatience.
"You don't remember? By that I recognize the
prosperity of a friend, — he loses his memory."
" He knows what he owes us ; I '11 guarantee his
heart," cried Finot, catching up Blondet's joke.
" Rastignac," said Blondet, taking that young man
by the arm as soon as he reached the upper end of
the foyer near the column around which these so-called
friends were grouped, " we are talking of a supper ; will
you come? — unless monsieur here," he added, very
seriously, motioning to Lucien, " persists in denying
a debt of honor. He may possibly do so."
14 Lucien de Rubempre.
" Monsieur de Rubempre is incapable of that," said
Rastignac, who was thinking of far other matters.
44 Here 's Bixiou ! " cried Blondet, " he '11 come ;
nothing is complete without him. Unless he 's at
hand, champagne only thickens ray tongue ; every-
thing is flat, even the spice of epigrams."
44 My friends," said Bixiou, 44 1 see you all collected
round the marvel of the day. Our dear Lucien re-
vives Ovid's metamorphoses. Just as the gods changed
themselves into remarkable vegetables and other things
to seduce women, he has changed his thistle Chardon
into a nobleman to seduce, what? Charles X. ! My
little Lucien," he went on, catching him by the button
of his coat, 44 a journalist who plays the great lord
deserves a famous charivari. In their place," added
the pitiless jester, pointing to Finot and Vernou, ' 4 I'd
cut you up in their paper ; you 'd supply them with
columns of jokes which would bring in thousands of
francs."
44 Bixiou," said Blondet, 44 amphitryons are sacred
twenty-four hours previous and twelve hours subse-
quent to the feast, which this illustrious friend of ours
is about to give us."
44 Of course, of course," replied Bixiou, 44 besides,
what can be more desirable than to save a great name
from oblivion and endow an effete aristocracy with a
man of talent? Lucien, you have the esteem of the
Press, of which you once were the noblest ornament,
and we '11 sustain you. Finot, short snapping items
in your Paris-column ! Blondet, long-winded, insinu-
ating articles on the fourth page of your paper ! Let
us announce the publication of the finest book of
Lucien de Rubempre. 15
our time, ' The Archer of Charles IX.' and implore
Dauriat to give us another edition of • Daisies,' those
divine sonnets of our French Petrarch. Let us bear
aloft our friend on the buckler of stamped paper which
makes and unmakes reputations ! "
" If you wish for a supper," said Lucien to Blondet,
to get rid of the troop which threatened to increase,
" it seems to me you need n't employ hyperbole and
parable with an old friend as if he were a ninny.
To-morrow evening, at Lointier's," he added hastily,
as he saw a masked woman approaching him and
sprang forward to meet her.
"Oh! oh ! oh!" exclaimed Bixiou, on three notes
with a scoffing air, apparently recognizing the woman
to whom Lucien had gone, " this needs investigating."
And he followed the graceful couple, passed in front
and around them, examined them with a searching
eye, and returned, to the great satisfaction of the envious
group, who were all interested to find out how and
why Lucien's luck had changed.
" Friends," said Bixiou, " we have known the Sieur
de Rubempre's new love for a long time. She is no
other than des Lupeaulx's former rat."
One of the social corruptions now forgotten, but in
fashion at the beginning of this century, was the so-
called "rat." A rat (the word is out of date) was
a child of ten or twelve years of age, supernumerary
of some theatre, more especially the Opera, who was
being trained for vice and infamy. A rat was a sort
of infernal page, a female gamin, whose lively tricks
were usually forgiven. A rat took what she could
get ; she was therefore a dangerous animal and to
16 Lucien de Rubempre.
be distrusted, though she introduced an element of
gayety into life behind the scenes, like that of Sgana-
relle, Scapin, and Frontin in the old comedies. But
the rat was expensive ; she produced neither honor,
nor profit, nor pleasure, and the fashion passed so
completely away that few persons knew this secret
detail of fashionable life before the Restoration until
the time when a few writers laid hold of the rat
as a novel subject.
" What! is Lucien, after having Coralie killed under
him, to ride away with our Torpille 1 too?" said
Blondet.
Hearing that name, the mask with athletic shoulders
made a movement which, though quickly repressed,
was seen by Rastignac.
''That's not possible," replied Finot. " La Tor-
pille has n't a brass farthing to give him ; she bor-
rowed, so Nathan told me, a thousand francs from
Florine."
" Oh ! messieurs," exclaimed Rastignac, endeavor-
ing to defend Lucien against these odious imputations.
" Bah ! cried Vernou, " is Coralie's former pensioner
too straight-laced ? "
" That thousand francs proves to me," said Bixiou,
" that our friend Lucien is living with La Torpille."
"What an irreparable wrong done to the elite of
literature, science, art, and politics ! " said Blondet.
" La Torpille is the only prostitute in these days
who has the making of a courtesan. Education has
never spoiled her ; she can't read and write ; but she
1 Torpille, torpedo, — a fish which gives electric shocks when
touched.
Lucien de Rubempre. 17
would always have understood us. We might have
given to our epoch one of those magnificent Aspasian
figures without which there has hitherto been no great
century. See how the Dubarry suits the eighteenth ;
Ninon de l'Enclos the seventeenth ; Marion de l'Orme
the sixteenth; Impe'ria the fifteenth. To Flora be-
longs the Roman republic which she made her heir,
and which paid its public debt with that inheritance.
What would Horace be without Lydia, Tibullus with-
out Delia, Catullus without Lesbia, Propertius without
Cynthia, Demetrius without Lamia, who is his only
glory in these days."
" Blondet talking of Demetrius in the foyer of the
Opera seems to me rather too much shop," whispered
Bixiou to his neighbor.
" And without these queens what would the empire
of the Caesars have been? " continued Blondet. " Lai's
and Rhodope are Greece and Egypt. All are the
poesy of the centuries in which they lived. This
poesy, which is lacking to Napoleon (for the widow of
his Grand army is a barrack jest) is not lacking to the
Republic, which had Madame Tallien. And now in
France who is there to fill the vacant throne ? All of
us here present could have made a queen. I might
have given an aunt to la Torpille (for her mother is
too authentically dead on the field of dishonor), du
Tillet could have provided the mansion, Lousteau a
carriage, Rastignac servants, des Lupeaulx a cook,
Finot hats " (Finot could not restrain a wince as he
received this shaft full in the face), " and Vernou
should have puffed her while Bixiou put wit in her
mouth. The aristocracy would have flocked to amuse
2
18 Lucien de Rubempre.
itself with our Ninon, around whom we would have
summoned artists of all descriptions under pain of
condemnatory articles. Ninon the Second should
have been magnificent in assumption, overwhelming
in luxury. She should have had Opinions. Forbidden
dramatic masterpieces should have been read at her
house ; written expressly for it. She should not have
been a liberal, for a courtesan is essentially monarchi-
cal. Ah! what a loss, what a loss ! she ought to have
kindled a whole century, and she loves one poor, mis-
erable young man ! Lucien will break her like a
hound ! "
" None of the female potentates you mention ever
came from the streets," said Finot, " but this little rat
has rolled in the gutter."
" Yes, like the bulb of a lily in the muck," remarked
Vernou, "where it blooms and increases in beauty.
There lies her superiority. Must we not know all, to
create the laughter and the joy that are derived
from all?"
61 He is right," said Lousteau, who until then had
listened and observed without speaking. " La Tor-
pille knows how to laugh and to create laughter.
That science of great writers and great actors belongs
to those who have fathomed all social depths ! At
eighteen years of age that girl has already known the
utmost opulence, the lowest poverty, and men at every
stage of life. She holds the magic wand that unchains
the passions of men ; she is the salt sung by Rabelais
which, if flung upon Matter inspires and lifts it to the
marvellous regions of Art ; her robe sheds speechless
magnificence ; her fingers drop jewels as her lips
Lucien de Bubempre. 19
drop smiles ; she gives to everything the spirit of the
occasion ; her jargon sparkles with wit ; she possesses
the secret of onomatopoeia to every shade of sound ;
she — "
" You are losing five francs' worth of feuilleton,"
said Bixiou, interrupting Lousteau. "La Torpille is
infinitely better than all that. You have all been
more or less her lovers, but none of you can say she
has ever been your mistress ; she can have you at any
moment, but you will never have her. You force your
way to her and ask her to do you a service — "
" Oh, as for that," said Blondet, "she is more gen-
erous than a brigand chief in his lucky moments ; and
more devoted than the best of college comrades. You
can trust her with your purse and your secrets. What
made me elect her for the queen of this epoch is her
Bourbon indifference to the fallen favorite."
" She is like her mother, much too expensive," said
des Lupeaulx. " The former would have swallowed
up the revenues of the archbishop of Toledo ; she ran
through two notaries — "
" And fed Maxime de Trailles when he was a page,"
put in Bixiou.
M La Torpille is expensive, like Raffaelle, like Ca-
reme, like Taglioni, like Lawrence, like Boule, just as
all artists of genius are dear," said Blondet.
" But Esther never had that air and manner of a
well-bred woman," said Rastignac, motioning to the
masked woman who was leaning on Lucien's arm.
" I will bet it is Madame de Serizy."
"Not a doubt of it, exclaimed du Chatelet, "and
that explains Monsieur de Rubempre's prosperity."
20 Lucien de Rubempre.
" Ah ! what a pretty secretary to an embassy he will
make ! " sneered des Lupeaulx.
"And all the more because Lucien is a man of
talent," said Rastignac. " These gentlemen have each
had more than one proof of that," he added, looking
at Blondet, Finot, and Lousteau.
" Yes, the lad 's cut out to go far," said Lousteau,
who was bursting with jealousy, " and he'll go the
farther for having what we call independence of
ideas — "
" You formed him," said Vernou.
M Well," resumed Bixiou, M I appeal to the recol-
lections of des Lupeaulx ; I '11 bet a supper that
masked woman is La Torpille."
" I take the bet," said du Chatelet, who was inter-
ested to know the truth.
" Come, des Lupeaulx," said Finot, " see if you
recognize the ears of your rat."
" There 's no need to commit a crime of Use-masque "
remarked Bixiou. " Esther and Lucien will pass us
presently as they come up the foyer, and 1 '11 engage
to prove to you that that is she."
' k So our old friend Lucien has come to the surface,
has he? " said Nathan, who just then joined the group.
" I thought he had returned to his native Angouleme
for the rest of his days. Has he discovered some
secret way of escape from duns ? "
" He has done what you will not do in a hurry," said
Rastignac ; " he has paid his debts."
The stout mask nodded his head as* if in assent.
M When a man reforms at his age, he often deforms
himself," said Nathan. " His boldness and vigor are
all gone ; he becomes a capitalist."
Lucien de Rulempre. 21
"Well, this one will always be grand seigneur"
replied Rastignac ; " there will always be in him a
certain height of ideas which will put him above many
men who think themselves his superiors."
At this moment journalists, idlers, dandies, were all
examining, as a jockey examines a horse, the charming
object of their bet. These judges, grown old in the
knowledge of Parisian depravity, all men of superior
mind each in his different way, equally corrupt, equally
corrupting, and given over to the service of unbridled
ambitions, accustomed to suppose all, to divine all, —
these men had their eyes fixed eagerly on the masked
woman,-'- a woman who could not be deciphered by
any but such as they. They and a few other habitues
of the Opera could alone recognize under the shroud
of a black domino, under the hood and the falling
cape, which make all women look alike, the outline of
the form, the peculiarities of carriage and gait, the
movement of the figure, the poise of the head, — things
the least perceptible to common eyes, but to theirs
quite easy to perceive.
In spite of the shapeless garment, they were able to
recognize the most moving of all sights, — that which
presents itself to the eye when we see a woman ani-
mated by a real, true love. Whether it were La Tor-
pille, the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse, or Madame de
Serizy, the lowest or the highest rung of the social
ladder, this creature was an adorable creation, the
flash of all happy dreams. These old young men, as
well as certain young old ones, were conscious of so
keen a sensation that they envied Lucien the sublime
privilege of transforming that woman to a goddess.
22 Lucien de Rubempre.
She was there as though she were alone with Lucien ;
to her there were no ten thousand persons present, there
was no heavy atmosphere thick with dust ; she was iso-
lated beneath the celestial vault of Love as Raffaelle's
madonnas beneath their golden halos. She felt no
pressure of the crowd; her eyes flamed through the
fissures of her mask, and fixed themselves on Lucien ;
the quivering of her whole person seemed to respond to
the movements of her beloved. Whence comes that
flame which shines about a loving woman and singles
her from every other? Whence that sylph-like buoy-
ancy which seems to change the laws of weight ? Is it
the soul escaping? Can happiness possess some phys-
ical efficacy? The graces of childhood, of virgin inno-
cence, were visible behind that domino. Though parted
and walking, these two beings were like the groups of
Flora and Zephyrus entwined, as we see them, by dis-
tinguished sculptors ; but here was something more
than sculpture, that grandest of arts. Lucien and his
domino recalled those angels playing with birds and
flowers, such as Gian- Bellini has painted beneath the
portraits of the Virgin-Mother ; Lucien and this woman
belonged to Fantasy, which is higher than Art as cause
is higher than effect.
When this woman, oblivious of all, came within
a step of the watching group, Bixiou cried out,
" Esther ! " The unfortunate creature turned her head
quickly, as persons do when they hear themselves
called, recognized the malicious querist, and dropped
her head on her breast, as the head of the dying falls
when the last breath leaves it. A jarring laugh broke
from the group of men, who dispersed into the crowd
Lucien de Eubempre. '23
like mice making for their holes. Rastignac alone re-
mained, that he might not seem to fly before Lucien's
flaming glance. He saw before him two sorrows,
equally profound, though veiled, — that of the poor
Torpille, struck down as by a thunderbolt ; that of
the strange, incomprehensible mask, the only remain-
ing person of the late group. Esther said a word in
Lucien's ear as her knees gave way under her, and
Lucien, supporting her on his arm, disappeared with
her. Rastignac followed the pair with his eye, stand-
ing lost in reflection.
" How did she get the name of Torpille?" said a
sombre voice, which struck to his very vitals, for it
was not disguised.
"It is he, indeed, — escaped again!" murmured
Rastignac to himself.
" Silence ! or I strangle you," said the mask, in
another voice. "I am satisfied with you; 3 T ou have
kept your word, and more than one arm is now at
your service. Henceforth be dumb as the grave ; but,
before being silent forever, answer my question."
" Well, the girl is so magnetic that she might have
laid her benumbing spell on the Emperor Napoleon, as
she will on some one more difficult to allure — you ! "
replied Rastignac, moving away.
"One moment," said the mask. " I wish to prove
to you that you have never seen me."
The man unmasked. Rastignac hesitated a moment,
seeing no sign of the repellent personage he had for-
merly known in the Maison Vauquer, then he said : —
"The devil has enabled you to change everything
about you except your eyes, which can never be for-
gotten."
24 ' Lucien de Rubempre.
An iron hand compressed his arm as if to warn him
to eternal silence.
At three in the morning des Lupeaulx and Finot
found Rastignac leaning against a column at the place
where the terrible mask had left him. He had con-
fessed his soul to himself ; he had been priest and
penitent, judge and criminal. He allowed them to take
him away to breakfast, and returned home completely
drunk, but taciturn.
Lucien de Rubempre. 25
IL
LA TORPILLE.
The rue de Langlade, like the adjacent streets, dis-
figures the Palais-Royal and the rue de Rivoli. This
part of one of the most brilliant quarters of Paris re-
tained for a long time the pollution left by the mounds
of filth and rubbish of the old city on which there were
formerly windmills. These narrow streets, dark and
muddy, where various slovenly industries are carried
on, present at night a mysterious physiognomy that is
full of contrasts. Coining from the lighted regions of
the rue Saint-Honore, the rue Neuve-des-Petits-Champs,
and the rue de Richelieu, incessantly crowded and
brilliant with the masterpieces of Industry, Fashion,
and Art, any man to whom the Paris of the night-time
is unknown would be seized with gloomy terror if he
entered the network of little streets encircled by that
light reflected on the skies. Black shadows succeed
the glare of gas. At long distances a pale oil-lamp
casts an uncertain smoky gleam, which does not
reach into certain dark and dismal alleys. Those
who pass through this region — and they are few —
hurry on. The shops are mostly closed ; the ones that
are open are of bad character, — either dirty, ill-lighted
wine-shops, or those of low milliners, where cologne is
sold. Unwholesome chills lay their damp mantle on
26 Lucien de Eubempre.
your shoulders. Few carriages go by. Ominous an-
gles meet the eye, among which can be distinguished
that of the rue de Langlade, the opening to the passage
Saint-Guillaume, and several other dark corners.
The municipal council has never succeeded in cleans-
ing this great plague-spot, where prostitution has long
established its headquarters. Perhaps it is as well for
the Parisian world to leave to these narrow streets
their loathsome aspect. Passing through them in
the day-time no one would imagine what they are by
night. Then they are lined with fantastic beings of
no world but their own ; white, half-naked figures
lean against the walls ; the shadows become ani-
mated. Between the walls and the passers along the
street, glide costumes which talk and walk. Some
half-open doors laugh loudly. Words which Rabe-
lais declares to be frozen, and which are melting, fall
upon the ear. Scraps of song rise between the paving-
stones. The noise is not vague ; it signifies some-
thing. When it is hoarse and strident it is a voice ;
but when it resembles a song there is nothing human
in it ; it is more like hissing ; it is sibilant. The
tapping of boot-heels has something, I know not
what, provocative and mocking. This confused mass
of things turns the brain. Atmospheric conditions are
upset; one is hot in winter and cold in summer. But,
whatever the weather be, this strange nature offers
ever the same spectacle : the fantastic world of Hoff-
mann is there. The most matter-of-fact book-keeper
would find nothing real after crossing the narrow de-
files which lead from decent streets where there are
passers and shops and lamps. More indifferent or
Lucien de Rubempre. 27
more shame-faced than the queens and kings of a
past time, who did not fear to concern themselves
with courtesans, present administrations or modern
policy dare not face the question of this open sore of
capitals. Certainly, measures must change with the
times ; and those which handle individuals and their
liberty are delicate ; but boldness and decision might
be shown on purely material points, such as air, light,
and condition of premises. The moralist, the artist,
and the wise administrator will regret the demolition
of Galeries de Bois of the Palais-Royal, where were
penned those lambs who will always come where
loungers congregate. What has been the result? To-
day, the most brilliant parts of the boulevards, that
enchanting promenade, are interdicted in the evening
to families. The police have not profited by the re-
source offered in certain passages, to protect the
public thoroughfares.
The girl crushed by the sound of her name at the
masked ball had lived, for the last month or two, in
a squalid-looking house in the rue de Langlade.
Propped against the wall of an enormous edifice,
this building, ill-plastered, shallow, and of prodigious
height, is lighted from the street only, and resembles
nothing so much as a parrot's perch. A couple of
rooms are on each floor, and no more. They are
reached by a slender stairwaj 7 clinging to the wall and
curiously lighted by sashes which show to those with-
out the railing of the stairs, — each landing being
indicated by a sink-drain, one of the most horrible
peculiarities of -Paris. The shop and the lower floor
were occupied just then by a tin-smith ; the owner of
28 Lucien de Rubempre.
the property lived on the floor above, and the remain-
ing four stories were hired by decent grisettes who
received a good deal of consideration and some conces-
sions from the proprietor and the portress on account of
the difficulty of letting a house so strangely built and
situated. The uses to which this quarter was put is
explained by the existence of several other houses
built in the same way, which are not serviceable for
business, and can only be profitably used for secret,
precarious, and questionable purposes.
About three in the afternoon, the portress who had
seen Mademoiselle Esther brought home in a fainting
condition by a young man at two in the morning, took
counsel with the grisette who lived on the floor above,
and who, before driving off in a carriage on a pleasure
excursion, had expressed her uneasiness to the portress
about Esther, whom she had not heard stirring as
usual all the morning. Esther was doubtless asleep,
but the sleep seemed suspicious. Being alone in the
lodge the portress was unable to go up and inquire
what was happening on the fourth story, where Esther
lodged. She began to feel anxious, and was just
about to confide the care of the lodge (a sort of niche
scooped in the wall of the lower floor) to the son of the
tinsmith, when a hackney-coach stopped at the door.
A man wrapped in a cloak from head to foot, with the
evident intention of hiding his dress or his quality, got
out, and asked for Mademoiselle Esther. The portress
felt reassured at once ; the silence and quietude were
fully accounted for. As the visitor passed up the stairs
above the lodge the portress noticed the silver buckles
that were on his shoes, and she fancied she saw the
Lucien de Bubempre. 29
fringe of the belt of a cassock. She went down to the
street and questioned the driver, who answered without
words, but the portress understood him.
The priest knocked, received no answer, heard low
sighs, and forced the door with his shoulder, with a
strength given to him, no doubt, by charity, though in
another man it might have been thought habit. He
went hastily into the second room, and there saw, be-
fore a figure of the Virgin in colored plaster, poor
Esther kneeling, or rather crouching down upon her-
self, with her hands clasped. She was dying.
A brasier of lighted charcoal told the story of that
dreadful morning. The hood and mantle of her
domino lay on the floor. The bed had not been oc-
cupied. The poor creature, struck to the heart by a
mortal wound, had doubtless made her preparations
on returning from the Opera. An end of candle-
wick remaining in the cup of a candlestick showed
how lost she had been in her last reflections. A
handkerchief, wet with tears, attested the sincerity
of the Magdalen's despair. This visible repentance
brought a smile to the priest's face. Ignorant of how
to destroy herself, Esther had left the inner door open,
unaware that the air of the two rooms needed more
charcoal to make it unbreathable ; the fumes had
merely stupefied her; the fresh air coming in from
the staircase brought her back by degrees to the sense
of her misery.
The priest stood still, lost in gloomy meditation,
unaffected by the divine beauty of the girl, watching
her first movements as if she had been some animal.
His eyes roved from this crouching body to the
30 Lucien de Rubempre.
objects about the chamber with apparent indifference.
He looked at the furniture of the room, the red-tiled
floor of which was barely hidden by a threadbare
carpet. A small painted wooden bedstead of an old
pattern, hung with yellow cotton curtains fastened
back with red rosettes ; one armchair and two com-
mon chairs of the same painted wood and covered with
the same cotton which also supplied the curtains for
the windows ; a gray paper dotted with flowers now
blackened by time and grease ; a mahogany work-
table ; a fireplace encumbered with cooking utensils
of the commonest description ; two bundles of firewood,
one half used ; a stone chimney-piece on which were
pieces of glass-ware mixed with jewels, scissors, a dirty
pin-cushion, white and perfumed gloves ; a charming
bonnet thrown on the water pitcher ; a Ternaux shawl
used to darken the window ; an elegant dress hanging
from a nail ; a little sofa, hard, without cushions ;
shabby broken clogs, delicate little slippers and dainty,
fit for a queen ; common earthen-ware plates chipped
and cracked, on which lay the remnants of the last
meal, and forks and spoons of German silver (the
plate of the poor of Paris), a basket of potatoes and
a pile of soiled linen, above which hung the fresh, crisp
cap of a grisette; a miserable wardrobe, open and
empty, on the shelf of which lay a pile of pawn-
tickets, — such was the strange collection of things
lugubrious and things joyous, miserable and opulent,
which met the eye. These vestiges of luxury in the
midst of dilapidation ; this home so suggestive of the
Bohemianism of the girl lying there in her huddled
clothing, like a horse lying dead in his harness under
Lucien de Rubempre. 31
broken shafts, — did this strange spectacle make the
priest reflect? Did he say to himself that this mis-
guided creature must be disinterested to couple such
poverty with the love of a rich young man ? Did he
attribute the disorder of that room to the disorder of
her life? Did he feel pity, or horror? Was his charity
stirred? Whoso had seen him, with crossed arms and
sombre brow, his lips contracted, his eye hard, would
have thought him absorbed in feelings of hatred, in
reflections that thwarted him, in projects of sinister
import. He was, assuredly, insensible to the beauty
of the rounded form of that crouching Venus as it
showed beneath the black of her skirt. The drooping
head, which, gave to view as she lay there the nape
of the white, soft, flexible neck, the beautiful shoulders
of a well developed physical nature, did not move him.
He made no effort to raise her ; he seemed not to hear
the gasping breath which told of returning life ; not
until she gave one horrible sob and cast a terrified
glance upon him did he deign to lift her and carry her
to the bed, — with an ease which proved his enormous
strength.
" Lucien ! " she murmured.
" Love returns, the woman follows," said the priest
to himself, with a sort of bitterness.
The victim of Parisian depravity now took notice
of the dress of her liberator, and said, with the smile
of a child that lays its hand on a coveted object, *'« I
shall not die without Heaven's pardon."
" You can live to expiate your sins," said the priest,
moistening her forehead with water, and making her
smell a flask of vinegar he found on the chimney-piece.
32 Lucien de Rubempre.
44 I feel that life, instead of leaving me, is flowing
back," she said, expressing her gratitude for this care
by charming natural gestures. This winning panto-
mime, which the Graces themselves might have used
to allure, justified the popular name of this strange
girl.
44 Do you feel better?" asked the priest, giving her
a glass of sugared water.
He seemed to know the ways of such abodes ; he
moved about as though the place were his. This priv-
ilege of feeling everywhere at home belongs only to
kings, prostitutes, and robbers.
4i When you have quite recovered," said the priest,
after a pause, " you will confess to me the reasons
which led you to commit this final crime of suicide."
M My history is very simple," she answered. " Three
months ago I was living in the vice to which I was
born. I was the worst of creatures, the most infa-
mous ; now I am only the most wretched. I cannot
speak to you of my mother, who was murdered — "
44 By a captain in a suspected house," said the priest,
interrupting his penitent. 44 I know your origin ; I am
aware that if a person of your sex can ever be excused
for leading a shameful life it is you, who have never
known a good example."
" Alas ! " she said, " I was never baptized or taught
religion."
44 All is not yet irreparable," replied the priest,
44 provided that } T our faith, your repentance, are sin-
cere and without reservations."
44 Lucien and God now fill my heart," she said,
simply.
Lucien de Bubempre. 33
" You should have said 4 God and Lucien,' " replied
the priest, smiling. " You remind me of the object of
my visit. Relate to me everything concerning that
young man."
" Do you come from him?" she asked, with a loving
expression which would have touched any other priest.
" Oh ! he suspected what I would do ! "
" No," replied the priest, "it is not your death, it
is your life about which we are concerned. Come,
explain to me your relations."
The poor girl trembled at the rough tone of the
ecclesiastic, but she trembled like a woman whom
brutality could not surprise.
" Lucien is Lucien," she said, — " the handsomest
young man and the best of living beings ; but if you
know him, my love must seem natural to you. I met
him by chance three months ago, at the Porte-Saint-
Martin, where I had gone on one of my days out ; for
we always had one day in the week at Madame Mey-
nardie's, where I lived. The next day I left without
permission. Love had entered my heart, and had so
changed me that when I returned from the theatre I
did not know myself ; I felt a horror for myself.
Never has Lucien known what I have been. Instead
of telling him where I lived I gave him the address of
these lodgings, which a friend gave up to me. I give
you my sacred word — "
" Do not swear."
"Is it swearing to give my sacred word? Well,
then, since that day I have worked in this room mak-
ing shirts at twenty-eight sous apiece that I might
live by honest work. For a month I ate nothing but
3
34 Lucien de Rubempre.
potatoes, to stay virtuous and worthy of Lucien, who
loves me and respects me as the most innocent of the
innocent. I have made my declaration in form to the
police to recover my legal rights, and I have put my-
self under two years' surveillance. They who are so
ready to inscribe us on the registers of infamy make
every difficulty before they will scratch us off. All I
prayed for was that Heaven would strengthen my reso-
lution. I shall be nineteen in April ; there 's hope at
that age. It seems to me that I was only born three
months ago. I prayed to God every morning, and
begged him to grant that Lucien might never know
my former life. I bought that Virgin you see there ;
I pray to her as best I can, for I don't know any
prayers. I don't even know how to read or write ; I
have never entered a church, and I 've never seen the
good God except in processions, out of curiosity."
M What do you say to the Virgin?"
"I speak to her as I do to Lucien, with outbursts
from my soul that make him weep."
" Ah ! he weeps?"
M With joy," she said, eagerly. u Poor darling! we
understand each other so well that we have but one
soul. He is so gentle, so caressing, so sweet of heart,
of mind, of manners. He says he is a poet ; but I say
he is a god. Ah, forgive me ! but you priests, you
don't know what love is. There 's none but us who
know men well enough to judge what Lucien is. A
Lucien is as rare as a woman without sin ; when we
meet him we can do nothing else but love him — there !
So I wanted to be worthy of being loved by my Lucien ;
there lies my misery. Last night, at the Opera, I was
Lucien de Bubempre. 35
recognized by some young men who have no more
heart than a tiger has pity ; I could manage a tiger.
My veil of innocence fell from me ; their laughs cut to
my head and heart. Do not think that you have saved
me ; I shall die of grief."
" Your veil of innocence ? " said the priest. "Then
you have treated Lucien with the utmost rigor?"
"Oh, father, you who know him, how can you ask
me that question? Who shall resist a god?"
" Do not blaspheme," said the ecclesiastic, in a gen-
tler voice. " No man resembles God. Such exagger-
ation ill becomes a veritable love. You do not love
your idol with a pure and true love. If you had really
experienced the change you boast of, you would have
acquired those virtues which are the attributes of youth
and innocence ; you would know the delights of chas-
tity, the delicacies of female modesty, — those glories
of a young girl. You do not love."
Esther made a gesture of terror, which the priest
saw; but it did not shake the impassibility of a
confessor.
" Yes, you love for yourself, and not for him, — for
the temporal pleasures which charm you, not for love's
sake in itself. If you take love so, you are devoid of
that sacred tremor inspired by a being on whom God
has laid the seal of adorable perfections. Have
you reflected that you degrade Lucien by your past
impurity ; that you corrupt his youth by those appal-
ling delights which have given you your name of in-
famy? You have been inconsistent with yourself in
this passion of a day."
" Of a day ! " she said, raising her eyes.
36 Lucien de Rubempre .
" By what name do you call a love which is not
eternal ; which can never unite us in the Christian's
future with the one we love?"
" Ah, I want to be a Christian ! " she cried, in a
muffled, violent tone, which must have won for her the
mercy of our Saviour.
44 Is a girl who has never received the baptism of
the Church, nor that of knowledge, who can neither
read nor write nor pray, who cannot take one step
without the very pavements rising up to accuse her, —
a girl remarkable only for the fugitive privilege of a
beauty which disease may take away from her to-
morrow ; is it this creature, disgraced, degraded, and
who knows her degradation (ignorant and less loving
you might have been more excusable), — is it this fu-
ture prey of suicide and hell who is fit to be the wife
of Lucien de Rubempre ? "
Each sentence was the thrust of a dagger to the
depths of her heart. At each sentence the swelling
sobs, the flowing tears of the despairing creature
proved the force with which light was entering into a
mind as untutored as that of a savage ; into a soul at
last awakened ; into a nature upon which depravity
had spread a layer of muddy ice, now melting in the
sun of truth.
" Why did I not die ! " was the sole idea that she
uttered from the midst of the torrent of ideas which
streamed through her brain and ravaged it.
" Daughter," said the terrible judge, u there is a
love which is never confessed before men, the aspira-
tions of which are received by the angels with smiles
of joy."
Lucien de Bubempre. 37
"What love?"
" Love without hope when it inspires the life, when
it puts into life the principle of self-sacrifice, when it
ennobles all acts by the. desire of attaining to ideal
perfection. Yes, the angels rejoice in that love, for it
leads to a knowledge of God. To strive for perfection
that you may be worthy of him you love ; to make a
thousand secret sacrifices for him ; to adore him from
afar ; to give drop by drop your blood ; to immolate
to him your self-love ; to have no pride or anger toward
him ; to spare him even the knowledge of the jealousy
he rouses in the heart ; to give him all he wishes, be it
to-our own detriment ; to love what he loves ; to have
our face turned ever to him that we may follow him
without his knowledge, — such love Heaven would have
pardoned you ; it offends neither divine nor human laws ;
it leads to other paths than your vile pleasures."
As she listened to this dreadful sentence (and in
what tones was it uttered !) Esther was seized with
a not unnatural mistrust. The words were like the
thunder-clap that precedes a storm. She looked at the
priest ; her entrails were wrung by that awful grip
which seizes the most courageous in face of sudden
and imminent danger. No glance could read what was
then passing in the soul of that man, but the boldest
would have knowm there was more to fear than to hope
in the aspect of his eyes, — formerly clear and yellow as
those of tigers, but on which austerities or privations
had thrown a mist like that we see on far horizons in
the dog-days, when the earth is hot and luminous but
so vaporous that it becomes almost invisible. Deep
folds of the flesh, to which countless pits of the small-
38 Lucien de Rubemprc.
pox gave an appearance of ragged ruts, ploughed up
the sallow skin which seemed to have been baked by
the sun. The harshness of this countenance came
out the more because it was framed by the neglected
wig of a priest who cares no longer for his person, — a
dilapidated wig of a rusty black in the sunshine. His
athletic chest, his hands like those of an old veteran,
his powerful torso and strong shoulders resembled those
of the caryatides which artists of the middle ages em-
ployed in certain Italian palaces, an imperfect repro-
duction of which may be seen in the facade of the
theatre of the Porte-Saiut-Martin.
The least clear-sighted person would have thought
that hot passions or uncommon events had cast
this man into the bosom of the Church. Certainly,
some awful thunderbolt could alone have changed him
— if indeed such a being is susceptible of change.
Women who have led the life now so violently repudi-
ated by Esther soon reach an absolute indifference to
the external form of men. They are like the literary
critic of the present day, who may, under certain
aspects, be compared with them, for he reaches, after
a while, a profound indifference to the formulas of art.
He has read so many books ; he sees so many come
and go ; he has so accustomed himself to written
pages ; he has endured so many plots, seen so many
dramas, made so many articles without saying what
he thought ; betrayed so often the cause of art in
favor of his friendships and his enmities, — that he
reaches at last a stage of disgust for all things, though
he goes on judging nevertheless. It needs a miracle
to make that man produce real work, — just as a pure
Lucien de Bubempre. 39
and noble love can only dawn through a miracle in the
heart of a courtesan.
The tone and manners of this priest, who seemed to
have stepped out of a canvas of Zurburan, appeared
so hostile to the poor girl, to whom outward appear-
ance was of no consequence, that she fancied herself
less the object of his solicitude than the necessary in-
strument of some plan. Without being able to mentally
distinguish between the arguments of self-interest and
the unction of charity (for we must be on the watch
indeed to detect the false coin that is given by a friend) ,
she instinctively felt herself in the talons of some mon-
strous and ferocious bird of prey, swooping down upon
her after circling for a time in the air. In her terror,
she said in a piteous voice : "I thought that priests
were meant to comfort us, but you torture me."
At this cry of anguish the priest made a gesture and
paused ; he collected himself before replying. During
that moment these two persons so singularly brought
together examined each other furtively. The priest
understood the woman, but the woman could not un-
derstand the priest. During that pause he must have
renounced some plan which threatened poor Esther, and
returned to his first intentions.
" We are physicians of the soul," he said in a
gentle voice ; u we know what remedies are needed
for its ills."
" Much should be forgiven to misery," said Esther.
She thought she had been mistaken, and so thinking,
she slid from her bed and knelt at the feet of that man,
kissed his cassock in deep humility, and raised her eyes
bathed in tears to his face.
40 Lucien de Bubempre.
" I thought I had done much," she said.
" Listen, my daughter ; your fatal reputation has
plunged Lucien's family into mourning. They fear,
with some justice, that you will entice him to dissipa-
tion, to reckless follies — "
" True, true," she said ; "it was I who took him to
the ball last night — "
" You are beautiful enough to make him wish to
exhibit you before the eyes of the world ; he would
take pride in showing you, as he would a fine riding-
horse. If only his money were spent upon 3 t ou, — but
he will spend his time, his strength ; he will become
indifferent to the noble prospects preparing for him.
Instead of being — as he can be some day — an am-
bassador, rich, admired, famous, he will become like
so many other debauched men who have drowned their
talents in the mud of Paris for the love of an impure
woman. As for you, sooner or later, you would re-
turn to your former life, having risen for a moment
only to a higher sphere, for yon have not in j t ou that
inner strength given by education to resist vice and
think of the future. You have no more really parted
from your former companions than you have from
those young men who shamed you at the Opera last
night. Lucien's true friends, alarmed at the love you
have inspired in him, have followed his steps and have
learned all. Full of anxiety, they have sent me here
to you to learn your intentions and decide your fate ;
for while they are powerful enough to remove this ob-
stacle to the young man's career, they are also merciful.
Know this, my daughter : a woman beloved by Lucien
has claims to their respect ; the true Christian wor-
Lucien de Ruhempre. 41
ships the mire upon which by chance the divine light
shines. I have come here as the agent of their benev-
olent thoughts. Had I found you wholly wicked, bold,
crafty, corrupt to the marrow of your bones, and deaf
to the voice of repentance, I should have abandoned
you to their just anger. The liberation, civil and po-
litical, which you say you have found so difficult to
obtain, — and which the police do right to withhold in
the interests of Society itself, — the release, which I
have just heard you long for with the earnestness of
true repentance, is here," said the priest, drawing from
his belt an official paper. " You applied only yester-
day, and this paper is dated to-day. Judge from that
how powerful are the persons who watch over Lucien's
interests."
At sight of that paper the convulsive tremblings of
an unexpected joy shook poor Esther, and overcame
her so ingenuously that a fixed smile rested on her lips
like that of idiocy. The priest paused, looked atten-
tively at the girl to see if, when deprived of the hor-
rible strength which such corrupted creatures gain
from their corruption itself, and returned to her frail
and delicate primitive nature, she could bear the strain
of so many impressions. As a courtesan Esther could
have played the comedy ; but restored to innocence and
truth she mightvdie of it, — just as a blind man ope-
rated upon has been known to lose his recovered sight
by the too rapid admission of the daylight. The priest
saw at this moment human nature to its depths ; but
he remained in a calmness that was awful from its
fixity. He stood there a cold alp, white, and reaching
to the skies ; lofty, inalterable, with granite sides, and
42 Zucien de Eubempre.
yet beneficent. Prostitutes are beings essentially fitful,
who pass without reason from the most dogged distrust
to unlimited confidence ; in this respect, they are lower
than animals. Extreme in everything, in their joy and
their despair, their religion and their irreligion, most
of them would eventually become insane were it not
for the decimating mortality which is peculiar to them,
and the few happy chances which raise some few among
them from the slough in which they live.
To penetrate the misery of that dreadful life, one
must have seen how far the poor creatures can go into
madness without remaining there ; and the violent
ecstasy of La Torpille kneeling at the priest's feet
may give some idea of it. She looked at the liberating
paper with an expression forgotten by Dante, for it
surpassed the revelations of the Inferno. But reaction
came with her tears. Esther rose, cast her arms around
the priest's neck, laid her head upon his breast, kissing
the coarse cloth that covered that heart of steel as
though she would force her way to it. She seized his
hands and kissed them ; she used, unconsciously,
in the fervor of her gratitude, the cajolery of ca-
resses, lavishing sweet names upon him, and crying
out, amid these honeyed sentences, "Give it to me!
Give it to me ! Give it to me ! " with a hundred differ-
ent intonations. She happed him with her tenderness ;
she held him by her eyes with an eagerness that left
him no defence, until at last she benumbed his anger.
The priest knew then how and why she had obtained
her name. He comprehended how impossible it was to
withstand the love of such a being ; he divined Lucien's
love, and all that had seduced the poet in him.
Lucien de Bubempre. 43
Such a passion hides, amid a thousand charms, a
barbed hook which fastens, above all, upon the soul
of an artist. These passions, inexplicable to the many,
are perfectly explained by the thirst for the beau ideal
which distinguishes creative beings. Is it not creat-
ing to purify such a creature? What enticement it
offers to bring moral beauty and physical beauty into
harmony ! What joy of pride if successful ! What a
noble task is that which has no instrument but love !
These alliances, illustrated in the lives of Aristotle,
Socrates, Plato, Alcibiades, Pompey, and so monstrous
in the eyes of the many, are founded on the same sen-
timent as that which led Louis XIV. to build Versailles ;
which drives men into ruinous enterprises, converts
miasmatic swamps into flowery mounds surrounded
by flowing waters, puts lakes at the top of hills, as
did the Prince de Conti at Nointel, or transports Swiss
scenery to Cassan, as did Bergeret the farmer-general.
It is Art making irruption into the domain of Morals.
The priest, ashamed of having yielded to any gen-
tleness, pushed the girl hastily away. She sat down,
mortified, for he said, harshly, "You are a courtesan,
and will always be one."
Then he replaced the letter in his belt. Like a child,
which has but one desire in its head, Esther never
ceased to gaze at the place in the belt where the paper
lay.
" My child," said the priest, after a pause, "your
mother was a Jewess, and you have never been bap-
tized ; but neither have 3'ou ever been taken to the
synagogue. You are in the religious limbo of a little
child — "
44 Lucien de Rubempre.
" A little child ! " she said, softly.
" Just as you are a mere number on the registers of
the police, outside of all other social beings," contin-
ued the impassible priest. " If love, seen by a snatch
of fancy, made you believe three months ago that you
were born again, you must surely feel that since that
day you are still in childhood. You must let yourself
be guided as though you were indeed a child ; you
must change yourself wholly, and I will take upon me
to make you unrecognizable. But, first, you must
forget Lucien."
The poor girl's heart was broken by the sentence ;
she raised her eyes to the priest and made a sign of
negation ; she was incapable of speech, perceiving
once more the executioner in the deliverer.
" You must renounce the sight of him, at least," he
continued. " I shall place you in a religious establish-
ment where young girls of the best families receive
their education. You will become a Catholic, and you
will be instructed in the practice of Christian duty ;
you will learn religion. After that you will leave the
place a virtuous young girl, chaste, pure, and well
trained, if — "
He paused and raised his finger.
*' If," he resumed, "you feel the strength to leave
behind you, here, the Torpille."
" Ah ! " cried the poor thing, to whom each word
had seemed like a note of music, at the sound of which
the gates of Paradise were slowly opening. "Ah ! if
it were only possible to pour out, here, all my blood
and take another — "
" Listen to me."
Lucien de Bubempre. 45
She was silent.
" Your future depends on your power of forgetting.
Reflect on the obligations you will have upon you.
One word, one gesture that betrays the Torpille puts
an end forever to your being Lucien's wife ; a word
said in a dream, an involuntary thought, an immodest
look, an impatient motion, a recollection of the past, a
sign of the head which reveals what you know or what
others have known to your disgrace — "
" Ah, father!" cried the girl with sacred enthusi-
asm, "to walk on red-hot iron and smile, to wear a
corset armed with spikes and dance, to eat my bread
mingled with ashes, and drink wormwood, all, all would
be sweet, easy ! "
She fell again on her knees and kissed his shoes, her
tears moistened them ; she clung to his legs, murmur-
ing senseless words amid the tears that joy had brought.
Her beautiful fair hair lay like a carpet at the feet of this
celestial messenger ; then, rising, she looked at him
and saw how hard and stern he was.
"Have I offended you?" she said, all trembling.
" I have heard of a woman like me who washed the
feet of Jesus Christ with perfumes. Alas ! virtue has
made me poor ; I have only tears to give."
" Did you not hear me?" he replied in a cruel voice.
"I told you that you must leave the house where I
shall now place you so changed physically and morally
that none who ever knew you can call .< Esther,' to your
shame. Last night, the love you boast of 'had not
given you the power to bury the prostitute so that she
could never reappear ; no other worship than ttyat of
God will hide her forever."
46 Lucien de Rubempre.
" God has sent you to me," she said.
" If, during your education, Lucien discovers you,
all is lost," he resumed ; " remember that."
44 Who will console him?" she whispered.
" For what have you ever consoled him ? " asked the
priest, in a voice through which, for the first time, was
heard a tremor.
" I do not know," she answered, " but he is often
sad."
44 Sad ! " repeated the priest ; " has he not told you
why?"
44 Never," she said.
44 He is sad because he loves a creature like you,"
he cried.
44 Alas! he may well be," she answered" with deep
humility. 44 1 am the most despicable creature of my
sex ; I could only find favor in his eyes by the force
of my love."
44 That love should give you courage to obey me
blindly. If I took you immediately to the house where
your education will be given to you, all the people here
would tell Lucien that you had gone with a priest, and
he might trace you. Therefore, this day week, after
my visit is forgotten, leave the house alone at seven
in the evening, and enter a hackney-coach, which I
will send to the corner of the rue des Frondeurs.
During this week avoid seeing Lucien ; find some pre-
text to keep him away ; but if he comes, go to a
friend's room. I shall know if you see him. If you
do, all is at an end ; you will not see me again. You
will need these eight days to give you a decent outfit,"
he added, laying a purse upon the table. " In your air,
Lucien de Bubempre. 47
in your clothes, there is that unspeakable something
so well known to all Parisians which reveals what you
have been. Have you never met in the streets or on
the boulevards a modest, virtuous young girl walking
with her mother ? "
" Yes, to my sorrow ! The sight of a mother with
her daughter is the greatest of our punishments ; it
stirs the remorse which is lurking in our minds. It
tortures us. I know but too well what is needful
for me."
" Very good ; then you know how you ought to look
on Sunday next," said the priest, rising.
" Oh, wait," she said ; " teach me a real prayer be-
fore you go, — that I may pray to God."
It was a moving thing to see the priest teaching the
unfortunate girl to say the Lord's Prayer aud the u Hail,
Mary " iu her own language.
4 1 It is very beautiful," said Esther, when she had at
last repeated without a blunder those two magnificent
and well-known expressions of catholic faith.
" What is your name?" she said to the priest as he
bade her adieu.
" Carlos Herrera," he replied. " I am a Spaniard,
banished from my country."
Esther took his hand and kissed it. She was no
longer a courtesan, but an angel rising from her fall.
48 Lucien de Bubemjpre.
III.
AN INTERIOR AS WELL KNOWN TO SOME AS UNKNOWN
TO OTHERS.
In an institution celebrated for the religious and
aristocratic education which is there given to young
girls, on a Monday morning early in the month of
March, the pupils noticed that their charming ranks
were increased by the presence of a new-comer, whose
beauty triumphed without gainsaying, not merely over
that of her companions, but over the particular beau-
ties that were perfect in each. In France it is ex-
tremely rare, not to say impossible, to meet with the
thirty famous perfections described in Persian verse,
and carved, it is said, on the walls of the harems, —
thirty perfections which are necessary to a woman
before she can be accounted as absolutely beautiful.
As for the imposing collection of beauties which sculp-
ture endeavors to render, and which she has rendered
in a few rare instances, like the Diana and the Venus
Callipyge, it is the privileged possession of Greece
and Asia Minor.
Esther came from that cradle of the human race,
the native land of beauty ; her mother was a Jewess.
The Jews, though so often deteriorated by contact
with other peoples, show among their various tribes
strata, or veins, through which is still preserved the
Zucien de Eubempre. 49
splendid type of Asiatic beauty. Esther could have
won the prize in a seraglio ; she possessed the thirty
beauties harmoniously blended. Far from doing injury
to the finish of her form and the freshness of its envel-
ope, her peculiar life had communicated to her a name-
less something of the woman, — a something that is no
longer the smooth closed bud, or unripe fruit, nor has
it yet the warm and glowing tones of maturity ; the
flower is still there. A few months more spent in dis-
sipation and she might have been too plump. This
richness of health, this perfection of animal life in a
creature to whom physical pleasure stood in place of
thought, ought to be an important fact to the eyes of
physiologists.
By a rare, not to say impossible, circumstance in
very young girls, her hands, which were incomparably
noble, were soft, transparent, and white as those of a
woman on the birth of her second child. She had
precisely the feet and hair so justly celebrated in the
Duchesse de Berry, — hair which no coiffeur's hand
could hold, so abundant was it, and so long that when
it fell to the ground it lay there in circles ; for Esther
was of that medium height which allows a woman to
be a sort of plaything, to be lifted, and even carried
without fatigue. Her skin, delicate as rice-paper, of
a warm amber-color, with rosy veins, shone without
being dry, and was soft without moisture. Vigorous
to excess, yet delicate in appearance, Esther attracted
immediate attention by a trait remarkable in the fig-
ures which Raffaelle has more artistically outlined than
other masters, for Raffaelle is the painter who has
studied most and rendered best the Jewish beauty.
4
50 Lucien de BubemprJ.
This wonderful trait was produced by the depth of the
space below the brow, in which the eye revolved as if
detached from its setting, and the curve of which,
clearly defined, was like the outline of an arch. When
youth adorns with its pure and diaphanous tints this
beautiful curve, surmounted by eyebrows the spring of
which is imperceptible ; when light, gliding along that
inner circle, takes a pale rose tint, there are treasures
of tenderness lying there to content a lover, and be the
despair of Art. These luminous folds, in which the
shadows take golden tints, this tissue, which possesses
the consistence of a nerve and the flexibility of a deli-
cate membrane, are Nature's highest effort. The eye
in repose lies there like some miraculous egg on a
couch of silken fibres. But later in life this marvel
turns to awful melancholy, — when passions have
charred those supple outlines, when sorrows have
wrinkled that nest of fibres.
Esther's origin was plainly seen in this oriental
placing of her eyes, which were fringed with Turkish
lashes ; their color was the gray of slate, changing in
a strong light to the blue-black tint of a raven's wing.
The extreme tenderness of her glance could alone
soften the dazzling light of it. It is only the races
which have come from deserts that possess in the eye
the power of fascination over every one, — for all
women can fascinate some one. Their eyes retain, no
doubt, something of the infinite their race has con-
templated. Did Nature, with her foresight, furnish
their retinas with some reflector to enable them to bear
the dazzle of the sand, the floods of sunlight, the hot
cobalt of the ether? Do human beings take, like other
Lucien de Bubempre. 51
creations, something from the centres on which they
develop and keep through centuries and eras that
which they have taken? The great solution of the
problem of races lies, perhaps, in this very question.
Instincts are living facts, the cause of which is in a
felt necessity. The animal species are the result of the
exercise of instincts. To convince ourselves of this
truth, so long sought after, it is enough to apply to
troops of men the observation recently made on flocks
of Spanish and English sheep, which, on the level
meadows where grass is plentiful, feed closely pressed
together, but disperse upon the hillsides where grass is
scarce. Transport these two species of sheep from
their own land to France or Switzerland, and you will
find the hill sheep feeding apart on the plain, and the
plain sheep huddling closely together on an alp. Even
many generations will scarcely change acquired and
transmitted instincts. At the end of a hundred years
the mountain spirit will reappear in refractory lambs,
just as, after eighteen hundred years of banishment,
the East shone in the eyes and in the face of Esther.
The glance of those eyes exerted no terrible fascina-
tion. It cast a gentle warmth ; it moved to tender-
ness without startling ; the hardest wills were melted
in that soft glow. Esther vanquished hatred ; she
had magnetized the depraved of Paris. It was this
glance and her soft, smooth skin which had won her
the terrible nickname, the revelation of which had sent
her to seek the grave. All else about her was in har-
mony with these characteristics of the Peri of the
deserts. Her forehead was resolute, and proud in
form ; her nose, like that of the Arabs, delicate, thin,
52 Lucien de Ruhempre.
with oval nostrils well-placed and turning upward at
the edges. Her fresh, red mouth was like a rose un-
blighted ; the orgies of her life had left no trace upon
it. The chin, modelled as if some loving sculptor had
polished its contour, was white as milk. One only
thing, which betrayed the courtesan who had fallen
low, she had been unable to remedy, — her split and
defaced nails needed time to recover their naturally
elegant shape, deformed by the commonest work of
the household.
The pupils began by feeling jealous of these miracles
of beauty, but they ended by admiring them. A week
had not gone by before they attached themselves to
the simple, natural Esther ; they were interested in
the- secret misfortunes of a girl who, at eighteen years
of age, could neither read nor write ; to whom all
knowledge and all instruction were new things ; and
who was about to procure for the archbishop the glory
of a conversion from Judaism to Christianity, and for
the convent the pleasures of a baptismal fete. They
forgave her beauty, knowing themselves her superiors
by education. Esther soon acquired the manners, the
soft voice, the carriage, the attitudes of these well-
bred young girls ; in fact, she recovered her original
nature. The change was so complete that, on the
occasion of his first visit, Herrera was amazed, he
whom nothing in the world seemed ever to surprise ;
and the superiors of the convent congratulated him on
his ward. These women had never, in their career of
teaching, met with a more lovable nature, more Chris-
tian meekness, a truer modesty, and so great a desire
for instruction. When a girl has suffered the evils
Lucien de Rubempre. 53
which had overwhelmed this poor creature, and she
looks for such a recompense as that the Spaniard had
offered to Esther, it would be strange if she did not
renew the miracles of the early Church, which the
Jesuits are now reviving in Paraguay.
" She is edifying," said the superior, kissing her on
the forehead.
That expression, which is essentially catholic, tells
all.
During the recreation hours Esther questioned her
companions, though reservedly, on the simplest things
of their social life, which to her were like the first won-
ders of existence to an infant. When told she was to
wear white on the day of her baptism and her first
communion, white ribbons, white shoes, a white badge,
she burst into tears, to the amazement of her comrades.
It was the reversal of the scene of Jephthah on the
mountain. But Esther was afraid of being suspected,
and she ascribed this strange distress to the joy the
mere thought of the ceremony caused her. The gulf
between the habits and morals she was quitting and
those she sought to take was greater even than that
between civilization and a state of barbarism ; and
Esther had the natural grace and naivete and also the
depth of nature which characterizes the wonderful
heroine of the "Puritans of America." But she had
also, without being aware of it herself, a love in her
heart which was gnawing it ; a strong love, a desire
more violent in her who knew all than it is in any
virgin heart that knows nothing, though these desires
may have the same cause and the same object.
During the first few months the novelty of a clois-
54 Lucien de Rubempre.
tered life, the surprises of her education, the work she
learned to do, the exercises of religion, the fervor of
her sacred resolution, the sweetness of the affections
she inspired, in short, the employment of the faculties
of an awakened intellect, all assisted in repressing her
memories, even the efforts of the new memory she was
acquiring ; for she had as much to unlearn as to learn.
Several memories are in us : body and mind have each
a memory. Nostalgia, for example, is a disease of
the physical memory. After the first three months,
the vigor of this virgin soul which was stretching with
outspread wings toward heaven, was not conquered,
but shackled by a dumb resistance the cause of which
was unknown to Esther herself. Like the sheep of
Scotland she wanted to browse apart ; she could not
vanquish the instincts developed by debauchery. The
muddy streets of the Paris she had abjured called to
her. Did the chains of her horrible broken habits still
hold to her by some forgotten link ? Did she feel them
as surgeons say old soldiers suffer in the limbs that
have long been amputated? Had vice and its ex-
cesses so penetrated to the marrow of her bones that
the holy waters had not yet touched the hidden demon?
Was the sight of him for whom she was making so
many angelic efforts necessary to one whom God must
surely pardon for mingling human love with sacred
love? The one had led to the other. Did there
occur in her a displacement of the vital force which
brought with it inevitable suffering? All is doubt
and darkness in a situation which those who have
knowledge refuse to examine, considering the subject
immoral and too compromising, — as if the physician,
Lucien de Buhempre. 55
the writer, the priest, and the statesman, were not
above suspicion. Nevertheless, one physician, whose
work was stopped by death, did have the courage to
begin such studies, — alas ! left incomplete.
Perhaps the black melancholy to which Esther fell
a prey, which obscured, like a pall, her happy life,
shared in all these causes; and — incapable of guess-
ing its nature — perhaps she suffered as the sick who
are ignorant of medicine and of surgery suffer. The
fact is strange and even fantastic. Abundant and
wholesome nourishment substituted for inflammatory
and detestable food Esther could not assimilate. A
pure and regular life divided between moderate work
and recreation, put in place of a disorderly life in
which the pleasures were as horrible as the pains, —
this life was crushing down the young pupil. The
cool repose, the calm of nights substituted for extreme
fatigue and cruel agitations, caused fever of which the
symptoms escaped both the eye and finger of the in-
firmary nurse. In short, welfare and happiness suc-
ceeding to evil and misery, security to anxiety, were
as fatal to Esther as her past wretchedness would have
been to her young companions. Born in corruption,
implanted there, there she had developed. Her in-
fernal native land still exercised its power over her,
in spite of the sovereign orders of her absolute will.
What she hated was life to her ; what she loved was
killing her. Her faith had become so ardent that her
piety rejoiced the hearts about her. She loved to pray-
She had opened her soul to the light of true religion,
which she received without effort, without doubt ; but
in her the body thwarted the soul at every turn.
56 Lncien de Rubempre.
Carp were taken from a muddy pond and placed in
a marble basin filled with clearest water, to satisfy
a desire of Madame de Maintenon, who fed them with
scraps from the royal table. The carp died. Animals
may be devoted to man, but man can never communi-
cate to them the leprosy of flattery. A courtier re-
marked upon the resistance of the fish. " They are
like me," said the uncrowned queen, " they regret their
mud." That saying was Esther's history at the period
of which we speak.
Sometimes the poor girl was impelled to wander
restlessly through the beautiful gardens of the con-
vent ; she went eagerly from tree to tree ; she darted
despairingly into shady corners, looking for — what?
She did not know ; but she succumbed to the devil,
she coquetted with the trees, saying words she never
uttered. At other times she would glide along the
walls in the darkness, like an eel, without a shawl and
her shoulders bare. Often, in the chapel during the
services, she would kneel with her eyes fixed on the
altar; those about her admired her. Tears came to
her, but they were tears of rage ; instead of the sacred
images she wished to see, the flaming nights when she
had led the revels, as Habeneck leads a symphony of
Beethoven at the Conservatoire, came back to her,
dishevelled, furious, brutal. Outwardly she was like
a virgin who belongs to earth by her feminine form
only ; within, an imperial Messalina raged. She alone
was in the secret of this struggle of the devil against
the angel. When the superior remarked on the pains
with which she had dressed her hair, and rebuked her,
she changed it with sweet and prompt obedience ; she
Lucien de Bubemjpre. 57
was ready to cut the hair from her head if her mother
ordered it. This nostalgia, for such it was, was piti-
fully touching in a girl who would rather die than
return to her impure native land.
She grew pale and thin, and changed greatly. The
superior lessened her studies, and took so interesting a
pupil to her own apartment to question her. Esther
seemed happy ; took pleasure in her companions ; felt
no ill in any vital part, — and yet her vitality was
attacked. She regretted nothing ; she desired nothing.
The superior, surprised at the girl's answers, knew not
what to think, seeing her so evidently the prey to a
consuming languor. The physician of the convent was
called in as soon as the pupil's condition seemed serious ;
but Esther's previous life was unknown to him, and he
could not suspect it. The mother superior, under a
sense of danger, sent for the Abba Herrera. The
Spaniard came, saw Esther's desperate condition, and
said a few words in private to the physician. After
this conversation the man of science informed the man
of faith that the best remedy would be to take the girl
a journey to Italy. The abbe would not consent to
the journey being made before Esther's baptism and
first communion.
"How long before they take place?" asked the
physician.
"A month," said the superior.
" She will be dead."
" Yes, but in a state of grace and saved," said the
abbe.
The religious point governs all questions political,
civil, and vital, in Spain. The doctor made no reply
58 Lucien de Eubempre.
to the Spaniard ; he turned to the mother superior ;
but the terrible abbe took him by the arm and stopped
him.
" Not one word, monsieur," he said.
The physician, though religious and monarchical,
cast a look of tender pity upon Esther. The girl was
beautiful as a lily bending on its stalk.
" To the mercy of God, then ! " he cried as he went
away.
The same day Esther was taken by her protector,
the abbe, to the Rocher de Cancale, for the desire of
saving her suggested a strange expedient to the priest ;
he would try dissipation, — two dissipations : an excel-
lent dinner, which might recall to the girl's mind
her past excesses ; and the Opera, which would give
her worldly images. It needed all his overwhelming
authority to induce the young novice to enter such
scenes. At the Opera he placed her in a box where
she could not be seen. But these remedies were of no
avail ; the convent pupil felt a disgust for the dinner
and the theatre, a deep repugnance for what she did,
and fell back into sadness.
" She is dying of love for Lucien," thought Herrera,
who now resolved to sound the depths of that soul and
know what he could exact of it.
There came a day at last when the poor girl was sus-
tained only by her moral force ; the body was about to
give way. The priest had calculated the moment with
the awful practical sagacity shown in the olden time
by executioners when applying the "question." He
found his ward in the garden, sitting on a bench beside
a trellis on which an April sun was flickering. She
Lucien de Bubempre. 59
seemed cold, and to be trying to warm herself; her
comrades watched with pitying interest her pallor
like that of withered grass, her eyes like those of
a dying doe, her attitude expressive of melancholy.
Esther rose to go forward and meet the Spaniard, with
a movement which showed how little life she had, and,
let us say, how little desire she had to live. This poor
Bohemian, this bruised wild swallow, excited, for the
second time, the pity of Carlos Herrera. That gloomy
minister, whom it seemed that God would employ only
in the accomplishment of his dire punishments, received
the feeble creature with a smile that expressed as much
bitterness as gentleness, as much revenge as charity.
Trained to meditation and to self-examination during
her semi-monastic life, Esther felt for the second time
a strong distrust of her protector ; but she was reas-
sured, as on the first occasion, by his words.
" My dear child," he said, " why have you never
spoken to me of Lucien ? "
" I had promised you," she answered, quivering from
head to foot with a convulsive motion, " I had sworn
to you never to pronounce his name."
" But you have not ceased to think of him? "
" That is my only blame. I think of him at all
times, and when you appeared I was saying to myself
his name."
" Absence from him is killing you? "
For all answer Esther inclined her head on her breast
like one at the point of death.
" If you saw him again — "
" I could live," she said.
" Do you think of him with your soul only?"
60 Lucien de Rubempre.
" Oh, father," she said, " love cannot be divided
into parts ! "
" Daughter of an accursed race ! I have done my
best to save you ; I return you to your fate. You shall
see him again."
" Why curse my happiness? Can I not love Lucien
and practise virtue, which I love as much as I love
him ? Am I not ready to die for it, as I am to die for
him? Am I not dying for those two fanaticisms, for
the virtue which made me worthy of him, and for him
who cast me into the arms of virtue? Yes, ready to
die without seeing him, — ready to live by seeing him.
God will judge me."
Her color had returned, her paleness had taken a
golden hue. Once more her grace came back to her.
" The day after that on which you are cleansed by
the waters of baptism you shall see Lucien again ; if
you think you can live virtuously in living for him you
shall not again be separated from him."
The priest was forced to lift her up, for her knees
gave way beneath her. The poor girl fell as if the
earth had given way at her feet. The abbe placed her
on the bench, and when her voice came back to her she
said : —
"Why not to-day?"
u Would you rob Monseigneur of the triumph of
your conversion and baptism ? You are too near to
Lucien ; you are far from God."
" Yes ; I thought of nothing ! "
M You will never be of any religion," said the priest,
with a motion of the deepest sarcasm.
"God is good!" she answered. "He reads my
heart."
Lucien de Rubempre. 61
Vanquished by the simplicity of soul which shone
in Esther's voice, look, gestures, and attitude, Herrera
kissed her for the first time upon her forehead.
"The libertines have rightly named you," he said;
" you would seduce the very elect. A few days and
you shall both be free."
" Both ! " she repeated, in a tone of ecstasy.
This scene, viewed from a distance by the pupils
and the superiors, struck them with a sense that they
had looked upon some magical operation. The girl
was changed. She reappeared in her true nature of
love, — gentle, winning, affectionate, and gay ; in short,
she was resuscitated.
62 Lucien de Bubempre.
IV.
IN WHICH WE LEARN HOW MUCH OF A PRIEST THERE
WAS IN THE ABBE DON CARLOS HERRERA.
Herrera lived hi the rue Cassette, near Saint-
Sulpice, the church he had selected for his religious
duties. This church, cold and barren, suited a Span-
iard whose religion partook of that of the Dominicans.
A true son of the crafty policy of Ferdinand VII., he
was sent to do all the ill he could to the constitutional
cause, aware that this devotion could never be rewarded
until the restoration of the " Key netto." Carlos Her-
rera had given himself body and soul to the camarilla
at the moment when the Cortes seemed not likely to
be overthrown. To the world this conduct proclaimed
him a superior soul. The expedition of the Due
d'Angouleme took place, King Ferdinand reigned, but
Don Carlos Herrera did not return to Madrid to claim
the reward of his services. Protected against curiosity
by diplomatic silence, he gave as the reason of his
continued stay in Paris his strong affection for Lucien
de Rubempre, to which affection on the part of the
diplomatist the young man owed the ordinance of
the king permitting him to take the name and arms
of his mother's family.
Herrera lived, as live traditionally all priests em-
ployed on secret missions, very obscurely. He accom-
Lucien de Eubempre. 63
plished his religious duties at Saint-Sulpice, never went
out except on business, and then at night and in a car-
riage. The day was spent by him in the Spanish
siesta, which places sleep between the two repasts, and
occupies the very hours when Paris is most tumultuous
and busy. The Spanish cigar also played its part, and
consumed as much time as it did tobacco. Laziness
is a mask as well as gravity, which is also laziness.
Herrera lived in one wing of the house, on the second
floor ; Lucien occupied the other wing. The two suites
were separated, and also united, by the grand reception-
rooms, the ancient magnificence of which was equally
in harmony with the grave ecclesiastic and the youth-
ful poet. The court-yard of this mansion was gloomy.
Large trees shaded the garden. Silence and discreet
seclusion are always noticeable in the dwellings selected
by priests. Herrera's lodging can be described in one
word, — cells. That of Lucien, brilliant with luxury
and supplied with every refinement of comfort, com-
bined all requisites for the life of the dandy, poet, and
writer, ambitious, worldly, proud, and also vain, — a
careless being, yet desirous of order ; one of those in-
complete geniuses who have some force to desire and
to conceive (which are, perhaps, the same thing), but
are powerless to execute.
The two, Lucien and Herrera, formed a policy ;
in that, no doubt, lay the secret of their union.
Elderly men, in whom the action of life is displaced
and diverted into the sphere of abstract interests,
often feel the need of some fresh machine, some
young and ardent actor to accomplish their projects.
Richelieu long sought for a handsome moustached face
64 Lucien de Rubempre.
to attract and divert the women he had to manage.
Not comprehended by giddy youths, he was forced
to banish the mother of his master and frighten the
queen, after endeavoring vainly to make them each
in love with himself, — he being not of a style to
please queens. No matter what men may do, they
must, in a life of ambition, bring up sooner or later
against a woman, and at the moment usually when
they least expect it. However powerful a great states-
man may be, he needs a woman to oppose to a woman,
as the Dutch cut diamonds with diamonds. Rome, at
the summit of her power, obeyed this necessity. See
how the life of Mazarin, the Italian cardinal, was
dominant in another way than that of Richelieu.
Richelieu was opposed by the great lords, and laid
the axe at their roots ; he died at the height of his
power, worn out with the duel, in which he had had
no helper but a Capuchin monk. Mazarin was re-
pulsed by Noblesse and Bourgeoisie united, both armed
and sometimes victoriously able to put Royalty to
flight; but the servitor of Anne of Austria, though
he cut off no head, vanquished all France, and formed
Louis XIV., who accomplished Richelieu's work by
strangling the Noblesse with the golden bow-strings
of the harem of Versailles. Madame de Pompadour
dead, Choiseul was powerless.
Was Carlos Herrera imbued with such doctrines?
Did he do wisely for himself sooner than Richelieu
did? Had he chosen a Cinq-Mars in Lucien, — a
faithful Cinq-Mars? No one could answer these ques-
tions or measure the ambition of that Spaniard, nor
could any foresee what his end would be. These
Lucien de Bubempre. 65
inquiries put by those who were able to cast an eye
on this union, which was kept secret for some time,
tend towards the disclosure of a dreadful mystery,
the truth of which Lucien had only known within a
few days. Don Carlos was ambitious for both ; that
fact was plainly demonstrated to every one who knew
them, and all believed that Lucien was the natural son
of the priest.
Fifteen days after Lucien's reappearance at the
Opera, which cast him into the Parisian world sooner
than the abbe wished (for he wanted more time to arm
him against society), Lucien had three fine horses in
his stable ; # coupe for use at night, a cabriolet and
tilbury for the morning. He dined out daily. Her-
rera's expectations were realized ; dissipation laid hold
of his pupil, but he thought this needful to create a
diversion to the young man's desperate love for Esther.
But, after squandering some forty thousand francs in
folly, Lucien was only the more bent on recovering
Esther, for whom he searched pertinaciously ; not find-
ing her, she became to him what the game is to the hunter.
Could Herrera comprehend the nature of a poet's love?
When once that sentiment has entered the head of those
great little men as it has their heart and their senses,
the poet becomes as superior to humanity through love
as he is through the power of his fancy. Owing to a
caprice of the present generation the rare faculty of
expressing nature by images on which he imprints
both sentiment and ideas, the poet gives to his love
the wings of his mind ; he feels and' he paints, he
acts and he meditates, he multiplies his sensations by
thought, he triples present felicity by aspiration of the
5
66 Lucien de Bubempre.
future and memory of the past ; he mingles with his
love all the exquisite enjoyments of the soul which
make him the prince of artists. The passion of a
poet then becomes a great poem in which it often
happens that human proportions are surpassed. The
poet places his mistress higher than women desire to
be held. He changes, like the noble knight of La
Mancha, a girl of the fields to a princess. He puts
to his own use the wand with which he touches all
things and makes them marvellous ; he magnifies his
sensuous pleasures by his adorable instinct of the
ideal. Therefore this love is a model of passion; it
is excessive in everything, — in its hopes; in its despair,
in its anger, its sadness, its joy ; it flies, it bounds, it
creeps ; it resembles none of the agitations which lay
hold of common men ; it is to the bourgeois love what
the eternal torrent of the Alps is to the rivulet of the
plain. These rare geniuses are so seldom understood
that they waste their being on false hopes ; they con-
sume their vitality in the search for their ideal mis-
tresses ; they die like the beautiful insects adorned for
fetes of love by Nature, the great poet, and crushed
while yet virgin beneath the foot of some unconscious
passer. But, lo ! another danger ! When they meet
the form which responds to their spirit, — sometimes a
baker's girl, — they do as Raffaelle did, as the beauti-
ful insect does, they die for the Fornarina. Lucien had
reached this point. His poetic nature, necessarily ex-
treme in everything, in good as in evil, had divined
the angel in the prostitute, more smeared by corrup-
tion than corrupted ; he saw her white-winged, pure,
mysterious, as if she had made herself for him, divining
that he needed her thus.
Lucien de Eubempre. 67
Towards the end of the month of May, 1825, Lucien
had lost all his vivacity ; he no longer went out ; dined
daily with Herrera, was pensive, did some work, read
collections of diplomatic treaties, and sat like a Turk
on his divan smoking three or four hookas a day. His
groom employed more time in cleaning the tubes of the
pretty instrument than in currying the horses or deck-
ing them with roses for the Bois. The day on which
the Spaniard saw Lucien's forehead pallid, and recog-
nized the signs of illness from the madness of thwarted
love, he resolved to go to the bottom of this heart of
man upon which he had now built his own life.
On a fine evening, when Lucien, sitting in an arm-
chair, was idly gazing through the trees in the garden
at the setting sun, casting the mist of his perfumed
smoke in prolonged and regular exhalations, as pre-
occupied smokers do, he was suddenly drawn from his
revery by a heavy sigh. Looking up, he saw the abbe
standing before him with his arms crossed.
** So you are there," he said.
"And have been for some time," replied the priest.
" My thoughts have been following yours."
Lucien understood the meaning of the words.
" I never claimed to have an iron nature like yours,"
he said. "Life is to me, by turns, first heaven and
then hell ; but when, by chance, it is neither the one
nor the other, then it bores me ; I am bored."
" Why? — when you have so many magnificent pros-
pects before you?"
"When one does not believe in such prospects, or
when they are too mysteriously veiled — "
"No nonsense!" said the priest. "It would be
68 Lucien de Ruhempre.
far more worthy of you and of me if you opened your
heart to me. There is between us what ought never
to have been, a secret. This secret has lasted sixteen
months. You love — "
"Goon."
" — a depraved girl, whom they call La Torpille."
"Well?"
" My son, I permitted you to take a mistress ; but a
woman in society, young, handsome, influential, and of
rank. I chose for you Madame d'Espard, so that you
might have no scruple in making her a stepping-stone
of fortune ; she would never have perverted your heart,
she would have left you free. But to love a prostitute
of the lowest kind when you have not, like kings, the
power of ennobling her, is a monstrous fault."
" Am I the first who has renounced ambition to
follow the bent of an ungovernable love?"
" Ah ! " said the priest, picking up the mouth-piece
of the hookah which Lucien had let drop, and handing
it to him. "I note the sarcasm. But why not com-
bine both ambition and love? Child, you have in your
old Herrera a mother whose devotion is boundless."
" I know it, old friend," said Lucien, pressing the
priest's hand and shaking it.
" You wanted the gewgaws of wealth, and you have
them. You wanted to shine, and I have guided you
into a path of power. I have kissed many dirty hands
for your advancement, and you can advance. A little
more time, and you will lack nothing that can please
and delight either man or woman. Effeminate through
your caprices, you are virile in mind ; I know yon
wholly, and I pardon all. You have only to say the
Lucien de Eubempre. 69
word and all your passions of the hour shall be satisfied.
I have enlarged your life by putting upon it that which
will make it admired by the greater number, the seal
of statecraft and dominion. You shall be as great as
you once were small. But we must not break the ma-
chine with which we coin the money. I allow all, except
the faults which compromise your future. When I
open to you the salons of the faubourg Saint-Germain,
I forbid you to rake in the gutters. Lucien ! I stand
like a bar of iron in defence of your interests ; I will
endure all from you, for you. I have converted your
weak throw in the game of life into the successful play
of a practised gambler."
Lucien raised his head with an abrupt and furious
motion.
" I carried off La Torpille."
" You ! " cried Lucien.
In a passion of animal rage Lucien bounded up,
threw the jewelled mouth-piece in the face of the priest,
and pushed him so violently as to throw over that
athletic form.
"I," said the Spaniard, rising and still preserving
his terrible gravity.
The black wig had fallen off. A skull, polished like
that of a death's head, restored to the man his true
physiognomy : it was terrifying. Lucien remained on
his divan, with hanging arms, overwhelmed, gazing at
the abbe with stupid eyes.
" I carried her off," repeated the priest.
" What have you done with her? Did you carry her
away the day after the masked ball ? "
" Yes, the day after I saw a being who belonged to
70 Lucien de Rubempre.
you insulted by rascals whom I would not stoop to
even kick — "
"Rascals!" said Lucien, interrupting him; "say
rather monsters, beside whom criminals who are guil-
lotined are angels. Do you know what that poor girl
had done for three of them ? One was for two months
her lover ; she was poor and earned her bread in the
gutter; he himself had not a penny, — like me when
you met me near the river. The fellow got up in the
night and went to the closet where she kept the
remains of her scanty dinner and ate them. She ended
by discovering this act ; she felt the shame of it ; after
that she left much more of her food for him ; it made
her happy. She told this to me, to me only, as we
drove back that night from the Opera. The second
had robbed a friend, but before the theft could be
discovered she lent him the money to replace it, which
he has never returned to her. As for the third, she
made his fortune by playing a comedy -worthy of the
genius of Figaro ; she passed for his wife and made
herself the mistress of a man in power, who thought
her the most honest of bourgeoises. To one she gave
life, to another honor, to the third fortune ; and see
how they rewarded her."
" Shall they die? " said Herrera in a muffled voice.
" Ah, there you are ! I know you now — "
" No, not yet ; hear all, peevish poet! La Torpille
no longer exists."
Lucien sprang upon Herrera so vigorously to catch
him by the throat that any other man w r ould have
been knocked down, but the Spaniard was on his
guard, and his arm held Lucien back.
Lucien de Rubemjpre. 71
" Listen," he said coldly. "I have made a chaste,
religious, well-trained woman of her ; a well-bred
woman ; she is in the road to farther improvement.
She may, she should, become under the empire of your
love, a Ninon, a Marion Delorme, a Dubarry, as that
journalist said at the Opera. You can admit that she
is your mistress, or you can stay behind the curtain,
which would be the wiser way ; either way will bring
you profit, pleasure, and progress. But if you are as
worldly-wise a man as you are a great poet, Esther
will be no more to you than a sister, for later, mark
my words, she will extricate us from some difficulty,
or play some great card for us ; she is worth her weight
in gold. Drink, if you will, but do not get drunk.
If I had not taken the reins of your passion into my
own hands, where would you be now? Here, read,"
said Herrera, as simply as Talma in " Manlius," which
he had never seen.
A paper fell upon the poet's knees, and drew him
from the stupefied surprise into which this speech had
thrown him. He took and read the first letter ever
written by Esther : —
To Monsieur I'Abbe Carlos Herrera :
My dear Protector, — Will you not believe that grati-
tude goes before love in my heart when you see that it is to
thank you that I employ, for the first time, the faculty of
expressing my thoughts in writing, instead of spending it in
trying to describe a love which Lucien has, perhaps, for-
gotten. But I will tell to you, a man of God, what I dare
not tell to him, — to him who, for my happiness, is here on
earth. The ceremony of yesterday has poured treasures of
grace and mercy into my soul, and again I place my destiny
72 Lucien de RuhemprS.
in your hands. If I am to die parted from my beloved, I
shall die purified, like the Magdalen, and my soul will be-
come to him the rival of his guardian angel. Can I ever
forget the festival of yesterday ? How could I ever abdicate
the glorious throne to which I rose ? Yesterday I cleansed
my sins, visibly, in the waters of baptism ; I received the
sacred body of our Saviour ; I became one of his tabernacles.
At that moment I heard the songs of angels ; I was more
than a woman ; I was borne to a life of light on a cloud
of incense and prayers, decked like a virgin for a celestial
spouse. Feeling myself — what I never hoped to be — wor-
thy of Lucien, I abjured unworthy love ; I will walk in no
other paths than those of virtue. If my body is more feeble
than my soul, let it perish. Be the arbiter of my fate;
guide me. And if I die, tell Lucien that I died for him in
being born to God.
Sunday evening.
Lucien raised his tearful eyes to the abbe.
" You know the apartment of little Caroline Belle-
feuille in the rue Taitbout," said the Spaniard. " That
poor girl, abandoned by her magistrate, was in great
distress ; they were about to put an execution in the
house. I have bought it, furniture and all. Esther,
that angel who talked of rising to the skies, is there,
and you can find her."
Lucien had no strength to express his gratitude ; he
flung himself into the arms of the man he had latel} 7
attacked, repaired the insult with a look and the mute
effusion of his feelings. Then he rushed down the stairs,
threw Esther's address to his groom, and the horses
started as if their master's passion inspired their legs.
The next day a man, whom the passers might have
judged from his dress to be a disguised gendarme, was
Lucien de Bubempre. 73
walking up and down the rue Taitbout, looking at a
house from which he seemed to expect some one to
issue ; his step was that of a man under excitement.
You will often meet such preoccupied pedestrians in
Paris : either real gendarmes, watching some national
guard, who is avoiding arrest for misdemeanor; or
creditors, waiting to affront a debtor, who keeps him-
self carefully immured at home ; or lovers and hus-
bands, jealous and suspicious ; or friends, standing
sentinel in behalf of friends. But you will seldom
meet a face gleaming with the savage wickedness that
lighted that of the sombre athlete who paced the street
beneath Esther's windows like a bear in a cage.
About mid-day a window was opened and the blinds
thrown back by a woman's hand, and Esther looked
out to breathe the air. Lucien was beside her. Any
one who had seen them would have been reminded of
an English vignette. Esther instantly caught the basi-
lisk eyes of the Spanish priest, and the poor creature,
struck by their expression as by a curse, gave a cry
of fear.
" The priest is there," she said to Lucien.
11 He," he said, smiling, — " he is no more a priest
than you are ! "
" What is he, then? " she asked, terrified.
"Ha! an old heathen, who believes neither in God
nor in the devil," replied Lucien, letting a gleam of
light escape him on the secrets of the priest, which
might have ruined them both with any other listener
than Esther.
As they entered the dining-room, where their break-
fast was served, the lovers met Herrera.
74 Lucien de Ruhempre.
" Why are you here? " asked Lucien.
"To bless you!" replied that powerful individual,
stopping the couple and obliging them to go back into
the salon. " Listen, my young lovers ! Amuse your-
selves, be happy, — that 's all very well. Happiness
at any price, — that 's my doctrine. But you," he said,
addressing Esther, — "you whom I dragged from the
mud and washed, body and soul, — you must not ven-
ture to put yourself across the path of Lucien's ad-
vancement. As for you," he added, after a pause,
looking at Lucien, " you are no longer a mere poet, to
let yourself be sunk in a new Coralie. We are making
prose, now. What can the lover of Esther become?
Nothing. Can Esther be Madame de Rubempre ? No.
Well, then, the world, my dear," — he placed his hand
on that of Esther, who shuddered and shrank from
him as if touched by a snake, — " if you love Lucien,
the world must be ignorant of your existence ; above
all, it must never know that Esther loves Lucien and
Lucien loves her. This house will be your prison, my
little girl. If you wish to go out, and your health
requires it, it must be at night, and in a way that you
cannot be seen ; for your beauty, your youth, and the
distinction you have acquired in the convent would be
instantly remarked upon. The day when any one, no
matter who," he said, in a terrible tone, accompanied
by a still more terrible glance, " discovers that Lucien
is your lover, that day will be your last on earth. An
ordinance has been procured for that young man which
permits him to bear the name and arms of his maternal
ancestors. That is not all ; the title of marquis has
not yet been granted to him. To recover it, he must
Lucien de Rubempre. 75
marry the daughter of a noble house, to whom the
king will grant that favor. This alliance will put
Lucien into the society of the court. This youth, of
whom I have made a man, will become, first, the secre-
tary of an embassy, and later, an ambassador to one
of the German courts ; and God — or I, which is more
to the purpose — aiding him, he will sit some day on
the bench of peers — "
" Or the bench of — " said Lucien, interrupting the
so-called priest.
" Silence ! " said Carlos, standing in front of Lucien.
" Such secrets before a woman ! " he whispered.
"Esther, a woman of that kind! " cried the author
of the " Daisies."
"Sonnets!" sneered the priest. "All such angels
come down to being women, sooner or later. All
women have times when they are monkeys and chil-
dren in one ; two beings who can kill us while they
amuse us. Esther, my jewel," he said, to the horror-
stricken girl, "I have engaged a maid for you, — a
creature who belongs to me as if she were my own
daughter. You will also have as cook a mulatto
woman ; she will give a certain air to your establish-
ment. With Europe and Asia (those are the names by
which I call them) you can live here for two thousand
francs a month, all told, like a queen, — a theatre queen.
Europe has been a dress-maker, milliner, and super-
numerary ; Asia was a cook to a gormandizing milord.
These two women will be your household fairies."
Seeing Lucien a mere babe before this strange being,
who was guilty at any rate of sacrilege and forgery,
the poor woman felt an awful terror and despair to the
76 Lucien de Bubempre.
very depths of her heart. She could not speak, but
dragged Lucien away to the inner room, and whis-
pered, "Is he the devil?"
" Far worse — for me," he said, passionately. " But
if you love me, obey him under pain of death."
" Death?" she echoed, still more terrified.
" Death," repeated Lucien. "Alas, my sweetest, no
death could be compared to that which would befall
me if — "
Esther turned deathly pale as she heard these words
and felt herself faltering.
" Well ! " cried the false abbe, " have n't you pulled
all the leaves from your daisies yet?"
Lucien and Esther returned to the salon, and the
poor girl said, without daring to look at the mysterious
man: u You will be obeyed, monsieur, as we obey
God."
" Right," he replied, " now you may be happy for a
certain time at any rate. You will want but few
clothes," he added, " as you never go out except at
night ; that will be economical." The lovers again
turned toward the dining-room ; but Lucien's master
made a gesture which arrested them. " I spoke of
your servants, my dear," he said to Esther; " I will
now present them to you."
The Spaniard rang twice. The two women whom he
had named Europe and Asia appeared, and the reason
of their nicknames was at once apparent.
Lucien de Eubempre. 77
V.
TWO WATCH-DOGS.
Asia, who appeared to have been born on the island
of Java, presented to the eye, as if to alarm it instantly,
the copper visage peculiar to the Malays, flat as a board,
the nose seeming to have been pushed in by some power-
ful compression. The singular position of the maxillary
bones gave to the lower part of the face a strong re-
semblance to that of the larger species of ape. The
forehead, though retreating, was not without a certain
intelligence produced by cunning. Two flaming little
eyes had the calmness of those of tigers ; but they
never looked you in the face. Asia seemed to be
afraid of terrifying her companions. The lips, of a
pale blue, disclosed teeth of dazzling whiteness, but
overlapping. The general expression of this animal
countenance was villanous. Her hair, shining and oily
like the skin of the face, lay in two black bands on
either side of a rich silken turban. Her ears, extremely
pretty, had in them two large brown pearls for orna-
ment. Short and thick-set, Asia resembled certain
comical figures which the Chinese permit themselves
to paint on their boxes ; or rather, to speak more pre-
cisely, to those Hindu idols, the type of which we
think could never exist until some traveller meets with
it. Seeing this monster, dressed in a stuff gown and
a white apron, Esther shuddered.
78 Lucien de Eubempre.
" Asia/' said the Spaniard, to whom the woman
raised her head with a movement that was comparable
to that of a dog looking at his master ; M this is your
mistress."
He pointed to Esther in her morning-gown. Asia
looked at the young sylph with an expression that was
somewhat sorrowful ; though at the same time a stifled
gleam shot from her half -closed eyelids at Lucien, who
looked divinely handsome at that moment. Italian
genius may invent the tale of Othello, and English
genius may show it on the stage, but nature alone is
able to put into the human glance the complete and
magnificent expression of jealousy. Esther saw it,
and she gripped the Spaniard by the arm, setting in
her nails as a cat would have clung to save itself from
falling down a precipice. The Spaniard said three or
four words in an unknown language to the Asiatic
monster, who at once knelt down at Esther's feet
and kissed them.
" She can cook in away to put Careme beside him-
self," said the Spaniard to Esther. ** Asia knows how
to do everything. She will send up a simple dish of
vegetables which will make you wonder if the angels
have not been down from heaven to add some celestial
herb to it. She goes to market every morning herself,
and fights like the devil that she is, to get things
at the lowest price. Moreover, she will tire out all
inquisitive people with her discretion. As you are to
be thought to have come from India, Asia's presence
will assist the fable ; she 's a Parisian born to be of
any country she chooses — though my advice to you is
not to be a foreigner. Europe, what say you? "
Lucien de Bubempre. 79
Europe was a perfect contrast to Asia, being as
trig a little soubrette as Monrose ever desired for an
opponent on the stage. Slim, and apparently giddy,
with a sharp little nose and the face of a weasel,
Europe presented to all observers a face worn out by
Parisian corruptions ; the wan, tired face of a girl fed
on raw apples, lymphatic yet wiry, slack but tenacious.
With her little foot advanced, her hands in the pockets
of her apron, she wriggled while standing still, out of
mere excitability. A grisette and a figurante, she must,
in spite of her youth, have played various roles in life.
Naturally depraved, like so many of her kind, she may
have robbed her parents or sat on the benches of the
correctional police. Asia inspired fear, but she was
known for what she was in a moment ; she descended
in a direct line from Locusta ; whereas Europe inspired
a perpetual anxiety, which could only deepen as her
service continued ; her corruption seemed to have no
limit; she would, as the saying is, have balked at
nothing.
"Perhaps madame comes from Valenciennes," said
Europe, in a hard, thin voice. " I do. Will monsieur
please to tell us," she added, addressing Lucien, " what
name he gives to madame? "
11 Madame van Bogseck," said the Spaniard, revers-
ing two letters in Esther's name. " Madame is a
Jewess, originally from Holland, the widow of a mer-
chant, and ill of a liver complaint brought back from
Java. Of no great fortune to excite curiosity — "
M Only enough to live on, and we are to complain of
her economies," suggested Europe.
"Precisely," said the Spaniard, nodding his head.
80 Lucien de Bubempre.
" Imps of Satan ! " be cried in his terrible voice, de-
tecting looks between Europe and Asia which displeased
him ; u remember what I have told you ; you serve a
queen ; and you are to serve her with devotion, as you
would me. Neither the porter, nor the neighbors, nor
any one else is to know what passes here. It is your
business to mislead curiosity, should any be shown.
And madame," he continued, putting his large hairy
hand on Esther's arm, " madame must not commit the
smallest imprudence ; you will prevent it if need be,
but — always respectfully. Europe, I place you in
relation with the outside world ; you will attend to
madame's dress and purchases ; be careful to practise
economy. Lastly, let no one, not the most insignificant
persons, set foot in this apartment. Between you two
the work of taking care of it must be done. My little
beauty," he said to Esther, " when you want to go out
in the evening tell Europe ; she knows where to get
you a carriage, and you will have a chasseur at your
orders, — one of my choosing," he added, " like the
other two."
Esther and Lucien were unable to say a word. They
listened to the Spaniard and gazed at the two strange
characters to whom he gave his orders. To what secret
power did he owe the submission, the devotion written
upon their faces, one so wickedly rebellious, the other
so profoundly cruel? He guessed the thoughts of
Esther and of Lucien, who seemed paralyzed, as Paul
and Virginia might have been at the sight of two
horrible serpents ; and he whispered in their ears in
a kinder voice : —
"You can trust them as you can me; keep no
Lucien de Eubempre. 81
secrets from them ; that will flatter them. Come,
Asia," he said, smiling, "serve the breakfast; and
you, my little Europe, put me a knife and fork ; the
least these children can do is to invite papa to a
meal."
When the two women had closed the door and the
Spaniard heard Europe going and coming in the ad-
joining room, he said to Lucien and the young girl,
opening and shutting his large hand, " I hold them ! "
a saying and gesture which made them tremble.
" Where did you find them? " cried Lucien.
"Eh! parbleu!" replied the man, " I did not look
for them on the steps of the throne. Such as they
come from the mud, and they fear to go back into it.
Threaten them with monsieur Vabbe if they don't do
as you wish ; you '11 see them tremble like mice that
hear the cat. I 'm a tamer of wild beasts," he said,
laughing.
" You seem to me a demon," cried Esther, shrinking
to Lucien' s side.
* ' My child, I attempted to give you to heaven ; but
the repentant Magdalen will always baffle the Church.
If there is such a being she '11 return to her ways in
paradise. You have gained something, however. You
learned, over there, things that you never could have
known in the infamous sphere in which you lived, —
how to behave like a well-bred woman, how to conduct
yourself. You owe me nothing," he exclaimed, seeing
the expression of gratitude that overspread Esther's
face. "I did it all for him," pointing to Lucien.
"You are a courtesan, and a courtesan you will con-
tinue to be, for, in spite of the theories of those who
82 Lucien de Bubempri.
raise cattle, no living being can become in this world
anything but what he is. The man of the bumps is
right ; you have the bump of love."
The Spaniard was, as we see, a fatalist, like Napo-
leon, like Mohammed, and many other great states-
men. Strangely enough, nearly all men of action
incline to Fatalism, while the majority of thinkers
incline to Providence.
44 I don't know what I am," replied Esther, with the
gentleness of an angel, "but I love Lucien, and I
shall die loving him."
" Come to breakfast," said the Spaniard, roughly,
44 and pray to heaven that Lucien may not be married
soon, for when he does marry you will never see him
again."
44 His marriage will be my death," she said.
She let the false priest enter the dining-room before
her that she might lift herself to Lucien's ear unseen.
44 Is it your will," she asked, 44 that I shall remain
under the power of that man who puts those two
hyenas to watch me ? "
Lucien bowed his head. The poor girl instantly
repressed her sadness and seemed joyful ; but she
was horribly oppressed at heart. It required more
than a year of constant and devoted care before she
could accustom herself to the presence of the terrible
creatures whom Herrera called his watch-dogs.
Lucien's conduct since his return to Paris in com-
pany with the Abbe Don Carlos Herrera had been
marked by a policy so deep and calculated that it was
certain to excite, and did excite, the jealous ill-will of
all his former friends, towards whom he attempted no
Lucien de Bubempre. 83
other vengeance than that of making them furious by
his success, his irreproachable style of living, and his
method of keeping them all at a distance. The author
of "Daisies," the poet once so expansive, so commu-
nicative, became cold and reserved. De Marsay, that
type adopted by Parisian youth, did not impart to his
actions and to his conversation more reserve than did
Lucien. As for his wit, the author and journalist had
already proved that. De Marsay, to whom some per-
sons compared Lucien, giving their preference to the
poet, was petty enough to be annoyed by it. Lucien,
who was much in favor with men in secret possession
of governmental power, abandoned so completely all
desire for literary fame that he was quite indifferent
to the success of his novel, republished under its
original name, " The Archer of Charles X.," and to
the noise made by his collection of sonnets, sold off
by Dauriat in a single week.
"A posthumous success," he said, laughing, to
Mademoiselle des Touches, who complimented him.
The terrible Spaniard held his creature with an arm
of iron in the path which ends in the flourish of trum-
pets and profits that await the patient politician.
Lucien had taken the apartment of Baudenord on the
quai Malaquais, so as to be nearer to the rue Taitbout.
The abbe had three rooms in the same house on the
fourth floor. Lucien kept only one horse for saddle
and cabriolet, one servant, and a groom. When he
did not dine out he dined with Esther. The abbe
kept so close a watch on the household of the quai
Malaquais, that Lucien did not spend in all more than
ten thousand francs a year. Ten thousand francs suf-
84 Lucien de Rubempre.
ficed for Esther, thanks to the unremitting and inex-
plicable devotion of Europe and Asia. Lucien adopted
great precaution in going to and from the rue Taitbout ;
always going there in a hackney coach and driving into
the court-yard. His passion for Esther, and the exist-
ence of the household in the rue Taitbout remained
therefore unknown to the world, and were no injury to
any of his political relations and enterprises. No word
on the subject ever escaped him. His faults of that
kind with Coralie had given him experience. His
daily life had the regularity of good society, behind
which many a mystery can be hid. He was always
to be found at home in the morning from ten o'clock
to half-past one ; then he went to the Bois or paid
visits till five ; and he stayed in society at parties or
theatres every night till one in the morning. He was
seldom seen on foot, and thus he avoided his former
acquaintances. When he was saluted by certain jour-
nalists and old comrades he replied by an inclination
of the head, civil enough to make it impossible to be
angry, yet expressive of that cutting disdain which
puts an end to all friendly familiarity. He soon rid
himself in this way of men whom he no longer wished
to know. His old hatred kept him from going to see
Madame d'Espard, who had several times made ad-
vances to receive him ; but when he met her at the
houses of the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse, Mademoi-
selle des Touches, the Comtesse de Montcornet and
others, he treated her with exquisite politeness. This
hatred, shared by Madame d'Espard, compelled Lucien
to practise some prudence, for we shall see how he
deepened it in the marquise by allowing himself a
Lucien de Bubempre. 85
piece of revenge, which won him, moreover, a strong
lecture from the abbe.
" You are not yet powerful enough to revenge your-
self on any one, no matter who," said the Spaniard.
" When we are travelling under a hot sun, there's no
stopping to gather flowers."
There was too much future promise and too much
real superiority in Lucien not to make the young men
whom his sudden return to Paris with a fortune daz-
zled and galled, delighted to do him some ill-natured
turn. Lucien, who knew he had enemies, was not igno-
rant of these intentions ; for the abbe was constantly
warning his adopted son against the treachery of the
world and the imprudence so fatal to youth. Lucien
was made to relate the events of each day to him.
Thanks to the counsels of this mentor, the young man
baffled the keenest of all curiosities, — that of society.
Protected by his newly acquired English gravity, sup-
ported by the redoubts thrown up by diplomatic cir-
cumspection, he gave no one the right or the occasion
to cast an eye on his affairs. His young and beautiful
face had ended by becoming as impassible in society
as that of a princess at a public ceremony.
At the beginning of the year 1829, nearly five years
after the period at which we have taken up this portion
of his history, a prospect presented itself of his mar-
riage to the eldest daughter of the Duchesse de Grand-
lieu, who had no less than four daughters to establish.
No one doubted that the king, in view of such an alli-
ance, would graciously restore to him the title of mar-
quis. Such a marriage would secure his political
fortunes ; for he would probably be sent at once as
86 Lucien de Bubempre.
ambassador to a German court. For the last four
years, especially, Lucien's conduct had been absolutely
irreproachable, thanks to the abbe's scheme, so that
de Marsay, that acute social observer, said of him,
" That fellow must have some very strong individual
behind him."
Lucien had become almost a personage. His passion
for Esther had aided him not a little in playing the
part of a serious man. A habit of that kind guaran-
tees an ambitious man from much folly ; caring for no
other woman, he is not caught by reactions of the
physical over the mental. As to the happiness enjoyed
by Lucien, it was the realization of the penniless poet's
dream in a garret. Esther, while reminding him of
Coralie, completely effaced her. All loving and devoted
women want seclusion, — the life of the pearl in the
depths of ocean ; but, with most of them, this is only
a charming caprice, a temporary pleasure to be talked
of, a proof of love which they dream of giving, but
only give for a short while, — whereas Esther, always
on the morrow of her first happiness, living at all
hours for Lucien only, had no impulse of curiosity or
desire for change in four years. She gave her whole
mind to remaining under the terms of the agreement
laid down for her by the fatal hand of the false abbe.
Neither did she ever use her power over Lucien to ask
him a single question about Herrera, who, indeed, so
terrified her imagination that she dared not think of
him. The cautious benefits of that inexplicable per-
sonage, to whom Esther certainly owed her rescue, her
training, the habits of respectable life, and her regen-
eration, seemed to the girl like advances from hell.
Lucien de Bubempre. 87
" I must pay for them some day," she said to her-
self in terror.
On fine evenings she drove out in a hired carriage,
always to one of those charming woods in the vicinity
of Paris, — Boulogne, Vincennes, Romainville, or Ville
d'Avray, — often with Lucien, sometimes alone with
Europe. When there she walked about quite fearlessly,
for if Lucien was not with her, she was accompanied
by a chasseur, whose muscle was that of an athlete.
This third keeper carried, like English footmen, a cane
called bdton de longueur, known to all players of single-
stick, with which he could defy assailants. In accord-
ance with an order given by the abbe, Esther had never
spoken to this man, whose name was Paccard.
Parisians, especially Parisian women, know nothing
of the charm of driving out into the woods of a
fine night. The silence, the solitude, the balmy air,
the moonlight, have the calming effect of a bath.
Usually Esther started at ten o'clock, and returned
about half-past two. She was late, therefore, in the
morning, being seldom up before eleven. Then she
bathed, and went through the minutiae of the toilet,
ignored by most of the busy women of Paris as taking
too much time, and practised only by great ladies and
courtesans who have time on their hands. She was
never ready until Lucien came, and then she seemed to
him like a flower freshly opened. She had no thought
in life but his happiness ; she was his as a part of his
being ; as such she left him the most absolute freedom.
Never did she attempt to cast a glance beyond the
sphere in which they lived. Happiness has no history,
and the tellers of tales in all lands know this so well
88 Lucicn de Bubcmpre.
that they wind up their stories with one sentence, —
" They were happy."
Lucien was thus at liberty to live as he pleased in
society, and to follow out what seemed to be the ne-
cessities of liis position. During these years, when he
slowly made his way, he rendered secret services to
certain statesmen by aiding their work. In this he
showed the utmost discretion. He cultivated, more
especially, the society of Madame de Serizy, with
whom, indeed, the salons averred he was on the most
intimate terms. Madame de Serizy had won Lucien
away from the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse, who, it was
said, no longer cared for him, — a reason given by
many women to explain a defeat. Lucien was, so to
speak, in the bosom of the Church, being intimate with
several women who were friends of the archbishop of
Paris. Reserved and discreet, he bided his time pa-
tiently. The speech we have quoted of de Marsay
(who by this time was married, and made his wife lead
the same secluded life that Esther led) contained more
than one observation. But the submarine dangers that
threatened Lucien's position will appear in the course
of this history without further explanation.
Lucien de Eubempre. 89
VI.
AN ABYSS OPENS BENEATH ESTHER* S FEET.
Such were the circumstances when, on a fine night
in the month of June, 1829, the Baron de Nucingen
was returning to Paris from the country-seat of a
brother-banker with whom he had dined. The estate
was in Brie, twenty-four miles from Paris, and as the
baron's coachman had boasted of being able to take
his master there and back with the same horses, he
naturally drove slowly on the way home. As the car-
riage entered the wood of Vincennes the coachman,
liberally treated at the banker's chateau, was drunk,
and sound asleep though he held the reins. The foot-
man behind was snoring like a top. The baron wanted
to think ; but the gentle somnolence of digestion laid
hold of him on the bridge at Gournay. By the slack-
ness of tile reins the horses understood the coachman's
state ; they heard the bass of the footman's nose, they
felt they were masters of the situation, and they
profited by this brief half-hour of liberty to go as they
pleased. Presently, overcome by the curiosity which
everybody must have remarked in domestic animals,
they stopped short to examine some other animals, to
whom, no doubt, they said in equine language: "To
whom do you belong? What do you have to do?
Are you happy ? "
When the carriage rolled no longer the baron woke
up. At first he knew not where he was ; then he was
90 Lucien de Rubempre.
surprised by a celestial vision, which came to him, as
nothing else had ever done, without calculation. The
moon was so bright he could have read by it ; in the
silence of the woods at that still hour he saw a woman
alone, who, as she was getting into a hired carriage,
took notice of the singular spectacle of the sleepy
caleche. At sight of this vision the baron felt as
though illuminated by an inward light. Seeing herself
admired, the young woman lowered her veil with a
frightened gesture. The chasseur uttered a hoarse
order, and the carriage rolled rapidly away. The
baron was conscious of an inward convulsion ; the
blood rushed like fire from his feet to his head, his head
sent back the flame to his heart, his throat contracted.
The unfortunate man feared an apoplectic indigestion ;
but, notwithstanding that fear, he sprang to his feet.
"Follow that carriage!" he cried in his German
accent. "A hundred francs if you overtake it!"
At the words " a hundred francs," the coachman
woke up ; the footman behind heard them in his
dreams. The baron repeated the order, the coachman
put his horses to a gallop, and succeeded in overtaking
at the Barriere du Trdne a hired carriage similar to the
one in which the baron had seen his angel, but which
contained the head clerk of a celebrated shop with a
lady from the rue Vivienne. The blunder was con-
sternation to the baron.
The Baron de Nucingen was at this time sixty years
of age, and absolutely indifferent to all women, includ-
ing his wife. He boasted of never having known the
love that makes a man commit follies. He regarded it
as a happiness to have done with women, the best of
Lucien de Rubempre. 91
whom, he was in the habit of saying, were not worth
what they cost. Natural love, artificial love, and self-
love, love of ease and of vanity, decent love and con-
jugal love, eccentric love, the baron had bought all,
and knew all, except real love. This love had now
descended upon him as an eagle swoops upon its prey,
as it descended upon Gentz, the confidant of Prince
Metternich. We all know the follies that old diplo-
mat committed for Fanny Ellsler, whose rehearsals
took much more of his time than European interests.
The woman who had just convulsed the iron-lined
money-box called Nucingen appeared to him as one
of those women who are unique in their generation.
It is not certain that Titian's mistress, or Leonardo's
Mona Lisa, or Raffaelle's Fornarina was more beau-
tiful than Esther, in whom the most practised Parisian
eye could no longer detect a sign of the courtesan.
The baron was, above all, bewildered and dazzled by
the air of nobility and distinction which Esther now
possessed in the highest degree. During the whole of
the following week he went nightly to the Bois de Vin-
cennes ; then to the Bois de Boulogne ; then to Ville
d'Avray, and the woods of Meudon ; in short, to all
the environs of Paris, without ever meeting Esther.
That splendid Jewish figure, which he said was "a
form out of the Bible," was always before his eyes,
and in the end he lost health and appetite.
Delphine de Nucingen was in the habit of giving
Sunday dinners. She had taken that day for her
receptions, having remarked that in the great world
no one went to the theatres on Sunday, and that the
day was generally an unemployed one. The invasion
92 Lucien de Rubempre.
of the shopkeeping and bourgeois classes have made
Sunday as silly a day in Paris as it is wearisome in
London. The company at one of these dinners (about
three weeks after Nucingen's chance meeting with
Esther) consisted of Desplein, the famous surgeon,
Keller, Rastignac, de Marsay, du Tillet, all friends of
t{ie house, the Comte de Gondreville, father-in law
of Francois Keller, the Chevalier d'Espard, des Lu-
peaulx, Horace Bianchon, Desplein's favorite pupil,
Beaudenord and his wife, the Comte and Comtesse de
Montcornet, Blondet, Mademoiselle des Touches and
Konti, and finally Lucien de Rubempre, for whom
Rastignac had for the last five years shown the warmest
friendship, by order, as the advertisements say.
"We shall never get rid of that man easily," said
Blondet to Rastignac, as Lucien entered the room,
handsomer and more fastidiously dressed than ever.
" You had better make a friend of him, for he is
formidable," replied Rastignac.
" He? " said de Marsay. " I never heard of people
being formidable unless their position was clear ; and
his is more unattacked than unassailable. What does
he live on ? Where does his money come from ? He
has, to my knowledge, some sixty thousand francs of
debt upon him."
" He has found a rich protector in a Spanish priest,
who has taken a fancy to him," said Rastignac.
" He is to marry the eldest Mademoiselle de Grand-
lieu," said Mademoiselle des Touches.
"Yes; but," said the Chevalier d'Espard, "he is
required to buy an estate with a revenue of thirty
thousand francs a year to secure the sum he settles on
Lucien de Riibempre. 93
the bride. To do that he Deeds a million, — more than
he can pick up at the feet of any Spaniard."
"That's a large price, for Clotilde is very plain,"
said Madame de Nucingen, who gave herself the airs
of calling Mademoiselle de Grandlieu by her Christian
name, as if she, nee Goriot, frequented that society.
"No," remarked du Tillet, "the daughter of a
duchess is never plain to such men as we, above all
when she gives us the title of marquis and a diplomatic
post."
"I am no longer surprised at Lucien's gravity,"
said de Marsay. " Most likely he has n't a sou, and
does n't know how to get out of his position."
"But Mademoiselle de Grandlieu adores him," said
the Comtesse de Montcornet, " and, by her influence,
he may be able to make better conditions."
" What will he do with that sister and brother-in-
law in Angouleme? " asked the Chevalier d'Espard.
"The sister is rich," answered Rastignac, " and he
calls her now Madame Sechard de Marsac."
" Well, even if there are difficulties in his way, he's
a handsome fellow," said Bianchon, rising to bow to
the young man.
" Good-evening, dear friend," said Rastignac, ex-
changing a warm shake of the hand with Lucien.
De Marsay bowed coldly, after Lucien had bowed
to him.
Before dinner, Desplein and Bianchon took notice
of the evident illness of the Baron de Nucingen, per-
ceiving however that the cause was mental. Bianchon
declared, impossible as it seemed that this statesman
of the Bourse should be in love, that the root of the
94 Lucien de Eubempre.
trouble lay there. After dinner, when the company
dispersed about the garden, the intimates of the house
surrounded the banker, endeavoring to clear up the
mystery as soon as Biauchon had broached his theory.
" Do you know, baron," said de Marsay, " that you
are losing flesh rapidly ; and people suspect you of
violating the laws of financial nature?"
" Never ! " said the baron.
"Yes, they do," returned de Marsay. "They say
you are in love."
"That is true," said Nucingen, piteously. " I sigh
for an unknown object."
" You in love ! you ! " cried the Chevalier d'Espard.
" What fatuity ! "
" I know that nothing was ever more ridiculous than
to be in love at my age," said the baron, in his ludi-
crous German accent. " But I can't help it, the thing
is done."
4 ' Is it a woman in society?" asked Lucien.
" Of course," said de Marsay, " the baron would n't
get so thin except for a hopeless love ; he has money
enough to buy up all the women who could or would
sell themselves."
" I don't know who she is," said Nucingen. "I can
tell you one thing, — because Madame de Nucingen is
in the salon, — 1 have never known till now what love
is. It is enough to make me lose flesh."
" Where did you see her? " asked Rastignac.
"In a carriage, at midnight, in the Bois de Vin-
cennes."
" Describe her," said de Marsay.
" A bodice of white gauze, a rose-colored gown, a
Lucien de Bubempre. 95
white scarf, white veil, — a figure truly biblical ! eyes
of fire, an Eastern skin — "
" You dreamed it," said Lucien, laughing.
" It is true I was sleeping like a — "
" Was she alone? " asked du Tillet, interrupting the
banker's sentence.
" Yes," said the baron, in a dolorous tone, " except
for a chasseur behind the carriage, and a waiting-
maid."
u Lucien looks as if he knew her," cried Rastignac,
detecting a smile on the young man's face.
44 Who would n't know the sort of woman likely to
go at midnight to meet Nucingen ? " retorted Lucien,
turning on his heel.
" She can hardly be any one in society, or the baron
would have recognized the chasseur," remarked the
Chevalier d'Espard.
" I never saw him before," said the baron ; " I have
had the police looking for her for the last forty days,
and all to no purpose."
" She had better cost you a few hundred thousand
francs than your life," said Desplein. '*« At your age
a passion without nourishment is dangerous ; it may
cost you your life."
"Yes," replied Nucingen, "what I eat doesn't
nourish me ; the air seems deadly. I go every day to
the Bois de Vincennes to see the spot where I saw her.
I can't attend to my affairs ; if I paid a million to find
her I should save money, for I can't do anything on
the Bourse — ask du Tillet."
u True," responded du Tillet. " He has taken a dis-
gust for business ; a sign of death in a man like him."
96 Lucien de Ruhempre.
4 'Sign of love," said Nucingen, " and to me they
are the same thing."
The naivete of the old man, no longer a lynx, but
for the first time in his life conscious that there was
something more precious and sacred than gold, touched
these biases minds ; some exchanged smiles, but most
of them looked at Nucingen with one thought expressed
on their faces, "So strong a man to come to this ! "
From the baron's description Lucien had, of course,
recognized Esther. Greatly annoyed at his smile being
noticed, he took advantage of the talk becoming gen-
eral, while coffee was served, to disappear.
"What has become of Monsieur de Rubempre?"
asked Madame de Nucingen.
4 4 He is faithful to the motto of his family, Quid me
continebit?" replied Rastignac
44 Which means either, 4 Who can hold me?' or, 4 1
am unconquerable,' whichever you please," said de
Marsay.
Like all despairing patients, the baron snatched at
anything that seemed like hope ; and he resolved to
have Lucien watched by other spies than those of
Louchard, the ablest man on the commercial police of
Paris, with whom he had been in communication for
the last fortnight on the matter of his mysterious
woman.
Lucien, before paying his usual visit to Esther, in-
tended to spend at the h6tel de Grandlieu the two
hours which made Mademoiselle Clotilde-Frede'rique
de Grandlieu the happiest girl in the faubourg Saint-
Germain. The prudence which now characterized the
conduct of this ambitious young man counselled him
Lucien de Bubempre. 97
to inform Carlos Herrera immediately of the effect
produced by the smile which had been forced from
him on hearing Esther's portrait made by the Baron
. de Nucingen. The baron's infatuation for Esther,
and his idea of putting the police upon her traces,
were events of enough importance to communicate
without loss of time to a man who had sought in a
priest's cassock the shelter that criminals formerly
found in the churches. From the rue Saint-Lazare,
where the Nucingens lived, to the rue Saint-Dominique,
in which is the h6tel de Grandlieu, Lucien's way led
him past his own house on the quai Malaquais. He
found the abbe smoking his breviary, that is to say,
coloring a pipe, before he went to bed. This strangest
of men had ended by renouncing Spanish cigars, find-
ing them by no means strong enough.
k ' This is getting serious," said the abbe, when Lu-
cien had told him all. " If the baron employs Louchard
to get upon the girl's traces, he will certainly have the
sense to put a spy upon yours, and all will be discov-
ered. I have barely time to-night and to-morrow
morning to shuffle the cards for the game I shall play
against the baron, whom I must, before all else, con-
vince of the impotence of the police. When that old
lynx has lost all hope of finding the lamb, I '11 sell her
for what she is worth to him."
4 'Sell Esther!" cried Lucien, whose first impulses
were always right.
" You forget our present position," said the abbe.
Lucien's head dropped.
" No money," continued the sham priest, " and
sixty thousand francs of debt to pay! If you wish
7
98 Lucien de Eubempre.
to marry Clotilde de Grandlieu, you must buy a prop-
erty worth a million to secure a dowry to that ugly
creature. Esther is a game on which I will set the
lynx in such a way as to get the million out of him.
That 's my business."
" Esther will never — "
" It is my business, I tell you."
" She '11 die of it."
"Then it will be the business of the Pompes Fu-
nebres. Besides, what else is there to do?" asked the
savage brute, cutting short Lucien's elegies by the at-
titude he took. u How many generals died in the
flower of their age for the Emperor Napoleon ? " he
asked, presently, after a moment's silence. " Women
can always be had. In 1821 you thought no one could
be like Coralie ; but you found Esther. After Esther
will come — do you know who ? The unknown woman !
she who, of all women, is the most beautiful ; and you
can look for her in the German capital, where the son-
in-law of the Due de Grandlieu will represent the King
of France. Besides, please to tell me, baby that you
are, how you know that Esther will die of it. Let me
act ; you need not think of anything. The matter is
mine ; it concerns me, — only, you must give up Esther
for a week or two. Now, go and warble to your
Grandlieu ; I must be stirring at once. You will find
Esther rather sad when you see her ; but tell her to
obey me. Our cloak of virtue, our mantle of inno-
cence — the screens behind which all great men hide
their iniquities — are in danger ; and the danger threat-
ens my glorious I, — you, who must never be suspected.
Chance has served us better than my own thoughts,
Lucien de Mubempre. 99
which, for two months, have revolved about this
point."
Casting forth these terrible sentences one by one,
like pistol-shots, the false priest hastily dressed him-
self, and prepared to go out.
" Your joy is visible ! " cried Lucien. " You have
never liked poor Esther, and you are only too happy
that the moment has come to get rid of her."
"You have never ceased to love her, have you?
Well, I've never ceased to execrate her. But she
served my purpose, and I have always acted as though
I loved the girl, though I held her life, through Asia, in
my hands. A few mistaken mushrooms in a stew, and
all was over. Yet Mademoiselle Esther lives. She is
happy because you love her ! Don't play the baby
now. It is four years that we have watched and
waited for a turn of luck for or against us. Well, then,
let us display something more than talent in peeling
the fruit that the hand of fate has this day flung to us.
In this throw of the dice there is, as there is in every-
thing, something good and something bad. Do you
know what I was thinking of as you came in ? "
"No."
" Of making myself here, as I did at Barcelona with
Asia's help, the heir of a bigoted old woman."
" A crime? "
" There was no other resource that I could see to
secure your future. Our creditors are getting restless.
Once pursued by duns and bailiffs and driven from the
h6tel.de Grandlieu, what would become of you? Your
note to the devil was due."
And the false priest described by a gesture the
100 Lucien de Eubempre.
suicide of a man who flings himself into the water.
Then he turned on Lucien one of those fixed and pene-
trating looks by which the will of strong men enter the
souls of feeble ones. This look, which held the young
man spell-bound and had the effect of relaxing all
resistance, showed that there existed between Lucien
and the false abbe not only certain secrets of life and
death, but also sentiments paramount to all ordinary
sentiments, as was the man himself to the baseness of
his position.
Compelled to live an alien to social life, into which
the laws forbade him ever to return, exhausted by
desperate and terrible resistances, but endowed with
a force of soul which preyed upon him, this man, at
once ignoble and grand, obscure yet famous, con-
sumed, above all, by the fever of life, lived again in
the elegant person of Lucien, whose soul had become
his soul. He had made himself represented in the
social life to which he could never return by this poet,
to whom he gave his own tenacity and his iron will.
To him, Lucien was more than a son, more than a
beloved woman, more than family, more than life, —
he was his Vengeance ; and, inasmuch as strong souls
care far more for a sentiment than for life itself,
he had attached Lucien to him by indissoluble bonds.
Having bought the life of the despairing poet on the
verge of suicide, he proposed to him one of those
infernal compacts which are supposed to exist only
in the pages of a novel, but the possibility of which,
as a matter of fact, is frequently shown in the police
courts by celebrated legal dramas. In bestowing upon
Lucien all the joys and pleasures of Parisian life, in
Lucien de Rubempre. 101
proving to him that he could once more create for him-
self a splendid future, he had made the young man a
thing of his own. No sacrifice whatever cost this
strange man anything, so long as it concerned his
second self. In spite of his own vast strength, he
was so feeble against the fancies of his creature that
he had ended by confiding to him his secrets. Per-
haps this purely mental participation in crime was a
bond the more between them. From the day when
la Torpille was spirited away, Lucien knew the hor-
rible foundations on which his prosperity was based.
The cassock of the Spanish priest hid Jacques Collin,
a celebrity of the galleys, who, ten years earlier, had
lived, under the vulgar name of Vautrin, in the Pension
Vauquer, where Rastignac and Bianchon were also
living. (See " Pere Goriot.")
Jacques Collin, also called " Trompe-la-Mort,"' who
escaped from the galleys at Rochefort almost as soon
as he was returned there, had profited by the example
of the famous Comte de Sainte-Helene, modifying
however, the more vicious part of Coignard's bold
action. To substitute himself for an honest man and
continue, as he must, the life of an escaped galley-
slave, was a scheme with two lines so antagonistic
that it could scarcely fail to come to some fatal end,
in Paris especially ; for, by transplanting himself into
a family a criminal increased, tenfold, the dangers
of detection. To protect himself from inquiry it
was necessary* to go outside or above the ordinary
round of life. A man in society is subject to certain
risks which never touch the man who has no contact
with it. For this reason the cassock is the safest of
102 Lucicn de BubemprS.
all disguises, when it can be carried out by an exem-
plary, solitary life, devoid of action. " Therefore, I
will be a priest," said this socially dead man, who
willed to live again under a social form and satisfy
passions for power and for existence as strange as
the being himself.
The civil war which the constitution of 1812 pro-
duced in Spain, where this resolute man betook himself
after his escape from the galleys, gave him the means of
secretly killing the real Carlos Herrera on the high-road
from an ambush. This priest, who was the bastard of
a grandee, abandoned by his father and ignorant of his
mother, was charged with a political mission to France
by King Ferdinand VII., to whom a bishop had recom-
mended him. The bishop, the sole man who took an
interest in Carlos Herrera, died during the journey
which this forlorn hope of the Church was making from
Cadiz to Madrid, and from Madrid to Paris. Fortu-
nate in meeting so desired an individual under circum-
stances that exactly suited him, Jacques Collin wounded
his own back to efface the fatal letters of the galleys
and changed his skin with acids. In thus transform-
ing himself in presence of the priest's body before
destroying it, he was able to give himself a certain
likeness to his double ; and to complete this transmuta-
tion (which was nearly as marvellous as that in the
Arabian tale where the dervish acquires the power of
entering — he, an old man — into a young body by the
use of magic words) the galley-slave, who could speak
Spanish, taught himself as much Latin as a Spanish
priest might be expected to know.
Collin had been chosen the banker of the galleys,
Lucien de Bubempre. 103
and he was rich with deposits confided to his well-
known honesty, — an honesty which was also a matter
of necessity, for among such partners an error is bal-
anced by a dagger. To these funds he added the
money given by the bishop to Carlos Herrera. Before
leaving Spain he was able to lay hands on the wealth
of a pious old lady in Barcelona, to whom he gave
absolution on her death-bed and a promise to restore
certain sums derived by her from a crime, through
which her fortune came to her.
Having become a priest, charged with a secret mis-
sion which would naturally obtain for him powerful
supporters in Paris, Jacques Collin, firmly resolving
to do nothing that might compromise the character he
had now assumed, had given himself up to the chances
of his new career at the moment when he encountered
Lucien on the high-road from Angouleme to Paris.
The young man seemed to the false abbe a marvellous
instrument of power placed unexpectedly in his hand.
He saved the suicide from himself, saying : —
" Give yourself into the hands of a man of God as
some men give themselves to the devil, and you shall
have every chance for a new existence. You shall
live as in a dream, from which the worst awaking can
be no worse than the death you are about to seek."
The alliance of these two beings, who became as it
were one, rested on this argument, full of force, which
the abbe clinched still further by slowly and saga-
ciously leading up to complete collusion. Gifted with
the genius of corruption, he destroyed Lucien's con-
science by plunging him into cruel difficulties, from
which he extricated him by obtaining his tacit consent
104 Lucien de Ruhempre.
to wicked or infamous actions, which, he was careful
to show, left Lucien pure and loyal in the eyes of
others. Lucien was to be a social splendor, in the
shadow of which the spurious abbe wished to live.
"lam the author, you shall be the drama; if you
do not succeed, it is I who will be hissed," he said to
Lucien the day that he revealed to him his sacrilegious
disguise.
The false priest went cautiously from avowal to
avowal, measuring the infamy of his confidences by
Lucien's needs and the progress made in corrupting
him. Trompe-la-Mort did not, however, make his final
disclosure until the moment when the habit of Parisian
enjoyments, success, and satisfied vanity had enslaved
both body and soul of the feeble poet. Where, in the
olden time, Rastignac, tempted by this devil, had re-
sisted, Lucien succumbed, being better manoeuvred,
more judiciously compromised, vanquished, above all,
by the happiness of having conquered an enviable
position. Evil, which the poetic imagination calls
Satan or the Devil, employed upon this man, half a
woman, its most alluring seductions, asking little of
him at first, and giving much. The great argument of
the abbe was the same eternal secrecy promised by
Tartuffe to Elmire. The reiterated proofs of an abso-
lute devotion, like that of Said to Mohammed, com-
pleted the horrible work of Lucien's conquest by
Jacques Collin.
At the moment of which we write, the money spent
on Lucien and Esther had used up the funds confided
to the honesty of the banker of the galleys, who was
now exposed to a terrible settling of accounts ; and,
Lucien de Rubempre. 105
more than that, they had incurred heavy debts. At
this moment, when Lucien was about to attain com-
plete success, the mere rolling of a pebble beneath
their feet might bring down the illusive edifice of a
fortune so audaciously built up. At the masked ball,
Rastignac had recognized Vautrin, the Vautrin of the
Pension Vauquer ; but he knew he was a dead man in
case of indiscretion, and the looks exchanged between
him and Lucien hid fear on both sides beneath a sem-
blance of friendship. It was certain that if a critical
moment came, Rastignac would with joy call up the
cart to take Jacques Collin to the scaffold.
Every one can now understand the savage joy with
which the false priest welcomed the news of Nucingen's
sudden passion, seizing in a single thought the extri-
cation a man of his kind could derive by the sacrifice
of poor Esther.
" No matter," he said to Lucien, " the devil protects
his almoner."
" You are smoking on a powder-cask."
" Incedo per ignes /" replied the false priest, laugh-
ing ; " it is my business."
106 Lucien de Bubempre.
VII.
THE HOTEL DE GRANDLIEU.
The house of Grandlieu became divided into two
branches about the middle of the last century. First,
the ducal house, now doomed to extinction, because
the present duke has only daughters ; secondly, the
Vicomtes de Grandlieu, w T ho bear the title and arms
of the elder branch. The ducal branch bear gules,
three battle-axes or, placed in fesse, with the famous
Caveo non Timeo for motto, which tells the whole
history of the house. The arms of the vicomtes are
quartered with those of the Navarreins, who bear
gules, a fesse crenellated or, surmounted by a knight's
helmet for crest, and the motto, Grands faits, Grand
lieu. The present vicomtesse, a widow since 1813,
has a son and one daughter. Though she returned
from the emigration half-ruined as to property, she
recovered, thanks to the devotion of a lawyer, Derville,
quite a handsome fortune.
The Due and Duchesse de Grandlieu, who returned
in 1804, were the object of much blandishment on the
part of the Emperor. Napoleon, who invited them to
court, returned everything that could be found belong-
ing to the house of Grandlieu in the National domain,
amounting to a revenue of nearly forty thousand francs
a year. Of all the great seigneurs of the faubourg
Saint-Germain who allowed themselves to be cajoled
Lucien de Rubempre. 107
by Napoleon, the duke and duchess (an Ajuda of the
elder branch, allied to the Braganzas) were the only
ones who did not repudiate the Emperor or forget his
benefits. Louis XVIII. respected this fidelity when
the faubourg Saint-Germain considered it a crime ;
but in so doing perhaps the King only meant to annoy
Monsieur.
It was thought probable that the young Vicomte de
Grandlieu would marry Marie- Athenai's, the youngest
daughter of the duke, now nine years old. Sabine,
the youngest but one, married the Baron de Guenic
after the revolution of July. Josephine, the third,
became Madame d'Ajuda-Pinto when the marquis lost
his first wife, Mademoiselle Rochefide (alias Roche-
gude). The eldest daughter had taken the veil in
1822. The second, Mademoiselle Clotilde-Frederique,
now twenty-seven years of age, was deeply in love
with Lucien de Rubempre. It is unnecessary to ask
if the h6tel de Grandlieu, one of the finest in the rue
Saint-Dominique, exercised a powerful fascination over
Lucien's mind. Every time the great gates turned on
their hinges to admit his cabriolet to the court-yard he
experienced the satisfaction described by Mirabeau : —
"Though my father was only an apothecary at
Angouleme, I am here — "
Such was his constant thought ; and he would will-
ingly have committed other crimes than his alliance
with Jacques Collin to keep the right of walking up the
steps of that portico and hearing his name announced
— Monsieur de Rubempre ! — in the grand salon of
the style of Louis XIV., built on the model of those
at Versailles, where was assembled that society of the
108 Lucien de Bubempre.
dlite, the cream of Paris, which went at that time by
the name of " le petit chateau." The duchess, one of
those women who dislike leaving their own homes, was
generally surrounded by her neighbors, the Chaulieus,
the Navarreins, and the Lenoncourts. Often the pretty
Baronne de Macumer (nee Chaulieu), the Duchesse de
Maufrigneuse, Madame d'Espard, Madame de Camps,
Mademoiselle des Touches (connected with the Grand-
lieus who come from Bretagne), were there for a while
before going to a ball or after the opera. The Vicomte
de Grandlieu, the Due de Rh6tore, the Prince de Bla-
mont-Chauvry, the Marquis de Beauseant, the Vidame
de Pamiers, the two Vandernesses, the old Prince de
Cadignan, and his son the Due de Maufrigneuse were the
habitues of this grandiose salon, where the atmosphere
was that of a court, and the manners, tone, and wit har-
monized with the noble presence of the masters, whose
grand aristocratic bearing caused their Napoleonic
servitude to be forgotten.
The old Duchesse d'Uxelles, mother of the Duchesse
de Maufrigneuse, was the oracle of this coterie, where
Madame de Serizy had never yet been able to obtain
admittance, though born a Rouquerolles. Lucien,
brought there by Madame de Maufrigneuse, who had
made her mother act in the matter, maintained his
position, thanks to the influence of the Grand Almonry
of France and the help of the archbishop of Paris.
But even so, he was not presented until after the
King's ordinance had restored to him the name and
arms of the house of Rubempre. The Due de Rhetor^,
the Chevalier d'Espard, and a few others, jealous of
Lucien, did their best from time to time to prejudice
Lucien de Rtibempre. 109
the Due de Grandlieu against him, by relating anec-
dotes concerning Lucien's antecedents ; but the pious
duchess, surrounded by the magnates of the Church,
and Clotilde de Grandlieu supported him. Lucien
explained this enmity by alluding to his affair with the
cousin of Madame d'Espard, Madame de Bargeton,
now Comtesse du Chatelet. Then, feeling the neces-
sity of being admitted on terms of intimacy by so
powerful a family, and prompted by his desire to win
Clotilde, Lucien had the courage of parvenus; he called
there five days out of seven every week ; he swallowed
all indignities with a good grace, bore with impertinent
glances, and answered slighting speeches with ready wit.
His assiduity, the charm of his manners, and his appar-
ent good-humor ended by neutralizing objections and
lessening obstacles. Received by the Duchesse de
Maufrigneuse, Madame de Serizy, and Mademoiselle
des Touches, Lucien, satisfied with admission to four
such houses, learned from the abbe to put the greatest
reserve and discretion into all his relations with them.
M No one can devote himself to many houses at a
time," said his private counsellor. " He who goes
everywhere, never excites a real interest anywhere.
Great people only protect those who frequent them,
those they see every day ; individuals who manage to
make themselves necessary to them, like the sofas on
which they sit."
Accustomed to consider the salon of the Grandlieus
as his battlefield, Lucien reserved his wit, his clever
sayings, and the courtier graces which characterized
him for the hours that he spent there. Insinuating,
caressing, and warned by Clotilde of the rocks around
110 Lucien de RubemprL
him, he flattered the little foibles of the Due de Grand-
lieu. Clotilde, who began by being jealous of Madame
de Maufrigneuse, was now desperately in love with
Lucien. Knowing well the advantages of such a mar-
riage, Lucien played his r61e as a lover with all the
charm of Armand, the new jeune premier of the Com-
edie-Francaise. He went to mass every Sunday at
Saint-Thomas d'Aquin ; he appeared in the character
of an ardent Catholic ; he delivered himself of religious
and monarchical precepts which did marvels for him.
Moreover, he wrote quite remarkable articles in the
journals devoted to the Congregation without being
willing to take money for them, or to put any signa-
ture but L. He also wrote political pamphlets required
by the King or the Grand Almonry without asking the
slightest recompense.
"The King," he said, "has already done so much
for me that I owe him my very blood."
So, within a few days, it had been proposed to ap-
point Lucien as private secretary to the prime-minister ;
but Madame d'Espard hearing of this, put so many per-
sons at work against Lucien that the Maitre Jacques
of Charles X. hesitated to take the step. Not only
was Lucien's position scarcely defined enough as yet,
but the question " What does he live on? " which came
more and more to the surface as he raised himself in
society, demanded an answer ; and benevolent curiosity
as well as malicious curiosity, beginning to investigate,
found more than one flaw in his armor. Clotilde de
Grandlieu served her father and mother as an innocent
spy. A few days earlier she had taken Lucien aside
into the recess of a window, and had there told him of
the family objections.
Lucien de Bubempre. Ill
" Obtain an estate worth a million and you may have
my hand ; that is my mother's answer," said Clotilde.
"They'll ask you later where the money comes
from," said the abbe, when Lucien reported to him
Clotilde' s speech.
" My brother-in-law, David Sechard, must have made
his fortune by this time," said Lucien. "I'll take
him for my responsible editor."
"Then nothing is wanting to your triumph but
that million," the abbe cried. " I must think about
getting it."
To explain Lucien's exact position at the h6tel de
Grandlieu, it must be told that he had never dined
there. Neither Clotilde nor the Duchesse d'Uxelles,
nor Madame de Maufrigneuse, who always continued
a good friend to Lucien, could persuade the old duke
to grant them that favor, for he persisted in distrust-
ing the man whom he called the " Sieur de Rubempre."
This cloud, noticed by all who frequented the salon,
was sharply wounding to Lucien's self-love ; he felt
he was only tolerated there after all. The world is
right to be exacting, for it is often deceived. To cut
a figure in Paris without known means, without an
acknowledged profession, is a position which no schem-
ing can long maintain. Therefore Lucien, in raising
himself socially gave additional strength to the objec-
tion, " What does he live on?" He had been forced
into saying at the house of Madame de Serizy, — to
whom he owed the support of the attorney-general
Granville, and of a minister of State, Comte Octave
de Bauvan, — "J am dreadfully in debt."
As he now entered the court-yard of the h6tel where
112 Lucien de HubemprS.
lay the hope and triumph of all his vanities, he said to
himself, bitterly, thinking of Trompe-la-Mort's words,
44 1 hear the whole thing cracking under my feet."
He loved Esther, but he wanted Mademoiselle de
Grandlieu for his wife. Strange situation, — he must
sell one to obtain the other! Only one man could
make that traffic without his own honor suffering ; that
man was Jacques Collin. Ought they not, therefore,
to be as cautious and silent one toward the other as
one for the other?
Life does not offer two compacts of this nature in
which a man is alternately the master and the slave.
Reaching the h6tel de Grandlieu, Lucien shook off the
clouds that darkened his brow, and entered the salon
gay and radiant.
At this moment the windows were open, the fra-
grance from the garden perfumed the room, the plant-
stand, which occupied the centre of it, was a pyramid
of bloom. The duchess, seated on a sofa in a corner,
was talking with the Duchesse de Chaulieu. Several
women made a group around her, remarkable for divers
attitudes conveying the expressions which each gave
to simulated grief. In society no one is really inter-
ested in misfortunes or suffering ; sentiments are mere
words. The men were walking about the salon or in
the garden. Clotilde and Josephine were sitting at
the tea-table. The Vidame de Pamiers, the Due de
Grandlieu, the Marquis d'Ajuda-Pinto, and the Due de
Maufrigneuse were playing wish (sic) in a corner.
When Lucien was announced, he crossed the salon
and bowed to the duchess, asking her the cause of the
affliction expressed upon her face.
Lucien de Rubempre. 113
" Madame de Chaulieu has received some dreadful
news. Her son-in-law, the Baron de Macumer, ex-
Duc de Soria, has just died. The young Due de Soria
and his wife, who had gone to Chantepleurs to be with
him, have written the sad news. Louise is in a heart-
rending state."
" A woman is not loved twice in her life as Louise
was by him," said Madeline de Mortsauf.
" She will be a rich widow," remarked the old
Duchesse d'Uxelles, with a glance at Lucien, whose
face continued impassible.
" Poor Louise ! " exclaimed Madame d'Espard. " I
understand her, and I pity her."
The Marquise d'Espard, as she said these words,
had the thoughtful look of a woman full of heart and
soul. Though Sabine de Grandlieu was only ten years
old, she looked at her mother with an intelligent eye,
the almost mocking expression of which was reproved
by a glance from the duchess. This is what is called
" bringing up your children well."
" If my daughter survives this blow," said Madame
de Chaulieu, with a most maternal air, " her future will
make me very uneasy. Louise is too romantic."
"I am sure I don't know," said the Duchesse
d'Uxelles, " from whom our daughters get that
characteristic."
" It is difficult in these days," said an old cardinal,
" to make the demands of the heart and the conven-
tions of society agree."
Lucien, who had nothing to say on this topic, went
to the tea-table to pay his respects to the Demoiselles
cle Grandlieu. When the poet was at sufficient dis-
114 Lucien de Eubetnpre.
tance from the group of women, the Marquise d'Es-
pard leaned forward to the ear of the Duchesse de
Grandlieu.
"Then you really think that man is very much in
love with your dear Clotilde ? " she said.
The perfidy of this question can only be understood
after reading a sketch of Clotilde. This young lady,
about twenty-seven years of age, was then standing
up ; an attitude which allowed the sarcastic glance
of the Marquise d'Espard to observe the whole of
her lank, lean form, which somewhat resembled that
of asparagus. Her bust was so flat that it did not
allow of those colonial resources which dressmakers
caWjlchus menteurs. In fact Clotilde, who knew the all-
sufficing advantages of her name and rank, so far from
being at the pains to disguise this defect, heroically
allowed it to be fully perceptible. By wearing her
gowns made tight and plain, she conveyed the effect
of those stiff, rigid forms which the sculptors of the
middle-ages placed in the niches of the cathedrals.
Clotilde was four feet five inches in height. If it is
permissible to make use of a familiar expression,
which has the merit of being easily understood, she
was all legs. This fault of proportion gave the upper
part of her body the effect of being slightly deformed.
A brunette in complexion, with wiry black hair, very
thick eyebrows, ardent eyes revolving in orbits that
were already charring, the face arched at the top of
the prominent forehead like the moon in its first quar-
ter, she presented a curious caricature of her mother,
who had been one of the handsomest women in Por-
tugal. Nature seems to take delight in such freaks.
Zucien de Rubempre. 115
We often see in families a sister of surprising beauty,
while the same cast of feature in a brother will be
absolute ugliness, although they may strongly resemble
each other. Clotilde's mouth, which was very much
drawn in, had a stereotyped expression of disdain.
Her lips betrayed, more than any other feature of her
face, the secret movements of her heart ; affection
gave them at times a delightful expression, all the
more remarkable because her cheeks, too brown to
blush, and her black, hard eyes said nothing. In
spite of all these disadvantages, in spite of her plank-
like rigidity, she derived from her race and her educa-
tion an air of grandeur, a lofty countenance, and the
nameless something, well-called the je ne sais quoi
(due, perhaps, to the frankness of her gown), which
marked her as the daughter of a noble house. She
made the most of her hair, which in length and vigor
might have been called a- beauty. Her voice, which
she had cultivated, was charming, and she sang
delightfully.
"Why shouldn't he be in love with my poor Clo-
tilde? " replied the duchess. " Do you know what she
said yesterday? 'If I am loved for ambition, I will
take care that I am loved for myself as well.' She is
witty and ambitious ; there are many men to whom
those qualities are pleasing. As for that young man,
my dear, he is as beautiful as a dream ; and if he can
buy back the Rubempre estate, the King will restore
to him, for our sakes, the title of marquis. After all,
his mother was the last Rubempre."
" Poor fellow, where will he get the million? " said
the marquise.
116 Lucien de BubemprS.
"That's not our affair," returned the duchess,
laughing; " but he certainly will not steal it. You
may be sure we shall not give Clotilde to an adven-
turer, or a dishonest man, were he as beautiful, poet-
ical, and charming as Monsieur de Rubempre."
" You are late," said Clotilde, smiling at Lucien
with infinite grace.
" Yes, I dined out."
" You go a great deal into society of late," she said,
concealing her jealousy and her anxiety beneath a
smile.
" Society! " exclaimed Lucien. " No, I have only
by mere chance dined all the week with bankers ; to-day
with Nucingen, yesterday with du Tillet, the day
before with the Hellers."
Observe that Lucien had learned to take the super-
cilious tone of grands seigneurs.
" You have many enemies," said Clotilde, offering
him a cup of tea. " Some one has told my father that
you have sixty thousand francs of debt, and that be-
fore long you will be in Sainte-Pelagie. If you knew
what these calumnies cost me ! The blame all falls on
me. I will not speak to you of what I suffer (my
father gives me looks which torture me), but of what
you must suffer if there is any truth at all in such a
rumor."
" Don't trouble yourself about such nonsense ; love
me as I love you, and trust me for a few weeks longer,"
said Lucien, setting down his empty cup on the silver
salver.
" Pray do not speak to my father to-night, or he
may answer you with some impertinence which you
Lucien de Bubempre. 117
will be unable to bear, and then we are lost. That
malicious Marquise d'Espard told him that your mother
nursed women in childbirth and that your sister was a
washerwoman."
"We were in the deepest poverty," replied Lucien,
the tears rushing to his eyes. " That was not calumny,
only ill-natured gossip. To-day my sister is more than
a millionnaire ; my mother died two years ago. Spite-
ful persons have withheld this information until I was
on the point of succeeding here."
" But what have you done to Madame d'Espard? "
" I had the imprudence to relate at Madame de
Serizy's, before Monsieur de Granville, the story of
the suit she brought against her husband to obtain the
injunction, the facts of which had been confided to
me by Bianchon. Monsieur de Granville's opinion
changed that of the Keeper of the Seals. They both
drew back, fearing the i Gazette des Tribunaux ' and
the scandal, and the marquise was rapped over the
knuckles in the verdict which put an end to that dread-
ful business. Though Monsieur de Serizy committed
an indiscretion which made the marquise my mortal
enemy, I, at any rate, gained his protection, and that
of the attorney-general, and also that of Comte Octave
de Bauvan, to whom Madame de Serizy told the peril in
which they had put me by revealing the source of their
information. Monsieur le Marquis d'Espard had the
want of tact to pay me a visit of acknowledgment, as
the cause of his triumph in that infamous suit."
" I will deliver you from Madame d'Espard," said
Clotilde.
" Ah ! and how ? " cried Lucien.
118 Lucie n de Eubempre.
" My mother shall invite the little d'Espards here;
they are charming and nearly grown up. The father
and the sons will sing your praises, and then we are
certain not to see the mother."
"Oh! Clotilde, you are adorable, and if I did not
love you for yourself, I should love you for your wit
aud sense."
" It is neither wit nor sense," she said, putting all
her love upon her lips. "Adieu; don't return here
for several days. When you see me at Saint-Thomas
d'Aquin wearing a pink scarf you will know that my
father has changed his tone."
The young lady seemed from this speech to be more
than twenty-seven years of age.
Lucien took a hackney-coach at the rue de la Planche,
left it on the boulevards, took another near the Made-
leine and told the man to drive into the court-yard in
the rue Taitbout. He entered Esther's room at eleven
o'clock and found her in tears, but dressed as if she
wished to make a festival of his coming. When the
door opened, she wiped away her tears and sprang
forward to Lucien, wrapping her arms about him as a
silken tissue caught up by the wind winds itself round
a tree.
" Parted ! " she cried. " Is it true ? "
" Pooh ! only for a few days," replied Lucien.
Esther released him from her arms and fell back
upon the sofa as if dead. She said not a word ; she
lay with her face pressed into the cushions, weeping
hot tears. Lucien tried to raise and soothe her.
" My child, we are not separated. What ! after five
years of happiness is this how you take a little absence ?
Lucien de Eubempre. 119
Ah! "thought he, remembering Coralie ; "how is it
that these women love me so?"
The senses have their beau ideal. When to so much
beauty is added sweetness of nature and the poetic
charm which distinguished Lucien, we can conceive the
fond passion of these poor women, so sensitive to ex-
ternal natural gifts and so naive in their admiration.
Esther sobbed gently, and lay without moving in an
attitude of the deepest sorrow.
" But, my child," said Lucien, " did he not tell you
that it concerns my very life ? "
At these words, said intentionally by Lucien, Esther
sprang up, like some wild animal ; her hair, which had
fallen loose, surrounded her beautiful face like foliage.
She looked at Lucien with a fixed eye.
" Your life ! " she cried, raising her arms and letting
them fall again, with a gesture which belongs only to a
woman in danger. " True ; that savage wrote it."
She drew a paper from her belt.
11 See," she said, " this is what he wrote," giving
Lucien a letter which the abbe had sent to her. Lucien
read it aloud : —
" You will leave Paris to-morrow, at five in the morning.
A carriage will be sent to take you to a house in the forest
of Saint-Germain. There you will have an apartment on
the first floor. Do not leave it until I permit you. You will
want for nothing. The keeper of the house and his wife are
trustworthy. Do not write to Lucien. Keep the carriage
blinds down as you drive there. This matter concerns
Lucien's life.
" Lucien will see you to-night to say farewell ; burn this
letter in his presence."
120 Lucien de Eubempre.
Lucien instantly burned the letter at the flame of a
candle.
" Hear me, my Lucien," said Esther, having listened
to the reading of the note as a criminal listens to his
sentence of death. " I will not tell you that I love
you ; it would be silly to do so. It is now five years that
to love you has seemed to me as natural as to breathe,
or live. Since that first day when my happiness began,
under the protection of that inexplicable being who put
me here like some curious little animal in a cage, I
knew that you would marry. Marriage is necessary
to your destiny, and God keep me from hindering the
development of your career. This marriage is death
to me ; but I will not harass you ; I shall not do as the
grisettes, who smother themselves with pans of char-
coal, — once was enough for that. No, I shall go far
away, out of France. I only ask one thing, my angel,
my adored ; it is that you will not deceive me. I have
had my share of life ; since the day I first saw you in
1824 until to-day, I have had more happiness than
there is in ten lives of other happy women. There-
fore, judge me for what I am, — a woman both strong
and weak. Say to me, 'lam to marry ; ' I will ask
you only for a tender, a very tender farewell, and you
shall never hear of me again."
There was a moment's silence after these words,
the sincerity of which was deepened by tones and
gesture.
" Does it concern your marriage?" she asked,
plunging her compelling eyes, brilliant as the blade
of a dagger, into the brilliant eyes of the man before
her.
Lucien de Rubempre. 121
" For the last eighteen months we have certainly
been working for my marriage, but it is not arranged,"
replied Lucien, " and I do not know when it will be.
But that is not the present matter, my dear child, which
concerns the abbe and me and you. We are threatened
with a great danger, — Nucingen has seen you."
"Yes, I know," she said, — "at Vincennes. Did
he recognize me?"
"No," said Lucien, "but he has fallen frantically
in love with you. After dinner, when he described
3 7 ou, 1 let a smile escape me, — an involuntary and
most imprudent smile ; for I live in the midst of social
life like a savage, perpetually in fear of the traps of
enemies. The abbe, who takes the burden of thinking
from me,, considers the situation dangerous ; he takes
upon himself to baffle Nucingen if Nucingen attempts
to spy upon us ; and the baron is quite capable of
that. He said something to-night about the stupidity
of the police. You have set on fire a chimney full of
soot."
" What does the abbe mean to do?" asked Esther,
very gently.
" I don't know ; he told me to keep quiet, and see
nothing of Esther."
" If that is so, I obey with the submission that is
my pride," she said, passing her arm through that of
Lucien and leading him to her room. " Did you
have a good dinner, my Lulu, with your infamous
Nucingen? "
"Asia's cooking prevents one from thinking any
dinner good, however famous the cook may be ; but
Careme sent up the usual Sunday dinner."
122 Lucien de BubemprS.
Lucien involuntarily compared Esther with Clotilde.
The first was so beautiful, so constantly charming,
that the monster of satiety had never once approached
him.
" What a pity," he said to himself, " to be forced to
have one's wife in two volumes ! Here, poetry, pleas-
ure, love, devotion, beauty, charm ; there, noble blood,
race, honors, rank, and knowledge of the world. And
no way of uniting them in a single person ! "
The next day when he woke, at seven in the morn-
ing, in that charming room, all white and rose, the
poet was alone. When he rang, Europe came in.
11 Where is your mistress?"
11 Madame left the house at a quarter to five, ac-
cording to the orders of Monsieur l'abbe, who sent a
carriage."
Lucien de Eubempre. 123
VIII.
FALSE NOTES, FALSE DEBTS, AND A CRAVEN HEART.
The day after Esther was removed to Saint-Germain,
the terrible and inexplicable man, who weighed upon
her heart and ruled her fate, came to her with three
stamped papers, which he requested her to sign, bear-
ing the words, on the first, " Accepted for sixty thou-
sand francs ; " on the second, " Accepted for one
hundred and twenty thousand francs ; " on the third,
" Accepted for one hundred and twenty thousand
francs." In all, three hundred thousand francs. When
the words " good for " are used, a simple note is
drawn; but the word "accepted" constitutes a bill
of exchange, which, if unmet, subjects the drawer to
arrest. That single word makes a person who igno-
rantly or imprudently signs it liable to five years'
imprisonment, — a penalty seldom inflicted in the cor-
rectional police courts, and which the court of assizes
only inflicts on criminals. The law as to imprison-
ment for debt is a relic of barbarism, which adds to
its stupidity the merit of being useless, for it never
touches real swindlers.
" The object is," said the former galley-slave, " to
extricate Lucien from his embarrassments. We have
sixty thousand francs of debt hanging over us ; but
with these three hundred thousand francs he can clear
himself and start again."
124 Lucien de RulemprS.
After antedating the bills of exchange by six months,
the abbs' made them drawn on Esther by a man who
never fell into the hands of the police of Paris, and
whose adventures, in spite of the noise they made,
were speedily forgotten, lost, and covered up by the
racket of the great symphony of July, 1830.
This young man, one of the most audacious swin-
dlers who ever lived, the son of a clerk at Boulogne,
near Paris, was named Georges-Marie Destourny. The
father, obliged to sell his clerkship for very little,
died about 1824, and left his son without resources,
after giving him that brilliant education for the world
which the folly of the lesser bourgeoisie covets for
their sons. At twenty-three, the young and brilliant
pupil at the law-school had repudiated his father by
printing his name on his cards as " Georges d'Es-
tourn}'." This card gave him a fragrance of aristoc-
racy. He became a frequenter of clubs, and acquired
a groom and a tilbury. One word will explain all. He
gambled at the Bourse with the money entrusted to
him by courtesans, whose agent he was. He was
finally in danger from the correctional police, and,
when obliged to fly, neglected to pay up his " differ-
ences " at the Bourse. He had accomplices, — young
men corrupted by him, his henchmen, and the sharers
of his elegance and credit. When he fled, the Paris of
the boulevards trembled. In the days of his splendor,
Georges d'Estourny, handsome, good-natured, and
generous as a robber-chief, had protected La Torpille
for several months. The abbe based his speculation
on this acquaintance.
Georges d'P^stourny, whose ambition was emboldened
Lucien de Rulempre. 125
by success, had taken under his protection a man from
the departments whom the liberal party wished to in-
demnify for an imprisonment bravely, it was said,
incurred in the struggle of the press against the gov-
ernment of Charles X. The Sieur Cerizet, called the
"courageous Cerizet," was pardoned. Now Cerizet,
patronized for form's sake by the magnates of the Left,
had opened a sort of agency, which combined bank-
ing, brokerage, and a commission business. Cerizet
was very glad at that time to ally himself with Georges
d'Estourny, who trained him. Esther, in virtue of the
old story of Ninon, might very well be supposed to be
the depositary of a part of d'Estourny's fortune. An
endorsement by Georges d'Estourny made the abbe mas-
ter of the notes he had created. The forgery was no
risk if Esther, or some one on her behalf, paid the notes.
After obtaining full information as to Cerizet' s busi-
ness, Jacques Collin perceived that he was one of those
obscure individuals who are determined to make their
fortunes, but — legally. Cerizet, who was the real
depositary of d'Estourny's gains, held for him as locum
tenens certain important securities which were waiting
for a rise at the Bourse, and which enabled Cerizet to
call himself a banker. Such things are done every day
in Paris. The man may be despised, but not his
money. Jacques Collin now went to see Cerizet, in-
tending to make use of him after his fashion ; for he
was, by a lucky chance, master of the secrets of this
worthy associate of d'Estourny. The courageous
Cerizet lived in an entresol in the rue du Gros-Chenet,
and the abbe, having ordered the servant to announce
him as coming from Monsieur d'Estourny, found the
126 Lucien de Rubempre.
so-called banker quite pale with fear at this announce-
ment, and recognized at a glance, from the description
given him by Lucien, the Judas of David Sechard.
" Can we talk here without danger of being over-
heard?" said the abbe', transformed, however, into an
Englishman with red hair, blue spectacles, and as clean
and neat as a puritan going to meeting.
" Why so, monsieur?" asked Cerizet. "Who are
you?"
"Mr. William Barker, creditor of Monsieur d'Es-
tourny. But I '11 show you the necessity of closing
the door if you desire it. We know, monsieur, what
were your relations with Petit-Claud, the Cointets, and
the Sechards at Angouleme."
At these words Cerizet jumped to the door and closed
it, after which he went to the door of an inner room and
bolted that. Then he said to the stranger: "Speak
low, monsieur," adding, as he examined the false
Englishman, "What do you want with me?"
" Well," said William Barker, " every man for him-
self in this world. You have the securities of that
rascal d'Estourny in your hands — Oh ! don't be
afraid, I have not come to ask for thern ; but, pressed
by me, that swindler, who, between ourselves, deserves
the halter, has given me these notes which he thinks I
may be able to get paid; and as I don't want to sue
the person in my own name, he told me that you would
let me use yours."
Cerizet looked at the letters of exchange.
" But he 's no longer at Frankfort," he said.
" I know that," said Barker, " but he might have
been at the date of these notes."
Lucien de Bubempre. 127
" I don't want to make myself responsible," said
Cerizet.
" I don't ask for any such sacrifice ; hut you can he
empowered to receive them. Receipt for them, and I
will see that they are paid."
"I am surprised that d'Estourny should show so
little confidence in me," remarked Cerizet.
"He knows a good deal," said the Englishman,
significantly. " I don't blame him for not wishing to
put all his eggs in one basket."
"Do you think — " began the little peddler in
business, returning the letters of exchange duly ac-
knowledged and signed.
" I think that you take good care of his funds," said
the Englishman. "In fact I am sure of it; they are
already staked on the green table of the Bourse."
" My interest is — "
"To lose them, ostensibly," said William Barker.
"Monsieur ! " cried Cerizet.
" Look here, my dear Monsieur Cerizet," said
Barker, coolly, interrupting the little man, " you can
do me a service by facilitating this payment. Have
the kindness to write me a letter in which you say you
consign these notes to me, receipted for by you on
d'Estourny's account, and add that the sheriff's officer
is to consider the bearer of the letter as the owner of
the three notes."
" Tell me your name."
" Never mind names," said Barker ; " say ' the bearer
of this letter and the three notes.' You shall be paid
for this service.".
" How? " asked Cerizet.
128 Lucien de Rubempri.
" With a word in your ear. You intend to remain
in France, don't you? "
" Yes."
" Well ; Georges d'Estourny will never return here."
"Why not?"
" Because there are more than half a dozen persons
who, to my knowledge, will kill him, and he knows it."
M Then I 'm not surprised he has told me to send him
an outfit for India," cried Cerizet. " He has unluckily
compelled me to invest all his property in the Funds.
We are already debtors for differences. I live from
hand to mouth."
" Get out of the scrape yourself."
4k Ah ! if I had only known it earlier ! " cried Cerizet.
" I have missed a fortune."
" One word more," said Barker. "Prudence —
you are capable of that — and (what I am not so sure
about) fidelity ! Adieu ; we shall meet again, and I '11
help you to make your fortune."
Having cast into that soul of mud a hope which
might secure its prudence and fidelity for some little
time, Barker went off to a sheriff's officer on whom he
could rely, and ordered him to get the various judg-
ments through the courts against Esther.
" The money will be paid," he said ; " it is an affair
of honor, and we want it done legally."
The sheriff's officer, thus instructed took the neces-
sary steps, and being requested to act politely, put the
various summons in an envelope and went himself to
the rue Taitbout to seize the furniture ; Europe received
him. The preliminaries of the arrest for debt being
thus laid, Esther was ostensibly under the sword of
Lucien de Ruhempre. 129
some three hundred thousand francs of undeniable
debt. Jacques Collin did not invent the situation.
The vaudeville of false debts is often played in Paris.
There are many sub Gobsecks and sub-Gigonuets who,
for a premium, will play the trick. Maxime de Trailles
had sometimes made use of this means, and played new
comedies to the old score. Carlos Herrera, however,
who wished to save both the honor of his cloth and
Lucien's honor, had recourse to a forgery without risk,
though it is now so often practised that the law is
beginning to interfere. There is, they say, a Bourse
for false notes in the neighborhood of the Palais
Royal, where for three francs any one can buy a
signature.
Having thus laid his plans to secure three hundred
thousand of the million necessary to the purchase of
the property required by the Grandlieus, the abbe
determined to get another hundred thousand out of
Monsieur de Nucingen as a preliminary. In this way.
By his orders, Asia paid a visit to the baron in the
character of an old woman cognizant of the affairs
of the girl in search of whom Nucingen was now
employing the police.
Up to the present time various writers on manners
and morals have described many usurers ; but the
female usurer who traffics with her sex has been neg-
lected. She is called decently a marchande de toilette;
and this was the part which Asia was now about to
play.
" You are to put yourself in the skin of Madame de
Saint-Esteve," he said.
He insisted on seeing her dressed for the part ; and
9
130 Lucien de BubemprS.
she came in a gown of flowered damask, made appar-
ently from the curtains of some boudoir that had come
under the hammer, wearing one of those faded, worn,
unsalable shawls which end their lives on the backs of
such women. She wore a collarette of splendid but
ragged lace, and a shocking bonnet; but her shoes
were of Irish kid, round the edges of which her flesh
puffed out like a cushion, covered with open-work black
silk stockings.
" Look at the buckle of my belt," she said, pointing
to an article of questionable jewelry which her portly
stomach pushed forwards. " Hein ! what style!
And the false front, — doesn't it make me fine and
ugly?"
" Mind that you are honey itself, at first," said the
abbe. "Be almost timid, wary as a cat, and, above
all, make the baron ashamed of having employed the
police ; but don't seem to fear them. Make him un-
derstand, in terms more or less clear, that you defy all
the police in the world to discover where she is. Hide
your traces. When the baron has given you a chance
to put on the screws, get insolent, and work him like a
lacquey."
Nucingen, threatened by Asia that if he watched
her he should never see her again, and would thus lose
all trace of Esther, met her, mysteriously, in a wretched
apartment in the rue Neuve-Saint-Marc, lent by some
one, but by whom the baron was unable to ascertain.
There "Madame de Saint-Esteve " led him through
various stages of hope and despair, playing one against
the other, until the baron was brought to the point of
offering any price for information about his undiscov-
erable beauty.
Lucien de Bubempre. 131
During this time the sheriff's officer was proceeding
through the various legal steps (meeting, of course,
with no opposition from the unconscious Esther) which
were necessary to make the arrest in due course of
law.
Lucien, accompanied, or rather conducted, by the
abbe, had paid poor Esther some five or six visits in
her retreat at Saint-Germain. The cruel conductor of
these machinations had judged a few such interviews
necessary to prevent Esther from fading away, for her
beauty now represented to him capital. On the last
of these visits he took Lucien and the poor girl along
a deserted road to an open spot whence they could
see Paris, and where no one could overhear them.
All three sat down on the trunk of a fallen poplar,
facing the magnificent landscape, one of the finest in
the world, which takes in the valley of the Seine,
Montmartre, Paris, and Saint-Denis.
" My children," said the abbe, " your dream is over.
You, my dear, will never see Lucien again ; or, if you
do see him, you must only have known him five years
ago for a short time."
" My death has come at last/' she said, without a
tear.
" Well, you have been ill five years," said the abbe.
" Fancy yourself consumptive, and die without boring
us with elegies. But you will soon see that it is worth
your while to live, and live splendidly. Leave us,
Lucien ; go and gather sonnets," he said, pointing to
a meadow not far distant.
Lucien cast upon Esther an imploring look, one of
those craven looks proper to weak and covetous men,
132 Lucien de BubemprS.
— men who are full of tenderness in the heart and
baseness in the character. Esther answered by a sign
of her head, which seemed to say, 44 I will listen to
the executioner, and learn how to lay my head upon
the block, and I will have the courage to die well."
The gesture was so gracious, and yet so full of hor-
ror, that the poet wept. Esther ran to him, took him
in her arms, and drank his tears. "Don't suffer!"
she said, — one of those sayings which are uttered
with the gestures and the glance and the voice of
delirium.
The abbe at once explained to her clearly, suc-
cinctly, without ambiguity, often with horribly plain
words, Lucien's critical situation, his position at the
h6tel de Grandlieu, his splendid life in case of tri-
umph, and the absolute necessity that Esther should
sacrifice herself to this magnificent future.
44 What must I do?" she cried, spell-bound.
" Obey blindly," said Jacques Collin. " Why should
you complain? It rests with you to have a splendid
future. You shall become what your former friends
— Tullia, Mariette, Florine, and the Val-Noble — now
are, the mistress of a rich man whom you do not love.
Our money once obtained, he is rich enough to give you
everything to make you happy."
" Happy ! " she said, raising her eyes to heaven.
44 You have had five years of paradise," he said.
44 Cannot you live on those memories? You owe them
to Lucien ; will you now destroy his career ? "
44 I will obey you," she replied, wiping a tear from
the corner of her eyes. 4i Do not be uneasy. You said
true ; my love is a mortal disease."
Lucien de Eubempre. 133
'* But that is not all," said the master of her fate ;
" you must continue beautiful. At twenty-two years
of age you are at your highest point of beauty, thanks
to your love. In short, make yourself once more La
Torpille. Be lively, whimsical, extravagant, scheming,
and pitiless to the millionnaire whom I will send you.
Listen to me ; that man has been pitiless to many.
He has enriched himself with the money of widows
and orphans ; you will be their vengeance ! Asia will
come here this evening with a coach and take you to
Paris. If you allow a suspicion of your past relations
to Lucien to get abroad, you might as well put a pistol
shot through his head. People will ask you where you
have been during the last five years ; you must answer
that an Englishman took you to travel. You had
plenty of wit in former days for foolery ; have it
again."
Did you ever see a glittering kite, that giant butter-
fly of our infancy, sparkling with gold, and soaring
toward heaven? The child forgets the cord for an
instant ; it slips from his hand, the meteor pitches —
as we say in school-boy language — downward, and
falls with terrifying rapidity. Such was Esther as she
listened to that man.
134 Lucien de Bubempre.
IX.
A HUNDRED THOUSAND FRANCS INVESTED IN ASIA.
For more than a week Nucingen bargained almost
daily at the house in the rue Neuve-Saint-Marc for the
delivery of the woman he desired. There sat Asia in
the midst of handsome garments and finery that have
reached the horrid stage in which they are no longer
gowns and garlands, but are not yet tatters. The
frame was in keeping with the face of the woman
now occupying it; these shops, called those of the
"marchandes de toilettes," are among the most
awful and sinister peculiarities of Paris. Here we
see the last frippery of a human life cast by death's
fleshless fingers ; we hear the rattle of consumptive
lungs beneath a shawl ; we divine the anguish of pov-
erty in those pawned glittering gowns. The cruel
struggle between Luxury and Hunger is written on
many a flimsey lace. The countenance of one who
was a queen is beneath that plumed turban, the pose
of which recalls, nay, almost replaces, the absent
face. *T is the hideous in the brilliant ! The lash of
Juvenal, in the hands of the official auctioneer, scat-
ters about these moth-eaten muffs and faded furs of
despairing Messalinas. 'T is a manure-heap of flowers
where, here and there, glow the roses cut but yester-
day, and worn but a single day; over which an old
Lucien de Rubempre. 135
woman ever crouches, cousin-german to the usurer, a
bald and toothless crone, waiting to sell its contents, —
the gown without the woman, the woman without the
gown.
Asia was there like the keeper of the galleys, like
the vulture with its beak reddened upon corpses, —
there in the bosom of her element, more awful even
than the savage horrors in the midst of which these
women ply their trade.
From one irritation to another, adding ten thousand
to ten thousand, the banker at last offered sixty thou-
sand francs to kl Madame de Saint-Esteve," who re-
fused with a grimace that might have rivalled that of
a dog-faced monkey. After an agitated night, in
which he recognized what disorder this*vehement de-
sire was working in his brain, and after a day of
unexpected gains at the Bourse, he arrived one morn-
ing with the intention of paying the hundred thousand
francs demanded by Asia ; but he was also determined
to drag out of her a vast amount of information.
" So you've made up your mind, you old rogue,"
said Asia, tapping him on the shoulder.
The most degrading familiarity is the first tax which
women of this sort levy on the unbridled passions, or
the abject miseries which intrust themselves to their
hands. They never rise to the level of their clients ;
they make them sit down beside them on their muck-
heap. Asia, as we see, was obeying her master
strictly.
" I 'm forced to," replied Nucingen.
" Well, you are not robbed," returned Asia ; " many
women are sold much dearer, relatively. It is true
136 Lucien de Rubempre.
you pay a hundred thousand francs for her at the first
start ; but what 's that to you, old croaker?"
" Where is she?"
" Ah! you shall see her. I'm like you, — nothing
for nothing. Ah, qa! my old man; your beauty has
got into trouble. 'T is n't reasonable in young girls ;
but she is just now what we call a night-bird."
" A what?"
u Come, now, don't play the ninny. She has got
Louchard at her heels. I 've lent her, myself, fifty
thousand francs."
" Twenty-five, more likely ! " cried the banker.
" Parbleu! twenty-five for fifty, of course," replied
Asia. " To do her justice, she is honesty itself. She
had nothing to pay with but herself, and so she came
to me and said, ' My dear Madame Saint-Esteve, I am
sued ; and not a soul can help me but you. Give me
twenty thousand francs, and take a mortgage on my
heart.' Oh, she 's got a good heart ! Nobody but me
knows where she is, because she 's hiding, you see ;
and if the police were to find it out I should lose my
twenty thousand francs. She used to live in the rue
Taitbout ; but they 've put an execution in there and
seized her furniture, — those rascally sheriffs ! And
now they talk of selling it."
" So you play banker, do you? " said Nucingen.
" Of course I do," returned Asia. " I lend to
pretty women, and they return it ; that 's how I dis-
count two notes at once."
" Well, if I promise you that hundred thousand
francs, where shall I see her?" he cried, with the ges-
ture of a man who decides to make every sacrifice.
Lucien de Eubempre. 137
" "Well, old fellow, come this evening in a carriage,
and wait for me opposite to the Gymnase. It is on
the road," said Asia. u Stop at the corner of the rue
Saint-Barbe. I '11 be there, and we '11 go and find my
mortgage with the black hair. Oh, such hair, — my
mortgage ! If she takes out her comb it rolls all over
her like a flag. But I advise you to hide her away
carefully ; for, though you 're a banker, you seem to
me rather a nincompoop in other ways. I warn you
they '11 clap her into Sainte-Pelagie if they find her ;
and they are looking for her everywhere."
" I can arrange all that," said the banker, " when it
is once understood that I 'm her protector."
At nine o'clock that evening he found Asia at the
appointed place, and took her into the carriage.
i ' Where ? " said the baron.
" Where?" repeated Asia, — "rue de la Perle, in
the Marais ; only a stopping-place. Your pearl is in
the mud ; but you '11 wash it off."
When they reached the place she said, with a fright-
ful grin: "Now we'll go a little way on foot; I'm
not such a fool as to give the right address."
M You think of everything," said the baron.
u That's my business," she replied.
Asia took him to the rue Barbette, where, in a fur-
nished house, kept by an upholsterer of the neighbor-
hood, he was taken up to the fourth floor. When he
saw Esther in a meanly furnished room, dressed as a
working-girl, and doing some embroidery, the million-
naire turned pale. At the end of a quarter of an hour,
during which time Asia had made conversation with
Esther, the old man could scarcely speak.
138 Lucien de Rubempre.
" Mademoiselle," he said at last to the poor girl,
" will you have the kindness to accept me for your
protector ? "
" I must, monsieur," said Esther, two heavy tears
rolling down her cheeks.
M Do not weep ; I will make you the happiest of
women. Only let me love you, and you shall see."
" My dear," said Asia, " monsieur is very reasonable ;
he knows he is over sixty-five, and he will be very in-
dulgent. In short, my little angel, I have found you
a father. Better tell her that," she whispered to the
surprised banker; " you can't catch swallows with
pistol-shots. Come here," she added, dragging Nuein-
gen into the next room, — " you remember our little
agreement, old man ? "
Nucingen drew from the pocket of his coat a port-
folio, out of which he took and counted the hundred
thousand francs, which the abbe, hidden in a closet,
was awaiting with keen impatience, and which Asia
presently made over to him.
11 Here 's the hundred thousand francs our man in-
vests in Asia," he said to her when they reached the
landing ; " now he must be made to invest in Europe."
He disappeared after giving his instructions to the
woman, who re-entered the room where Esther was
weeping bitterly. The girl, like a criminal condemned
to death, had made a romance of hope, but the fatal
hour had come.
" My dear children," said Asia, " where will you
go? for you cannot stay in such a place as this. Ma-
dame's former maid," she added, addressing Nucin-
gen, " can take you in at madame's old lodgings in
Lucien de Bubempre. 139
the rue Taitbout. Louchard and the sheriff's officer
will never think of looking for her there — "
"That will do! that will do!" cried the banker.
" Besides, I know Louchard, who is a commercial
guard, very well. I have ways of getting rid of
him."
Asia took Nucingen aside, and said : —
" For five hundred francs a month paid to Eugenie,
who is making her pile fast, you can know everything
that madame does. Keep her as madame's maid ; but
put a curb on her. She 's all for money, that girl, —
horrid ! "
"What of you?"
"I?" said Asia, — "I'm only paying myself back."
Nucingen, sly and cautious as he was, had a band-
age about his eyes, and let himself be managed like
an infant.
"Will you come to the rue Taitbout?" he said to
Esther.
" Where you please, monsieur," she replied, rising.
" Where I please ! " he replied, with delight. " You
are an angel from heaven, whom I love as if I were a
young man, though my hair is gray."
" Gray ! " cried Asia, " better say white. It is dyed
too black a black to be only gray."
"Go, you vile seller of human flesh! You have
your money ; don't come near this flower again," cried
the banker, revenging himself by this apostrophe for
all the insolence she had made him bear. Then he
gave his arm to Esther and took her as she was to the
carriage, with more respect, perhaps, than he would
have shown to the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse.
140 Lucien de Bubempre.
When they reached the rue Taitbout, Esther was
overcome by the sorrowful impressions produced upon
her by the scene of her happiness. She sat down on
a sofa, motionless, brushing away her tears as they
fell, and not even hearing one word of the professions
which the baron was stammering at her feet. She let
him stay there without notice ; she left her hands in
his when he took them, unconscious who, or of what
sex, the creature was who knelt beside her. This scene
of scalding tears falling on the baron's head, and en-
treaties on his part, lasted more than an hour. At
last he called to Europe.
" Eugenie," he said, " persuade your mistress to
listen to me."
M No," cried Esther, springing up like a frightened
horse, u never here ! "
" Listen to me, monsieur," said Europe. " I know
madame ; she is good and gentle as a lamb. But you
must n't be rough ; you must take the right way with
her. She has been so unhappy here ! See how shabby
this furniture is. Let her follow her own ideas now.
Find some pretty house for her and arrange it nicely.
When she sees everything new about her she '11 feel
differently ; I dare say she '11 think you better than
you are, and be as gentle as an angel. Madame has n't
her equal for goodness ! You may boast of your ac-
quisition, indeed, — such a kind heart, and pretty
manners, ah, and wit enough to make a man laugh on
his way to the scaffold ! And, then, does n't madame
know how to dress ! But it is too bad, — all her pretty
gowns are seized ! I know how she feels, for I love
her ; she 's my mistress. A woman like her to see her-
Lucien de fiubempre. 141
self here in the midst of her furniture attached by the
sheriff ! You must be just to her, poor little woman ;
she is not herself ! "
"Esther, Esther," said the baron, "if it is I who
frighten you, leave me ; go to your room. I will stay
here alone," he cried, prompted by real love at the
sight of her tears.
" Ah," she said, taking his hand and kissing it with
a gratitude that brought something like a tear to the
eyes of the hard man of business, " I will thank you
forever ! " and she fled to her chamber, where she
locked herself in.
" There is something inexplicable in all this," said
Nucingen to himself, sitting down on the sofa. Then
he rose and looked out of the window. It was just
daylight. He walked about the room, and listened at
the door of the chamber.
" Esther ! " No answer. " She is weeping still ! "
he cried, throwing himself on the sofa.
Less than ten minutes after the sun rose the baron
was roused with a bound by Europe, who rushed into
the room crying out : —
"Oh, madame, madame ! the soldiers! the police!
They 've come to arrest you ! "
At the moment when Esther opened her door and
showed herself, with her dressing-gown hastily thrown
on, her feet in slippers, and her hair in disorder, the
door of the salon gave entrance to a crowd of officials
and gendarmes. One of them, Contenson, a member
of the detective police, went up to her and laid his
hand upon her shoulder.
"You are Mademoiselle Esther van Gobseck? " he
said.
142 Lucien de Rubempre.
Europe, with a back-handed blow upon his cheek,
sent him reeling.
"Back!" she cried; "you shall not touch my
mistress."
From the crowd of soldiers and bailiffs Louchard
now advanced, with his hat on his head, laughing.
44 Mademoiselle," he said, 44 I arrest you. As for
you, my girl," — this to Europe, — " obstruction will
be punished, and resistance is useless."
The sound of the muskets, as they were dropped on
the tiles of the antechamber, showed the number of
the guard, and enforced the words.
44 But why do you arrest me?" asked Esther.
44 How about our little debts? " asked Louchard.
44 Ah, true ! " cried Esther ; 44 let me dress myself."
All this took place so rapidly that the baron had
had no time to interfere. He now threw himself be-
tween Esther and Louchard, who hastily took off his
hat as Contenson called out : —
44 Monsieur le Baron de Nucingen."
At a sign from Louchard the squad of men vacated
the room. Contenson alone remained.
44 Will monsieur le baron pay?" asked the officer,
hat in hand.
44 1 will pay," said the banker; 44 but I must knOw
what all this means."
" 4 The sum is three hundred and twelve thousand
francs, costs of suits and of arrest not included."
44 Three hundred thousand francs ! " cried the baron ;
44 the sum is too high."
44 Oh, monsieur!" interrupted Europe, 44 can you
have the heart to let my mistress go to prison? Take
Lucien de Rubemjpre. 143
my wages, my savings, — take them, madame ; I have
forty thousand francs." .
" Ah, my poor girl, I have never done you justice ! "
said Esther, pressing Europe in her arms. Europe
burst into tears.
" I will pay ! " said the baron, piteously, pulling out
a cheque-book, and preparing to fill out a cheque.
" Dont give yourself that trouble, monsieur le
baron," said Louchard ; " my orders are to take noth-
ing but gold or silver. But, as you are concerned in
the matter. I will consent to receive bank-bills."
"The devil!" cried the baron. "Show me the
papers. Ah, my child," he said to Esther, as soon as
he saw the bill of exchange bearing Georges d'Es-
tourny's name, "you are the victim of a great scoun-
drel, a swindler ! "
" Alas ! yes," said poor Esther; " but he was fond
of me once."
" Will monsieur le baron write a line to his cashier? "
said Louchard. "I'll send Contenson to him, and
dismiss my men. It is getting late, and everybody
will know — "
"Right!" said Nucingen, "send at once; my
cashier lives at the corner of the rue des Mathurins.
I will give you a line, and he will bring the money."
Louchard took the bills of exchange from the baron,
and remained alone with him in the salon. Esther re-
turned to her room. In about half an hour Contenson
came back with the cashier. Esther then reappeared,
having dressed herself. When Louchard had counted
the money, and the bills were handed over to Nucin-
gen, Esther seized them from him with the gesture of
a kitten, and put them in her secretary.
144 Lucien de RubemprL
Louchard departed, followed by Contenson ; but as
soon as they reached the boulevard, Asia, who was on
the watch, stopped them.
" The agent and the creditor are here in a coach,"
she said. "They are thirsty for their property, and
there 's money in it for you," she added.
While Louchard counted out the money, Contenson
examined the clients. He saw the abbd's eyes ; he
noticed the shape of his forehead under the wig, and
the wig seemed to him suspicious. He took the num-
ber of the hackney-coach, while apparently indifferent
to what was going on. Asia and Europe puzzled him
to the last degree. He felt certain that the baron was
being victimized by a very able set of rogues, — all
the more because Louchard, in asking for his help, had
been unusually reticent.
The disguised abbe dismissed Louchard, paid him
generously, and got into the hackney-coach, saying : —
" Palais-Royal, — the portico ! "
u Ah, the rascal ! " thought Contenson, overhearing
the order; " there 's something under all this."
The abbe reached the Palais- Royal at a pace that
relieved hirn of all fear of being followed. He crossed
the galleries after his own fashion, took another hack-
ney-coach near the Chateau-d'Eau, saying, " Passage
de l'Opera on the side of the rue Pinon." Fifteen
minutes later he was back in the rue Taitbout.
As soon as Esther saw him she cried out, giving him
the bills of exchange : —
44 Here are those fatal papers ! "
The abbe took them, looked them carefully over,
and then went and burned them in the kitchen fire.
Lucien de Rubempre. 145
"The trick is played," he said, showing the three
hundred thousand francs rolled in a packet which he
took from the pocket of his overcoat. "These and
Asia's hundred thousand will enable us to act."
"Oh, my God ! " cried poor Esther.
"Idiot! " said the savage sharper, "be Nucingen's
mistress ostensibly, and you can still see Lucien ; he
is Nucingen's friend. I don't forbid your seeing him."
Esther saw a faint ray of light in her darkness, and
breathed freer.
" Europe, my girl," said the abbe, taking the woman
into the boudoir where not a word of the conversation
could be overheard, " I am satisfied with you."
Europe raised her head and looked at this man with
an expression that so changed her blighted face that
Asia, who was watching at the door, asked herself by
what chain he held Europe which was stronger than
that by which she herself was riveted to him.
"But the thing is not all done yet," he went on.
" Four hundred thousand francs are not enough for
me. There 's a bill for silver-plate which amounts to
thirty thousand francs, on which something has been
paid ; but Biddin, the jeweller, has been put to some
costs. The furniture will be attached by him to-mor-
row. See him to-day ; he lives rue de l'Arbre-Sec.
He will give you pawn-tickets of the Mont-de-Piete for
ten thousand francs. You understand? Esther had
the silver made, and has n't paid for it, but pawned
it ; she is threatened with a complaint for swindling.
Therefore he must pay thirty thousand to the jeweller,
and ten thousand to the Mont-de-Piete, to recover the
property. With the costs, that will be forty-three
10
146 Lucien de Eubempre.
thousand francs. That plate has loads of alloy in it.
The baron will want to replace it ; we can get a little
off of him that way. You owe — how much for two
years to the dressmaker? "
44 Six thousand francs or so," replied Europe.
14 Well, if Madame Auguste wants to be paid and
keep our custom, she must make out a bill for thirty
thousand francs standing four years. Do the same
with the milliner. That Jew in the rue Saint-Avoie,
Samuel Frisch, the jeweller, will help you ; we must
owe him twenty-five thousand, and have the jewelry in
pawn for six thousand. We return the jewels to him,
which are half false, so the baron must not be allowed
to examine them too closely. In short, you must make
him vomit at least a hundred and fifty thousand francs
within the next week."
44 Madame ought to help me a little," replied Europe.
44 Speak to her ; she sits like one daft, and obliges me
to have more wit than three authors to one play."
44 If Esther turns prude, let me know," said the
abbe. 44 Nucingen will give her a carriage and horses,
and she must insist on choosing them herself. Buy
them from the man where Paccard is employed. You
can get fine horses there, very dear, and they '11 go
lame in a month, and he '11 have to get others."
44 One might get five or six thousand francs on the
perfumer's bill," said Europe.
44 Oh," said the abbe\ shaking his head, 44 go gently,
screw by screw ! Nucingen has only put one arm in
the machine as yet ; we must get his whole head in.
Besides all this, I shall want another five hundred
thousand."
Lucien de Bubempre. 147
"You'll have them," replied Europe; " madame
will soften about the sixth hundred thousand, and the
rest she can get for you herself."
u Listen to me, my girl," said the abbe ; " the day
I receive the last hundred thousand, you shall have
twenty thousand for yourself."
"What good will they do me?" said Europe, let-
ting her arms drop like one to whom existence is
impossible.
" You can go back to Valenciennes, buy a fine busi-
ness, and become an honest woman if you choose, —
every one to his taste in this world. Paccard thinks
of it ; his shoulder is clear, and he has n't much on his
conscience. You and he can marry."
" Go back to Valenciennes! how can you say so,
monsieur?" cried Europe, as if terrified.
Born in Valenciennes, of poor weavers, Europe was
sent at seven years of age into a rope-walk, where
modern industry abused her physical forces, and vice
depraved her before her time. Corrupted at twelve, a
mother before she was thirteen, she found herself fas-
tened for life to degraded beings. In consequence of a
murder she was brought before the court of assizes as a
witness. Influenced at sixteen by a last remnant of
integrity, and by fear of the law, she told the truth,
and her evidence condemned the accused to twenty
years at the galleys. The criminal, known for his
ferocious and revengeful nature, said to the girl, before
the whole court- room : " In ten years from now, Pru-
dence (Europe's name was Prudence Servien), I '11 re-
turn to put you under ground, if I go to the scaffold
for it." The president of the court endeavored to
148 Lucien de Rubempre.
reassure the girl, promising her the protection and
watchfulness of the law ; but the poor creature was so
terrified that she fell ill, and was a year in hospital.
Law, or call it Justice, is a reasoning being, repre-
sented by a collection of individuals who are con-
stantly removed and renewed ; whose good intentions
and recollections are, like themselves, extremely am-
bulatory. The courts can do nothing to prevent crime ;
they are invented to deal with them ready made. A
preventive police would be a blessing to any country ;
but the word police frightens the legislator of today,
who no longer knows how to distinguish between the
terms, to govern, to administrate, to make laws. The
legislator now tends to gather up all into the State, as
it were capable of acting.
The convict, no doubt, continued to think of his vic-
tim and of his vengeance when law and justice had
forgotten all about them. Prudence, who understood
her danger, left Valenciennes and came, when seven-
teen years old, to Paris, thinking she could be better
hidden there. She took up four callings, the best of
which was supernumerary at a minor theatre. There
she met Paccard, to whom she related her troubles.
Paccard, the right arm and henchman of Jacques
Collin, spoke of Prudence to his master; and when
the master wanted a slave, he said to Prudence, " If
you will serve me as people are made to serve the
devil, I'll rid you of Durut," — Durut being the con-
vict and the sword of Damocles over her head.
Without these details Europe's devotion might seem
unnatural ; and no one would have understood the
scenic effect the abbe now produced.
Lucien de Rubempre. 149
" Yes, my girl, you can safely return to Valen-
ciennes. Here, read that," and he took a newspaper
from his pocket, and pointed to an article headed :
u Toulon. Yesterday, the execution of Jean-Francois
Durut took place. From early morning the garrison,"
etc., etc.
Prudence let fall the paper ; her legs gave way un-
der the weight of her body. Life came back to her,
for she had not, as she said herself, known a relish for
food since the day of Durut's threat.
" You see I have kept my word. It has taken me
four years to inveigle Durut and drop his head into
the basket. Well, now, then, finish my work here, and
you shall be put into a nice little business in your own
town, rich by twenty thousand francs, and married
to Paccard, to whom I '11 grant virtue as a retiring
pension."
Europe picked up the paper and read with glaring
eyes the details which all newspapers have never wea-
ried of giving for the last twenty years about the exe-
cution of criminals, — the imposing scene, the priest
who converts the patient, the hardened criminal who
exhorts his late colleagues, the artillery drawn up in
line with cannon pointed, the kneeling galley-slaves,
and the trite and commonplace reflections, which do
nothing to change the condition of the galleys where
eighteen thousand crimes are swarming.
" Asia must come back here as cook," said the abbe,
signing to her to join them, "and Paccard must be
coachman instead of chasseur. Coachmen don't leave
their box, and are not so much watched as footmen."
"Are we to have other servants?" asked Asia,
doubtfully.
150 Lucien de EabemprS.
M Honest people," replied Hen-era.
" Weak fools ! " retorted Asia.
11 If the baron hires a house, Paccard has a friend
who will do for concierge," said the abbe. " Then we
shall need a footman and a kitchen-girl ; you can very
well manage two strangers."
As the abba was about to leave the house Paccard
appeared.
" Wait," said the chasseur, " there are people in the
street."
Those simple words were so alarming that Herrera
went up to Europe's room and remained there until
Paccard returned with a hired carriage, which was
driven into the court-yard. When he reached the
faubourg Saint-Antoine, the abbe got out and walked
to a stand of hackney-coaches, where he took one and
returned to the qnai Malaquais, thus baffling any pos-
sible curiosity.
M Here, my boy," he said, showing Lucien the four
hundred thousand francs in notes, — "here's a first
payment on account for the estate of Rubempre. I
propose to speculate with one hundred thousand of it.
They 've just put that Omnibus stock on the market.
Parisians will be taken by such a novelty, and we '11
triple the investment in six months. I know the ins
and outs of it ; they mean to pay splendid dividends
at first out of the capital to run up the stock, — an idea
of Nucingen's. In recovering the Rubempre estate we
need n't pay the whole cost immediately. You must
see des Lupeaulx, and ask him to recommend you to
a lawyer named Desroches, a sharp rascal, whom you
should see at his own office. Tell him to go to Ru-
Lucien de Bubempre. 151
bempre and study the ground ; promise him a fee of
twenty thousand francs if he will manage to buy you
for eight hundred thousand francs land enough around
the ruins of the old chateau to give you a rental of
thirty thousand a year."
" How you go ! you go ! you go ! "
" Yes, I go on and on. But no joking now. Go
and put three hundred thousand at once into Treasury
bonds, so as to lose no interest. You can safely leave
them with Desroches ; he 's as honest as he is sly.
Having done that, go to Angouleme ; see your sister
and David Sechard, and coax them to tell a little offi-
cial lie in your behalf. Your relations must be sup-
posed to have given you six hundred thousand francs
to facilitate your marriage with Clotilde de Grandlieu ;
there 's nothing dishonorable in that."
"We are saved!" cried Lucien, dazzled at the
prospect.
" You are, yes 5 " replied the abbe, "though not
really saved until you come out of Saint-Thomas
d'Aquin with Clotilde as your wife."
"What do you fear for yourself?" asked Lucien,
with much apparent interest.
" Some inquisitive persons, I don't yet know who,
are on my traces," said the abbe. " I shall have to
seem a real priest; and that's extremely annoying.
The devil won't protect me if he sees me going about
with a breviary under my arm."
152 Lucien de Bubempre.
X.
PROFIT AND LOSS.
If rich men of Baron de Nucingen's stripe have
more occasions than other men for losing money, they
have also far more opportunity for making it, even
when indulging their follies. Though the financial
policy of the famous banking-house of Nucingen has
been fully explained elsewhere, it may not be useless
to remark here that such large fortunes are not ac-
quired, not consolidated, not augmented, and not pre-
served, during periods of commercial, political, and
industrial revolution, without immense losses of capi-
tal, or, if you prefer it, without enormous taxes being
levied on private fortunes. Very Ijttle fresh wealth is
poured into the common treasury of the globe. All
additional monopoly represents some new inequality in
the general distribution of it. What the State exacts
it returns ; but what a house like that of Nucingen
takes it keeps. This coup de Jarnac escapes the law,
for the reason that would have made Frederick II.
a Jacques Collin, or a Mandrin, if, instead of operat-
ing on provinces with battles, he had spent his ener-
gies in outlawry, or in manipulating stocks. To force
the European States to borrow at twenty or ten per
cent, to gain these ten or twenty per cent with the
capital of the people, to levy a tax on industries by
seizing raw material, to fling a rope to the originator
Lucien cle Rubempre. 153
of some enterprise and bring him to the surface of the
water just long enough to fish out his submerged plan,
— in short, all such battles for lucre constitute the
statecraft of money. Certainly, there are risks for
the banker as for the conqueror ; but there are so few
persons in a position to fight him that the flock know
nothing of it. These great manoeuvres take place only
among the shepherds. Moreover, as the "executed"
(consecrated slang term for the Bourse gamblers who
fail) are always guilty of trying to make unholy gains,
very little interest is felt in misfortunes caused by
such manoeuvres as those of the house of Nucingen.
When a speculator blows out his brains, a broker
takes to flight, a notary carries off the means of a
hundred households (which is far worse than killing
one man), or a banker goes into liquidation, — such
catastrophes, forgotten in Paris in a few months, are
soon covered by the tumbling waves of the great city.
The colossal fortunes of such beings as Jacques Coeur,
the Medici, Ango of Dieppe, the Auffredis of La Ro-
chelle, the Fuggers, the Tiepolos, and the Corners, were
honestly obtained by privileges due to the ignorance
which prevailed in those days of the source of precious
commodities. But to-day geographical knowledge has
so penetrated the masses, competition has so limited
profits, that all rapidly acquired wealth is either the
result of chance or of some discovery, or else the re-
sult of a legal theft. Corrupted by scandalous exam-
ples, trade has carried out, especially within the last
ten years, the treacherous practices of commerce by
shameful adulterations of raw material. Wherever
chemistry is known wine is no longer drunk, and the
154 Lucien de Eubempre.
vine-growing industry languishes. Salt is adulterated
to cheat the treasury. The courts are alarmed by this
widespread dishonesty. In short, French commerce is
distrusted by the whole world, and England is getting
equally demoralized. The evil comes, with us, from
our political regime. The Charter proclaimed the king-
ship of money ; material success becomes, therefore,
the main object of an atheistical epoch. Corruption in
the higher spheres is, in spite of the dazzling results
of wealth and their specious reasons, infinitely more
hideous than the ignoble and quasi-personal corrup-
tions in the lower spheres, — a few details of which
play the comic, or, if you choose, the terrible, in this
scene. The ministers, afraid of all new thought, have
banished the comic of the present day from the stage.
The bourgeoisie, less liberal than Louis XIV., tremble
at a modern " Mariage de Figaro," forbid the presen-
tation of a political "Tartuffe," and, most certainly,
would not allow " Turcaret " to be played in these
days ; for Turcaret is now supreme. Consequently, the
comic must be related, not played ; books become a
weapon, less rapid, it is true, but more sure than the
drama of the poets.
Sure of obtaining Esther sooner or later, the baron
became once more the great financier that he was. He
went back to the direction of his affairs with such
readiness that his cashier found him at six o'clock on
the following morning in his counting-room looking
over his securities and rubbing his hands. During the
morning, in the midst of the coming and going of
clients and the giving of orders, one of his brokers in-
formed him of the disappearance of a brother broker, —
Lucien de Rubempre. 155
the cleverest and richest of them all, — Jacques Falleix,
successor of Jules Desmarets. He was chief broker to
the firm of Nucingen. In conjunction with du Tillet
and the Kellers, the baron had brought about the ruin
of this man as coolly as he might have ordered the kill-
ing of a sheep for the Passover.
" He could n't hold on," replied Nucingen, tranquilly.
Jacques Falleix had rendered enormous services to
stock-jobbers. But to expect gratitude from these
money-lynxes is like asking the wolves of the Ukraine
in winter not to eat you up.
M Poor man ! " replied the broker, "he so little
expected this disaster that he had just furnished a
charming little house in the place Saint-Georges for
his mistress. He spent more than a hundred and fifty
thousand francs in furniture and pictures alone."
" Ah ! " said Nucingen, " had he paid anything on
them ? "
" No," said the broker, " no upholsterer or picture-
dealer would have feared to give him credit. It seems
he had a fine cellar. The house was for sale, and he
meant to buy it. The lease is in his own name ; what
a piece of folly ! The result is that everything —
plate, furniture, wines, carriage, and horses — goes to
the hammer, and what will the creditors get? "
"Come to-morrow," said Nucingen. "I will go
and see the place ; if no bankruptcy is declared, we '11
arrange matters quietly, and you can offer a reasonable
price for the whole, taking the lease."
"Oh, that can be done easily!" said the broker.
" If you go there this morning, you '11 find one of
Falleix's partners with the upholsterers, who are try-
ing to prove a first claim on the property."
156 Lucien de Rubemjpre.
This failure forced the baron to go to the Bourse,
but iu leaving the rue Saint-Lazare he was unable to
resist going through the rue Taitbout. The gain he
expected to make out of the ruin of his broker made
the loss of his four hundred thousand francs compara-
tively light ; and he wanted to announce to his angel
that she would soon be mistress of a u little balace "
(as he said in his German accent), where no fond
memories would oppose their happiness. At the cor-
ner of the rue des Trois-Freres he met Europe, her face
quite convulsed.
44 Where are you going?" he asked.
44 Oh, monsieur, I was going to you! Such a mis-
fortune ! When madame's creditors found out she
had returned, they came down upon us like a flock of
vultures. Yesterday, at seven in the morning, the
sheriff came and put up the posters announcing the
sale of all her effects for Saturday next. But that 's
comparatively nothing ; Madame, who is all heart,
wanted to oblige that monster of a man — you
know?"
4 'What monster?"
44 Well, the one she loved, d'Estourny. Oh, he was
charming ! He gambled, — that was all."
44 He played with marked cards — "
44 Well, — and you," said Europe, 44 what do you do
at the Bourse? But let me tell you. One day, to pre-
vent d'Estourny from blowing his brains out, as he
threatened, she pawned all her plate and jewels, which
were not paid for ; and now the creditors have found
it out, and they threaten her with the police court.
Fancy what a horror to see her in the dock ! She is
Lucien de Rubempre. 157
crying bitterly, and wants to throw herself into the
river, — and she will, too."
"If I go to see her," cried Nucingen, "I have n't
time to go to the Bourse ; and I must go, for I want
to gain something for her. Try to calm her ; tell her
I "11 pay her debts, and will see her at four o'clock.
But, Eugenie, persuade her to love me a little."
" A little ! I promise you a great deal; for, don't
you see, monsieur, there 's nothing like generosity to
win women's hearts. I 've told madame already that
if she did n't love you she 'd be the lowest of woman-
kind, for you were taking her out of hell. As soon as
her worries are all over, you '11 see how different she
will be. Between ourselves, that night she cried so,
she dared not tell you all this, — she wanted to run
away, and — "
" Run away ! " cried the baron, alarmed at the idea ;
" but the Bourse ! the Bourse ! I must go, — say that
I will be with her at four o'clock."
Europe delivered the message, adding, " Won't you
show a little affection for a poor old man who is going
to pay your debts, — every one of them ? "
" Debts ! what debts? " cried Esther.
" Those that Monsieur Carlos incurred for madame."
"But he has had already four hundred thousand
francs."
" There 's a hundred and fifty thousand more un-
paid. But he has taken it all in good part, — the
baron has. He says he is going to get you out of
here, and put you in a 'little balace.' Faith, you're
lucky ! If I were you, inasmuch as you hold that man
by the safe end, I should make him, after you have
158 Lucien de RubemprS.
done all Monsieur Carlos wants, give me a house and
an income. Madame is certainly the prettiest woman
I ever saw, and the most engaging ; but ugliness
comes fast. I was fresh and pretty myself, and look
at me now ! I am twenty-three years old, almost as
young as madame, but I look ten years older. One
illness will do it. Well, if you have a house in Paris
and an income, there 's no fear of ending on the
streets."
Esther was no longer listening to Europe-Eugenie-
Prudence Servien. The will of a man endowed with
the genius of corruption had plunged her back into the
mud with the same force that he had used in pulling
her out of it. Those who know love in its infinity
know that its joy cannot be experienced without ac-
cepting its obligations. Since the scene with the priest
in her squalid room in the rue d'Anglade, Esther had
completely forgotten her past ; she had lived virtu-
ously in thought and deed, cloistered in her love. To
meet with no obstacles, the all-knowing corrupter had
so wisely prepared his scheme that the poor girl, im-
pelled by her devotion, had now only to give her consent
to knavery committed, or about to be committed. This
astuteness reveals the process by which he had brought
Lucien under complete subjection to his will. To cre-
ate terrible necessities, to dig the mine, fill it with
powder, and at the critical moment to say to his help-
less accomplice, ' k Do this, or ruin comes," — this was
the situation.
In her former life, Esther, born to the peculiar mo-
rality of courtesans, estimated her rivals by the sums
they could persuade men to spend upon them. For-
Lucien de Eubempre. 159
tunes squandered were badges of honor to these
women. The abbe, counting upon this feature of
Esther's life, was not mistaken. These tricks and
stratagems, constantly employed not only by the
women but by the spendthrifts themselves, did not
affect Esther's mind. The girl felt only her own deg-
radation. She loved Lucien, and was forced to be the
mistress of Nucingen ; all lay there to her. That the
false abbe took ,the gains, that Lucien built the edifice
of his fortunes with the stones of her tomb, that Eu-
rope should extract from the baron a few hundred
thousand francs by means more or less tricky, did not
occupy the girl's mind. The cancer that was eating
into her soul was something different. For five years
she had felt herself white as the angels. She loved,
and she had not committed in thought or deed a single
infidelity to that love, and now it was about to be
soiled. Her mind did not contrast the years of her
beautiful life with the vileness of her coming years.
Neither reflection nor poesy moved her. What she
felt was a feeling indefinable, but of boundless power :
from white she was becoming black ; from pure, im-
pure ; from noble, ignoble. Purified by her own will,
the moral soiling seemed to her unendurable. When
the baron threatened her with his love, her thought
was to fling herself from the window. Pushed by an
iron hand, she had gone to her middle in infamy with-
out having time or power to reflect ; but for the last
two days reflection had come, and with it a deadly cold
to her heart.
At Europe's words, "ending on the street," she
sprang up, violently exclaiming : —
160 Laden de BtibcmprS.
44 End on the street? No, sooner in the Seine ! "
44 In the Seine?" said Europe. "And Monsieur
Lucien?"
That name sent Esther back into her chair, where she
sat with her eyes fixed on a pattern of the carpet, the
furnace of her brain burning up her tears. At four
o'clock Nucingen found her plunged in that ocean of
reflections and resolutions in which the female mind is
wont to float, and from which women issue with words
incomprehensible to those who have not navigated the
same waters.
" Do not look so sad, my dear," said the baron, sit-
ting down beside her. " You shall have no debts ; I
will arrange with Eugenie. In a month you shall leave
this apartment for a little palace. Oh, the pretty hand !
Give it to me that I may weigh it." Esther let him
take her hand as a dog gives its paw. " Ah, you give
your hand, but you will not give your heart, and it is
the heart I want ! "
This was said in so sincere a tone that Esther turned
her eyes upon the old man with an expression of pity
that drove him well-nigh beside himself. There is no
greater comprehension in the world than that of two
corresponding sorrows.
" Poor man ! " she said, " he loves ! "
Hearing these words, which he misunderstood, the
baron turned pale, his blood tingled in his veins, he
breathed another air.
" I love you as much as I love my daughter," he said ;
"and I feel here" — laying his hand upon his heart —
44 that I do not wish to see you otherwise than happy."
44 If you will indeed be my father, I will love you
Lucien de Rubempre. 161
•well. I will never leave you ; you shall never see me
the bad and venal and grasping woman that I now
seem to be."
"You have had your follies," replied the baron,
"like other pretty women, that's all. Don't say an-
other word about it. Our business, we men, is to
make money for you. Be happy. I will, indeed, be
your father for a few days ; for I know you must get
accustomed to my poor carcass."
"Truly?" she said, rising, and passing her arm
about his neck.
" Truly," he answered, trying to put a smile upon
his face.
She kissed him on the forehead, believing an impos-
sible thing, — to be saved from infamy and see Lucien.
She caressed the banker with her old fascination, and
bewitched him so thoroughly that he promised to re-
main her father for the next month, reflecting that a
month was necessary to complete the purchase and
arrangement of Falleix's house in the Place Saint-
Georges.
Once in the street, however, on his way home the
baron said to himself, "I am a simpleton." In Es-
ther's presence he was a child ; away from her the
lynx revived.
11
162 Lucien de BubemprS.
XL
ABDICATION.
Toward the end of December, 1829, the little
44 balace" of the rue Saint-Georges was almost ready
for occupation. All the inventions of luxury before the
revolution of 1830 had made the house a type of good
taste. Grindot, the architect, considered the decora-
tions his chef-d'oeuvre. The marble staircase, the
stuccos, the stuffs, the gilding soberly applied, — in
short, the smallest detail, as well as the greatest
effects, surpassed all that the Louis XV. period has
bequeathed to Paris.
The baron, driven to distraction, and still rebuffed
by Esther, resolved to treat what he called the affair
of his marriage by correspondence, hoping to obtain
some written engagement. Bankers believe in letters.
Consequently the lynx rose early one morning in Jan-
uary, and locked himself into his study, where he com-
posed the following letter, written in very good French,
for though he pronounced the language abominably, he
wrote it well : —
Dear Esther, — Flower of my thoughts, and sole happi-
ness of my life, when I told you that 1 would love you as
my daughter, I deceived you and I deceived myself. 1
wished to express to you in that way the sacredness of my
feelings, which resemble none that I have ever heard of, first,
because I am an old man, and next, because I never loved
Lucien de Eubempre. 163
before. I love you so much that if you cost me my whole
fortune I should not love you less. Be just : most men
would not have seen, as I have done, an angel in you ; but I
have never cast one thought upon your past. I love you as
I love my daughter Augusta, and as I would have loved my
wife had my wife loved me. If love is the only absolution
for an old man's love, ask yourself if I am not made to play
a miserable part. 1 have made you the joy and the conso-
lation of my old age. You know well that until my death
you shall be made as happy as a woman can be ; and you
also know that after my death you shall be rich enough to
make you envied by other women. In all the affairs of
business about which I have talked to you, your share is
first deducted and placed to your account with the house of
Nucingen. In a few days you will move to a house which
will sooner or later be your own if it pleases you. When
there, will you still receive me only as your father, or will
you make me happy ?
Forgive me if I write to you plainly. When I am near
you I have no courage ; I feel that you master me. I do not
mean to offend you ; I only desire to tell you how I suffer
and how cruel suspense is at my age. The delicacy of my
conduct is a guarantee of the sincerity of my intentions.
Have I acted like a creditor ? You reply to my complaints
that my wishes threaten your life, and I believe it when I
am with you ; but away from you I fall into doubts, which
dishonor us both. You have seemed to me as good and
candid as you are beautiful ; but you take pains to destroy
that conviction. You tell me you have a love in your heart,
unconquerable, pitiless; you will not tell me for whom.
See what my position is : I am obliged to ask you at the end
of five months what future you intend to grant to me. 1
must know what role you mean me to play on taking posses-
sion of your house. Money is nothing to me where you are
concerned. lam not so foolish as to make a merit of this in
your eyes ; but if my love is limitless my fortune is not, and
164 Lucien de Rubempri.
I would give all for you. Yes, if by giving you all I possess
I could, a poor man, win your affection, I would rather be
poor and loved by you, than be rich and despised. You
have so changed me, my dear Esther, that I am not recog-
nizable. I paid ten thousand francs for a picture by Joseph
Bridau, because you said he was a man of talent and un-
recognized. I give to every pauper I meet five francs in
your name. Well, what does the old man, who feels himself
your debtor when you do him the honor to accept his ser-
vice, ask in return ? Only a hope. I am ready to submit to
all conditions ; but tell me at least if, on the day you take
possession of your house, you will accept the heart and
servitude of him who is for the rest of his days
Your servant,
Fre'de'ric de Nucingen.
On receiving this letter Esther hastily seized a sheet
of note-paper, and wrote in large letters, covering the
whole page, a phrase from Scribe's comedy (then in
vogue), which has since, to his honor, become a pro-
verb, " Prenez mon ours." A quarter of an hour
later, after despatching the note, Esther, seized with
remorse, wrote the following : —
Monsieur le baron, — Pay no attention to the letter
you have just received from me ; in writing it I returned to
the heedless folly of my youth. Forgive, monsieur, a poor girl
who ought to be a slave. I never felt the baseness of my lot
as I have since the day on which I was delivered over to you.
You have bought me and paid for me ; I am owing to you.
There is nothing, they say, so sacred as the debts of dis-
honor. I have not the right to liquidate mine by throwing
myself into the Seine. It must be paid in that awful money
which is good on one side only. You will find me therefore
at your orders. I will pay once for all the sums that are
Lucien de Rubempre. 165
mortgaged upon me ; that fatal moment will be the first and
last and only payment. The debt paid, T am free to go out
of life. A virtuous woman has chances to raise herself after
a fall ; but we, poor creatures, we fall too low. My resolu-
tion is so fixed that I beg you to keep this letter as a testi-
mony to the cause of the death of her who will be for one
day only
Your servant,
Esther.
This letter despatched, Esther again regretted it.
Ten minutes later she wrote the following : —
Forgive me, dear baron ; this is myself. I did not mean
to mock you, nor to wound you ; but I wish to make you
reflect upon a simple argument. If we can stay together in
the relation of father and daughter, you will have a feeble
pleasure, but a lasting one ; if you exact the fulfilment of
the contract you will lose me. I will not worry you with
further words. The day on which you choose pleasure,
rather than happiness, will be without a morrow for me.
Your daughter,
Esther.
The stupidity of the moneyed man, though quasi-
proverbial, is nevertheless only relative. There are
faculties of the mind as there are aptitudes of the
body. The dancer has his strength in his feet, the
blacksmith in his arms, the singer works his throat,
the pianist his wrists. A banker is trained to contrive
affairs, to study them, to make interests act, just as
a playwright contrives situations, studies them, and
makes his personages act. Baron de Nucingen could
no more be expected to perceive the situation than
mathematicians can be expected tp have the images of
166 Lucien de Rubemprc.
a poet in their understanding. Equally distributed,
the vital human force produces fools or mediocrities
everywhere ; unequally distributed, it gives birth to
those abnormal natures, to which we give the name of
genius, but which, if they were visibly clear to us,
would seem deformities. The same law rules the
body ; perfect beauty is almost always accompanied
by coldness or stupidity. In the sphere of speculative
calculation, a banker displays as much mind, ability,
shrewdness, and faculty, as the ablest statesman in
national affairs. If, outside of his couuting-room, he
is remarkable he becomes a great man. Nucingen,
multiplied by the Prince de Ligne, by Mazarin, or by
Diderot, is an almost impossible human formula,
though it has existed under the names of Pericles,
Aristotle, Voltaire, and Napoleon. Monsieur de Nu-
cingen, being a banker, and nothing more, had no fac-
ulty of perception outside of his calculations, like other
bankers who believe only in actual values. In the
matter of art, for instance, he had the good sense to
go, money in hand, to experts, — to the best architect,
the best connoisseur in pictures, in statues. But as
there exists no expert, and no trustworthy connoisseur
in love, a banker is terribly embarrassed in managing
a woman. Nucingen, therefore, who was ill in his bed
for a day after receiving these letters, saw nothing to
do but what he had already done, and to trust that
time, the little " balace," and his unceasing attentions
would bring Esther to reason.
Under the system of espionage in which Esther was
held, copies of the poor girl's letters were carried by
Asia to the abbe. The anger of the man was, like
Zucien de Eubempre. 167
himself, terrible. He came at once in a carriage, with
the blinds down, to Esther's house, ordering the driver
to enter the court- yard. He was livid when he pre-
sented himself before her; she gazed at him for a
moment, and then, happening to be on her feet, she
staggered to a chair, her legs giving way beneath her.
44 What is the matter, monsieur?" she said, quiver-
ing in every limb.
44 Leave us, Europe," he said to the waiting-woman.
44 Do you know where you are sending Lucien?" he
asked when they were alone.
"Where?" she said in a feeble voice, trying to look
up at the man.
M Where I come from, my girl."
Esther saw red as she looked at him.
44 To the galleys," he added, in a low voice.
Esther closed her eyes. Her legs stretched out ; her
arms hung down. She turned white, and fainted. The
man rang, and Prudence ran in.
44 Bring her to," he said, coldly. 44 1 have not done
yet."
He walked up and down the salon while waiting.
Presently Prudence came to ask him to lift Esther to
her bed. He did so with an ease that showed his
athletic strength. It needed the most powerful drugs
to bring the girl back to the consciousness of her woes.
In about an hour she was able to listen to her living
nightmare as he sat at the foot of the bed, fixing upon
her the terrible glance of his glittering eyes like streams
of molten lead.
44 My little girl," he resumed, 44 Lucien stands at
this moment between a splendid, honored, happy, and
168 Lucien de RubcmprL
worthy life and the pool in the river, where he was
about to cast himself when I first met him. The family
of Grandlieu require him to possess an estate worth a
million before they will obtain for him the title of
marquis, and give him the hand of that great pole
named Clotilde. Thanks to you and me Lucien has
just bought his maternal manor, the old castle of
Rubempre, which did not cost much, only thirty thou-
sand francs. But his agent, by fortunate negotia-
tions, has added to it adjoining property amounting to
a million of francs, on which we have paid three hun-
dred thousand francs down. The castle, the costs,
and the premiums have absorbed the rest. We have,
it is true, another hundred thousand francs invested,
which in a few months will have more than doubled.
But there will still remain four hundred thousand francs
to be paid. In three days Lucien will return from
Angouleme, where he has been to give color to his
statement of the source from which the money comes,
for he must not be suspected of finding it under your
mattress — "
4i Oh, no! " she cried, casting her eyes upward with
exaltation.
"I ask you, therefore," he continued, unmoved, "is
this a time to frighten away the baron? He fainted
on reading your second letter. You have a fine style,
and I congratulate you on it. If the baron had died
of apoplexy, as he might have done, what would be-
come of us ? When Lucien comes out of Saint-Thomas
d'Aquin the son-in-law of the Due de Grandlieu, if you
still want to go into the Seine, — well, my dear, I '11
take your hand and we'll make the plunge together.
Lucien de Bubempre. 169
It is one way to end off ; but reflect a little. Would n't
it be better to live, and say to yourself at every turn,
' This brilliant fortune, this happy family ' ? — for he '11
have children, children ! have you thought of the
pleasure of putting your hand upon their little heads?"
(Esther closed her eyes and quivered gently.) " Well,
seeing the edifice of his happiness, you will be able to
say, ' It is my work. ' "
He made a pause, during which these two beings
looked at each other.
14 That is what I undertook to do for his despairing
life when he was about to fling it into the water," re-
sumed the abbe. " Am I a selfish man? That is how
we should love. That is the devotion given to kings ;
and I have anointed him a king. They might rivet me
for the rest of my clays to my old chain, and I think I
could be peaceful and happy, saying to myself, ' He is
at court ; lie is honored in the world ; he is prosperous.'
My soul and my thought would triumph while my car-
cass was toiling at the galleys. You are but a mis-
erable woman ; you love as a woman. If ever they
discover under the skin of the Abbe Carlos the convict
I once was, do you know what I should do rather than
compromise Lucien?" (Esther listened anxiously.)
" I should die as the negroes do, by swallowing my
tongue. But you, with your affectations, are bringing
ruin upon him. What have I asked of you? To put
on La Torpille's petticoat for six months, for six
weeks, — long enough to complete that million. Lu-
cien will never forget you ; men don't forget the being
who is recalled to their mind daily by their prosperity.
Lucien is worth more than you. He began by loving
170 Lucien de BubemprS.
Coralie ; she died. Very good, but he had n't the means
to bury her. Did he do as you did just now, — faint
away? No, poet as he is, he wrote six rollicking
songs, and earned the money to pay for her burial. I
have those songs ; I know them by heart. Well, do
you compose your songs. Be gay, frolicking, irre-
sistible, insatiable ! You have heard me ; don't oblige
me to say this again. Kiss papa. Adieu."
When, half an hour later, Europe entered her mis-
tress's room she found her kneeliug before the crucifix.
Having said her last prayers, Esther renounced her
beautiful life, the honor she had tried to make for her-
self, her virtue, her future, her love. She rose.
" Oh, madame, you will never look like that again ! "
cried Prudence Servien, startled at the wondrous beauty
of her mistress.
She hastily turned the psyche so that the girl might
see herself. The eyes still kept a little of the soul
that had gone to heaven. The Jewish tones of the
skin sparkled. Moist with tears absorbed by the fire
of her prayer, the lashes of her eyelids were like
leafage after a summer's rain, — the sun of love had
shone upon them for the last time. The lips still
seemed to invoke the angels, from whom, perhaps,
she had asked the palm of martyrdom as she gave
into their hands her unstained life. She had the
majesty which must have attended Mary Stuart at the
moment when she bade adieu to crown and earth and
love.
" I wish that Lucien could have seen me thus," she
whispered softly, with a smothered sigh. "Now," she
cried in a vibrant voice, "blaguons/"
Zucien de Bubempre. 171
Hearing that word, Europe stood aghast, as though
she had heard an angel out of heaven blaspheme.
" Well, why do you look at me as if I had cloves in
my mouth instead of teeth? I am nothing now but
a thief, an infamous, unclean creature, a prostitute !
and I await my lord. He'll come after the Bourse.
I '11 write and tell him I expect him. Asia is to serve
a dainty dinner ; I '11 make a fool of him, — that man.
Go, go, my girl ; and now for folly — I mean business."
She sat down and wrote the following letter : —
My friend, — I have much curiosity to know how many
times you fainted on receiving my three notes two days ago.
But how could I help it ? I was very nervous that day ; I
had been going over in my mind all the facts of my deplor-
able existence. I won't repent for having caused you so
much grief, because it proves to me that 1 am really dear to
you. That 's how we are, we poor, despised creatures ; a
true affection touches us more than the money spent upon
us. As for me, I feared I was only the hook on which you
hang your vanities, and it vexed me not to be more than
that to you. Yes, in spite of your fine protestations, I
thought you only looked upon me as a bought woman.
Well, now you shall find me a good girl, but on condition
that you will still obey me. If this letter does you more
good than your doctor's prescription, come and see me to-
day on your way from the Bourse. You will find, under
arms and adorned with your gifts, the creature who here
declares herself, for life, your machine of pleasure.
Esther.
172 Lucien de RubemprL
XII.
ESTHER REAPPEARS ON THE SURFACE OF PARIS.
It was exactly six years since Esther had been to
a theatre. All Paris was at this time rushing to the
Porte-Saint-Martin to see a play to which the power of
the actors had given an expression of terrible reality, —
"Richard d' Arlington." Like all ingenuous natures,
Esther liked to tremble with horror as much as she
liked to weep for sympathy.
" Let us go to see Frederick Lemaitre," she said to
the baron after dinner. "I adore that actor, and I 'm
hungry for the theatre."
u It is a cruel drama," he replied, as he ordered his
servant to take one of the two proscenium boxes on
the first tier. When a successful play fills a theatre,
there is always a proscenium box to be hired ten min-
utes before the rising of the curtain ; the directors retain
it for themselves, unless at the last moment some one
sends in haste to obtain it.
By an accident, so natural that it cannot be called
chance, three of Esther's former companions — Tullia,
Mariette, and Madame du Val-Noble — were present
on this occasion. "Richard d'Arlington" was one of
those wild successes (and well deserved) which are
never obtained out of Paris. While seeing this drama,
all the men began to think they had the right to throw
Lucien de Mube?npre. 173
their legitimate wives out of the window, and all the
wives thought it delightful to see themselves unjustly
victimized. A beautiful creature like Esther, dressed
exquisitely, could not display herself in a proscenium
box on a crowded night with impunity. Therefore,
after the end of the second act, a great commotion
arose in the box of the two danseuses when the iden-
tity of the beautiful stranger with La Torpille was
clearly made out by them.
" Ah, ca! where does she come from?" said Mari-
ette to Madame du Val-Noble. "1 thought she had
gone under, — swamped."
"Is it really she? She seems to me three dozen
times younger, and far more beautiful than six years
ago."
"Perhaps she has been preserved, like Madame
d'Espard and Madame Zayonchek, in ice," said Phi-
lippe Bridau, now called the Comte de Brambourg,
laughing.
This parvenu had brought the three women to the
theatre, where they occupied a box on the lower tier.
"Is n't she the rat you talked of sending me to get
possession of my uncle? " said Philippe to Tullia.
"Precisely," replied Tullia. " Du Bruel, go down
into the stalls and see if it is really she."
" What a head she carries ! " exclaimed Madame du
Val-Noble, using an expression in the vocabulary of
such women, which means, " Look at the airs she gives
herself."
" Oh," cried the Comte de Brambourg, " she has the
right to, for she is with my friend Baron de Nucingen !
I '11 go to their box myself."
174 Lucien de Bubempre.
" Perhaps she's that pretended Joan of Arc who has
conquered Nucingen, about whom we 've been bored to
death for the last three months," said Mariette.
41 Good evening, my dear baron," said Philippe Bri-
dau, entering Esther's box. u 80 here you are, mar-
ried to Mademoiselle Esther. Mademoiselle, I 'm a
poor officer whom you once consented to get out of a
difficulty at Issoudun, — Philippe Bridau."
11 Don't know him," said Esther, sweeping the audi-
ence with her opera-glass.
" Mademoiselle," interposed the baron, " is not
called Esther any longer. Her name is now Madame
de Champy, from a little property which I have bought
for her."
" Those ladies over there," said Philippe, " are
complaining that she gives herself airs. If you do
not choose to remember me," he said to Esther, " will
you deign to recognize Mariette, Tullia, and Madame
du Val-Noble?"
"If those ladies are civil to me, I am disposed to be
civil to them," replied Esther, shortly.
"Civil! why, they are all that's amiable. They
have christened you Joan of Arc."
Philippe Bridau hastened back to Mariette's box
with his report.
" Let us go and see her," proposed Tullia.
"Faith, no!" cried Mariette; "she's too hand-
some. I'll go and see her in her own house."
" I think I 'm handsome enough to risk it," replied
Tullia.
Accordingly, at the next entr'acte, Tullia went to
Esther's box and renewed acquaintance with her.
Esther, however, kept to generalities.
Lucien de Eubempre. 175
"Where do you come from, dear child?" asked the
danseuse, who was bursting with curiosity.
"Ob! I was five years in a chateau among the Alps,
with an Englishman as jealous as a tiger, — a nabob ;
I called him nabot, for he was n't bigger than a shrimp.
And now I 've fallen to a banker, de caraibe en syllabe,
as Florine used to say. But here I am back in Paris,
with dreams of amusement that will make a regular
carnival of life ! I '11 keep open house. Ah ! I 've
five years of solitude to make up. Five years of an
Englishman is too much ; they ought to be played ' for
six weeks only,' as the posters say."
" Did the baron give you that lace? "
" No, a relic of the nabob. But fancy what ill-luck,
my dear ; he was as ghastly as a friend's smile at our
success, and I thought to be sure he 'd die in six
months. Pooh ! he proved to be as rugged as the Alps.
Always distrust men who say they have something the
matter with their liver. I don't wish ever to hear
about livers again ; I 've too much faith in proverbs.
My nabob robbed me ; he died without making a will,
and the family turned me out as if I had the plague.
So the banker will have to pay double. Ah ! you are
right to call me Joan of Arc ; I 've lost England, and
perhaps I '11 die at the stake, burned — "
"Of love?" saidTullia.
" Alive ! " replied Esther, dreamily.
A few days later, Esther, who had been driving in
the Champs Elysees, met Madame du Val-Noble in the
alley which runs at right angles to the drive, where, at
that time, people left their carriages to walk up and
down if the weather was fine and dry.
176 Lucien de RubemprL
"Well, clear child," said Esther, after they had
talked for a while, " come and see me soon. Nucingen
dines with me to-morrow, and I want you." Then she
whispered in her ear, " I do what I like with him, for
he has n't that ! " She put one of her gloved nails un-
der her front teeth, and made the well-known gesture,
which means, " not a thing ! "
" You are sure of him? "
11 My dear, he has so far only paid my debts. "
" How mean ! " cried the other.
" Oh," said Esther, " I owed enough to scare the
minister of finance ! But now he has promised me an
investment in Funds for thirty thousand francs a year
on the day I take possession of his house. Oh, he 's
charming ! I have n't a word to say against him ;
he '11 do ! Next week we shall have the house-warm-
ing, and you must come. In the morning he is to give
me the investment in the Funds, for I could n't begin
to live in such a house as that without an income.
I 've known poverty, and I don't mean ever to come
to it again."
"You, who used to say, 'Fortune is I, myself!'
how you have changed," said Susanne du Val-Noble.
" Well, it is living in Switzerland ; everybody gets
miserly there. Go there yourself, my dear; catch a
Swiss. In fact, you might marry one, for they don't
know anything as yet about women of our kind. But
anyhow you '11 come back, as I have, in love with the
Grand Livre and a good income — such a delicate,
honest love ! Come and see me soon. Adieu."
During this time the Abbe Don Carlos Herrera had
his passport vised at the Spanish embassy, and was
Lucien de Rubempre. 177
arranging all things at the house on the quai Mala-
quais preparatory to a journey to Madrid. For this
reason : In a few days Esther would remove to the
house in the rue Saint-Georges, and become possessed
of the investment in the Funds representing thirty
thousand francs a year. Europe and Asia were
charged with the duty of making her sell out the stock
and remit the proceeds to Lucien. Lucien, supposed
to be enriched by the liberality of his sister, could thus
pay off the whole cost of the Rubempre estate. No
one could find a flaw in such conduct. Esther alone
could be indiscreet, and she, he knew, would die sooner
than let the truth escape her. Clotilde had appeared
in church wearing the pink ribbon tied round her crane-
like throat, so that the difficulties at the hdtel de
Grandlieu were conquered. Carlos, by disappearing
for a time, would divert all danger to Lucien if there
were, as he now suspected, malevolent persons on his
traces. In short, human prudence had foreseen all.
There was no weak spot ; no miscarriage was possible.
The evening before the day on which the abbe was to
start, Lucien went, as usual, to the h6tel de Grandlieu.
The company was numerous. Before the eyes of the
whole salon the duchess kept Lucien beside her for
some time, and showed him the greatest kindness.
" You have made a little journey?" she said to him.
"Yes, madame la duchesse. My sister, wishing to
facilitate my marriage, has made great sacrifices, and
so enabled me to buy the estate of Rubempre, and
greatly increase it."
" Is there a house upon it?" asked Clotilde, smiling
too eagerly.
12
178 Lucien de RubemprL
" There is something that resembles an old castle,"
he replied ; " but it would be wiser to use the materi-
als in building a modern house."
Clotilde's eyes flashed with happiness in addition to
the contentment on her lips.
"You are to play a rubber to-night with my father,"
she said to him in a low voice. ' ' Before long you will
certainly be invited to dinner."
" Well, my dear monsieur," said the Due du Grand-
lieu, " you have bought, I am told, the estate of
Rubempre. I congratulate you ; it is a conclusive
answer to those who declared you were in debt."
"Ah, monsieur le due, I still owe half the purchase-
money ! "
" Well, you must marry a girl with a fortune. But
you will hardly find one in our faubourg ; we cannot
afford to give such dowries to our daughters."
" They have dowry enough in their name," replied
Lucien.
" We are only three at whist to-night, Maufrigneuse,
d'Espard, and I," said the duke; "will you make the
fourth," he added, showing Lucien the whist-table.
Clotilde sat down beside her father to watch his
play.
"She wishes me to take this attention to myself,"
said the duke, tapping his daughter's hand, and look-
ing toward Lucien, who remained serious.
Lucien was partner to Monsieur d'Espard, and lost
twenty louis.
" My dear mother," whispered Clotilde to her mother,
" he has had the tact to lose."
At eleven o'clock, after exchanging a few words of
Lucien de Bubempre. 179
love with Mademoiselle de Grandlieu, Lucien returned
home, and went to bed thinking of the complete tri-
umph he had obtained in one short month ; for there
was no longer any doubt of his acceptance as Clotildes
suitor, and their marriage before the Lent of 1830.
The next morning, as he was smoking his cigarettes
after breakfast in company with the abbe, who was
thoughtful and seemingly very anxious, the servant
announced Monsieur de Saint-Denis, a gentleman who
desired to speak either with the Abbe Don Carlos Her-
rera, or with Monsieur de Rubempre.
"Didn't they say below that I had left Paris?"
cried the abbe.
"Yes, monsieur," replied the groom.
" Then you must receive the man," he said to Lu-
cien. " Be careful not to say a single compromising
word, nor let a gesture, even of surprise, escape you.
1 am certain this is the enemy."
"You shall hear me," replied Lucien.
Carlos concealed himself in the adjoining room, and
through the crack he saw a man well known to him
enter the salon, although he only fully recognized him
by his voice ; for Corentin — such was the man's name
— possessed the gift of transformation. At this mo-
ment he resembled an old head-clerk in the Treasury
department.
Corentin, whom we have met already in other
scenes, was, with a certain Peyrade, at the head of
the political police of France. The Revolution had
no police ; it needed none. Espionage, then uni-
versal, was- called civism. The Directory, with a
rather better regulated government than that of the
180 Lucien de Rubemprt.
Committee of Public Safety, was obliged to reconsti-
tute a police, — a work which the First Consul com-
pleted by the creation of the prefecture of police and
the ministry of police. Corentin, in conjunction with
Peyrade, created the staff of the new department.
In 1808 the immense services of these men were re-
warded by the appointment of Peyrade as commissary-
general of police at Antwerp, while Corentin remained
at the head of the police of France both political and
judiciary. This position he retained after and during
the Restoration. The ministry, made aware of some
plot or machination, would say, " How much do you
need for such or such results?" and Corentin, after
careful estimation, would reply, " Twenty, thirty, forty
thousand francs," as the case might be. Then, when
the word was once given to go to work, the means and
the men to be employed were left to the choice and
judgment of Corentin, or the agents whom he selected.
This was the system under which the judiciary police
was conducted for the discovery of crime in the days of
Vidocq. From 1817 to 1822 it sometimes happened
that Corentin was employed to watch the ministry itself.
The ministry, having perfect confidence in him, would
set him to watch the men who were watching them, — a
circumstance which used to make Louis XVIII. smile.
Corentin's private office was known only to the min-
istry of police, and one or two other persons. There
he received the personages whom the ministry or the
king employed as intermediaries in serious affairs ; but
no agent or sub-official ever came there. He had other
quarters for the transaction of his regular police-work.
In this secret room plans were concocted and resolu-
Lucien de Eubempre. 181
tions taken which would have furnished strange an-
nals and curious dramas could the walls have spoken.
There, from 1816 to 1826, vast interests were analyzed
and discussed. There were unfolded, in their germ,
events which later bore heavily on France. There
Corentin and his friend Peyrade said to each other
after 1819, "If Louis XVIII. does not choose to
strike such or such a blow, or get rid of such a prince,
it is because he execrates his brother. He wants to
bequeath to him a revolution." *
Corentin had seen the Abbe Don Carlos Herrera on
several occasions, and observed his glance, which could
never be forgotten ; also the square structure of the
powerful shoulders, and the bloating of the face. On
the previous night, when the abbe had been out in the
disguise of a sheriff's officer, Corentin had met him.
He was just about to get into a hackney coach.
"Eh, Monsieur l'abbe ! " cried Corentin, suddenly.
Carlos turned his head, saw Corentin, whom he knew
but too well, and jumped into the carriage. Corentin,
however, had time to say, through the door: —
" That's all I want to know. Quai Malaquais," he
called out to the driver, with infernal mischief in his
tone and look.
" Ha!" said Jacques Collin to himself as he drove
away, "I'm sold; they are on me. It is a question
of being quicker than they ; but I must know first what
they want of us."
1 The part omitted in this volume relates the manoeuvres of
police and criminals in connection with this plot of Jacques
Collin, whose - real identity, however, was not as yet known to
the police. — Tk.
182 Lucien de BubemprL
M I have not the honor of being known to you, mon-
sieur," said Corentin to Lucien as he entered the room ;
" but — "
" Excuse me for interrupting you, monsieur," said
Lucien ; " but — "
" But the matter concerns your marriage with Made-
moiselle Clotilde de Grandlieu, which will not take
place," said Corentin, quickly. (Lucien sat down and
said nothing.) " You are in the power of a man who
has the means, the will, and the intention of proving
to the Due de Grandlieu that the estate of Rubempre
will be paid for by a fool to whom you have sold your
mistress, Mademoiselle Esther. The minutes of the
proceedings against her for debt are easily procurable ;
also we have means of making d'Estourny and his
agent Cerizet speak out. The manoeuvres — extremely
clever ones — against the Baron de Nucingen will be
brought to light. At this moment, however, the mat-
ter can be arranged. Pay one hundred thousand francs,
and you will be left in peace. This payment does not
concern me. I am simply the agent of those who are
practising this blackmail ; that is all."
Corentin might have talked for an hour. Lucien
smoked his cigarettes with perfect equanimity.
" Monsieur," he replied, when Corentin paused, " I
do not wish to know who you are, for men who under-
take such commissions have no name, — at any rate,
none for me. I have allowed you to say what you had
to say unchecked, for I am in my own house. You
seem to me not devoid of sense ; therefore listen to
my dilemma." (A pause ensued, during which Lucien
met with an icy glance the cat-like eyes which Corentin
Lucien de Rubempre. 183
fixed on him.) " Either you are relying on statements
that are absolutely false, and I ought to take no notice
of them, or you are right in what you state ; in which
case, by giving you one hundred thousand francs I
also give you the power to ask me for as many hun-
dred thousands as you can find Saint-Denises to come
and ask for them. In short, to put an end in one sen-
tence to your very worthy negotiation, you are to know
that I, Lucien de Rubempre, fear no man, inasmuch
as I have nothing to do with such swindling as you
speak of. I may add that, if the family of Grandlieu
make difficulties, there are other young women of high
rank who are marriageable ; and, in any case, there is
no offence to me in remaining a bachelor."
" If Monsieur l'Abbe Carlos Herrera — "
" Monsieur," said Lucien, interrupting Corentin,
" the Abbe Carlos Herrera is at this moment on the
road to Spain. He has nothing to do with my mar-
riage, nor anything to say about my affairs. He is a
diplomatist who has kindly helped me for some time
past with his advice ; but he has reports to make to
his Majesty the King of Spain, and if you wish to
speak to him you must follow him to Madrid."
" Monsieur," said Corentin, curtly, " you will
never be the husband of Mademoiselle Clotilde de
Grandlieu."
" So much the worse for her," replied Lucien, impa-
tiently, urging Corentin to the door.
" Have you fully reflected?" said Corentin, coldly.
" Monsieur, I recognize neither your right to meddle
in my affairs nor to make me lose a cigarette," replied
Lucien, flinging away his extinguished cigarette.
184 Lucien de RubemprL
44 Adieu, monsieur," said Corentin. "You will not
see me again ; but there will, assuredly, come a mo-
ment in your life when you would give half your for-
tune to have had the thought of recalling me from that
staircase.*'
In reply to this threat the abbe made a sign of cut-
ting a man's throat.
" Now, to work ! " he cried, looking at Lucien, who
had turned livid when the terrible conference was
over.
Lucien de Rulempre. 135
XIII.
THINGS THAT MAY BE SUFFERED ON THE THRESHOLD
OF A DOOR.
No immediate events followed this scene. The
abbe, ostensibly gone to Spain, went really as far as
Tours. There he sent his carriage on to Bordeaux,
with a trusty subordinate in it to play the part of mas-
ter, and await him in an inn in that town. He him-
self returned, dressed as a commercial traveller, to
Paris, where he was secretly installed in the rue Tait-
bout, whence, by means of Asia, Europe, and Paccard,
he directed his machinations, and watched every one,
more especially Corentin.
Esther, meantime, continued conscientiously her r61e
of Pompadour to the prince of speculation. She gave
two or three little parties solely for the purpose of
inviting Lucien to the house. Lousteau, Rastignac,
du Tillet, Bixiou, Nathan, the Comte de Brambourg,
— the most dissipated young men of the day, — were
its habitues ; and Esther finally accepted, as actresses
in the drama she was now playing, Tullia, Florentine,
Fanny-Beaupre, Florine, and Madame du Val-Noble.
In six weeks time Esther became the wittiest, most
amusing, handsomest, and most elegant of the female
pariahs who compose the class to which she now
belonged. She tasted all the enjoyments of vanity
which seduce such women, but a secret thought put
186 Lucien de Rubempre.
her above her caste. She kept in her heart an image
of herself which was at once her shame and her glory.
The hour of her abdication was ever present to her
thoughts ; she lived a double life, holding her present
self in pity. Her sarcasms were the outward sign of
her deep contempt and horror for the infamous and
odious rdle played by the body in presence of the soul.
Spectator and actor, judge and criminal, she embodied
that wonderful fiction of the Arabian tales, in which a
sublime being appears in a loathsome person, a type
which we all know under the name of Nebuchadnezzar
in that book of books, the Bible.
The opening of the house in the place Saint-Georges
had been postponed by her on various pretexts from
time to time, but it was now fixed, with its attendant
fete, for the day after the first masked ball of the
season. About a fortnight before the day, Esther
was, as usual, at the Opera. She had selected her
box at a point from which she could command that of
Madame de Serizy, whom Lucien was in the habit of
accompanying. The poor girl put all her happiness into
the power of looking at him on Tuesdays, Thursdays,
and Saturdays, the Opera nights. On this occasion,
about half-past nine o'clock, she saw him enter Ma-
dame de Serizy's box with a pale and anxious face
that was almost distorted. These signs of inward
wretchedness were visible to her alone. The knowl-
edge of the face of a man by the woman who loves
him is that of a mariner about the ocean.
"Good God! what has happened?" she thought;
u what distresses him? Will he want to see that in-
fernal man, — but a guardian-angel to him? Could I
get word to Asia, in whose room he is hiding?"
Lucien de Euhempre. 187
Full of such painful thoughts, she scarcely listened
to the music, nor to the baron, who was holding a
hand of his "auchel" in both of his, and talking to
her in his Polish- Jewish jargon that was sometimes
incomprehensible.
"Esther," he suddenly cried, pushing away her hand
with some ill-humor, " you are not listening to me ! "
"Baron, you gabble love as you do your shocking
French."
"The devil!"
"lam not in my boudoir ; I am at the Opera. And
if you were not one of those iron safes made by Huret,
metamorphosed into a man by some trick of nature,
you would n't make such a disturbance in the box of a
woman who loves music. You keep rustling my gown
like a cockchafer on paper."
" How ungrateful you are ! " cried the baron.
"Ungrateful!" she exclaimed. "What have you
given me up to this time? Much annoyance. Do you
think I'm proud of you? You are proud of me, I
know ; I wear your buttons and your livery well
enough. You 've paid my debts, that 's true ; but
look how you filch millions. Ah ! you need n't make
faces at me ; you told me so yourself. Prostitute
and thief, we could n't be better matched. You have
bought a magnificent cage for a parrot whom you fan-
cied. Go and ask a Brazilian macaw if it owes grati-
tude to a man who keeps it in a gilded cage. Don't
look at me in that way ; you remind me of a Chinese
bonze. You show your red and white macaw to all
Paris, and call out, ' Is there any one here who pos-
sesses such a fine poll-parrot? Just hear it talk!
188 Lucie a de Rubempre.
You 'd really think there was sense in its words ; when
du Tillet comes in it says, " How do, old cheat? " ' You
say you want my heart. Well, come, I '11 tell you a
way to get it."
M Tell me, tell me ! I '11 do anything for you ; I like
to have you blague 1 me in this way."
" Be young, be handsome, be like Lucien de Ru-
bempre, who is over there in Madame de Serizy's box,
and you will obtain gratis what you can never buy
with all your millions."
" I shall go home, for you are really execrable to-
night," said the lynx, whose face elongated as he went
to the door and opened it.
" Here, Nucingen ! " said Esther, recalling him with
an imperious gesture.
The baron returned with a servility that was almost
canine.
" Do you want me to be nice to you and pet you,
old monster? "
" You break my heart."
" Prake your heart!" she cried, imitating his ac-
cent. " What do you know of a broken heart? But
I want you to go over there and bring Lucien here to
me ; I wish to invite him to Belshazzar's feast, and
make sure that he comes. Now, if you succeed in that
little negotiation, I '11 tell you I love you so plainly,
my old Frederic, that you '11 actually believe it."
1 The word blague cannot be translated, nor its meaning given
by any English word or term. It has a hundred meanings in
the French. It is talk, — reckless, witty, ironical, chaffing, boast-
ful, whimsical, free to license, the vehicle of which is bohemian
slang. — Tr.
Lucien de Rubempre. 189
" You are a witch," said the baron, kissing her
glove. " I 'd listen for an hour to your insults for a
sweet word at the end."
" Then obey me," she said, " or — " and she threat-
ened him with her finger as you might a child.
The baron shook his head like a bird caught in a net
which implores the hunter's pity.
"Oh ! what can be the matter with Lucien?" she
said to herself when left alone, the tears she had been
retaining dropping from her eyes. " Never, never, did
he look so sad as that ! "
Something had indeed happened to Lucien that very
evening. He had gone, as usual, in his coupe to the
hdtel de Grandlieu. Reserving his saddle-horse and
his cab-horse for the mornings, he had, like other fash-
ionable young men, a coupe for the winter evenings,
chosen from those of the best carriage-maker, and
drawn by fine horses. All things smiled upon him:
he had dined three times at the hdtel de Grandlieu ;
the duke was charming to him ; the Omnibus shares,
sold at treble their cost, had enabled him to pay off
another third on the cost of his estate ; Clotilde de
Grandlieu, who now appeared in charming toilets,
beamed joyously upon him when he entered the salon,
and openly avowed her love. Persons in high places
talked of the marriage as a probable thing. The Due
de Chaulieu, formerly ambassador to Spain, and now
minister of foreign affairs, promised the Duchesse de
Grandlieu to ask the King to bestow the title of mar-
quis upon Monsieur de Rubempre.
After dining with Madame de Serizy, Lucien had
gone, as we have said, to pay his usual evening visit
190 Lucien de Ruhcmpre.
at the hotel de Grandlieu. He arrived there ; his
coachman called for the gate to open, and he reached
the portico. As Lucien got out of his coupe he saw-
four or five other carriages waiting in the court-yard.
Seeing Monsieur de Rubempre, one of the footmen
opened and shut the door of the peristyle, and came
forward, standing with his back to the door, like a
soldier on guard.
" His Grace is not at home," he said.
" Madame la duchesse receives," observed Lucien.
" Madame la duchesse is out," replied the footman,
gravely.
" Mademoiselle Clotilde — "
" I don't think that mademoiselle would receive
monsieur in the absence of Madame la duchesse."
" But I see there is company," said Lucien, con-
founded.
M I don't know," said the man, trying to seem stupid
and yet respectful.
There is nothing more terrible than etiquette to those
who admit it to be the most formidable law of social
life. Lucien saw the meaning of this scene, disastrous
to him, — the duke and duchess refused to receive him.
He felt the marrow of his spinal cord freezing in the
sections of his vertebral column ; a cold sweat beaded
his brow. This colloquy had taken place before his
own valet, who held the handle of the carriage door, in
doubt whether to close it. Lucien signed to him that
he was going aw r ay ; but as he got into the coupe he
heard the sound of persons coming out on the portico,
and a servant called out, "The carriage of Monsieur
le Due de Chaulieu." " Quick! " cried Lucien to his
Lucien de Rubempre. 191
valet, " to the Opera ! " But in spite of his haste
the unfortunate man could not avoid the Due de
Chaulieu and his son, the Due de Rhetore, to whom
he was forced to bow, although they did not speak
to him.
" How can I get word of this disaster to Carlos, to
my only adviser," thought Lucien. " What has hap-
pened? What will happen?" His mind wandered
away into conjectures.
Here is what had happened.
That morning, at eleven o'clock, the Due de Grand-
lieu, on entering the little salon where the family
breakfasted, had said to Clotilde : —
k * My child, until you hear more from me, you must
not think again of the Sieur de Rubempre."
Then he took the duchesse aside, and said a few
words to her in a low voice, which made poor Clotilde
turn pale, for her mother, on hearing them, showed the
utmost surprise.
"Jean," said the duke to one of the servants,
" carry this note to the Due de Chaulieu, and ask him
to send an answer, yes or no, by you. I have invited
him to dine with us to-day," he said to his wife.
The breakfast was very dismal ; the duchess was
thoughtful, the duke seemed angry with himself, and
Clotilde could scarcel} 7 retain her tears.
As soon as the duke had left the room the mother
said, tenderly : —
"My child, your father is doing right; obey him.
I cannot tell you, as he did, not to think of Lucien.
No, I understand your grief too well." (Clotilde
kissed her mother's hands.) "But I do say to you,
192 Lucien de RubcmprL
my angel, wait ! Make no move ; suffer in silence,
since you love him, and trust to the wisdom and solici-
tude of your parents. Women of our station, my
child, are great ladies because they know how to do
their duty on all occasions, and do it nobly."
"But what has caused this?" asked Clotilde, as
white as a lily.
"Things that cannot be told to you, dear heart,"
replied the duchess, " for if they are false, your mind
would be uselessly soiled ; if true, you should be igno-
rant of them."
At six o'clock the Due de Chaulieu entered the Due
de Grandlieu's study.
"Henri," said the latter, "I am in such difficulty
that I can only take counsel of an old friend like you,
who knows the world and deals with it. My daughter
Clotilde loves, as you know, that little Rubempre,
whom they have almost persuaded me to accept as her
husband. I have always been against the marriage ;
but the fact is Madame de Grandlieu has not been able
to withstand Clotilde's feelings. When the young man
bought his property, and paid three-fourths of the
purchase-money, I felt I could not make any further
objection. But last night I received an anonymous
letter, in which I am told that the young man's money
comes from an impure source, and that he lied to us in
saying that his sister had given him the funds neces-
sary to the purchase of the property. I am advised, in
the interests of my daughter's happiness and our family
credit, to make inquiries, and the means are suggested
to me. But I distrust and despise all anonymous let-
ters. Here, read it yourself."
Lucien de Rubempre. 193
" I share your opinion of anonymous letters, my
dear Ferdinand," said the Due de Chaulieu when he
had read the letter ; " but while we despise them it is
best to use them. There are cases in which we must
treat such letters as we do spies. Close your doors to
the young man for the present, and make inquiries.
Your lawyer is Derville, — a man in whom we all have
confidence ; he has the secrets of many families, and
he can be trusted with this. He is an upright man, —
a man of weight and honor ; also he is very shrewd
and wary. But you will want another man with him,
more accustomed to detective duty, and we have one
at the ministry of foreign affairs who is without his
equal for discovering secrets of state. We often send
him on missions. Let Derville know that he will have
a lieutenant in ferreting out this matter. Our spy is a
monsieur, who will present himself with the cross of
the Legion of honor, and has all the appearance of a
diplomat. He will do the hunting, and Derville can
assist in the chase ; after which they will be able to
tell you if the mountain has given birth to a mouse, or
whether you must get rid of that young Rubempre. A
week ought to be enough for the inquiry."
" The young man is not marquis enough yet to take
offence at my shutting my doors on him for a week,"
said the Due de Grandlieu.
" Especially if you give him your daughter after-
wards," said the minister. "And if the anonymous
letter tells the truth, what do you care if he is affronted
or not? If the statements are true, you must send
Clotilde to travel with my daughter-in-law Madeleine,
who wants to go to Italy."
13
] 94 Lucien de Rubempre.
"You pull me out of trouble," said the Due de
Grandlieu. " I don't know how to thank you."
" Wait for the result."
" Ah ! " exclaimed the Due de Grandlieu, " what is
the name of your man? I must tell it to Derville.
Send him here at four o'clock to-morrow, and I '11 have
Derville on hand, and put them in communication."
"The real name of the man is, I believe, Corentin
(a name you never heard of) ; but the gentleman will
make his appearance here under his ministerial name.
He calls himself Monsieur de Saint something or
other. Ah, Saint-Ives ! No, Saint- Valere, — one or
the other."
After this conference the majordomo of the mansion
received orders to close the doors to Monsieur de Ru-
bempre, which, as we have seen, was done.
Lucien walked about the foyer of the Opera-house
like a drunken man. He saw himself the talk of all
Paris. In the Due de Rhetore he had, as he knew,
one of those pitiless enemies on whom we are com-
pelled to smile, unable to avenge ourselves, because
their attacks are conformed to the laws of society.
The Due de Rhetore knew of the scene that had just
taken place on the portico of the h6tel de Grandlieu.
Lucien felt the absolute necessity of informing his
guardian-counsellor, now hiding in the rue Taitbout,
of this sudden disaster, yet he was afraid of compro-
mising himself by going to Esther's house where there
might be company. He was so beside himself that he
forgot that Esther was in the Opera-house. In the
midst of all these terrible perplexities, Rastignac,
knowing nothing as yet of what had happened, came
Lucien de Rubempre. 195
up to congratulate him on his approaching marriage.
At that instant Nucingen approached him smiling, and
said : —
" Will you do me the pleasure to come and see
Madame de Champy? She wants to invite you herself
to our house-warming."
" Willingly, baron," replied Lucien, to whom the
banker appeared for a moment like a saving angel.
"Leave us," said Esther to the baron when he re-
appeared with Lucien ; "go and see Madame du
Val-Noble, whom I see over there in a box on the
third tier."
"What is it, my Lucien?" she said in his ear the
moment that the door closed on Nucingen.
" I am lost ! They have just refused me entrance at
the hotel de Grandlieu, under pretext that the duke
and duchess were not at home, when there were four
or five carriages in the court-yard."
"What! the marriage broken off!" said Esther in
a faltering voice, for a vision of paradise rose before
her.
" I don't yet know what is on foot against me."
" My Lucien," she said in a voice adorably caress-
ing, "why be so grieved? You can make a better
marriage later."
" Invite a number of us to supper to-night, so that
I can speak secretly to Carlos — "
Lucien suddenly stopped, and made a gesture of
despair.
" What is the matter?" said the poor girl, who felt
as though she was in a furnace.
"Madame de Serizy sees me here!" cried Lucien;
196 Lucien de Rubempre.
" and worst of all, the Due de Rhe'tore, who witnessed
my rebuff, is with her."
At that moment the young duke was saying to Ma-
dame de Serizy, " Why do you let Lucien show himself
in the box of Mademoiselle Esther? You take an in-
terest in him, and you ought to warn him that such
things are not admissible. He may sup with her if he
chooses ; but, really, I am no longer surprised that
the Grandlieus have given him up. I saw him refused
to-night at their door, on the portico."
" Those women are very dangerous," said Madame
de Serizy, with her lorgnette turned full on Esther's
box. "They'll ruin him."
" Oh, no! " said the duke, " instead of costing him
money, they would give it to him if he needed it. All
women run after him."
M Well," said Esther, u come to supper at midnight,
and bring Blondet and Rastignac. Have two amusing
men at any rate, and don't let us be more than nine."
When Lucien returned to Madame de Serizy 's box,
instead of turning her face to him and smiling, and
drawing back her dress to make room for him, she
continued to gaze at the audience through her opera-
glass ; but Lucien saw by the trembling of the lor-
gnette that the countess was angrily agitated. Never-
theless, he walked down to the front of the box, and
seated himself in the other corner of it, leaving a
little space between Madame de Sdrizy and himself.
He leaned over the edge of the box, with his elbow on
the cushion, and his chin in his gloved hand. Then he
turned to a three-quarter position, and waited to be
addressed. By the middle of the third act the countess
Lucien de Rubemjpre. 197
bad not only not spoken, but she had not even looked
at him.
"I don't know," she said at last, "why you are
here ; your proper place is in Mademoiselle Esther's
box."
" I am going there," said Lucien, who rose and left
the box without even glancing at the countess.
198 Lucien de Eubempre,
XIV.
ONE OF CORENTIN's MANY MOUSE-TRAPS.
Corentin, coming in from his country-house at
Passy, presented himself before the Due de Grandlieu
on the following day. In a buttonhole of his black
coat was the ribbon of the Legion of honor. He had
made himself the face of a little old man, with pow-
dered hair, much wrinkled, and very wan. His eyes
were hidden by tortoise-shell spectacles. He had the
air and manner of the head-clerk in some government
office. When he had given his name (Monsieur de
Saint-Denis) he was conducted to the duke's study,
where he found Derville reading the letter he had dic-
tated himself to one of his own agents, whose business
it was to write the office letters.
The duke took Corentin apart to explain all that
Corentin knew. Monsieur de Saint Denis listened
coldly and respectfully, amusing himself by studying
this great seigneur, penetrating to the man beneath
the velvet, and turning inside out to his own mind the
being whose sole occupation in life was, then and al-
ways, whist and the contemplation of the family of
Grandlieu. Great seigneurs are so naive and simple-
minded with their inferiors that Corentin had not
many questions to put to the duke to elicit his
superciliousness.
" If you will take my advice, monsieur," Corentin
Zucien de Rubemjpre. 199
said to Derville, after being duly presented to him,
" we had better leave to-night for Angouleme by the
Bordeaux diligence, which goes quite as fast as the mail.
Six hours will get us all the information that Monsieur
le due requires. Did I understand your Grace to say
that it would suffice to ascertain whether the sister and
brother-in-law of Monsieur de Rubempre had been able
to give him twelve hundred thousand francs?" he
added, looking at the duke.
"You have understood me perfectly," replied the
peer.
" We can be back here in four days," said Corentin,
turning to Derville. " Not so long an absence that
the affairs of either will suffer."
" That was the only objection I made to his Grace,"
said Derville. " It is four o'clock ; I will return home
to say a word to my head-clerk and pack my travelling-
bag, and after dinner I will be at — But are we sure
of places?" he said to Monsieur Saint-Denis, inter-
rupting himself.
tk I '11 answer for that," said Corentin. "Be in the
court-yard of the Messageries du Grand-Bureau at eight
o'clock. If there are no places I shall make some ; for
that is how monseigneur the Due de Grandlieu must
be served."
" Messieurs," said the duke, with much grace, " I do
not thank you now."
Corentin and the lawyer, taking that speech as their
dismissal, bowed and went away. At half-past eight
o'clock Monsieur de Saint-Denis and Derville, seated
in the coupe of the diligence to Bordeaux, were ob-
serving each other in silence as they left Paris. The
200 Lucien de RiibemprL
next morning, between Orleans and Tours, Derville,
who was bored, seemed disposed to talk, and Corentin
deigned to amuse him, keeping at the same time his dis-
tance ; he allowed the lawyer to think that he belonged
to the diplomatic body, and expected to be made a
consul-general by the influence of the Due de Grand-
lieu. Two days after their departure from Paris,
Corentin and Derville stopped at Mansle, much to the
astonishment of the lawyer, who expected to go to
Angouleme.
" We shall get more accurate information about
Madame Sechard in this little town than in Angou-
leme," said Corentin.
" Do you know her?" asked Derville, surprised to
find his companion so well informed.
"No, but I made the conductor talk, finding that
he came from Angouleme. He tells me that Madame
Sechard lives at Marsac, which is only three miles from
Mansle ; and I think we shall be able to get at the
truth here rather than in Angouleme."
"Well, after all," thought Derville, "I am only
employed, as the duke told me, to witness the inqui-
ries made by this confidential man of his."
The inn at Mansle, called " La Belle-Etoile," had
for its landlord one of those fat, gross men, whom we
hardly expect to see alive on our return, but who are
still, ten years later, on the threshold of their door,
with the same amount of flesh, the same cotton night-
cap, the same apron, the same knife, the same greasy
hair, the same triple chin, — landlords who are stereo-
typed in all romance, from the immortal Cervantes to
the immortal Walter Scott. Always boasting of their
Lucien de fiubempre. 201
kitchen ; always having everything that you want to
feed you, — promises which culminate in an ema-
ciated chicken and vegetables cooked with rancid
butter. Each and all vaunt their fine wines, and
force you to drink the vin du pays. But, from his
youth up, Corentin had learned to extract from an
innkeeper more essential things than doubtful dishes
and apocryphal wines. He accordingly gave himself
out for a man very easy to please, who trusted impli-
citly to the best cook at Mansle, as he remarked to the
fat landlord.
" I have no difficulty in being the best, for I 'm the
only one," said the host.
" Serve us in a side room," said Corentin, winking
at Derville, " and above all, don't be afraid of setting
fire to your chimney ; we want to get the numbness out
of our limbs."
" It was n't hot in the coupe," remarked Derville.
M How far is it from here to Marsac? " asked Coren-
tin, addressing the innkeeper's wife, who descended
from the upper regions on hearing that the diligence
had unloaded two travellers intending to sleep at the
inn.
" Monsieur, are you going to Marsac? " inquired the
hostess.
" I don't know," he replied, shortly. "Is it far
from here to Marsac?" he asked again, giving the
woman time to notice the red ribbon in his buttonhole.
u If you drive, it takes a short half-hour," she
said.
" Do you think that Monsieur and Madame Sechard
are there in winter ? "
202 Lucien de BubemprS.
44 Of course, — they live there all the year round."
"It is now five o'clock. Shall we be likely to find
them still up at nine?"
M Oh, yes, till ten o'clock, certainly ! They have
company every evening, — the cure and Monsieur
Marron, the doctor."
"They are very worthy people, are they not?"
asked Derville.
14 Oh, monsieur, yes, the very cream ! " replied the
innkeeper's wife, — " good, upright people, not ambi-
tious, no ! Monsieur Sechard, though he has enough
to live on comfortably, might have had millions, so
they say, if he had n't let himself be robbed of an
invention he made about paper-making ; the Cointet
Brothers profited by that."
44 Ah, yes, the Cointet Brothers ! " said Corentin.
" Hold your tongue, wife ! " said the landlord.
44 What do these gentlemen care whether Monsieur
Sechard got his patent or not; they are not paper-
dealers. If you intend to pass the night with me at
La Belle-Etoile," said the man, addressing the travel-
lers, 44 here 's the book in which I will ask you to write
your names. We have a constable at Mansle who has
nothing to do, and spends his time plaguing us."
44 The devil ! I thought the Sechards were very
rich," said Corentin, while Derville wrote their names
and his own description as barrister to the Civil Court
of the Seine.
44 Some folks do say they are millionnaires," replied
the landlord ; 4 4 but to stop tongues from wagging is
like trying to keep the river from running. Pere Se-
chard left two hundred thousand in lands, so they say ;
Lucien de fiubempre. 203
and that 's pretty good for a man who began as a
workman. Perhaps he had as much more in savings ;
for he ended in getting an income of ten or twelve
thousand francs from his property, and it is not to be
supposed he was such a fool as to neglect to put his
savings out at interest as he made them. But if he
did, as some say he did, dabble in usury, three hun-
dred thousand francs was as much as he ever handled,
and that ain't a million. I wish I had the difference
between them, and I wouldn't be here now keeping
the Belle-Etoile."
" Is it possible? " said Corentin. " I was told that
Monsieur David Sechard and wife had fully two or
three millions."
"Goodness!" cried the wife, "that's all they say
the Cointets have after robbing him of his invention,
for which they only paid him twenty thousand francs.
Where do you suppose such honest people as the Se-
chards could get a million? They were very poor in
the lifetime of the old man. Without Kolb, who is
now their bailiff, and Madame Kolb, who are both
devoted to them, they would hardly have had bread to
eat. What had they when they went to live at La
Verberie? Three thousand francs a year at most."
Corentin took Derville aside.
" In vino Veritas, — truth in taverns. For my part,
I consider an inn the best civil court in the land ; a
notary does n't know more of what goes on in a small
place than a landlord. Just see how we are supposed
to know 'the Cointets,' and 'Kolb,' etc. A tavern-
keeper is the living record of all adventures ; he 's the
police himself without knowing it. The government
204 Lucieii de MubemprS.
does n't need more than two hundred detectives at the
most in a country like France, where there are ten
million honest spies. We are not obliged, however, to
trust this report, though they would be certain to
know in this little place if twelve hundred thousand
francs had been taken out of it to pay for the Rubem-
pre estate. We need not stay here long — "
44 1 hope not," said Derville.
44 For this reason," continued Corentin : 44 1 have
found the most natural way in the world to get the
truth from Sechard and his wife. I rely on you to
support my little scheme with the weight of your au-
thority as notary, for it will bring forth a clear and
succinct account of their fortune. After dinner we
shall drive over to see Monsieur Sechard," he said to
the hostess. 44 Be sure that our beds are prepared;
we require two rooms."
44 Dinner is ready, messieurs," said the landlord.
44 Where the devil could that young man have got
his money ? " said Derville to Corentin, as they took
their places at table. 44 Can that anonymous letter
be true? Do you suppose- it was the money of some
mistress ? "
44 Ah, that's the subject of another inquiry ! " said
Corentin. 44 Lucien de Rubempre lives, so the Due
de Chaulieu tells me, with a converted Jewess, who
passes for being Dutch, and calls herself Esther van
Bogseck."
44 What a singular coincidence," said the lawyer.
44 1 am searching for the heiress of a Dutchman named
Gobseck ; it is the same name with a transfer of
consonants."
Lucien de Bubempre. 205
" Well," said Corentin, "you shall have full infor-
mation as to the relationship on my return to Paris."
An hour later the two emissaries of the house of
Grandlieu started for La Verberie, the home of Mon-
sieur and Madame David Sechard.
Never had Lucien experienced such emotion as that
which took possession of his soul at La Verberie when
comparing his fate with that of his early friend and
brother-in-law. The two Parisians were now to see
the same scene as that which, a few days earlier, had
so affected Lucien. In the first place, the whole at-
mosphere was that of peace and plenty. At the hour
when the two strangers arrived, the salon of La Ver-
berie was occupied by a little coterie of four persons, —
namely, the rector of Marsac,— a young priest, twenty-
five years of age, who, at Madame Sechard's earnest
request, was the tutor of her only son Lucien ; the
doctor of the neighborhood, Monsieur Marron ; the
mayor of the township ; and an old colonel, retired
from service, who cultivated roses on a small estate
situated opposite to La Verberie on the other side of
the road. Every evening in winter these persons came
to pla} r an innocent boston, at a farthing a stake, and
obtain the newspapers, or return those they had read.
When Monsieur and Madame Sechard bought La Ver-
berie, — a pretty house, built of tufa, and roofed with
slate, — its only pleasure-ground was a small garden
of about two acres. With time, and with the fruits of
her economy, the beautiful Madame Sechard had ex-
tended the garden to a little water-course by sacrificing
a vineyard, which she bought and transformed into
lawn and shrubberies. At the present time, La
206 Lucien de Rubempre.
Verberie, surrounded by a park of twenty acres, in-
closed with walls, was considered the most important
estate in the neighborhood. The house of the late
Sechard and its dependencies was only used for the
working of some twenty acres of vineyard, left by the
old man, besides six farms, each bringing in about six
thousand francs, of ten acres apiece, situated on the
other side of the water-course, exactly opposite to the
park of La Verberie.
Already the country people were calling La Verberie
4 'the chateau," and Eve Sechard was usually spoken
of as "la dame de Marsac." In satisfying his social
vanity by calling his sister Madame Sechard de Mar-
sac, Lucien had only done as the peasants and the
vine-dressers were already doing. Courtois, the pro-
prietor of a mill picturesquely situated at a few stones'
throw from La Verberie, was, they said, then in treaty
for the sale of this mill to Madame Sechard. This
purchase would give to La Verberie its finishing touch
as an estate of the first class in the department. Ma-
dame Sechard, who did much good, and did it with as
much discernment as liberality, was loved and re-
spected. Her beauty, now become magnificent, had
reached its highest development. Though nearly
twenty-six years of age, she had kept the freshness
of youth, thanks to the repose and the abundance
afforded by country life. Always in love with her
husband, she respected in him a man of talent, suffi-
ciently modest to renounce the loud clamor of fame.
To describe her fully, it may suffice to say that, in all
her married life, she had never had one heart-throb
prompted by aught else than her husband and children.
Lucien de Rabempre. 207
In six years Lucien had seen his sister three times,
and he had only written her at the most six letters.
His first visit to La Verberie was at the time of his
mother's death, and the last, which had just taken
place, was made to ask the favor of the lie so neces-
sary to his present circumstances. It led to a some-
what painful scene between himself and Monsieur and
Madame Sechard, who were left with grave and dis-
tressing doubts as to their brother's conduct.
The interior of the house, transformed like the ex-
terior, but without luxury, was comfortable. This will
be seen by a rapid glance cast into the room where the
company were now assembled. A pretty Aubusson
carpet on the floor, the walls hung with twilled gray
cotton, their panels defined by a cord of green silk,
woodwork stained to resemble ironwood, furniture of
mahogany, covered with gray cashmere with green
trimmings, plant-stands filled with flowers in spite of
the season, — all this gave an aspect that was soft and
pleasing to the eye. The window curtains of green
silk, the drapery of the mantel-shelf, and the frame of
the mirrors, were free from the bad taste which spoils
so much in the provinces. Even the appropriate and
elegant minor details were restful to the soul and to
the eye by the sort of poesy which a loving and intelli-
gent woman can and should introduce into her home.
Madame Sechard, still in mourning for her mother,
was busy at the corner of the fire with a piece of em-
broidery, assisted by Madame Kolb, the housekeeper,
on whom she relied for all the household details. As
the cabriolet containing the two strangers reached the
first houses in Marsac, the usual company at La Ver-
208 Lucien de Hubempre.
bene was increased by the arrival of Courtois, the
miller, now a widower, who wanted to retire from
business, and hoped to sell his property to the owners
of La Verberie, and sell it well, because Madame Eve
seemed to want it especially, and Courtois knew why.
u Here 's a cabriolet stopping at the door," said
Courtois, hearing the sound; "by the rattle I should
say it was a country vehicle."
" Very likely Postel and his wife, who have driven
over to see us," said the doctor.
" No," said Courtois, " for the vehicle comes from
the road to Mansle."
"Matame," said Kolb, a tall and stout Alsacian,
opening the door of the salon, " here 's a lawyer from
Paris who wants to speak to monsieur."
" A lawyer ! " cried Sechard, u the mere word gives
me the colic."
" Thank you!" said the mayor of Marsac, named
Cachan, a lawyer of twenty years' standing in Angou-
leme, who was formerly employed to sue David
Sechard.
" My poor David will never change ; he '11 always
be absent-minded," said Eve, smiling.
" A lawyer from Paris? " said Courtois. " Then you
have business there ? "
" No," said Eve.
" But you have a brother there," said Courtois.
u Take care it is n't about your inheritance from
Pere Sechard," said Cachan; "many of his doings
were very shady, the old man ! "
As they entered, Corentin and Derville, after bow-
ing to the company and giving their names, asked
Lucien de Eubempre. 209
to speak to Madame Sechard and her husband in
private.
" Certainly," replied Sechard ; " but is it on
business?"
" Solely about your inheritance from your father/'
replied Corentin.
"Then you will please permit Monsieur le maire,
who was formerly a lawyer in Angouleme, to be pres-
ent at the conference."
" Are you Monsieur Derville? " asked Cachan, look-
ing at Corentin.
"No, monsieur; this is he," replied Corentin, mo-
tioning to the lawyer, who bowed.
" We are here as one family," said Sechard, " and
we have nothing to conceal from our friends ; there-
fore we need not go into my study, where there is no
fire. Our life is open to the daylight."
"That of your father, monsieur," said Corentin,
" had certain secrets in it which you might not like
made known — "
"Is it anything to make us blush?" asked Eve in
alarm.
"Oh, no; only a youthful peccadillo," replied Co-
rentin, setting with much care one of his thousand and
one little mouse-traps. " Your father gave you an
elder brother."
"Ha! the old bear!" cried Courtois. "He never
loved you, Monsieur Sechard, and he kept this to come
down upon you after his death, the dissembling old
fellow ! I know now what he meant when he used to
say to me, ' You '11 see what you will see when I 'm
dead and gone.' "
14
210 Lucien de Bubempri.
" Oh, don't be uneasy, monsieur ! " said Corentin to
Sechard, studying Eve out of the corner of his eye.
M A brother ! " cried the doctor, " why, there 's your
inheritance divided in halves ! "
Derville pretended to be looking at the fine engrav-
ings, before lettering, which were hanging on the
walls.
" Oh, don't distress yourself, madame ! " said Coren-
tin, seeing the surprise depicted on Madame Sechard's
beautiful face. " I mean only a natural son. The
rights of natural children are not those of legiti-
mate children. This son is in great poverty, and he
has a right to a certain sum based on the amount of
the inheritance. The millions that your father left — "
At the word millions there rose a unanimous cry
throughout the salon. Derville stopped looking at the
pictures.
" Old Sechard, millions ! " ejaculated Courtois.
"Who told you that? Some peasant, of course."
" Monsieur," said Cachan, "you don't belong to the
Treasury, therefore I presume there is no danger in
telling you — "
" Oh, you need n't fear! " said Corentin. " I give
you my word of honor that I am not employed in the
National Domain office."
Cachan, who had signed to every one to keep quiet,
nodded his head with satisfaction.
" Monsieur," continued Corentin, " even if there is
only One million, the share of a natural son is a large
one. We don't wish to bring a suit ; on the contrary,
we merely propose that you shall pay us a hundred
thousand francs to settle the claim."
Lucien de Bubempre. 211
"A hundred thousand francs!" cried Cachan, in-
terrupting Corentin. " Why, monsieur, old Sechard
left twenty acres of vineyard, five little farms, ten
acres of meadow-land in Marsac, and not one farthing
with — "
" Not for all the world," cried David Sechard, "will
I consent to lie, Monsieur Cachan, and less in a matter
of self-interest than in all others. Messieurs," he said
to Corentin and Derville, "my father left us, beside
his land " (Courtois and Cachan in vain made signs to
him), "three hundred thousand francs, which brings
the whole value of our inheritance from him to five
hundred thousand francs."
" Monsieur Cachan," said Eve Sechard, " what is the
share which the law gives to a natural child ? "
" Madame," said Corentin, " we are not Turks ; we
only ask you to swear before these gentlemen that you
have not received more than three hundred thousand
francs in money from your father's estate. That is all
we want."
"First, give us your word of honor," said the for-
mer lawyer of Angouleme to Derville, "that j 7 ou are
indeed a lawyer."
"Here is my passport," replied Derville, giving
Cachan a paper folded in four. " Monsieur," mo-
tioning to Corentin, "is not, as you may think, an
inspector-general of the Domains. Make yourself
easy," added Derville. "We have merely a strong
interest in knowing the truth about the Sechard prop-
erty, and we now know it."
Derville then took Madame Sechard by the hand, and
led her very courteously to the end of the salon.
212 Lucien de RubemprL
"Madame," he said in a low voice, " if the honor
and future welfare of the house of Grandlieu were not
concerned, I would not have lent myself to this strata-
gem, invented by that decorated gentleman. But you
will excuse it, I am sure. The question was simply to
verify the truth or falsehood of a tale by which your
brother has gained the confidence of that noble family.
Be careful now not to let it be believed that you have
lent your brother twelve hundred thousand francs to
buy the estate of RubempreV'
44 Twelve hundred thousand francs ! " exclaimed Ma-
dame Sechard, turning pale. " Where can he have
got them, unhappy boy?"
11 Ah, that's the point," said Derville. " I fear the
source of his fortune is a very impure one."
The tears were in Eve's eyes, and her neighbors
saw them.
44 We have, perhaps, done you a great service,"
continued Derville, " by preserving you from being
connected with a deception which may have very dan-
gerous consequences."
Derville left Madame Sechard seated, and very pale,
with the tears on her cheeks. He bowed to the com-
pany and quitted the house.
44 To Mansle ! " cried Corentin to the little boy who
drove the cabriolet.
The diligence from Bordeaux to Paris passed through
Mansle during the night ; there was one seat in it.
Derville asked Corentin to allow him to take it, al-
leging his urgent business ; but in reality he wanted
to shake off his travelling companion whose diplo-
matic dexterity and sangfroid seemed to him a well-
Lucien de Eubempre. 213
practised habit. Corentin stayed three days at Mansle
without finding an opportunity to get away. He
finally wrote to Bordeaux to retain a place for Paris
where he did not return until nine days after his de-
parture.
Five days after Derville's return Lucien received,
in the morning, a visit from Rastignac.
"My dear fellow," said the latter, "I am almost
in despair about a negotiation which has been con-
fided to me on account of our well-known intimacy.
Your marriage is broken off without allowing you any
hope whatever of renewing it. Never put your foot
again in the hotel de Grandlieu. To marry Clotilde
you would have to wait till the death of her father,
and he 's too selfish to die soon. Old whist-players
hang long over their tables. Clotilde is going to Italy
with Madeleine de Lenoncourt-Chaulieu. The poor
girl really loves you ; they have had to watch her ;
she wanted to come and see you, and actually made
a plan to get away. That 's one consolation for your
disaster."
Lucien did not answer ; he looked at Rastignac.
"After all, is it a disaster?" Rastignac went on.
" You can find other girls as noble and much hand-
somer than Clotilde. Madame de Serizy will find you
one out of revenge ; she can't endure the Grandlieus,
who have never been willing to receive her. There's
her niece, that little Clemence du Rouvre."
" My dear fellow, I am not on good terms with
Madame de Serizy. She saw me in Esther's box and
made me a scene ; I left her without a word."
" A woman of forty does n't quarrel long with a
214 Lucien de Bubempre.
young man as handsome as you," said Rastignac. "I
know a little about those sunsets ! They last ten
minutes on the horizon and ten years in a woman's
heart."
" I have been expecting a letter from her for the
last week."
" Go and see her."
" Well, I suppose I must."
Lucien de BubemprS. 215
XV.
FAREWELL.
The day before the much talked-of housewarming,
Madame du Val-Noble was sitting at nine in the
morning by Esther's bedside, weeping bitterly. Her
last protector had died suddenly, and she knew her-
self on the down-hill to misery.
" Oh ! if I only had two thousand francs a year ! "
she cried. " With that I could live in a country-town
and find some one to marry."
"I'll get them for you," said Esther.
"How?" cried Madame du Val-Noble, eagerly.
"Oh, easily enough. Listen. Pretend that you
want to kill yourself ; play the comedy well ; send for
Asia and offer to give her ten thousand francs for two
black pearls in a very thin glass cover ; she has them ;
they contain a poison that will kill in a second. Bring
them to me, and I '11 give you fifty thousand francs
for them."
" Why don't you ask her for them yourself?" asked
the Val-Noble.
" Asia would not sell them to me."
" They are not for yourself? "
" Perhaps so."
"You! — who live in the midst of joy and luxury
and in a house of your own ! You, on the eve of a
216 Lucien de BubemprS.
fete about which people will talk for ten years, — a
fete that will cost Nucingen tens of thousands of
francs ! I 'm told there '11 be strawberries, here in
February ! asparagus ! grapes ! melons ! and three
thousand francs' worth of flowers are ordered for the
salon ! "
"What are you talking about? There'll be three
thousand francs' worth of roses on the staircase alone."
" They say your dress cost ten thousand ! "
"Yes; it is Brussels point. I wanted a regular
bridal dress."
u Where am I to get the ten thousand francs for
Asia?"
" Oh ! I'll give them to you ; it's all the money I
have," said Esther, laughing. "Open my dressing-
case ; you '11 find them — under the curl-papers."
"When people talk of dying they never kill them-
selves," said Madame du Val-Noble. " If it were to
commit — "
" A crime? nonsense! " said Esther, completing the
thought. " You need n't worry," she continued ; " I 'm
not going to kill any one. I had a friend, a very
happy woman ; she is dead, and I shall follow her —
that's all."
" How silly you are ! "
" Can't help it, we promised each other."
" Then let the note go to protest," said Madame du
Val-Noble, laughing.
" Do as I tell you, and go away. I hear a carriage,
and it is Nucingen ; he is going mad with happiness.
Ah! he loves me, that man! Why don't we love
those that love us?"
Lucien de Ruhempre. 217
"Ah! that 's it," said Madame du Val-Noble. " It
is the history of the herring, — the most intriguing of
fishes."
"Why?"
" Nobody has ever known."
"Come, go, my angel! I must get you your fifty
thousand francs."
"Well, then, adieu!"
For the last three days Esther's manner to the baron
had completely changed. The mocking tone had first
grown feline, and now the cat had turned into a
woman. She lavished affection on the old man, and
made herself charming to him. Her talk, devoid now
of malice and bitterness, was even tender, and brought
conviction to the mind of the clumsy banker. She
called him Fritz ; he believed she loved him.
He had now brought her the certificate of the in-
vestment on the Grand-Livre, and had come to break-
fast with his "dear little ancliel" to take her orders
for the next day, the famous Saturday, the great day.
"Here, my little wife, my only wife," he said joy-
ously, "here's enough to keep your kitchen going for
the rest of your days."
Esther took the paper, without the slightest emotion,
folded it, and put it in her dressing-case.
" So now you are pleased, monster of iniquity," she
said, giving a little tap to his cheek, — " pleased to see
me accepting something from you at last. I can't
tell you any more home truths, for now I share the
fruit of what you call your labors. 'T is n't a gift, —
no, my poor "old man, it is a restitution. Come, don't
put on your Bourse face ; you know I love you."
218 Lucien de BubemprS.
"My beautiful Esther, my angel of love, don't talk
to me so again," said the banker. "See! I would
not care if all the world called me a thief if I could
only be an honest man in your sight ; I love you daily
more and more."
" That's my plan," said Esther. " Therefore I will
never again say anything to grieve you, my old ele-
phant ; for you 've grown as innocent as a child. Par-
bleu! vieux scelerat, you never had any innocence but
that which you came into the world with ; it had to
get to the surface some day, but 't was so deep down
it could n't get up till you were sixty-five years old ;
and then it was fished up with the hook of love ! —
a phenomenon of old men. And that's why I've
ended by loving you — you 're young, oh ! very young !
There 's none but me who knows this Fre'deric — none
but me ! for you must have been a banker in your
teens. I know you lent your schoolmates one marble
on condition they returned you two. Ah ! well, well ! "
she cried, as she saw him laugh, "you shall do as you
like. Hey ! pillage men, and I '11 help you. Men are
not worth being loved ; Napoleon killed them like flies.
What does it signify whether they pay taxes to you or
the budget ? There 's no love in the budget, and I say —
yes ! I 've reflected about it, and you 're right — shear
the sheep ; that 's in the Gospel according to Beranger.
Kiss your 'Esther. Ah ! dis done, promise that you '11
give that poor Val-Noble all the furniture of my apart-
ment in the rue Taitbout — promise ! And to-morrow,
1 want you to present her with fifty thousand francs.
What a figure you '11 cut, mon chat! Babylonian gen-
erosity ! all the women will talk of you — so, after all,
it is putting your money out at interest."
Lucien de Bubempre. 219
"You are right, my anchel ; you know the world,"
he replied. " I'll be guided by you."
" Well," she said, " you see how I think about your
affairs, and your consideration and your honor. Now
go and get me that fifty thousand francs."
She wanted to be rid of him and send for a broker
to sell the investment that very day at the Bourse.
M Why must I get them at once? "
"Oh, you silly! don't you know you should offer
them in a pretty satin box under a fan, and say,
' Here, madame, is a fan that I hope will please you '?
Do go and get the things at once."
" Charming," said the baron ; " I shall have wit
enough now. Yes, I shall repeat your words."
Just as poor Esther was flinging herself down, weary
with the effort of playing her rdle, Europe entered.
" Madame," she said, " here 's a messenger sent
from the quai Malaquais by Celestin, Monsieur Lu-
cien's valet."
"Let him come in. No, stay; I'll go to the ante-
chamber."
Esther rushed to the antechamber and looked at the
messenger, who seemed to her an ordinary porter. He
gave her a letter.
When she had read it she dropped into a chair, and
said, in a weak voice, —
"Tell him to come down;" adding, in Europe's
ear, "Lucien has tried to kill himself. Show Mm the
letter."
The abbe, who still wore the dress of a commercial
traveller, came down at once, and instantly observed
the porter standing in the antechamber.
220 Lucien de RubemprL
" You told me there was no one here," he said in
Europe's ear.
As a matter of precaution he passed into the salon
after glancing at the man. Trompe-la-Mort was not
aware that the well-known head of the detective police,
who had arrested him in the Maison Vauquer, had a
rival and possible successor in Contenson.
"Yes, you are right," said the porter (Contenson),
when he joined his superior, Corentin, in the street-
" The man you described is in the house ; but he 's no
Spaniard. I 'd be willing to put my hand in the fire
that there 's some of our own game under that cassock.
He is no more a priest than he is a Spaniard."
"I'm certain of that," replied the head of the
political police.
" Oh, if we could only prove it ! " said Contenson.
Lucien had really been missing two days, and they
had profited by his absence to lay this trap ; but he
returned that evening, and Esther's fears were quieted.
The next morning, just after she had taken her bath
and had gone back to bed again, Madame du Val-
Noble arrived.
" There are your two pearls," she said.
" Let me look," said Esther, half rising, and rest-
ing her pretty elbow on the lace pillow.
Madame du Val-Noble held out to her what looked
to be two black currants. The baron had given
Esther a pair of little greyhounds of a celebrated
breed (which will sooner or later bear the name of a
great contemporary poet, who first brought them into
fashion). She was very proud of possessing them,
and had given them the names of their progenitors,
Lucien de Rubemjpre. 221
Romeo and Juliet. Esther called Romeo. The pretty
creature ran to her on his slender, flexible feet, so firm,
so sinewy that they were like steel springs. He looked
at his mistress. Esther made a gesture of throwing
one of the pearls to attract his attention.
"His name has destined him to die thus," said
Esther, flinging the pearl, which Romeo broke between
his teeth.
The dog gave no cry ; he turned upon himself and
fell stone-dead while Esther was still uttering the
words of his funeral oration.
" Oh, heavens ! " cried Madame du Val-Noble.
" You have a carriage ; carry off the late Romeo,"
said Esther. " His death would create a commotion
here. Make haste. You shall have your fifty thou-
sand francs to-night."
This was said so tranquilly, with the absolute in-
sensibility characteristic of a courtesan, that Madame
du Val-Noble cried out, —
"You are indeed our queen!"
" I shall say I lent Romeo to you ; and you must
say he died at your house. Come early, and look
your best."
At five o'clock that afternoon, Esther dressed, as
she had said, like a bride. She put on her lace gown
over a skirt of white satin, and wore a white sash
and white shoes, and over her beautiful shoulders a
scarf of point d'Angleterre. In her hair were nat-
ural white camellias, and round her throat a neck-
lace of pearls costing thirty thousand francs, sent to
her by Nucingen. Though her toilet was finished by
six o'clock, she had closed her doors to every one,
222 Zucien de Bubempre.
for she expected Lucien. He came at seven, and
Europe found means to bring him up to Esther's
room without his arrival being noticed.
When Lucien saw Esther dressed as she was and in
all her beauty, he said to himself : " Why not go and
live with her at Rubempre, far from the world, and
never see Paris again? I have had five years' instal-
ment of that life, and the dear creature's nature can
never be false to itself ; where could I ever fiud
another such perfection ? "
" My friend, you whom I have made my deity,"
said Esther, kneeling before Lucien, " bless me — "
Lucien tried to raise her, and kissed her, saying:
" You are joking, dear love."
Then he tried to take her by the waist, but Esther
disengaged herself with a motion of mingled respect
and horror.
" I am no longer worthy of you, Lucien," she said,
letting the tears roll from her eyes. " I implore you,
bless me — and swear to found two beds at the H6tel
Dieu ; as for masses in church, God will never par-
don me except to myself. I have loved you too
much. But at least tell me that I made you happy
and that you will sometimes think of me — won't
you?"
Lucien saw such solemn sincerity in Esther's man-
ner that he grew thoughtful.
" You mean to kill yourself," he said at last, in a
tone of voice that indicated some deep meditation.
" No my friend; but to-day, you see, is the death
of the woman, chaste and pure and loving, who was
yours, and I am afraid that grief may kill me."
Lucien de Eubempre. 223
"Poor child! wait," said Lucien. "I have made
great efforts during the last two days ; I have man-
aged to communicate with Clotilde."
"Always Clotilde!" she cried in atone of smoth-
ered anger.
"Yes," he said, "we have written to each other.
On Tuesday morning she starts on her journey, but
I am to meet her near Fontainebleau on the road to
Italy."
"Ah, gaf what do you want for wives, you men?
Planks?" cried poor Esther. " Tell me, if I had four
or five millions would you marry me ? "
"Child! I was just about to tell you that if all
is over for me, I want no other wife but you."
Esther lowered her head to hide her sudden pallor
and the tears that she brushed from her eyes.
"You love me!" she said, looking at Lucien with
bitter sorrow. " Well, that is my benediction. Don't
compromise yourself ; go down by the little staircase
and pretend that you entered the salon from the ante-
chamber. Kiss me on the forehead," she said. She
took Lucien in her arms, strained him to her heart with
violence, and said, " Go! go ! or I must live."
When she appeared in the salon a cry of admiration
arose. Esther's eyes reflected an infinity in which the
soul seemed lost ; and the blue-black of her beautiful
hair brought out the white tones of the camellias.
She had no rival. She appeared as the supreme ex-
pression of unbridled luxury, the creations of which
surrounded her. Her talk sparkled with wit. She
commanded- the revels with the cold calmness of
Habeneck at the Conservatoire when he leads the
224 Lucien de BubemprS.
best musicians of Europe in interpreting Beethoven
and Mozart. Nucingen ate little and drank nothing.
By midnight all the company had lost their senses.
They broke the glasses that they might never be used
again. The curtains were torn. None could keep
their feet; the women were asleep on the sofas.
Bixiou, who was drunk for the second time in his
life, said, as he saw Nucingen lead Esther away,
"The police ought to be notified, — some evil is about
to happen."
The jester thought he jested ; he prophesied.
Monsieur de Nucingen did not appear in his office
until twelve o'clock Monday morning. At one
o'clock, his broker informed him that Mademoiselle
Esther van Gobseck had sold the investment on the
Grand-Livre the preceding Friday and received the
money.
" But, Monsieur le baron," he said, " the head-clerk
in Monsieur Derville's office came in just as we were
speaking of this transfer, and after reading Mademoi-
selle Esther's real name, he told me that Monsieur
Derville was searching for her as the heiress to a for-
tune of seven millions."
u Bah!" cried Nucingen.
" Yes ; she is the sole heiress of the old usurer
Gobseck. Derville is to verify the facts. If the
mother of Mademoiselle Esther was that beautiful
Dutch girl who — "
"I know all that," said the banker. "She has re-
lated to me her life. I '11 write a note to Derville."
The baron sat down at his desk, wrote the little note,
and sent it. Then he went to the Bourse, and at three
Lucien de Eubempre. 225
o'clock he returned to the house in the place Saint-
Georges.
" Madame has forbidden me to wake her under any
pretext whatever," said Europe.
" The devil ! " cried the baron. " Europe, my dear,
she won't be angry if you tell her she is rich, richis-
sime ! She inherits a fortune of seven millions. Old
Gobseck is dead, and your mistress is his heiress, for
her mother was the old fellow's niece."
"Ha! your reign is over, old mountebank," said
Europe, looking at the baron with the insolence of
one of Moliere's servant-women. " Eugh ! old crow
of Alsace ! She loved you about as much as one
loves the plague — Heavens and earth! millions?
ah, now she can marry her lover ! Oh ! won't she be
glad ! "
And Prudence Servien left the baron confounded,
and ran to be the first to tell her mistress of this stroke
of luck. The old man, believing in his happiness, re-
ceived this shock of cold water on his love at the
moment when it had reached its highest degree of
incandescence.
" She deceived me ! " he cried, with tears in his
eyes. " She was deceiving me ! Oh, Esther ! oh, my
life ! Fool that I have been ! Such flowers cannot
bloom for old men. Youth I could not buy. Oh, my
life ! What can I do ? What shall I become ? She
is right, that dreadful Europe ! Esther, rich, escapes
me. Shall I go hang myself? What is life without
love? Oh, my life ! "
A piercing cry made him quiver to the very marrow
of his bones ; he rose, and walked with shaking legs,
15
226 Lucien de Rubempre.
drunk from the shock of disenchantment. Nothing
intoxicates so fatally as the wine of misery. At the
door of the chamber the unhappy man saw Esther stiff
on her bed, livid from poison, dead.
He went to her side and fell on his knees.
" You are right," he said. " She warned me of this.
She has died of me ! "
Paccard, Asia, and the rest of the household ran in.
It was a sight to see, — a surprise ; but there was no
desolation. Some uncertainty was felt among the ser-
vants. The baron became a banker, and, feeling sus-
picious, was imprudent enough to ask where were the
seven hundred and fifty thousand francs, the product
of the sale of the investment. Paccard, Asia, and
Europe looked at each other in so singular a manner
that Nucingen went out immediately, believing in a
murder and robbery. Europe, who felt under Esther's
pillow a limp package which seemed to reveal bank-
notes, began to busy herself with the body, and said
to Asia : —
" Go and tell Monsieur Carlos. To die before she
knew she had seven millions ! Tell monsieur that Gob-
seek was her uncle, and has left her everything."
Paccard seized the meaning of Europe's manoeuvre.
As soon as Asia's back was turned, Europe opened the
package, on which the poor girl had written, " To be
given to Monsieur Lucien de Rubempre." Seven hun-
dred and fifty thousand francs in bank-bills beamed on
the eyes of Prudence Servien.
" Oh," she cried, " how happy and honest we might
be for the rest of our days ! "
Paccard's thieving nature was stronger than his
attachment to Trompe-la-Mort.
Lucien de Rubemjpre. 227
"Durut is dead," he said; "my shoulder is still
clear. Let us be off together, and divide it up, so
as not to have all our eggs in one basket, and get
married."
' ' But where can we hide ? " said Prudence.
" In Paris," replied Paccard.
The pair turned and went down the stairway with
the rapidity of thieves, and left the house.
11 My dear," said Trompe-la-Mort, when Asia had
told her news, " go and find me a letter or paper in
Esther's handwriting, while I write her will. Carry
the letter and will to Girard, and tell him to write it
off at once, for you must slip the will under Esther's
pillow before the seals are put on."
He then wrote the following draft of a will : —
Having never loved any one in the world but Monsieur
Lucien Chardon de Rubempre, and being resolved to put an
end to my days rather than fall back into vice and the in-
famous life from which his charity redeemed me, I give
and bequeath to the said Lucien Chardon de Rubempre all
that I die possessed of, on condition that he will found a
mass at the parish church of Saint-Roch for the repose of her
who has given him all, even her last thought.
Esther Gobseck.
" There, that 's sufficiently in her style ! " said
Trompe la-Mort.
By seven in the evening this will, duly written and
signed by a trained forger, was put by Asia under
Esther's pillow.
" The police have come ! " she cried, hurrying up to
the abbe's room shortly after.
" You mean the justice of peace and his people."
228 Lucien de RubemprL
" No, I do not ; the justice of peace was there too,
but the gendarmes accompany him. The public prose-
cutor and the justice of peace are both there. The
doors are guarded."
44 This death has made a sudden rumpus," said
Trompe-la-Mort.
"Europe and Paccard have disappeared, and I'm
afraid they have carried off the seven hundred and fifty
thousand francs," said Asia.
"Ah, the blackguards!" he cried. "That bit of
pilfering may lose us all / "
Human justice and Parisian justice, — that is to say,
the most distrustful, most intelligent, ablest, and best-
informed of all justice, — too intelligent sometimes,
because it interprets everything solely by the law, —
had at last put its hand on the threads of this horrible
intrigue. The Baron de Nucingen, recognizing the
effects of poison, and remembering the seven hundred
and fifty thousand francs, thought that one or other of
the odious servants whom he disliked was guilty of a
crime. In his first fury he went straight to the pre-
fecture of police. It was like ringing a bell that
brought all Corentin's minions into play. The prefec-
ture, the courts, the commissary of police, the justice
of peace, the examining justice, were at once afoot.
By nine o'clock three doctors were engaged on poor
Esther's autopsy, and the inquiry began. Trompe-
la-Mort, informed of this by Asia, said coolly : —
" No one knows I am here ; I can keep out of
sight."
He raised himself by the frame of his garret sky-
light, and sprang with extraordinary agility to the
Lucien de BiLbemjpre. 229
roof, where, standing erect, he began to consider the
surroundings with the coolness of a slater. " Good ! "
he said, noticing a garden at a distance of five houses
off, "a garden ; that 's all I want."
" Easily pleased, Trompe-la-Mort," said Contenson,
coming from behind a stack of chimneys. " You can
explain to Monsieur Camusot what sort of mass mon-
sieur l'abbe proposed to say on the roofs ; and, above
all, why he wanted to run away."
" I have enemies in Spain," said Carlos Herrera.
" Come, we '11 go down through your attic."
Carlos yielded apparently ; but as soon as he could
brace himself against the frame of the sky-light, he
seized Contenson round the legs, and flung him with
such violence that the police-spy fell headlong into the
place Saint-Georges, and died upon his field of honor.
Jacques Collin returned composedly to his attic, where
he went to bed.
"Give me something to make me very ill without
killing me," he said to Asia. " Don't be alarmed at
whatever happens. I am a priest, and I shall stay a
priest. I have just got rid, in a natural manner, for
he slipped off the roof, of the only man who could
unmask me."
At seven o'clock the same evening, Lucien had
started in his cabriolet, with a passport taken that
morning for Fontainebleau, where he slept in the last
inn on the road to Nemours. About six the next
morning he went on foot through the forest and
walked to Bouron.
"It was just there," he thought, sitting down on
one of the rocks from which the noble landscape of
230 Lucien de Bubempre.
Bouron can be seen, "just at that fatal spot, that
Napoleon hoped to make a gigantic effort two nights
before his abdication."
After a while he heard the wheels of a carriage, and
a britska passed him, in which were the servants of
the young Duchesse de Lenoncourt-Chaulieu and the
waiting-maid of Clotilde de Grandlieu.
" Here they come," thought Lucien ; " now to play
this comedy well, and I am saved. I shall be the
son-in-law of the duke in spite of him."
An hour passed, and then a travelling-carriage, in
which were the two young women, came on with the
roll, so easily distinguished, of an elegant equipage.
The duchess had given orders to put the brake on
the wheels as the carriage came down the steep de-
scent from Bouron. The footman got off his seat
to obey her, and the carriage stopped. At that mo-
ment Lucien advanced.
"Clotilde!" he cried, tapping on the window.
u No," said the young duchess to her friend, " he
must not get into the carriage ; he shall not be alone
with us. Have a last interview with him ; I consent
to that ; but it must be on the open road, where we
will go on foot, followed by Baptiste. The day is
fine, we are warmly dressed, and we need not fear the
cold. The carriage can follow."
They both got out.
4 1 Baptiste," said the duchess, "the postilion is to
follow slowly ; we want to walk a little way, and you
will accompany us."
Madeleine de Mortsauf took Clotilde by the arm,
and allowed Lucien to talk with her. Together they
Lucien de Bubempre. 231
walked on to the little village of Grey. It was
then eight o'clock, and there Clotilde bade Lucien
good-bye.
" Remember, my friend," she said, ending nobly the
long interview, " I will never marry any one but you.
I prefer to believe in you above all men, above even
my father and my mother. Could I give you a greater
proof of my attachment? Now strive to remove the
unjust prejudices which weigh upon you."
The gallop of several horses was heard, and in a
moment a squad of gendarmes surrounded the little
group, much to the astonishment of the two ladies.
"What do you mean by this?" said Lucien, with
the arrogance of a fashionable young man.
"Are you Monsieur Lucien de Rubempre?" asked
a person who was the public prosecutor of Fontaine-
bleau.
"Yes, monsieur."
"You will sleep to-night in La Force; I have a
warrant to arrest you."
" Who are these ladies?" inquired the corporal of
gendarmes.
"Ah, true! Mesdames, your passports — for this
young man has acquaintances, so my instructions say,
with women capable of — "
" Do you take the Duchesse de Lenoncourt and her
friend for such women ? " said Madeleine, casting the
look of a duchess at the speaker. " Baptiste, show
our passports."
"Of what crime is monsieur accused?" asked Clo-
tilde, whom the duchess was entreating to get into the
carriage.
232 Lucien de Ruhempre.
"Of theft, and murder," replied the corporal of
gendarmes.
Baptiste lifted Mademoiselle de Grandlieu in a dead
faint into the carriage.
At midnight Lucien was locked up in the prison of
La Force, where he was kept in solitary confinement.
The Abbe Carlos Herrera had been brought there on
the previous evening.
Lucien de Rubempre. 233
XVI.
WHITHER THE PATH OF EVIL LED.
At six o'clock on the following morning, two ve-
hicles, called, in the vigorous language of the populace,
" salad-baskets," left the prison of La Force and took
the road to the Conciergerie, the prison of the Palais
de Justice.
There are few loungers in Paris who have not met
this rolling jail; but — although as a rule French
books are written solely for Parisians — foreigners may
like to find here a description of this formidable equi-
page of our criminal justice. Who knows but what
the Russian, German, or Austrian police, hitherto
lacking salad-baskets, may profit by it? and in several
foreign countries an imitation of this mode of trans-
portation would certainly be a benefit to prisoners.
This ignoble vehicle, with a yellow body, mounted
on two wheels, and lined with sheet-iron, is divided
into two compartments. In the first is a seat, cov-
ered with leather and having a leathern apron. Here
sit the constable and a gendarme. Behind them a
heavy iron grating, reaching from roof to floor, filling
the whole width of the vehicle, separates this species
of cabriolet from the second compartment, in which
are two wooden benches, placed, as in omnibuses, on
either side of the van ; on these the prisoners sit.
234 Lucien de Ruhempre.
They are put in at the back, where there is one step,
through an iron door without a window. The nickname
of " salad- basket" came from the fact that the vehicle
had originally an open grating on all sides, through
which the prisoners could be seen, shaken about like
lettuces. For greater security, in case of accidents,
this van is followed by a gendarme on horseback,
especially when conveying condemned prisoners to the
scaffold. Consequently escape is impossible. The
vehicle, being lined with sheet-iron, cannot be cut
by any instrument. The prisoners, carefully searched
when arrested or when locked up, possess no other
implement than, possibty, their watch-springs, which
may serve to file a bar, but are useless on smooth sur-
faces. The salad-basket, now brought to perfection
by the police of Paris, serves as a model for the cel-
lular wagon used to convey convicts to the galleys,
which has taken the place of the dreadful cart, that
shame of preceding generations, though Manon Les-
caut glorified it.
The salad-basket serves several purposes. First,
it conveys accused persons before trial from the vari-
ous prisons to the Palais, there to be questioned by
the examining magistrate. In prison language this is
called " going up for examination." Also it conveys
accused persons to the Palais for trial, unless the case
is one for the correctional police-courts, which take
cognizance of misdemeanors only. When " a big crim-
inal," to use a Palais term, is concerned the salad-bas-
ket conveys him from the various houses of correction
to the Conciergerie, which is the jail for the depart-
ment of the Seine. Finally, criminals condemned to
Zucien de Rubempre. 235
death are taken in it from Bicetre (where prisoners
under capital sentence are confined) to the barriere
Saint-Jacques, the place designated for executions after
the revolution of July. Thanks to philanthropy, these
unhappy wretches no longer suffer the torture of con-
veyance from the Conciergerie to the Place de Greve
in a cart exactly like that used for the conveyance
of wood. That cart is only used now for conveyance
from the scaffold. It is impossible to go to execution
more comfortably than by the present system in Paris.
At this moment the two salad-baskets, issuing so
early in the morning, were engaged, somewhat excep-
tionally, in transferring two accused persons from the
house of correction called La Force to the Concier-
gerie ; each of these prisoners had a salad-basket to
himself.
Nine-tenths of readers, and nine-tenths of the last
tenth are ignorant of the very considerable differences
that exist among the words inculpe [suspected per-
son], prevenu [accused person], accuse" [indicted
person], detenu [convicted person, prisoner], maison
d 'arret [house of correction], maison de justice or
maison de detention [jail, or prison]. Readers will
be surprised to hear that our whole process of criminal
law lies in those terms, which will presently be ex-
plained for the elucidation of our story. When it is
known that the first salad-basket contained Jacques
Collin, and the second Lucien de Rubempre, fallen in a
few hours from the summit of grandeur to a prisoner's
cell, the curiosity of readers will be sufficiently excited
to make them glad of these details.
The attitude of the two accomplices was character-
236 Lucien de Rubempre'.
istic. Lucien de Rubempre hid his face to escape the
glances which the street passengers cast through the
front grating of the ill-omened vehicle as it went from
the rue Saint- Antoine to the quays, through the rue du
Martooi and the arcade of Saint- Jean, beneath which
it had to pass in order to cross the Place of the Hotel-
de-Ville. To-day that arcade forms the entrance to
the house of the prefect of the Seine, in the vast
municipal structure. The bold galley-slave, on the
contrary, held his face as near as he could get it to
the grating, between the policeman and the gendarme,
who, certain of the security of their vehicle, gave no heed
to the prisoner, and were talking of their own affairs.
The days of July, 1830, and their formidable whirl-
wind did so overlay with their uproar anterior events,
political interests were so absorbing during the last six
months of that year, that few persons at the present
moment remember the private, financial, or judicial
catastrophes, singular as they were, which formed the
food of Parisian curiosity during the early months of
that year. It is therefore necessary to state how all
Paris was momentarily agitated by the news of the
arrest of a Spanish priest found in the house of a cour-
tesan, and that of the elegant Lucien de Rubempre, the
suitor of Mademoiselle de Grandlieu, arrested on the
high-road to Italy near the little village of Grey ; both
of them being suspected of a murder the profits of
which would have exceeded seven millions. The ex-
citement caused by this scandal even surpassed for
several days the immense interest taken in the last
elections under Charles X.
In the first place this criminal affair involved, as a
Lucien de Bubempre. 237
party concerned in it, one of the richest bankers in
Paris, Baron de Nucingen. Then Lucien, on the eve of
becoming private secretary to the prime minister, be-
longed to the very highest circle of Parisian society.
In all the salons of Paris it was remembered that the
beautiful Duchesse de Maufrigneuse had taken him up,
and that he was then intimate with Madame de Serizy,
wife of one of the ministers of State. Also, the beauty
of the victim had remarkable celebrity in the various
worlds which compose Paris, — the great world, the
financial world, the world of courtesans, the world of
young men, the literary world. For two days all Paris
had been talking of these arrests. The examining
judge, on whom the affair devolved, Monsieur Cam-
usot, saw in it a chance for his own advancement, and,
in order to proceed with as much alertness as possible,
he had ordered the transference of the two accused
persons from La Force to the Conciergerie as soon as
Lucien de Rubempre should arrive from Fontainebleau.
Before entering into the terrible drama of a crim-
inal examination, it is necessary to explain the nor-
mal process of a case of this kind, so that its divers
phases may be better understood both by Frenchmen
and foreigners ; who will thus be enabled to appreciate
more fully our system of criminal law as the legisla-
tors under Napoleon conceived it. This is all the
more important because that great and noble work is
at this moment threatened with destruction by a new
system calling itself reformatory.
A crime is committed. If detected in the act,
the suspected persons are taken to the nearest guard-
house and put in the cell called in popular parlance
238 Lucien de Rubempre.
"the violin," probably on account of the music — of
cries and tears — that is heard there. From there
they are taken before the commissary of police, who
makes a preliminary inquiry and has the power to
release them if a mistake has been made ; otherwise
they are next taken to the dep6t, or guard-house of
the prefecture, where the police hold them at the dis-
position of the prosecuting officer and the examining
judge, who, being informed of the affair, more or less
promptly according to the gravity of the case, come to
the dep6t and question the parties who are in a condi-
tion of provisional arrest. According to the presump-
tive nature of the case the examining judge issues a
warrant and orders the accused person locked up in a
house of correction. Paris has three such houses :
Saint-Pelagie, La Force, and Les Madelonnettes.
Remark the term "suspected person" [inculpe, in-
culpated person]. Our code has created three essen-
tial distinctions in criminality, — inculpation, arraign-
ment, indictment. So long as the warrant for arrest
is not signed, the presumed authors of the crime, or
the grave misdemeanor, are only suspected persons ;
under the warrant of arrest they become accused per-
sons [prevenu'], and they remain simply accused as long
as the examination continues. When the examination
ends and the judge decides that the accused persons
must be referred to a court of justice, they pass to
the condition of indicted persons [accuse] as soon
as the Royal court decides, on the application of its
attorney-general, that there is sufficient ground to send
the case before the court of assizes. Thus persons
suspected of crime pass through three states, three
Lucien de Bubempre. 239
sieves, preliminary to their appearance before what is
called the justice of the land. In the first state, in-
nocent persons have various means for making known
their innocence, — through the public, their keepers,
the police. In the second state, they come before
a magistrate, are confronted with witnesses, and
judged, — in chambers in Paris, or by a whole court
in the departments. In the third state, they appear
before a dozen judges, and the sentence of transfer-
ence to the court of assizes may, in case of error or
defect of form, be carried by the indicted persons be-
fore the Court of Appeals. A jury does not know
how many ears of municipal, administrative, and judi-
cial authority it boxes when it acquits an indicted
person. Therefore it seems to us that in Paris (we
are not speaking of other places) it is a difficult matter
for an innocent person ever to reach the benches of
the court of assizes.
The convicted person [detenu] is the condemned
man. Our criminal law has created houses of correc-
tion, jails, and prisons [maisons d'arr&t, de justice, et
detention], with differences which correspond to those
of accused, indicted, and convicted. The punishment
of mere incarceration is light, and is given for the les-
ser misdemeanors ; that of imprisonment means bodily
restraint, and is, in some cases, ignominious. Those
who propose to-day a general reformatory system are
simply overthrowing an admirable criminal equity of
graduated punishment ; and they will end in punish-
ing peccadilloes almost as severely as great crimes.
Compare the curious differences which exist between
the criminal law of the Code Brumaire, year IV., and
the Code Napoleon which was substituted for it.
240 Lucien de Rubempre.
In nearly all great criminal cases, like the one with
which we are now concerned, the suspected persons
become almost immediately accused persons. The law
at once gives the warrant for removal to the prefecture
and the warrant of arrest. Thus, as we have seen, the
police and the law both fell together with the rapid-
ity of lightning upon Esther's house. Even if no sus-
picions of murder and revenge had been whispered
by Corentin into the ears of the judiciary police, the
Baron de Nucingen had denounced a robbery of seven
hundred thousand francs.
As the first salad-basket, containing Jacques Collin,
reached the dark and narrow passage of the arcade
of Saint Jean, an obstruction of some kind forced the
postilion to stop beneath it. The eyes of the accused
man shone through the grating like a pair of carbun-
cles, in spite of the mask of death on his features, to
which the governor of La Force had felt it his duty
to call the attention of the doctor of the prison. Free
at this moment (for neither the gendarme nor the
policeman looked round at their "customer") those
flaming eyes spoke a language so dear that a clever
examining judge, like Popinot for example, would have
recognized the galley-slave in the priest. Jacques
Collin, from the moment that the salad-basket issued
from the gateway of La Force, had examined every-
thing on the way. Though the vehicle was driven
fast, his eye took in the houses with its eager but
thorough glance, from their garrets to the street level.
He saw all the passers, and analyzed them. An
omniscient eye could scarcely have seized creation, in
its means and ends, more completely than this man
Lucien de Bubempre. 241
caught up the slightest details in the mass of things
and human beings that passed him. Armed with a
hope, as the last of the Horatii with his sword, he
expected succor. To any other man than a Machia-
velli of the galleys, the hope would have seemed so
impossible to realize that he would certainly have let
himself go mechanically, as most culprits do ; for few
of them ever dream of resisting the situation in which
the law and the police of Paris place accused persons, —
especially those who, like Jacques Collin and Lucien,
are in solitary confinement. It is difficult for those at
large to imagine what this sudden isolation is to the
accused person ; the gendarmes who arrest him, those
who convey him to the lock-up, the turnkeys who place
him in what is literally a dungeon, those who take him
by the arm and make him mount the step into the
salad-basket, in short, all the beings who surround him
from the time of his arrest are mute, and notice him
only to make a record of his words for the police or
the judge. This absolute separation, so instantan-
eously and easily brought about between the whole
world and the accused person, causes an upset of all
his faculties, and a fearful prostration of mind ; above
all, when the person happens to be one not familiar,
through his antecedents, with the ways of the law. The
duel between the accused man and the examining judge
is, therefore, all the more terrible because the latter
has for auxiliary the silence of the walls and the incor-
ruptible stolidity of the agents of the law.
However, Jacques Collin, or Carlos Herrera (it is
necessary to give him both names, according to the
exigencies of each situation) , knew by long experience
16
242 Lucien de Rubemjpre.
the ways of the police,. of jails, and of law. There-
fore this colossus of craft and corruption had employed
all the forces of his mind, and the resources of his art
of counterfeiting, in playing surprise and the guileless-
ness of innocence, — all the while giving the magis-
trates the comedy of his death-agony. Asia, that
knowing Locusta, had given him a poison modified to
a degree that produced the semblance of mortal illness.
The proceedings of Monsieur Camusot, the examining
judge, those of the commissary of police, and the
activity of the public prosecutor, were all hampered, if
not annulled, by the action of a fit of apoplexy.
" He must have poisoned himself ! " cried Monsieur
Camusot, horror-struck at the sufferings of the so-called
priest, when he was brought from the attic in horrible
convulsions.
Four policemen had the utmost difficulty in getting
him down the stairs to Esther's chamber, where the
magistrates and the gendarmes were assembled.
" That is what he had better do if he is guilty/' said
the public prosecutor.
" Do you really think him ill?" said the commissary
of police.
The police doubt everything. The three officials
were speaking, of course, in a whisper ; but Jacques
Collin guessed from their faces the subject they were
discussing, and he profited by it to render of no avail
the first inquiries which are made at the moment of
arrest. He stammered a few phrases in a mixture of
Spanish and French that conveyed mere nonsense.
At La Force this comedy had an equal success, all
the greater because the chief of the detective brigade,
Lucien de Bubempre. 243
Bibi-Lupin, who had formerly arrested Jacques Collin
at the pension bourgeoise of Madame Vauquer, was on
a mission in the departments, and his temporary suc-
cessor had never known the famous convict.
Bibi-Lupin, formerly a galley-slave, and a compan-
ion of Jacques Collin at the galleys, was his personal
enemy. This enmity had its rise in quarrels, from
which Jacques Collin always issued uppermost, and in
the supremacy exercised by Trompe-la-Mort over the
other convicts. Moreover, Jacques Collin had been
during ten years the providence of released galley-
slaves, their chief, their adviser in Paris, the reposi-
tory of their funds, and, consequently, the antagonist
of Bibi-Lupin in his present capacity.
Thus it was that, although he was au secret [in
solitary confinement], he counted on the absolute
and intelligent devotion of Asia, his right arm, and
perhaps on Paccard, his left arm ; for he thought
that careful lieutenant would return to his duty as
soon as he had put the seven hundred and fifty thou-
sand francs in safety. This was the reason of the
almost superhuman attention with which he examined
everything as the salad-basket went along. Singular
to say, this hope was amply justified !
The two stout walls of the arcade of Saint- Jean were
splashed to a height of six feet with a permanent coat-
ing of mud thrown up from the gutter. Foot passen-
gers had nothing to protect them from the incessant
line of vehicles passing through the narrow way. More
than once the heavy cart of some stone-cutter had
crushed pedestrians. This will show the narrowness
of the arcade, and the ease with which it could be
244 Lucien de RubemprL
blocked. A hackney-coach had just entered it from
the Place de Greve, and an old market-woman was
pushing a little hand-cart full of apples from the rue
du Martroi ; a third vehicle coming along naturally
occasioned an obstruction. The pedestrians fled in
alarm, seeking a post that might protect them from
the old-fashioned hubs to the wheels, which projected
so far that a law was actually passed about this very
time to reduce them. When the salad-basket arrived,
the arcade was fairly blocked by the old woman's
hand-cart. She was a regular street-peddler of fruits ;
her head, covered with a dirty cotton handkerchief of
a checked pattern, bristled with rebellious locks that
looked like the hair of a wild-boar. The red and
wrinkled neck was horrible to behold, and the hand-
kerchief on her shoulders did not wholly hide a skin
that was discolored by the sun and dust and mud.
Her gown was in rags, and her shoes grinned as if
they were making fun of her face, which was quite as
full of holes as her gown. And what a stomach ! — a
poultice would have seemed less nauseous. At a dis-
tance of ten paces, this fetid and ambulating bundle
of rags was offensive to the nose. The hands must
have gleaned a hundred harvests. Either this woman
had come direct from a witch's sabbath, or from some
haunt of mendicants. But what a glance ! what auda-
cious intelligence ! what concentrated life when the
magnetic gleams of her eyes and those of Jacques Col-
lin met and exchanged a thought !
u Out of the way, you old bundle of vermin ! " cried
the postilion of the salad-basket in a hoarse voice.
" Don't you dare to crush me, hussar of the guillo-
Lucien de Bubempre. 245
tine, you!" she replied. "Your merchandise ain't
worth mine."
In trying to squeeze between two posts, to get out
of the way, the old woman blocked the passage long
enough to accomplish her object.
*' Oh, Asia ! " said Jacques Collin to himself, recog-
nizing his accomplice at once, " all 's well now ! "
The postilion continued to exchange amenities with
the crone, and the vehicles accumulated.
" Ahe! pecaire fermati. Sounildb. Vedrem!" cried
Asia, with the wild intonations common to street ven-
ders, who distort their words till they become cabalistic
to any but a practised Parisian ear.
In the hurly-burly of the street, and the shouts of
the angry coachmen, no one paid attention to that sav-
age cry, which seemed to be that of the old vender.
But the clamor, perfectly distinct for Jacques Collin,
cast into his ear, in a patois of Italian and corrupt
Provencal previously agreed upon, these terrible words :
11 Your poor little one is taken ; but I am on the watch.
You will see me again."
In the midst of the joy he felt at this triumph over
the power of the law, for he knew he could now estab-
lish communication with the outside world, Jacques
Collin was struck down by so violent a reaction that it
would have killed any other man than he.
"Lucien arrested !" he said to himself. He came
near fainting away. This news was more awful to
him far than the rejection of his last appeal had he
been condemned to death.
246 Lucien de Bubempre.
XVII.
HISTORY, ARCHAEOLOGICAL, BIOGRAPHICAL, ANECDOTICAL,
AND PHYSIOLOGICAL OF THE PALAIS DE JUSTICE.
Now that the two salad-baskets are rolling along
the quays, the interests of our present history require a
few words on the Conciergerie during the time it will
take those vehicles to arrive there. The Conciergerie,
historic name and awful word, but thing more awful
still, plays its part in all the revolutions of France,
and especially in those of Paris. It has seen most of
the great criminals. Of all the public buildings in
Paris this is the most interesting ; it is also the least
known — by persons belonging to the upper classes of
society. But, in spite of the immense interest of this
historical digression, we must make it as rapid as the
advance of the salad-baskets.
Where is the Parisian, the provincial, or the for-
eigner, even if the two latter are but a couple of days
in Paris, who has not remarked those black walls,
flanked by three stout towers with pointed tops of
which two are almost coupled, the sombre and mys-
terious ornament of what is called the quai des
Lunettes? This quay begins at the Pont au Change,
and extends to the Pont Neuf. A square tower, called
the Tour de l'Horloge, from which was given the sig-
nal for the Saint-Barthelemy, — a tower almost as tall
Lucien de Rubempre. 247
as that of Saint-Jacques-la-Boucherie, — is tbe begin-
ning of the Palais and forms the corner of the quay.
These four towers and the walls are covered with that
black shroud which drapes the front of buildings in
Paris that face the north. Toward the middle of the
qua3', at an unused arcade, begin a number of private
buildings which were stopped by the construction of
the Pont Neuf in the reign of Henri IV. The Place
Royal was a replica of the Place Dauphine ; it shows
the same system of architecture, and of brick sur-
rounded by freestone angles and courses. The arcade
and the rue du Harlay indicate the limits of the Palais
on the west. Formerly the Prefecture of police, the
residence of the parliament judges, was joined to the
Palais ; and the Court of the Exchequer and the Tax
office completed this abode of supreme law, once that of
the sovereign. Before the Revolution, as we can see, the
Palais really had the isolation which the government
is endeavoring to create for itself in these days.
This square, or we might call it this isle of public
buildings, among which is the Sainte-Chapelle, the
most magnificent gem in the jewel-case of Saint Louis,
this space is the sanctuary of Paris ; it is the sacred
place, the ark of the Lord. In the first place, it was
the whole of the primitive city, for the ground now
occupied by the Place Dauphine was a field belonging
to the royal domain, in which was a windmill used
for coining money. Hence the name of the rue de la
Monnaie, given to the street that leads to the Pont
Neuf. Hence also the name of one of the three round
towers (the second), which is called the Tour d' Argent,
which seems to prove that money was originally minted
248 Lucien de RubemprL
there. The famous windmill, which can be seen on
the ancient maps of Paris, is apparently of later date
than the money struck in the palace itself, and was,
no doubt, built for some improvement in the art
of minting. The first tower, which is side by side
with the Tour d' Argent, is called the Tour de Mont-
gomery. The third, the smallest but the best pre-
served of the three, for it has kept its battlements, is
called the Tour Bonbec. The Sainte-Chapelle, with
its four towers (including the Tour de l'Horloge),
defines distinctly the precincts — the perimeter, as a
clerk in the registry-office might say — of the Palais,
from the days of the Merovingians to those of the first
House of Valois. But for us, and in consequence of
its transformations, this palace represents more espe-
cially the epoch of Saint Louis.
Charles V. was the first who abandoned the Palais
to the parliament, an institution then newly created,
and went to live under the protection of the Bastille,
in the famous hotel de Saint-Paul. Under the last
Valois, royalty removed from the Bastille to the
Louvre, which had been its first bastille, that is, for-
tress. The first dwelling of the kings of France, the
palace of Saint Louis, which has always kept its name
of i4 Palais" to signify the palace par excellence, is
now completely enclosed in what is called the " Palais
de Justice." It forms the basement or cellar of the
modern buildings ; for it was built, like the Cathedral,
in the Seine, but built so carefully that the highest
water in the river scarcely reaches to its lower steps.
The quai de l'Horloge buries about twenty feet of
these ten times centennial buildings. Carriages roll
Lucien de Buhempre. 249
along on the level of the capitals of the strong col-
umns that support the three towers, the elevation of
which must, in former times, have been in harmony
with the elegant proportions of the palace, and grace-
fully picturesque on the water side ; for even to-day
these old towers rival in height the tallest public
buildings in Paris. When we contemplate this vast
capital from the top of the cupola of the Pantheon,
the Palais with the Sainte-Chapelle still seems the
most stupendous of all the monumental buildings of
Paris.
This palace of our kings, above which you walk
as you cross the floor of the immense " Salle des
Pas-Perdus," was a marvel of architecture ; it is so
still to the intelligent eyes of the poet who studies it
while he examines the Conciergerie. Alas ! the Con-
ciergerie has ruthlessly invaded this regal and ancient
palace. The heart bleeds to see how cells, corridors,
lodging-rooms, and halls, without light or air, have
been cut in this magnificent construction, where By-
zantine, Roman, and Gothic art — those three aspects
of ancient art — were united and reproduced in the
architecture of the twelfth century. This palace is to
the architectural history of France in the earliest times
what the Chateau of Blois is to the architectural
history of the middle ages. Just as at Blois, in the
court-yard, you can admire the castle of the Comtes of
Blois, that of Louis XII., that of Francois I., and that
of Gaston d'Orleans, so at the Conciergerie you will
find, within one precinct, the characteristics of the
earliest races, and in the Sainte-Chapelle the architec-
ture of Saint Louis. Ah, municipal council ! } 7 ou who
250 Lucien de EubemprS.
spend millions ! put a poet or two beside your archi-
tects if you would save the cradle of Paris, the cradle
of our kings, while you busy yourself in bestowing
upon Paris and its supreme court a palace worthy of
France. It is a matter that should be studied for
years before you commit yourself to action. Build
a few more prisons like that of La Roquette, and the
old Palais of Saint Louis could be redeemed.
To-day many wounds have injured this vast monu-
ment of the past, sunken beneath the palace and the quay
like some fossil animal in the clay of Montmartre ; but
the greatest of all is that of having been the Conciergerie !
That word, who does not understand it? In the first
days of the monarchy great criminals — the villains
(original name of peasants) and the burghers belong-
ing to urbane or seigniorial jurisdictions, also the pos-
sessors of " great or little fiefs" — were brought before
the king and kept in the Conciergerie. The original
Conciergerie must have been exactly where we find
the judicial Conciergerie of the Parliament before 1825,
namely, under the arcade to the right of the grand
exterior staircase, which leads to the Cour Royale.
From there, up to 1825, all persons condemned to
death went to the scaffold. From there issued all
great criminals, all victims of policy or statecraft, the
Marechale d'Ancre and the Queen of France, Semblan-
cay and Malesherbes, Damien and Danton, Desrues and
Castaing. The office of Fouquier-Tinville, like that of
the present public prosecutor, was placed so that he could
see the persons condemned by the Revolutionary tri-
bunal file in. That human being transformed into an
axe could here give a last glance at his " batches."
Zucien de RubemprL 251
After 1825, under the ministry of Monsieur de
Peyronnet, a great change took place at the Palais.
The old jailer's office, called the guichet of the Con-
ciergerie, in which took place the ceremonies of regis-
tration and of the toilette so-called, was closed up and
removed to where it now is, between the Tour de
l'Horloge and the Tour Montgomery, in an inner court-
yard, indicated on the quay by an arcade. The salad-
baskets enter this court-yard, where there is room for
several to be stationed and turn with ease, and even
find, in case of riot, complete protection behind the
strong iron gates of the arcade. The Conciergerie of
to-day, scarcely large enough to hold the present num-
ber of indicted persons (averaging three hundred men
and women), no longer lodges accused persons or con-
victed ones, except on rare occasions like that which
now brought Jacques Collin and Lucien de Rubempre
within its walls. All those who are confined there are
indicted persons who appear before the court of as-
sizes. Occasionally the authorities permit some crim-
inal of high station, already sufficiently dishonored by
appearance in the dock at the assizes, to undergo
his sentence there rather than in the prison of Melun
or Poissy, where the disgrace of the punishment would
be greater than his crime deserved. Ouvrard pre-
ferred to stay in the Conciergerie rather than go to
Sainte-Pelagie ; and at the present moment the notary
Lehon and the Prince de Bergues are undergoing their
sentences there under an arbitrary tolerance, but a
humane one.
Generally, accused persons, whether they are going
before the examining judge or to the correctional police
252 Lucien de BubemprS.
courts, are dropped by the salad-baskets at the Souri-
ciere. The Souriciere is exactly opposite to the jailer's
office [girichet], so-called from the wicket at its en-
trance. Above it is the guard-room of the interior
guard detailed from the gendarmerie of the depart-
ment, and the staircase from below ends there. When
the hour for the assembling of the court arrives, the
turnkeys call the names of the accused, the gendarmes
come down into the Souriciere, and each gendarme takes
an accused person by the arm. Thus coupled they go
up the staircase, across the guard-room, along the cor-
ridors to a room adjoining the famous sixth court-
room, in which are held the sessions of the correctional
police court. Accused persons who go to the Concier-
gerie for examination are taken the same way. All
the different offices of the examining judges are in this
part of the Palais, on different floors, and they are
reached by wretched little staircases, among which
persons unfamiliar with the Palais are certain to lose
their way. The windows of these offices look either on
the quay or into, the court-yard of the Conciergerie.
It was here, therefore, that the salad-basket contain-
ing Jacques Collin was making its way. Nothing
can be more forbidding than the aspect of the place.
Criminals and visitors see before them two wrought-
iron gates, six feet apart, always opening one after the
other ; and so scrupulously is everything and every-
body watched that persons who have permits to visit
the place must pass the first grating before the key
is put into the second. Imagine therefore the diffi-
culty of escape or of any communication with the out-
side. The governor of the Conciergerie would smile in
Lucien de Bubempre. 253
a way to freeze the boldest novelist who should suggest
a thing so impossible. In the annals of the Concier-
gerie only one escape is recorded ; that of Lavalette ;
but the certainty of august connivance, now proved,
must lessen, to our minds, if not the devotion of his
wife, at least the danger of failure.
Judging on the spot the nature of the obstacles, the
greatest devotees of the heroic and marvellous will
admit that through all time they have been what they
still are, invincible. No description can give an idea
of the strength of those walls and vaulted ceilings, —
they must be seen. The number of jailers, turnkeys,
warders (call them what you like) is not as large as
might be imagined ; there are but twenty. Their dor-
mitory and their beds differ in no degree from those
of the "Pistole," — so named, no doubt, because in
former times the prisoners were made to pay a pistole
a week for their lodging, — the bareness of which re-
calls the cold attic-rooms in which penniless great men
begin their careers in Paris.
These dormitories are to the right of an immense
vaulted hall, the massive walls of which are supported
by mighty columns. On the left is the " greffe" of the
Conciergefie, — the registration office, where sit the di-
rector and his clerk. Here the accused person, or the
indicted person, is registered, described, and searched.
Here is decided the kind of lodging he is to have,
which depends upon the length of his purse. Opposite
to the wicket of this door is a glass door, that of a
parlor, in which the friends and lawyers of the accused
may communicate with him through a double grating
of wood. This parlor is lighted from the " preau,"
254 Lucien de Ruhempre.
an inner court-yard, where the prisoners are made to
take air and exercise at stated hours.
The great hall, dimly lighted from these two open-
ings, for its solitary window looks upon the entrance
court-yard, offers a spectacle and an atmosphere en-
tirely in keeping with the preconceived ideas of the
imagination. It is all the more terrifying because,
parallel with the towers, you see openings into crypts,
vaulted, mysterious, awful, without light, which lead
to the dungeons of the Queen and Madame Elizabeth,
and to the cells called " les secrets " where persons who
are to be kept in solitary confinement are put. This
labyrinth of stone is the subterranean region of the
present Palais de Justice, having in its own great days
been the " Palais " itself, the scene of the fetes of
royalty. From 1825 to 1832, it was in this great hall,
between a huge china stove, which warmed it, and the
first of the iron gates, that the well-known operation
of the toilette was done. We cannot step without a
shudder over the flags of that pavement which have
received the confidences of so many last glances.
Lucien de Eubempre. 255
XVIII.
HOW THE TWO ACCUSED PERSONS TOOK THEIR
MISFORTUNE.
When the salad-basket containing the Abbe Don
Carlos Herrera reached the court-yard, the half-dying
man required the assistance of two gendarmes to en-
able him to leave the horrid vehicle. They each took
an arm, supported him, and bore him, fainting, into
the registration office. Thus dragged along, the suf-
ferer raised his eyes to heaven ; no human face was
ever more cadaverous, more painfully distorted than
that of the unfortunate Spanish priest, who seemed on
the point of giving up the ghost. When seated in the
office, he repeated in a weak voice the words he had
addressed to every one since his arrest : —
" I appeal to his Excellency the ambassador of
Spain."
"You can say that," replied the director, "to the
examining judge."
"Oh, God!" sighed the priest. "Can I have a
breviary? Will they still refuse me a doctor ? I have
not two hours to live."
As Carlos Herrera was to be kept in solitary con-
finement, it was unnecessary to ask him if he wanted
the benefits of the pistole — which means the right of
occupying a room in which the law permits a little
comfort; these rooms are situated at the end of the
256 Lucien de Rubempre.
preau. The turnkey and the registration clerk went
phlegmatically through the business of receiving and
committing the prisoner.
" Monsieur le directeur," said Herrera, in broken
French, "lam dying, as you see. Say, if you can,
to this judge of whom you speak, that I implore him,
as a favor, to do what a criminal would fear, — to
let me appear before him as soon as possible ; for my
sufferings are really intolerable, and as soon as I can
see him this dreadful mistake will end."
Invariable rule ! all criminals talk of mistakes.
Go to the galleys and question the convicts ; they will
tell you they are victims to some error of the law.
The word, therefore, brings an imperceptible smile to
the lips of those who have to do with accused, indicted,
and convicted persons.
" I will mention your requests to the examining
judge," said the director.
" I bless you for that, monsieur," replied Herrera,
raising his eyes to heaven.
As soon as the formalities were over, Carlos Herrera,
supported under each arm by two municipal guards,
and accompanied by a turnkey, to whom the director
named the solitary cell in which he was to place the
accused person, was conducted, through the subterra-
nean labyrinth of the Conciergerie to a room that was
perfectly healthy (in spite of what philanthropists have
said), but without any possible external communication.
When he had been safely secured there, the jailers,
the director, his clerk, and even the gendarmes looked
at each other as if to ask opinions, and on all these
faces a certain doubt was depicted. But on the ar-
Lucien de Eubempre. 257
rival of the other accused person who was now brought
in, they recovered their usual air of complete indiffer-
ence. Unless under very extraordinary circumstances
the employes of the Conciergerie have little curiosity ;
criminals are to them what customers are to a barber.
Thus formalities which would frighten the imagina-
tion of others are conducted by them as simply as
a banker does business, and often more politely.
Lucien's appearance was that of a broken-down cul-
prit ; he abandoned himself wholly and allowed them to
do what they pleased with him. From the moment of
his arrest at Fontainebleau, the poet considered himself
ruined ; he felt that the moment of expiation had come.
Pale, undone, ignorant of all that had happened as to
Esther, he knew only that he was the intimate com-
panion of an escaped galley-slave. That situation
was enough to make him foresee catastrophes that were
worse than death. If his thoughts turned to anything
resembling a plan it was to suicide. He wanted to
escape at any price from the ignominy which he saw
before him like a dreadful dream.
Carlos Herrera was placed, as the more dangerous
of the two accused persons, in a cell built wholly of
stone, which derived its light from one of those little
inner courts of which there are several in the Palais.
This little place served as preau or exercise yard
for the women's section of the prison. Lucien was
taken the same way, but the director had orders to
show some special consideration for him, and he was
placed in a cell adjoining the Pistoles.
Most persons who have never had anything to do
with criminal justice have the blackest ideas about
17
258 . Lucien de Bubempre.
solitary confinement. They hardly separate them from
the old ideas of torture, unhealthiness of dungeons,
cold walls sweating tears of dampness, brutality of
jailers and coarseness of food, — accessories required
for the drama. It may not be useless to say here
that these exaggerations exist only on the stage, and
make judges, lawyers, officials, and all who visit pris-
ons, either out of curiosity or on errands, laugh. No
doubt the time was when imprisonment was terrible.
It is quite certain that indicted persons under the old
Parliament, and in the times of Louis XIII. and Louis
XIV. were cast pell-mell into a sort of entresol above
the old " guichet." The prisons were the scenes of
the most awful crimes of the Revolution ; it is enough
merely to look at the dungeons of the Queen and that
of Madame Elizabeth to be filled with the deepest
horror at the old judicial system. But to-day, though
philanthropy has inflicted incalculable evil on society, it
has also produced some good for individuals. We owe
to Napoleon our criminal code, which (more than the
civil code, which stands in urgent need of reform on sev-
eral points) will ever remain a noble monument to that
short reign. This new code of laws closed forever an
abyss of suffering. And it may be said that, putting
aside the fearful mental and moral tortures of persons
of the upper classes who find themselves in the grasp
of the law, the action of this new power is of a gentle-
ness and simplicity which seem all the greater because
unexpected. Accused persons are certainly not lodged
as they would be in their own homes, but all neces-
saries are found in the prisons of Paris. It is not the
body that suffers ; in fact, the mind is in so agitated
Zucien de Rubempre. 259
a state that any form of being ill at ease, even brutal-
ity if it were met with, can be easily supported. And
it must be allowed that the innocent are quickly set at
liberty, especially in Paris.
Lucien found, therefore, in his cell a reproduction of
the first room he had occupied on his arrival in Paris.
A bed like those in the poorest furnished lodgings of
the Latin quarter, chairs with straw seats, a table and
a few utensils completed the furniture of a room in
which were sometimes confined two indicted persons if
their behavior were good and their crimes not danger-
ous, — such, for instance, as forging and swindling
This resemblance between his point of departure, bright
with innocence, and his end at the lowest step of shame
and degradation, was so instantly seized by a last
flash of his poetic nature that he burst into tears. He
wept for four hours, as insensible apparently to every-
thing about him as a stone image, but suffering anguish
from his broken hopes, his shattered social vanities,
his annihilated pride ; degraded in that I and all that
/represented of ambition, adoration, luck, of the poet,
the Parisian, the dandy, the man of pleasure, and of
social privilege and success ! All was crushed within
him by this Icarian fall.
Carlos Herrera, for his part, walked round and
round his cell, as soon as he was alone, like the bear
in his cage at the Jardin des Plantes. He examined
the door carefully and made sure that no hole, except
the regular peep-hole called the " judas," had been
bored in it. He sounded all the walls. He looked
up the chimney-funnel, down which a feeble ray of
light descended, and said to himself : —
260 Zucien de BubemprS.
"lam safe."
Then he seated himself in a corner where the eye of
a turnkey applied to the peep-hole could not see him.
Next he took off his wig and rapidly loosened a paper
which was fastened to the inside of it. The side of this
paper which the head had touched was so greasy that it
looked like the integument of the wig. If Bibi-Lupin
had had the idea of pulling off that wig to establish the
identity of the Spanish priest with Jacques Collin, he
would not have discovered the paper, so completely did
it seem a part of the wig-maker's work. The other side
of the paper was still sufficiently clean and white to re-
ceive a few written lines. The slow and difficult process
of ungumming the paper from the wig had been begun
at La Force ; two hours would not suffice for the work,
and the accused had already spent half of the previous
day upon it. He now began by paring off the precious
paper so as to get a strip of four or five lines in width ;
this he divided into several pieces ; next, he replaced
his provision of paper in the singular storehouse from
which he had taken it, after having wet the layer of
gum-arabic, by help of which he was able to reattach
it to the wig. He then hunted through the wig for
one of those pencils, slender as a pin, lately in-
vented by Susse, which was securely gummed into the
hair. He took a fragment of it long enough to write
with and small enough to hide in a fold of his ear.
After these preparations, made with the rapidity and
firmness of execution characteristic of old convicts who
are nimble as monkeys, Jacques Collin sat down upon
the side of his bed and applied himself to meditate on
the instructions he should give to Asia ; feeling abso-
Lucien de Eubempre. 261
lutely certain that she would meet him somewhere, for
he knew he could rely on the woman's genius.
" In my first examination," he said to himself, " I
played the Spaniard, speaking broken French and
appealing to his ambassador, relying on diplomatic
privileges, and unable to understand what was de-
manded of him, — all that, interspersed with fainting-
fits, gasps, hoax of dying. Better keep on that
ground. My papers are all right. Asia and I can
chew up Monsieur Camusot ; he 's not strong ! It is
Lucien I must think about ; the question is, to give
him moral strength. I must get at the boy, at any
cost, and show him a line of conduct, or he will betray
himself, and betray me, and all is lost. He must be
taught what to say before his examination. And then,
too, I want witnesses who '11 prove that I am a priest."
Such was the moral and physical condition of the
two accused persons, whose fate depended at this mo-
ment on Monsieur Camusot, examining judge for the
first court of the Seine, sovereign disposer, during the
time that the criminal code gave him, of the most
minute details of their existence ; for he alone could
permit the chaplain, the doctor of the Conciergerie,
or any one else, no matter who, to communicate with
them.
No human power, not the King, not the Keeper of
the Seals, nor the prime minister, can trench upon the
power of the examining judge ; no one can order him,
nothing can stop him. He is a sovereign, subject only
to his own conscience and the law. At this moment,
when philosophers, philanthropists, and newspaper
writers are incessantly occupied in diminishing social
262 Lucien de Rubempre.
powers, the rights conferred by our laws on examining
judges have become the objects of attack, the more
virulent because they are almost justified by those
rights which are, let us say it here, excessive. Never-
theless, every man of judgment must admit that these
rights ought not to be attacked. They might, it is
true, in certain cases, be modified by an exercise of
caution. But society, already much shaken by the
weakness and want of intelligence of juries, — an au-
gust institution, whose duties should not be committed
to any but notable men, — would be threatened with
ruin if this strong column which supports our Criminal
Law were broken. Arrest on suspicion is one of those
terrible necessities, the social danger of which is coun-
terbalanced by its very greatness. Besides, distrust
of the magistracy is the beginning of social dissolution.
Reconstruct the institution on other bases ; demand,
as before the Revolution, immense guarantees of prop-
erty from the magistracy ; but believe in it ; trust in
it ; do not make it an image of society only to insult it.
In these days, the magistrate, paid like a poor func-
tionary, has exchanged his former dignity for a haughty
and assuming manner which makes him intolerable to
the equals who are given him ; for haughtiness and
assumption are an attempt at dignity without ground of
support. There lies the evil of the present institution.
The only real amelioration that should be asked for
in the exercise of the power given to examining magis-
trates [juges d' instruction], is an improvement in the
houses of correction [maisons d'arr&t, — the prisons to
which accused but not convicted persons are taken].
Those of Paris should be rebuilt, furnished, and ar-
Lucien de Eubempre. 263
ranged in a manner to modify the public ideas as to
the just position of accused persons. The law arrest-
ing such persons is good ; the execution of it is bad ;
and the custom of the world is to judge of a law by its
execution. At the present time public opinion con-
demns the accused person and defends the indicted
one, by a curious contradiction. Perhaps this is the
result of the essentially carping or critical spirit of
Frenchmen. This inconsistency in the Parisian public
was one of the causes which led, as we shall see, to
the catastrophe of the present drama.
To be in the secret of the terrible scenes which are
enacted in the office of an examining judge ; to fully
understand the respective situations of the two antago-
nists, — the accused person and the magistrate, — the
object of whose struggle is the secret guarded by the
accused against the curiosity of the judge (who is
called, in prisoners' slang, the Curious), we must never
forget that the accused persons, who have been in
solitary confinement from the moment of their arrest,
are ignorant of all that the public says, all that the
police and the judges know, all that the newspapers
publish, as to the crime of which they are accused.
Therefore to give an accused, held au secret, a piece
of information such as that Jacques Collin had received
from Asia about Lucien's arrest, was like flinging a
rope to a drowning man. It resulted, as we shall
see, in defeating an effort which would otherwise
have ended, undoubtedly, in the ruin of the galley-
slave. These points once explained, the least emo-
tional person will tremble at the effect produced by three
causes of terror, — isolation, silence, and remorse.
264 Lucien de BubemprS.
XIX.
THE PERPLEXITIES OF AN EXAMINING JUDGE AND HIS
CURTAIN LECTURES.
Monsieur Camusot, son-in-law of one of the ushers
of the King's cabinet, already too well known to our
readers to need any explanation of his affiliations and
his position, was at this moment in a state of perplex-
ity almost equal to that of Carlos Herrera, in relation to
the examination now before him. Formerly justice of a
provincial court, he had been called from that position
and appointed judge in Paris by the influence of the
celebrated Duchesse de Maufrigneuse, whose husband,
equerry to the Dauphin and colonel of one of the regi-
ments of cavalry of the Royal Guard, stood as high
in the favor of the King as his wife did in that of
Madame. For a very slight but important service
rendered to the duchess on the occasion of a charge of
forgery brought against the young Comte d'Esgrignon
by a banker of Alencon (see " The Gallery of An-
tiquities ") he rose from being a simple provincial justice
to the station of first examining judge in Paris. For
the last eighteen months he had served in the most
important court of Paris ; and already he had been
called upon, at the request of the Duchesse de Mau-
frigneuse, to lend himself to the interests of another
great lady, the Marquise d'Espard ; but there he had
failed. Lucien, as we heard him say at the beginning
Lucien de Bubempre. 265
of this history, in order to revenge himself on Madame
d'Espard had shown certain facts against her to the
attorney-general and the Comte de Serizy at the
time she tried to put an injunction on her husband.
These two great powers once secured by the friends
of the Marquis d'Espard, the wife was only saved
from open blame in court by the clemency of her
husband.
The previous evening, when the news of Lucien's
arrest became known, Madame d'Espard had sent her
brother to Madame Camusot, and Madame Camusot
had gone, incontinently, to pay a visit to the Marquise
d'Espard. On her return, and just before dinner,
she called her husband into the privacy of their bed-
chamber.
" If you can send that little puppy Lucien de
Rubempre before the court of assizes and in such a
way that he is sure to be condemned," she whispered
in his ear, "you will be made counsellor to the Royal
Court."
"How so?"
"Madame d'Espard wants that poor young fellow
decapitated. I had cold chills down my back as I
listened to the hatred of a pretty woman."
"Pray don't meddle with legal matters," replied
Camusot.
"I — meddle ! " she retorted. " Any one might have
listened to us, without knowing what we were talking
of. The marquise and I were as delightfully hypo-
critical to each other as you are to me at the present
moment. She said she wished to thank me for your
kind efforts in her affair, for though they were unsuc-
266 Lucien de RubemprL
cessful, she was none the less grateful. Then she talked
of the terrible mission the law confided to an examin-
ing judge in this matter of Rubempre. ' It is frightful
to think of sending a human being to the scaffold ;
but in this case, justice,' etc., etc. She deplored
the fact that a young man brought to Paris by her
cousin Madame du Chatelet, should have turned out
so ill. ' This is where such corrupt women,' she said,
' as Coralie and Esther lead a man.' And then such
fine tirades on religion, virtue, and charity ! Madame
du Chatelet had told her that Lucien deserved a hun-
dred deaths for having almost killed his mother and
sister. Then she talked of a vacancy in the Royal
Court, adding that the Keeper of the Seals was a friend
of hers. Your husband, madame ' she said finally,
4 has a fine occasion to distinguish himself ' — There ! "
" We distinguish ourselves every day by doing our
duty," said Camusot.
"You'll go far! — you are a magistrate every-
where, even with your wife ! " cried Madame Camusot.
" Tiens, I have sometimes thought you were a ninny,
but to-day I admire j t ou."
The magistrate had a smile upon his lips, of the
kind that belongs to a magistrate only, as the smile
of a danseuse belongs to a danseuse only.
"Madame, may I come in?" said the voice of
Madame Camusot's waiting-maid at the door.
"What is it?" said her mistress.
" Madame, the head maid of Madame la Duchesse
de Maufrigneuse came here while madame was out,
and begs madame, in the name of her mistress, to go
to the hotel de Cadigan without a moment's delay."
Lucien de Rubemjpre. 267
"Put the dinner back," said the judge's wife, re-
membering that the hackney-coachman was still wait-
ing to be paid. She got back into the coach and
reached the h6tel de Cadignan in twenty minutes.
There she was kept waiting alone for ten minutes, in
a boudoir next to the bedroom of the duchess, who
presently appeared, resplendent, for she was just start-
ing for Saint-Cloud to dine at court.
* « Ah ! my dear, there you are ; between you and me
two words will suffice."
"Yes, indeed, Madame la duchesse."
"Lucien de Rubempre is arrested; your husband
examines the affair. I guarantee the innocence of that
poor boy ; he must be set at liberty within twenty-
four hours. But that's not all. Some one wants to
see Lucien privately to-morrow in prison ; your hus-
band can, if he wishes, be present provided this person
does n't see him. I am faithful to those who serve me,
as you know. The king expects much from the courage
of his magistrates under certain grave circumstances in
which he will soon be placed ; I will put your husband
forward, and recommend him as a man devoted to
the king even at the risk of his head. Our Camusot
shall be made councillor, and chief -justice somewhere,
but no matter where. Adieu, I am due at court ;
you '11 excuse me, I know. You will not only oblige
the attorney-general (whose name must not be men-
tioned in this affair), but also a woman who is deeply
concerned about it, Madame de Serizy. So you won't
want for supporters. Now you see what confidence
I place in you ; I need n't urge you to — you know ! "
She put a finger on her lips and disappeared.
268 Lucien de EubemprS.
"And I hadn't time to tell her that Madame
d'Espard wants to see Lucien on the scaffold ! "
thought the judge's wife as she returned to the hack-
ney-coach.
She reached home in such a state of anxiety that
the judge exclaimed when he saw her : —
"Amelie! what is the matter?"
" We are caught between two fires."
She related her interview with the duchess, speaking
in her husband's ear, for she feared her waiting-maid
might be listening at the door.
"Which of the two is most powerful?" she asked
as she ended. " The marquise nearly compromised
you in that foolish affair of her husband's injunction,
whereas we owe all that we are to the duchess. One
makes me vague promises, while the other says dis-
tinctly, ' You shall be, first, councillor, and then chief-
justice.' God keep me from giving you any advice ; I
never meddle with legal matters ; but I ought to tell
you faithfully what is said at court, and what is pre-
paring there."
"You don't know, Amelie, what the prefect of
police sent me this morning ; and by whom ? by one of
the most important men in the police of the kingdom,
a man named Corentin, who tells me that the State has
certain secret interests in this affair. Come to dinner,
and let us go to the Varietes. We'll talk this over
to-night, for I need your intelligence, — that of a judge
is n't enough."
Nine-tenths of the judges will deny the influence of
a wife over her husband in such circumstances ; but,
even if it be a marked social exception, it is very cer-
Lucien de JRubempre. 269
tain that it is occasionally a fact. The magistrate
is like the priest ; in Paris especially, where the elite
of the magistracy are found, he seldom speaks of the
affairs of the Palais, unless they have reached a ver-
dict. The wives of magistrates not only affect to know
nothing, but they have, all of them, sufficient sense
of conventional propriety to know that they would
injure their husbands if, being possessed of any secret,
they allowed it to be seen. Still, on great occasions
when it is a question of advancement depending on
such or such a course, many wives have assisted, as
Amelie was now doing, their husbands' deliberations.
These exceptions of course depend entirely on the re-
lation of the two characters in the bosom of their
family, — in this household, Madame Camusot ruled
her husband absolute^.
When everybody was asleep in the house, the magis-
trate and his wife sat down at the desk on which the
judge had already laid out the papers of the case.
" Here are the memoranda the prefect of police sent
me by Corentin," said Camusot.
" The Abbe" Carlos Herrera.
" This individual is, undoubtedly, the escaped convict
Jacques Collin, called Trompe-la-Mort, whose last arrest
was in the year 1819, and was made at the domicile of
Madame Vauquer, keeper of a pension bourgeoise in the
rue Neuve-Saint-Genevieve, where he concealed himself under
the name of Vautrin."
On the margin of this memorandum, was written in
the hand-writing of the prefect of police : — r
270 Lucien de EubemprS.
" Orders have been sent by telegraph to Bibi-Lupin, chief
of the detective brigade, to return to Paris immediately to
assist in identifying this man, as he personally knew Jacques
Collin, whom he arrested in 1819 by the help of a Demoiselle
Michonneau."
The memorandum continued : —
" The boarders in the Vauquer house are still living and
can be summoned to identify him.
"The so-called Carlos Herrera is the intimate friend of
Monsieur Lucien de Rubempre ; to whom, for a period of
three years, he furnished considerable sums of money, de-
rived, evidently, from crime.
"This intimacy, if the identity of the so-called Spanish
priest and Jacques Collin be established, will prove guilty
knowledge on the part of the Sieur Lucien de Rubempre."
On the margin was another note written by the pre-
fect of police, as follows : —
"It is within my personal knowledge that the Sieur
Lucien de Rubempre has deceived and misled many persons
as to the source from which he derived his money."
" What do you say to that, Amelie ? "
" It is very alarming," replied the wife. " Go on."
" The substitution of the Spanish priest for the convict
Collin is probably the result of some crime more ably com-
mitted than that by which Cogniard made himself the
Comte de Sainte-Helene."
"Lucien de Rubempre".
" Lucien Chardon, son of an apothecary at Angouleme,
and whose mother was a Demoiselle de Rubempre, is per-
Lucien de Bubempre. 271
mitted by an ordinance of the king to take the name of
Rubempre. This ordinance was granted at the solicitation
of the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse and the Comte de Serizy.
" In 182-, this young man came to Paris without any
means of subsistence, in the suite of Madame Sixte du
Chatelet, then Madame de Bargeton, cousin of Madame
d'Espard.
" Disloyal toward Madame de Bargeton, he lived after a
time matrimonially with a Demoiselle Coralie, an actress,
now deceased, of the Gymnase, who left Monsieur Camusot,
silk-dealer in the rue des Bourdonnais, for the said Lucien
Chardon.
" Plunged very soon into poverty by the insufficient means
of this actress who supported him, he compromised his hon-
orable brother-in-law, a printer at Angouleme, by uttering
forged notes, for the payment of which David Sechard, the
brother-in-law, was arrested during a short stay made by
the said Lucien at Angouleme.
" This affair led to the flight and disappearance of Ru-
bempre, who soon after reappeared in Paris in company
with the Abbe Carlos Herrera.
" Without known means of subsistence, the Sieur Lucien
spent, during the first three years after his return to Paris,
not less than three hundred thousand francs, which he must
have received from the so-called Abbe Carlos Herrera, — by
what right or claim upon him ?
" He has, moreover, recently paid more than a million for
the purchase of the estate of Rubempre to meet a condition
imposed on his marriage with Mademoiselle Clotilde de
Grandlieu. The rupture of this marriage came about from
inquiries made by the family of Grandlieu, to whom the
Sieur Lucien had stated that he derived this sum from his
sister and brother-in-law; these inquiries, pursued chiefly
by the lawyer Derville, showed that the respectable Sechard
couple were not only ignorant of the said purchase, but they
even thought their brother deeply in debt. Moreover, the
272 Lucien de Bulempre.
property of the Sechard couple does not amount, according
to their sworn declaration, to more than three hundred thou-
sand francs.
" The Sieur Lucien lived secretly with Esther Gobseck,
and it is certain that moneys paid to that demoiselle by the
Baron de Nucingen were transferred by her to Lucien.
" Lucien and his companion, the escaped convict, have
been enabled to maintain themselves before the world by
deriving their resources from the said Esther, who was
formerly a registered prostitute."
In spite of the repetition which these memoranda
introduce into our account of this drama, it is neces-
sary to report them verbatim, in order to show the
part played by the police of Paris. The police have
records [dossiers] of all the families and all the indi-
viduals whose lives are in any way suspicious, or whose
actions are reprehensible. They are ignorant of noth-
ing. This enormous scrap-book, this ledger of con-
sciences, is as carefully kept as that of the Bank of
France on fortunes. Just as the Bank notes down the
slightest delay in the matter of payments, weighs all
credits, estimates capitalists, following with attentive
eye all their operations, so does the police keep record
of the non-respectability of citizens. Here, the inno-
cent have nothing to fear ; the record is only of evil,
but there it is complete. No matter how high-placed
a family may be, it cannot secure itself from this social
inquisition. It is, however, a power with discretion
equal to its force. This immense quantity of reports,
notes, dossiers, memoranda, this ocean of information,
sleeps motionless, deep and calm as the sea itself.
"When some event occurs, some crime is committed, the
Zucien de Bubempre. 21 Z
law calls on the police, and instantly a memorandum
is forthcoming as to the suspected person, of which the
judge takes cognizance.
These dossiers, however, in which the accused per-
son's antecedents are analyzed, are mere sources of
information, which remain hidden at the Prefecture ;
the law can make no legal use of them ; they inform
the law, and the law acts upon them ; that is all.
These records furnish what might be called the reverse
side of the tapestry of crimes, their first causes — usu-
ally otherwise unknown. No jury would listen, and
the whole country would rise in indignation, if any
word of these memoranda were produced at the court
of assizes. It is actually a case of Truth compelled
to stay at the bottom of her well. No magistrate,
after a dozen years' practice in Paris, is ignorant of
the fact that the court of assizes and the correctional
police have secret knowledge of existing evils, which
are like nests where flagrant crimes have been brooded
and hatched ; he will own that law and justice do not
punish more than half the crimes that are committed.
If the public knew to what an extreme the discretion
of the police agents is carried, they would revere such
fine fellows as the Cheverus. People think the police
crafty and Machiavellian ; they are extremely kind, —
but while they listen patiently to outbreaks of passion,
they obtain information and they keep notes !
"We'll forget all that," said the judge, replacing
the papers in a portfolio; "those are secrets between
the police and the law ; the judge may decide what
they are worth; but Monsieur and Madame Camusot
have known nothing about them."
18
274 Lucien de Bubempre.
" Why do you repeat that?" said Madame Camusot.
" Lucien is guilty," said the judge, " but of what? "
U A man who is loved by the Duchesse de Maufri-
gneuse, the Comtesse de Serizy, and Clotilde de Grand-
lieu is not guilty," replied Amelie; "the other man
must have done it all."
" But Lucien is an accomplice," cried Camusot.
M Will you trust me?" said Amelie. " Restore the
priest to the diplomacy of which he is such a noble
ornament, declare that miserable little fool innocent,
and find some other persons guilty of the crime — "
"How you run on!" said the judge, smiling.
" Women fly to their ends across the laws as a bird
flies through air without an obstacle."
"But," said Amelie, "that abbe, diplomat, or con-
vict, as you please, can certainly put you on the track
of other guilty persons to save himself."
"Ah!" cried Camusot, in admiration of his wife,
" I 'm nothing but the cap ; you are the head."
"Well, then, the session is over! Come and kiss
your Melie ; it is past one o'clock."
And Madame Camusot went off to bed, leaving her
husband to sort his papers and his ideas preparatory
to the examination he was to make on the morrow of
the two accused persons.
Consequently, while the salad-baskets were making
their way to the Conciergerie, bearing Jacques Collin
and Lucien, the examining judge, after duly break-
fasting, crossed Paris on foot, according to the simple
habits of the Parisian magistracy, to reach his office,
where the papers of his cases had already arrived — in
this wise : —
Lucien de Bubempre. 275
Every examining judge has a clerk, a sort of sworn-
in judicial secretary, a race which perpetuates itself
without bounty, without encouragement, producing
excellent persons in whom dumbness comes naturally
and is absolute. An example of indiscretion on the
part of these clerks is a thing unknown at the Palais
from the earliest parliament until now. The perspec-
tive of a humble office at the Palais, that of registrar,
and a conscience about his calling, suffice to render
the clerk of an examining judge a successful rival to
the grave, — for the grave gives up its secrets since the
advance of chemistry. This employe is the very pen
of the judge. The clerk of Monsieur Camusot, a
young man twenty-two years of age, named Coquart,
had gone to the judge's house in the morning and
taken all the papers and notes of the cases, which he
had laid out in due order in the office, while the judge
tv as lounging along the quays, looking at the novelties
in the shop windows, and asking himself, " How am I
to deal with a sly dog like Jacques Collin, if Jacques
Collin it is ? Bibi- Lupin will certainly recognize him,
and I must seem to be doing my official duty, if only
for the eyes of the police. I do see such impossibil-
ities that in my opinion it would be better to enlighten
the countess and the duchess by showing them those
police notes. Besides, I should be revenging my
father, from whom Lucien took Coralie. By unmask-
ing such vile scoundrels my ability will be proclaimed,
and Lucien will soon be given up by all these friends
of his. Well, the examination will help me to decide."
Presently he went into one of the curiosity shops,
attracted by a clock of Boule.
276 Lucien de Rubempre.
44 Not to be false to my own conscience and yet
serve these two great ladies would be a masterpiece of
cleverness," thought he. " Why ! " he exclaimed aloud
as he saw the attorney-general, " you here, Monsieur
de Granville! Are you in search of coins?"
"That's a taste they say belongs to all the justi-
ciary," replied the Comte de Granville, laughing.
Then, after looking about the shop for a few min-
utes as if he were finishing his search, he accompanied
Camusot along the quay without any idea occurring to
the judge's mind that the meeting was other than
accidental.
"You are to examine Monsieur de Rubempre' this
morning, I am told," said the attorney-general. " Poor
young man! I was very fond of him."
"There are many charges against him," said
Camusot.
"Yes, I have read the police notes; but they are
due, in part, to an agent who does not belong to the
Prefecture, to the famous Corentin, a man who has
caused more heads of innocent men to be cut off than
you will send guilty to the scaffold and — But the
fellow is beyond our reach. Without wishing to influ-
ence the mind of a magistrate like yourself, I cannot
help calling your attention to the fact that if you could
acquire a certainty that Lucien was ignorant of the
girl's will, it might be shown that he had no interest,
so far as he was aware, in her death."
"We are quite certain of his absence during the
time the girl was poisoned," said Camusot. " He was
watching on the road to Fontainebleau for the passing
of Mademoiselle de Grandlieu and the Duchesse de
Lenoncourt."
Lucien de Bubempre. 277
''Oh!" replied the attorney-general, "he still re-
tained such hopes about his marriage with Mademoi-
selle de Grandlieu (so the Duchesse de Grandlieu tells
me herself) that it is quite impossible to believe so
intelligent a fellow would risk everything by a useless
crime."
" Yes," said Camusot, " more especially if it is true
that this Esther gave him all she won."
" Derville and Nncingen say she died ignorant of
the inheritance, which had, however, fallen to her
some time ago," said the attorney-general.
"But what do you really think about it?" asked
Camusot; "there's the crime at any rate."
m A crime probably committed by the servants,"
replied the attorney- general.
"Unfortunately," observed Camusot, " it is more in
the line of Jacques Collin,— for the Spanish priest is
undoubtedly that escaped convict ; he would be the
most likely person to rob the girl of that seven hun-
dred thousand francs which the Baron de Nucingen
knows she had in her possession."
" Well, you will weigh it all, my dear Camusot; be
prudent. The Abbe Carlos Herrera belongs to diplo-
macy ; though, of course, an ambassador who com-
mits a crime derives no immunity from his position.
Is he, or is he not the Abbe Carlos Herrera? The
whole question is there."
And Monsieur de Granville bowed with the air of
a man who does not wish for an answer.
"He too wants to save Lucien," thought Camusot
as he went along the quai des Lunettes, while the
attorney-general entered the Palais by the cour de
Harlay.
278 Lucien de Ruhempre.
When Carausot reached the court-yard of the Con-
ciergerie he turned into the director's office and taking
that official by the arm led him to the middle of the
paved court where no ear could overhear them.
" My dear monsieur," he said, " do me the kindness
to go yourself to La Force and ask your colleague
there if he happens to have at this moment any con-
victs who were at the galleys in Toulon between the
years 1810 and 1815 ; and ascertain also whether you
have any here yourself. If there are any at La Force
we will transfer them here for a few days, and you
must let me know if they recognize the Spanish priest
as Jacques Collin, called Trompe-la-Mort."
" Very good, monsieur ; but Bibi- Lupin has arrived."
"Ah ! " cried the judge.
44 He was at Melun. They have told .him that the
man is thought to be Trompe-la-Mort. He smiled with
pleasure and is now waiting your orders."
" Send him to me."
The director of the Conciergerie then presented
Jacques Collin's request to the judge, describing the
deplorable physical condition of the man.
44 1 intended to examine him first," said the judge,
44 but not on account of his health. I received a note
this morning from the director of La Force. It seems
that the sly dog, who says he has been at the point
of death for twenty-four hours, slept so soundly in
his cell at La Force, that he never heard the doctor
whom the director sent to him. The doctor did not
feel his pulse, but let him sleep ; which proves, per-
haps, that his conscience is as sound as his health.
I shall only believe in his illness sufficiently to let me
study his game," said Monsieur Camusot, smiling.
Lucien de Bubempre. 279
" One learns some new thing every day from these
prisoners," remarked the director of the Conciergerie.
The Prefecture of the police communicates with the
Conciergerie and with the sitting magistrates by means
of underground passages. This explains the marvel-
lous rapidity with which the administration and the
judges of the court of assizes can obtain information
during sessions. So that when Monsieur Camusot
reached the head of the staircase which led to his
office he found Bibi-Lupin, who had hurried up through
the Salle des Pas-Perdus.
"What zeal!" said the judge, smiling.
" Ah ! if it 's he," replied the detective, " you '11 see
a terrible row in the yard should there happen to be
any old galley-slaves confined here."
"Why so?"
" Because Trompe-la-Mort has filched their funds,
and I know they have sworn to exterminate him."
"They " meant the convicts whose money, confided
for the last twenty years to Trompe-la-Mort, had been
spent on Lucien.
" Can you find witnesses of his last arrest?"
" Give me two summonses, and I promise to bring
them to you to-day."
" Coquart," said the judge, taking off his gloves and
putting his hat and cane in a corner, " fill out two
summonses as monsieur directs."
He looked at himself in the mirror over the mantel-
shelf on which stood, in place of a clock, a ewer and
wash-basin, with a bottle of water and a glass on one
side, and a lamp on the other. The judge rang the
bell. An usher came, after a time.
280 Zucien de RubemprS.
1 * Are there any persons waiting ? " asked the judge
of the usher, whose business it was to receive wit-
nesses, examine their summonses and place them in
the order of their arrival.
"Yes, monsieur."
44 Take their names, and bring me the list."
Examining judges, being chary of their time, are
sometimes obliged to carry on several examinations at
once. That is the reason of the long detention of wit-
nesses who are taken to the room occupied by the
ushers, into which the bells of all the examining judges
ring.
" After you have done that," added the judge to his
usher, " you will go and fetch me the Abbe Carlos
Herrera."
44 Ha!" cried Bibi-Lupin. "I was told he had
turned himself into a priest and a Spaniard. Pooh!
that 's only a new edition of Collet."
"There is nothing new under the sun," remarked
Camusot, signing two of those formidable summonses,
which trouble the mind of every one, even those of the
most innocent witnesses, whom the law commands to
appear, under heavy penalties if they disobey.
Lucien de Bubempre. 281
XX.
ASIA AT WORK.
Half an hoar earlier, Jacques Collin had ended his
deep deliberations and was fully under arras. Noth-
ing can better depict this figure of the people in revolt
against the laws than the few lines which he had
written on his greasy bits of paper.
The meaning of the first was as follows, for it was
in a language arranged between himself and Asia,
a corruption of thieves' Latin, — hieroglyphics applied
to ideas : —
" Go to the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse or to Madame
de Serizy. One of them must see Lucien before his exami-
nation and give him the paper here enclosed. Find our two
thieves ; tell them to be ready to play the part I shall indi-
cate to them. Go to Rastignac ; tell him, from him whom
he met at the masked ball, to come here and certify that the
Abbe Carlos Herrera does not in any way resemble Jacques
Collin, arrested at Vauquer's. Obtain the same of Doctor
Bianchon. Set Lucien'' s two women at work in the same
direction."
On the enclosed paper was written in good French :
" Lucien, admit nothing as to me. I must be to you the
Abbe Carlos Herrera. Not only is this your justification,
but, if you show firmness now, you will gain seven millions
and save your honor."
282 Lucien de BubemprS.
These two bits of paper, gummed together on the
written side so that they looked like a fragment of the
same sheet, were rolled up with an art peculiar to those
who brood at the galleys over means of escape. The
whole took the form and consistence of those wads of
wax which thrifty women apply to their needles when
the eyes are broken.
" If I am examined first, we are saved; but if it
is the young one, all is lost," he thought as he sat
waiting.
The tension was so cruel that the strong man's face
was covered with a white sweat. This stupendous
being saw the True in his sphere of crime, as
Moliere in his sphere of dramatic poesy, as Cuvier
among vanished creations. Genius is, everywhere,
Intuition. Below this phenomenon all other remark-
able things are done by talent. In this consists the
difference which separates persons of the first order
from persons of the second order. Crime has its men
of genius. Jacques Collin, brought to bay, applied a
supreme effort of human intelligence against the steel
armor of the law.
As he heard the heavy grating of the locks and bolts
of his door Carlos Herrera resumed the attitude and
appearance of a dying man. In this he was aided by
the intoxicating sense of joy the jailer's steps, pausing
before his door, had caused him. He knew not by
what means Asia would reach him, but he felt certain
he should see her on his way to the judge's office, after
the promise she had given him at the arcade of Saint-
Jean.
Asia, as soon as that fortunate meeting was over,
Lucien de Bubempre. 283
had gone to the Greve, pushing the little hand-cart
rapidly to the bottom of the embankment, where she
hid it until such time as its true owner, now drinking
the price of its hire in one of the low wineshops of the
neighborhood, should return to find her property in
the place agreed upon. Asia then took a hackney-
coach on the place de l'H tel de Ville, saying to the
driver, " To the Temple ! and quick, too \ II y a gras
— there 's fat in it."
A woman dressed as Asia now was could easily, and
without exciting the slightest curiosity, be lost in the
throng of that vast hall where all the rags of Paris
accumulate, where swarm all ambulating peddlers, and
the female dealers in old clothes gabble. The two
accused persons were scarcely in their cells before she
was being reclothed in a damp little room over one of
those horrible shops where are sold the remains of
materials stolen by tailors and dressmakers. It was
kept by an old spinster called La Romette, from her
baptismal name of Jeromette. La Romette was to the
marchandes de toilette what those resourceful women
were themselves to other women, called respectable
but embarrassed, — a usurer at a hundred per cent.
"My dear," said Asia on arriving, "I must be
dressed. Make me a baroness of the faubourg Saint-
Germain at the very least. Harness me up quick ! "
she cried ; " my feet are in boiling oil ! You know
the sort of gown I want. Out with your rouge ; find
me some real lace, and a watch and a lot of charms to
sparkle ! Send your girl to fetch a coach and let it
wait at the back door."
"Yes, madame," said the old maid, with the sub-
284 Lucien de BubemprS.
mission and haste of a servant in presence of her
mistress.
If this scene had had a witness he would have seen
at once that the woman concealed under the name of
Asia was the proprietor of the place.
"They've brought me diamonds," said La Romette
as she was doing Asia's hair.
" Are they stolen?"
"I think so."
"Then, whatever the profit may be, my dear, de-
prive yourself of it. We have the Curious to fear for
some time yet."
We may now imagine how Asia appeared in the
Salle des Pas-Perdus of the Palais de Justice, with a
summons in her hand, asking to be guided through the
corridors and staircases to the office of Monsieur Cam-
usot, about a quarter of an hour before the arrival of
that judge.
She no longer resembled herself. After washing
off, like an actress, her old woman's face, and putting
on rouge and white paint, she had covered her head
with an admirable blond wig. Dressed precisely like
a lady of the faubourg Saint-Germain, she appeared to
be about forty years of age, for she had covered her
face with a black lace veil. A corset laced ruthlessly
tight, compressed her culinary figure. Very well-gloved,
wearing a bustle of considerable dimensions, she ex-
haled as she passed along, an agreeable odor of mare-
chale powder. Dangling a bag with a gold clasp in
her hand, she divided her attention between the walls
of the Palais, which she had entered apparently for
the first time, and the chain of a pretty King Charles
Zucien de Rubempre. 285
spaniel. A dowager of this kind was soon remarked by
the black-robed denizens of the Salle des Pas-Ferdus.
Besides the briefless barristers who sweep that hall
with their gowns and call distinguished lawyers by
their baptismal names to give the idea that they belong
to the aristocracy of their order, there can often be
seen in that huge lounging-place patient young fellows
at the beck and call of busy lawyers, dancing attend-
ance on the chance of a case coming up and requiring
to be argued when the barrister employed upon it is
not at hand. It would be a curious sight could we
lay bare the varieties beneath these black gowns which
walk about this immense hall in threes and sometimes
in fours, producing by their conversation the mighty
hum which echoes through this space so rightly named
the Hall of the Wasted Steps, — for this incessant tramp-
ing wears out a lawyer fully as much as the prodigal-
ities of speech. Asia had counted on meeting these
loungers of the Palais ; she laughed under her breath
at the witticisms she overheard, and finally attracted
the attention of Massol, a licentiate not as yet ad-
mitted to the bar, and more interested in reporting
for the " Gazette des Tribunaux " than in searching
for clients. He now, with a smile, offered his services
to the lady so richly dressed and agreeably perfumed.
Asia, in a mincing head voice, explained to this
obliging young gentleman that she was there on the
summons of a judge named Camusot.
" Ah ! in the affair Rubempre? "
The case was already named !
" Well,- it is not myself, but my maid — a girl who
calls herself Europe. I had her just twenty-four hours
286 Lucien de Bubemjpre.
and then she ran away when she saw my porter bring
me this summons."
Then, like all old women whose life is passed in
gossiping by their firesides, and instigated also by
Massol, she recounted, with many parentheses, several
of the misfortunes of her life, and the death of her
husband, one of the three directors of the Territorial
office. She consulted the young lawyer as to whether
she ought to sue her son-in-law, the Comte de Gross-
Narp, who made her daughter very unhappy, and
asked whether the law allowed her to dispose of her
fortune. Massol could not, in spite of his efforts,
make out whether the summons was for the mistress
or the maid. He had only glanced at the well-known
paper, which, to save time, is printed, so that the clerks
and judges are only obliged to fill in the blank lines
left for the names of witnesses, their address, and the
hour at which they are cited to appear. Asia made
her companion explain to her the Palais (which she
knew even better than he knew it himself), and finally
ended by asking him at what hour Monsieur Camusot
would come.
" Well, in general, the examining judges begin their
inquiry at ten o'clock."
M It is a quarter to ten," she said, looking at a
pretty little watch, a triumph of the art of jewelry,
which made Massol think to himself: —
" Where the devil does fortune poke itself."
By this time, Asia had come as far as the dark hall
looking out upon the court of the conciergerie, where
the ushers all assembled. Seeing the entrance to the
prison through the single window, she exclaimed : —
Lucien de EubemprS. 287
"What are those great walls over there?"
11 That is the Conciergerie."
"Ah! the Conciergerie, where our poor queen —
How I should like to see her dungeon ! "
" That is impossible, Madame la baronne," said the
young lawyer, who had given his arm to the dowager.
" It requires permits, which are very difficult to obtain."
" They tell me," she went on, "that Louis XVIII.
has himself written, in Latin, an inscription on the
walls of Marie Antoinette's cell."
" Yes, Madame la baronne."
"I should like to know Latin that I might learn
the words of that inscription. Do you think that
Monsieur Camusot would give me a permit?"
" That is not in his province. But he could ac-
company you."
"Could he leave his examinations?" she asked.
" Oh," said Massol, " the accused could wait."
" Tie?is ! yes, they are accused, that's true," said
Asia, artlessly. " But I know Monsieur de Granville,
your attorney-general."
This information produced a magical effect upon the
lawyer and the ushers who overheard it.
4 'Ah! you know the attorney-general," said Massol,
who now thought it worth while to discover the name
and address of the client whom fate had brought him.
"Yes, I often meet him at the Serizys'. Monsieur
de Serizy is a friend of his, and Madame de Serizy
is a relation of mine, through the Ronqucrolles."
"If Madame would like to step down to the Con-
ciergerie," said an usher, "she — "
"Yes, to be sure," said Massol.
288 Lucien de BubemprS.
The ushers allowed the lawyer and the baroness to
go down the staircase, and they were soon in the guard-
room where the stairway from the Souriciere ends, —
a place well-known to Asia, and which forms, as we
have already shown, a post of observation through
which every one from the prison must pass.
"Ask these gentlemen if Monsieur Camusot has
come," she said, observing the gendarmes who were
playing cards on a bench.
" Yes, madame, he has just come up from the Sou-
riciere."
u Souriciere ! " she exclaimed, " what is that? — Ah !
how stupid I was not to have gone directly to the
Comte de Granville — I haven't the time now. Take
me, if you please, to Monsieur Camusot before he
gets to work."
"Oh, madame, you have plenty of time to see
Monsieur Camusot," said Massol. "If you send in
your card he will spare you the annoyance of waiting
in the antechamber among the witnesses. We have
some consideration at the Palais for ladies like you.
You have your cards witli you ? "
At this moment Asia and her lawyer were exactly
in front of the window in the guard-room which com-
manded the office of the Conciergerie. The gendarmes
tolerated for a time the presence of a baroness accom-
panied by a lawyer. Asia let the latter relate to her the
various horrible things that all young lawyers have to
tell about what happens in that fateful office called
" le guichet." She refused to believe that the " toilet
of death" was made behind the iron railings which
he pointed out to her ; but the corporal of gendarmes
confirmed the fact.
Lucien de Bubempre. 289
" How I should like to see that ! " she said.
She stood there, chattering with the corporal and
the lawyer till she saw Jacques Collin, supported by
two gendarmes and preceded by Monsieur Camusot's
usher, come out of the " guichet."
"Ah! here comes the prison chaplain; perhaps he
is going to prepare one of those unfortunate — "
"No, madame," said the corporal, "that is an ac-
cused person who is coming to be examined."
" What is he accused of?"
"He is implicated in a poisoning case."
"Oh! I'd like to see him."
"You can't stay here," said the corporal, "for he
is in solitary confinement and he has to pass through
this guard-room. Here, madame, go through this
door to the staircase."
1 " Thank j^ou, monsieur," said the baroness, going
towards the door as if to rush down the staircase ;
then she seemed to lose her head and cried out,
" But where am I? "
Her voice was loud and it reached the ears of Jacques
Collin ; she meant in this way to prepare him to see
her. The corporal rushed at the baroness, seized
her round the waist, and dragged her into the midst
of four or five gendarmes, who had sprung up like one
man ; for in this guard-room they distrust everybody.
It was an arbitrary act, but a necessary one. The
lawyer himself had exclaimed, " Oh, madame ! ma-
dame ! " in frightened tones, so much did he fear
being compromised.
The Abbe Carlos Herrera, almost fainting, was
allowed to sit down for a moment in the guard-room.
19
290 Lucien de RubemprS.
" Poor man ! " said the baroness. " Is he guilty?"
These words, though said in the ear of the young
lawyer, were heard by every one, for the silence of
death reigned in the guard-room. As privileged
persons were occasionally permitted to see famous
criminals as they passed from the prison through this
guard-room, the gendarmes and the judge's usher who
had charge of the abbe made no observation on the
presence of the baroness. Besides, thanks to the
promptness with which the corporal had grasped her
person to prevent any communication between the
accused and the visitor, a very reassuring space was
left between them.
" Let us go on ! " murmured Carlos Herrera, mak-
ing an effort to rise.
At this instant the little ball rolled from his sleeve,
and the place where it stopped was noticed by the
baroness, whose veil gave freedom to her eyes. Damp
and greasy, it did not roll away ; for these little points,
apparently insignificant, had all been calculated by
Jacques Collin to produce success. When the prisoner
had been taken up the stairs, Asia dropped her bag in
a natural manner, stooped quickly to recover it, and as
she did so picked up the ball, the color of which, being
that of the dust and mud on the floor, kept it from
being seen.
"Ah!" she said, "it wrung my heart to see him.
He must be dying."
" Or trying to appear so," said the corporal.
" Monsieur," said Asia to the lawyer, " please con-
duct me at once to Monsieur Camusot ; I have come
here on this very business ; he may be very glad to
see me before he examines that poor abbe."
Lucien de Bubempre. 291
The lawyer and the baroness left the guard-room
with its fuliginous and oleaginous walls ; but when
they reached the top of the staircase, the baroness
gave a loud exclamation : —
" My dog!" she cried. "Oh! monsieur, my poor
dog!"
And she darted like a crazy woman into the Salle
des Pas-Perdus, asking eveiy one if they had seen her
dog. She reached the Galerie des Marchandes and
ran toward a stairway calling out : " I see him !
There he is ! "
This staircase was the one that leads to the cour de
Harlay, through which, her comedy played, she passed
to the quai des Orfevres, where she flung herself into
one of the hackney-coaches which stand there, and
disappeared, carrying with her Europe's summons and
the greasy wad of paper.
" Rue Neuve-Saint-Marc ! " she cried to the driver.
Asia could count on the inviolable secrecy of a cer-
tain dealer in second-hand finery named Madame
Nourrisson, also known under the name of Madame de
Sainte-Esteve, who lent her not only her individuality
but also her shop, — where Nucingen had bargained
for the delivery of Esther. Asia was there as though
she were at home, for she did actually occupy a room
in Madame Nourrisson's apartment. She paid the
fare, and went up to her chamber bowing to Madame
Nourrisson in a manner to let her know she had no
time to say a word.
Secure from prying eyes, Asia began to unfold the
papers with all the care that learned men give to un-
rolling a palimpsest. Having read the instructions,
292 Lucien de EubemprS.
she judged it necessary to copy the note to Lucien on
clean note-paper. Then she went down to Madame
Nourrisson's room and kept her talking, while a girl
from the shop ran to call a coach from the Boulevard
des ltaliens. In the course of her talk, Asia got from
Madame Nourrisson the addresses of the Duchesse de
Maufrigneuse and Madame de Serizy, which Madame
Nourrisson knew through her intercourse with their
waiting-maids.
These various trips and minute occupations took
over two hours. The Duchesse de Maufrigneuse, who
lived in the upper part of the rue Saint-Honore, kept
Madame de Sainte-Esteve waiting more than an hour ;
though the maid after knocking had passed in, through
the door of the boudoir, the card of " Madame de
Sainte-Esteve," on which Asia had written, " Come
on urgent business concerning Lucien."
At the first glance which she cast on the duchess
she saw that her visit had been ill-timed, and she hast-
ened to excuse herself on the ground of the peril that
threatened Lucien.
"Who are you? " asked the duchess, without using
any form of politeness and staring at Asia, who might
be taken for a baroness by Maitre Massol in the Salle
des Pas-Perdus, but who, in the little salon of the
h6tel de Cadignan, presented the effect of a spot of
cart-grease on a white satin dress.
" I am a marchande de toilette, Madame la du-
chesse, — for in circumstances like these people look for
assistance to those whose business compels them to be
absolutely discreet. I have never betrayed any one,
and God knows how many great ladies have trusted
Lucien de Rubempre. 293
their diamonds to me for months and borrowed false
ones like their own — "
"You have another name?" said the duchess, smil-
ing at a recollection this answer brought to her mind.
" Yes, Madame la duchesse, I am Madame de Sainte-
Esteve on great occasions, but my name in business is
Madame Nourrisson."
" Ah ! very good," said the duchess, changing her
tone.
"I can," continued Asia, " do great services ; I have
many secrets of husbands as well as of wives. I
have had much to do with Monsieur de Marsay, whom
Madame la duchesse — "
"Enough! enough!" cried the duchess; "let us
think of Lucien."
"If Madame la duchesse wants to save him she
must have the courage not to lose time in dressing
herself ; besides, she could hardly look better than she
does now. You are pretty enough to eat, though an
old woman says it! Don't order your carriage, ma-
dame ; come with me — I have a coach here — to
Madame de Serizy if you wish to avoid greater evils
than even the loss of that cherubim."
"Go on, I'll follow you," said the duchess after
a moment's hesitation. "Between us both," she re-
flected, " we ought to give her the courage to act."
In spite of the infernal activity of this Dorine of
the galleys, three o'clock was striking as she entered,
with the duchess, Madame de Serizy's h6tel in the rue
de la Chaussee-d'Antin. But there, thanks to the
duchess, not a moment was lost. They were both
shown immediately into the presence of the countess
294 Lucien de BubemprS.
who was lying on a sofa in a miniature cottage in a
garden redolent of the perfume of flowers.
"This is good," thought Asia, looking about her;
"no one can overhear us here."
u Ah! Diane, I shall die! what have you done?"
cried the countess, springing up like a fawn, and seiz-
ing the duchess by the shoulders she burst into tears.
u Come, come, Leontine, there are occasions when
women like us should act and not weep," said the
duchess, forcing the countess to sit down beside her
on the sofa.
Asia studied the countess with that glance peculiar
to depraved old women, which travels over the soul of
another woman as the scalpel of a surgeon round a
wound. Jacques Collin's companion recognized the
signs of the rarest sentiment ever found in a woman
of the world, — a true grief, the grief that ploughs
ineffaceable furrows in the heart and face. The
countess had counted forty-five spring-tides. At this
moment there was not the slightest coquetry in her at-
tire ; her muslin peignoir rumpled and creased showed
her figure without the support of a corset. The eyes
with their black circles and the stained cheeks proved
plainly enough her bitter weeping. No belt secured
the wrapper. The hair gathered into a knot under a
lace cap had not been combed for twenty-four hours
and revealed its thin short braid and straggling locks
in all their poverty ; she had even forgotten to put
on her false hair.
" Madame," said Asia, " there is no time to lose — "
Leontine looked up and saw the woman for the first
time and made a movement of fear.
Lucien de Rubempre. 295
"Who is it, Diane?" she said.
" Whom do you suppose I should bring here, but
some one devoted to Lucien and ready to serve us ? "
"Madame, this is no time to whine, as the duchess
said," cried the terrible Asia, taking the countess by
the arm and shaking her. "If you want to save him
there 's not a moment to be lost. He is innocent ; I
swear it on the bones of my mother ! "
"Oh yes! indeed he is," cried the countess, look-
ing kindly at the horrible creature.
"But," continued Asia, "if Monsieur Camusot ex-
amines him the wrong way, he can make him out guilty
in a couple of sentences. If you have the power to
get into the Conciergerie and speak to him, go in-
stantly — instantly — and give him this paper. If you
do that, to-morrow he will be at liberty, — I guaran-
tee it."
"But," said the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse, "if it
is all-important to prevent Monsieur Camusot from
examining him we can do that by writing him a line
and sending it at once to the Palais by your footman,
Leontine ; you can go to see Lucien later."
" Then let us go into the house," said Madame de
Serizy.
296 Lucien de RuhemprL
XXI.
DIAMOND CUT DIAMOND WHICH WINS?
Here is what was happening at the Palais while
Lucien's protectresses were obeying the orders sent to
them by Jacques Collin.
The gendarmes placed the half-fainting man upon a
chair facing the window in Monsieur Camusot's office ;
the judge was sitting in his arm-chair before his desk ;
Coquart, pen in hand, occupied a little table a few paces
from the judge.
The arrangement of the office of an examining judge
is not an accidental matter, and if it is not intention-
ally done it must be owned that chance has treated
justice like a sister. These magistrates resemble paint-
ers, — they require a clear and equable light coming
from the north ; for the faces of their criminals are
pictures that must be constantly studied. Therefore
nearly all examining judges place their desks like that
of Camusot, turning their own backs to the window and
consequently exposing the faces of those they exam-
ine to the light. Not one of them, after exercising
his functions for six months fails to assume an absent-
minded, indifferent air during an examination — unless
he wears spectacles. It was to a sudden change of
countenance detected by this means, and caused by an
unanswerable question asked suddenty, that Castaing's
Zacien de Eubempre. 297
guilt was discovered at the ver}' moment when, after
long deliberation with the attornej'-general, the judge
was about to let loose that criminal on societ} 7 for
want of proof. This little detail will show to the least
perceptive persons how keen, dramatic, interesting,
curious, and terrible a struggle is that of a crim-
inal examination, — a struggle without witnesses, but
always written down. God knows how much remains
upon the paper of these icy-burning scenes, in which
a glance, a tone, a tremor of the face, the slightest
touch of color given b}* a feeling, — all is perilous,
like the peril of savages watching and stalking each
other to discovery and death. The written record, the
procds-verbal, of such a scene is but the ashes of a
conflagration.
"What are }'Our true names?" asked Camusot of
Jacques Collin.
" Don Carlos Herrera, canon of the Rojal Chapter of
Toledo ; secret envoy of his Majesty Ferdinand VII."
It is to be remarked here that Carlos Herrera spoke
French "like a Spanish cow," as the popular saying
is ; murdering it in a way to make his answers almost
unintelligible and necessitating constant repetition ; but
we spare our readers the annoyance and delay of de-
ciphering his words as pronounced.
" You have papers to prove the status which } 7 ou
claim?" asked the judge.
"Yes, monsieur: a passport, a letter from his
Catholic Majesty authorizing my mission — But }'OU
could send immediately to the Spanish Embassy two
lines, which I will write before you, and I should be
claimed there. If you want further proof, I will write
298 Lucien de RuhemprS.
to His Eminence the Grand Almoner of France, and
he would send his private secretary to identify me."
44 Do you still pretend that you are very ill?" said
Camusot. u If you had really endured the sufferings
you have complained of since your arrest you would
have died by this time," remarked the judge, ironically.
" You are trying the courage of an innocent man,
and exhausting the strength of his temperament," re-
plied the accused, gently.
" Coquart, ring the bell, and call for the physician
of the Conciergerie and his attendant. We shall be
obliged to take off your coat and proceed to verify
the mark on }*our shoulder," resumed Camusot.
" Monsieur, I am in jour hands."
The accused then asked if the judge would have the
kindness to explain what that mark was, and why they
should look for it on his shoulder. The judge expected
the question.
"You are suspected of being Jacques Collin, an
escaped convict, whose audacity flinches at nothing, not
even the sacrilege of making yourself a priest," said
the judge quickly, fastening his eyes upon those of the
prisoner.
Jacques Collin did not quiver or change color ; he
continued calm and assumed an air of natural curios-
ity as he looked at Camusot.
" I ! monsieur, a convict? May the Order to which I
belong and God forgive you for that mistake. Tell me
all that I ought to do to keep you from persisting in
so grave an insult to the rights of individuals, to the
Church, and to the king my master."
The judge explained, without replying to the ac-
Laden de Bubempre. 299
cused, that if he were branded on the shoulder, as the
law required in the case of convicts sentenced to the
galleys, the letters would reappear when his shoulder
was struck.
' Ah, monsieur," said the abbe, " it would be sad
indeed if my devotion to the royal cause should now
become an injury to me."
" Explain yourself," said the judge ; " you are here
for that purpose."
"Monsieur, I have many scars on my back and
shoulders, for I was shot in the back as a traitor to my
country, whereas I was faithful to my king ; this was
done by the Constitutionals, who left me for dead."
" You were shot, and still live ! " said Camusot.
" I had friends among the soldiery, to whom pious
persons gave money ; they placed me at such a dis-
tance that their balls were half spent ; the soldiers
aimed for the back. That is a fact to which his Excel-
lency the Spanish ambassador can certify."
" This devil of a fellow has an answer to everything.
So much the better," thought Camusot, who was mak-
ing himself severe merely to satisfy the requirements of
the law and the police. " How is it that a man of
3'our character was found in the house of Baron de
Nucingen's mistress? — and such a mistress, a former
prostitute ! "
" The reason that I was found in that house is this,
monsieur," replied Herrera — " But before I tell you
the reason, I ought to explain that I had no sooner
set foot on the staircase than I was seized with a fit
and had no time to speak to the 3'oung woman. I
had received information of her design to kill herself,
300 Lucien de EubemprS.
and as this matter concerned the interests of Lucien
de Rubempre, for whom I have an affection the motives
of which are sacred to me, I went to the house to dis-
suade that poor creature from the act to which her de-
spair was leading her. I meant to tell her that Lucien
would certainly fail in his efforts to marry Mademoiselle
de Grandlieu ; that she herself had inherited a great
fortune ; and I hoped in this way to give her courage
to live. I feel certain, monsieur, that I was made the
victim of the political secrets intrusted to me. From
the way in which I was suddenly overcome, I believe
I had been poisoned that morning ; but the vigor of
my constitution saved me. I know that for a long time
an agent of the political police has dogged me, and
he may be endeavoring to implicate me in some dan-
gerous affair. If when I was arrested you had com-
plied with my request for a doctor you would have
had the proof of what I now tell } r ou about my health.
Believe me, monsieur, there are persons, placed far
above us, who have a strong interest in identifying
me with some criminal in order to be rid of me. It
is not all gain to serve kings and princes ; they have
their own pettiness, — the Church alone is perfect."
It is impossible to render the play of feature and ex-
pression on the face of the speaker, who took, intention-
ally, ten minutes to deliver this tirade, slowly, sentence
by sentence. The whole was so thoroughly natural
and probable, especialty the allusion to Corentin, that
the judge was shaken.
" Will you confide in me the cause of your affection
for Monsieur Lucien de Rubempre ? " he asked.
" Can you not guess it? I am sixty years of age,
Lucien de Bubempre. 301
monsieur, and — I beg you not to write this down —
he is — Must I, absolutely ? "
"It is for your interest, and above all for that of
Lucien de Rubempre, to tell the truth."
"Then — he is — Oh, heaven! — he is my son,"
he murmured.
And he fainted.
" Don't write that, Coquart," whispered Camusot.
Coquart rose to get a bottle of pungent vinegar.
44 If it is Jacques Collin, he's a great comedian,"
thought Camusot.
Coquart made Herrera inhale the vinegar, while the
judge sat watching him with the mingled penetration of
a lynx and a magistrate.
44 You must make him take off his wig," said Camu-
sot, waiting till the man had recovered his senses.
Collin heard the words and trembled inwardly, for he
knew what a base expression his whole countenance
would then assume.
4 ' If you have not the strength to take off your wig
— yes, Coquart, take it off," said the judge to his
clerk.
Herrera advanced his head to the clerk with touch-
ing resignation ; but no sooner was the head without
its covering than it was horrible to behold, — the
man's real character was seen. The sight plunged
Camusot into great uncertainty. While awaiting the
physician, he began to classify and arrange the papers
and other articles seized in Lucien's apartments. After
searching poor Esther's rooms in the rue Saint-Georges
the police had continued their inquiry at the hpuse on
the quai Malaquais-
302 Lucien de Rubempre.
" You have in your hands the letters of the Comtesse
de Serizy," said Carlos Herrera. •• I do not see why
you should have seized Lucien de Rubempre's papers."
" Lucien de Rubempre, suspected of being your ac-
complice, is arrested," said the judge, anxious to see
what effect that news would have on the accused.
" You have done a great wrong, for Lucien is as
innocent as I am myself," said Herrera, without exhib-
iting the slightest emotion.
" That we shall see ; at present we are establishing
your identity," said the judge, surprised at the tran-
quillity of the man. " If you are really Don Carlos
Herrera, that will immediately alter the situation of
Lucien Chardon."
M Yes, she was indeed Madame Chardon — that is,
Mademoiselle de Rubempre," murmured Carlos. " Ah !
it was one of the greatest faults of my life."
He raised his eyes to heaven, and, by the way in
which his lips moved, he seemed to be saying a fervent
prayer.
" But," added the judge, " if you are Jacques Collin,
Lucien has, knowingly, been the companion of an es-
caped convict, a sacrilegious impostor, and the crimes
of which the law suspects him become more than
probable."
Carlos Herrera was iron as he listened to this speech,
most ably delivered by the judge. For all answer he
raised his hands with a gesture that was nobly sorrow-
ful at the words kt knowingly " and " escaped convict."
" Monsieur l'abbe," said the judge, with extreme
politeness, " if you are indeed Don Carlos Herrera, you
will pardon us for all we have been forced to inflict
upon you in the interests of justice and truth."
Lucien de Bubempre. 303
Jacques Collin guessed the trap that was here set for
him, by the mere inflection of the judge's voice as he
said the words " Monsieur l'abbe," and his countenance
remained unmoved. Camusot expected a movement of
joy, which would have been an indication of a criminal's
ineffable delight at having deceived his judge ; on the
contrary, the hero of the galleys was under the arms
of a dissimulation that was more than Machiavellian.
"I am a diplomatist, and I belong to an Order the
vows of which are most austere," replied the abbe, with
apostolic gentleness. -' I understand all, and I am used
to suffering. I should be free already if your police
had found the hiding-place of my private papers ;
for I see the}* have seized none but those that are
insignificant."
This was a finishing blow for Camusot. Carlos
Hen-era had already counterbalanced by his ease and
simplicity all the suspicions that the sight of his bald
head had renewed.
" Where are those papers? "
" I will show the place if you will kindly allow your
delegate who takes me to be accompanied by a secre-
tary of legation from the Spanish Embassy on whom
3 r ou can rely, who must receive them ; for the matter
concerns my duty. These papers are diplomatic, and
contain secrets compromising the late King Louis
XVIII. Ah ! monsieur, you had better — However,
you are the sole judge ; besides, my ambassador, to
whom I shall appeal in all this, will appreciate the
situation."
At this "moment the physician and his assistant en-
tered the office, after being announced by the usher.
304 Lucien de Rubempre.
" Good morning, monsieur," said Camusot " I have
called you to examine the condition of the accused per-
son here present. He says he is poisoned, and de-
clares he has been almost at the point of death since
day before yesterday. See if there is any danger in
undressing him in order to verify the existence of a
mark on his shoulder."
The doctor took the prisoner's hand, felt his pulse,
asked to see his tongue, and looked him over verj-
attentivety. The inspection lasted about ten minutes.
M This person," said the physician, u has suffered
very much ; but he now has great strength."
"That factitious strength is due, monsieur, to the
nervous excitement of my present strange position," said
Jacques Collin, with all the dignity of a bishop.
" That may be," said the doctor.
At a sign from the judge, the prisoner was un-
dressed ; with the exception of his trousers all else
was taken off, even his shirt ; and every one present
could admire the hairy torso of Cyclopean power.
Here was the Farnese Hercules without his colossal
exaggeration.
" For what does Nature destine men of such a build
as that?" said the doctor to Camusot.
The usher now returned with that species of sabre
made of ebony which has been from time immemorial
among the insignia of their functions and is called a
rod. With it he is struck several blows at the place
where the executioner must have applied the fatal
brand. Seventeen scars then appeared, capriciously
scattered ; but, in spite of the care with which the
back was examined the shape of no letter could be
Lucien de Rubempre. 305
made out. The usher called attention, however, to the
fact that the bar of the T was indicated by two holes
exactly as far apart as the length of the bar required,
and that another hole was at the exact place for the
bottom of the same letter.
" But all that is very vague," said Camusot, noticing
the doubt expressed on the doctor's face.
Carlos Herrera now requested that the same thing
should be done to the other shoulder and to the back.
Fifteen or more other scars reappeared, which the doc-
tor made a note of at the request of the Spaniard, and
he declared that the whole back had been so riddled
with wounds that the branding could not now be dis-
covered were it there.
A messenger from the Prefecture of police here
entered the room and gave a note to Monsieur Camu-
sot, requesting an answer. After reading it, the judge
crossed over to Coquart and whispered something in
his ear, but so low that no other ear could hear it.
Only, from a single glance in his direction, Jacques
Collin felt certain that the message came from the
police.
" Corentin is on ray heels, I know that," thought he.
M I wish I could see Asia again."
After signing a paper written by Coquart, the judge
put it in an envelope and gave it to the messenger.
Then he motioned to the doctor and his assistant, who
re-dressed the prisoner, and retired, together with the
usher. Camusot sat down to a desk and played with a
pen.
"You have an aunt," he said, abruptly addressing the
accused.
20
306 Lucien de Bubempre.
"An aunt?" echoed Carlos Herrera in surprise.
"Monsieur, I have no relations; I am the unrecog-
nized son of the late Duke of Ossuna."
To himself he said, " They burn ! " — in allusion to
the game of hide and seek, an infantile image of the
terrible struggle between justice and criminals.
"Pooh!" said Camusot. "Come, you have an
aunt, — Mademoiselle Jacqueline Collin ; whom you
placed as cook with Mademoiselle Esther under the
fantastic name of Asia."
Herrera gave a careless shrug to his shoulders wholly
in keeping with the look of curiosity he showed on hear-
ing this statement of the judge, who was watching him
with sharp attention.
"Take care," said Camusot. "Listen to me
carefully."
" I am listening, monsieur."
" Your aunt is a procuress in the Temple ; her busi-
ness is carried on by a Demoiselle Paccard, sister of a
convict, but a very worthy woman, called La Romette.
The police are on your aunt's traces, and in a few hours
we shall have positive proofs. The woman is very de-
voted to you — "
" Go on, monsieur," said Herrera, composedly, when
Camusot paused as if for a reply ; " I am listening to
you."
" Your aunt, who is about five years older than you,
was formerly the mistress of Marat, of odious memory.
It was from that blood}' source that the nucleus of her
present fortune was derived. According to informa-
tion which I possess, she is a very clever receiver of
stolen goods ; for as yet no proofs have been obtained
Lucien de Bubempre. 307
against her. After Marat's death she belonged, as
appears from reports which I hold in my hand, to a
chemist condemned to death, in the year VIII., for
coining false money. She was a witness on his trial.
It was through this intimacy that she obtained her
knowledge of poisons. She was a procuress from the
year IX. to 1806. From 1807 to 1809 she was in
prison for the crime of leading minors into debaucherj-.
You were then being sought for the crime of forgery.
You had left the banking-house in which your aunt had
placed you as clerk, thanks to the education you had
received and to your aunt's influence with personages
to whose depravity she furnished victims. All this
does not comport with the grandeurs of the Dukes of
Ossuna. Do you persist in your denials? "
Carlos Herrera listened to Monsieur Camusot, think-
ing the while of his happy childhood in the school of
the Oratorians ; a meditation which gave him a truly
astonished air at the judge's words. In spite of Camu-
sot's clever probing, he was unable to bring a single
quiver to that placid countenance.
" If the explanation that I gave you in the begin-
ning has been correctly written down," said Herrera,
" you should read it over. I have no change to
make in it. I did not actually enter the courtesan's
house ; how could I know her cook ? I am a total
stranger to the persons of whom you speak."
" We shall proceed, in spite of your denials, to con-
front you with persons in such a way as to diminish
your assurance."
" A man who has once been shot can endure any-
thing," replied Herrera, gently.
308 Lucien de Eubempre.
Camusot returned to bis study of the papers while
awaiting the arrival of the detective officer whose com-
ing had been announced to him. It was now half-past
eleven ; the examination had begun at ten. Presenth r
the usher entered and announced to the judge in a low
voice that Bibi-Lupin had arrived.
" Let him come in," replied Monsieur Camusot.
As he entered, Bibi-Lupin — from whom the judge
expected the exclamation, "That is he!" — stopped
short in surprise ; he did not recognize the face of
his "customer" in that pock-marked visage. This
hesitation struck the judge forcibly.
" It is certainly his figure, his corpulence," said the
detective, — " Ah ! yes, that 's you, Jacques Collin ! "
he exclaimed, examining the e} T es, the cut of the brow,
and the ears. " There are some things that can't be
disguised. That is certainly he, Monsieur Camusot.
Jacques has a scar from the cut of a knife on his
left arm ; make him take off his coat and you will
see it."
Again the prisoner's coat was taken off; Bibi-Lupin
rolled up the sleeve of his shirt and showed the mark.
"It was a shot," said Carlos Herrera ; "here are
several other scars."
" Ha ! that 's his voice ! " cried Bibi-Lupin.
" Your certainty," said the judge, " is merely an
opinion ; it is not proof."
"I know that," said Bibi-Lupin, humbly. "But I
will get you witnesses. I have brought with me now
one of the boarders in the Maison Vauquer, where I
formerly arrested him," he added, looking fixedly at
the prisoner.
Lucien de Mubempre. 309
The placid face never changed.
"Let that person come in," said Monsieur Camusot,
whose annoyance was perceptible in spite of his apparent
indifference.
This fact was perceived by Jacques Collin, who
counted little on the sympathy of an examining judge ;
and he dropped into a sort of apathy, produced by the
intense meditation to which he gave himself up in
searching for the cause of it.
The usher introduced Madame Poiret, the unexpected
sight of whom caused the accused to quiver slightly ;
but this trepidation passed unnoticed by the judge,
whose attention was on the witness.
"What is 3'our name?" asked the judge beginning
the regular series of formalities.
Madame Poiret, a pale old woman as wrinkled as a
sweetbread, dressed in a dark-blue silk gown, stated
that her name was Christine-Michelle Michonneau, wife
of the Sieur Poiret, aged fifty-one years, born in Paris,
and now living rue de Poules, corner of the rue des
Postes, where she kept furnished lodgings.
" You lived, madame," said the judge, M in 1818 and
1819 in a pension bourgeoises kept by a Madame
Vauquer, did you not?"
" Yes, monsieur ; that is where I made the acquaint-
ance of Monsieur Poiret, a retired government-clerk,
who became my husband, and whom I have nursed in
his bed, poor man, for the last year ; for he 's very ill.
Therefore I cannot leave my house for any length of
time."
"Was there a certain Vautrin in that boarding-
house?" began the judge.
310 Lucien de Hubempre.
"Oh! monsieur, that's a long history ; he was a
dreadful galley-slave."
44 You assisted in arresting him?"
" That is false, monsieur."
" Take care ; you are before the law/' said the judge,
sternly.
Madame Poiret kept silence.
" Consult your memorj r ," resumed the judge. "Can
you recollect the man? Should you recognize him if
3'ou saw him?"
" I think so."
"Is that the man?" asked the judge.
Madame Poiret put on her glasses and looked at the
Abbe Carlos Herrera.
"That's his build, his figure, but — no — yes —
Monsieur," she said, " if I could see his breast bare,
I should recognize it in a minute."
The judge and his clerk could not help laughing, in
defiance of the solemnity of their functions. Jacques
Collin shared their hilarity, but with more restraint. He
had not replaced the coat taken off by Bibi-Lupin, and,
at a sign from the judge, he readily opened his shirt.
"That's his hairy breast! but }'Ou 've turned gray,
Monsieur Vautrin," cried Madame Poiret.
" What do you answer to that? " asked the judge.
" That she is crazy," replied Jacques Collin.
"Ah heavens! if I had a doubt — for it isn't the
same face — that voice would be enough, that 's the voice
that threatened me ! Yes, and that 's his look, too !"
" The agent of the detective police and this woman,"
said the judge, addressing Jacques Collin, " have had
no opportunity to consult each other, and yet they
Lucien de Bubempre. 311
agree on the same resemblances. How do you explain
that?"
"Justice has often committed even greater errors
than that of relying on the testimon\- of a woman who
recognizes a man by the hair of his breast, and on
the mere suspicions of a detective," replied Jacques
Collin. u They find in me resemblances of voice, look,
and figure to a great criminal, but that is very vague.
As for the reminiscence which proves relations between
madame and my double, at which she seems not to blush,
you have laughed at them yourself. Will }T>u, mon-
sieur, in the interests of truth, which I desire to estab-
lish for m}' own sake far more than 3011 can wish it
for justice, will you kindly ask Madame — Foi — "
" Poiret."
"Poret. Excuse me, I am Spanish — whether she
remembers the other persons who lived in that — what
did 3'ou call the house ? "
"Pension bourgeoises said Madame Poiret.
" 1 don't know what that is," said Jacques Collin.
M A house where people dine and breakfast by subscrip-
tion," replied the former Mademoiselle Michonneau.
"You are right," cried Camusot, who nodded his
head in approval of Jacques Collin, so much was he
struck \)\ the apparent good faith with which the
accused offered him the means of reaching a result.
Madame, try, if you please, to remember the names of
the persons who lived in the pension at the time of
Jacques Collin's arrest."
" There was a Monsieur de Kastignac, and Horace
Bianchon, and Pere Goriot, and Mademoiselle Taille-
fer — " '
312 Lucien de RubemprL
" Very good," said the judge, never ceasing to watch
Jacques Collin, whose face was impassible ; " that Pere
Goriot — "
44 He is dead," said Madame Poiret.
44 Monsieur," said Jacques Collin, " 1 have several
times met in Lucien's rooms a Monsieur de Rastignac,
intimate, I think, with Madame de Nucingen ; if it
is he whom she means he never mistook me for the
criminal with whom some one is now attempting to
confound me."
44 Monsieur de Rastignac and Doctor Bianchon,"
said the judge, 44 both occupy such social position that
their testimon}', if favorable to you, will suffice to make
me release you. Coquart, write out the summons for
their attendance here."
In a few moments the formalities of Madame Poiret's
examination were over and Coquart read to her the
written report of her testimony, which she signed ; but
the accused refused to add his signature, on account of
his ignorance of the forms of French law.
" That 's enough for to-day," said Monsieur Camusot.
44 You must be in want of food ; I will now send you
back to the Conciergerie."
44 Alas ! I suffer too much to eat," said Jacques
Collin.
Camusot was anxious that Herrera's return should
coincide with the hour when the other prisoners took
their exercise in the preau ; but he wanted an an-
swer from the director of the Conciergerie to the order
he had given him in the morning. He therefore rang
the bell for his usher. When the man came he said
that the portress of a house on the quai Malaquais
Lucien de Rubempre. 313
was waiting in the antechamber to see the judge and
give him a paper of importance relating to Monsieur
Lucien de Rubempre.
This incident seemed so important that Camusot
dropped his immediate intention and said, hastily : —
" Let her come in, at once."
314 Lucien de Rubempre.
XXII.
A MESSAGE FROM THE DEAD.
" Pardon me, excuse me, monsieur," said the por-
tress, bowing to the judge arid to the abbe in turn,
"but we have been so upset, my husband and I, and
troubled by the officers of the law, that each time they
have come to the house we have forgotten to give them
a letter that came b} T post for Monsieur Lucien ; it
was put away in our drawer ; we had to pay ten sous
for it, though it comes from Paris, — but it is very
heavy. Would you pay the postage? For God knows
when Monsieur Lucien may get back."
"Was this letter given to you by the postman?"
asked Camusot, after attentively examining the outside
of the letter.
" Yes, monsieur."
" Coquart, draw up an affidavit of this declara-
tion. Give your name, my good woman, and your
occupation."
Camusot made the portress swear to her declaration,
and then he himself dictated the report.
During the progress of these formalities, he examined
the post-mark, which bore the hour of receipt and dis-
tribution and also the date of the day of delivery.
This letter, delivered at Lucien's home the morning
after Esther's death, must have been written and
posted on the day of that catastrophe.
Lucien de Bubempre. 315
We may now judge of the stupefaction of Monsieur
Caniusot on reading this letter, written and signed by
a woman who was supposed to be the victim of a
crime.
Monday, May 13, 1830.
My last day, — 10 o'clock in the morning.
My Lucien, — I have not an hour to live. At eleven
o'clock I shall be dead, and I shall die without pain. I
have paid fifty thousand francs for a pretty little black cur-
rant containing a poison which kills like lightning. And so,
my treasure, you can say to yourself : " My little Esther did
not suffer." Yes, I shall only have suffered in writing to
you these lines.
The monster who bought me so dearly, knowing that the
day on which I should know myself to be his would have no
morrow, has left me. For the first and last time I have
been able to contrast my former life with the life of love, to
compare the tenderness which expands into infinity with the
horror of a debt which made me long for annihilation, so
that no spot of me might be left for kisses. Perhaps this
disgust was needful to make me find death sweet. I have
taken a bath ; I wish the confessor of the convent where I
was baptized were here to confess me, and wash my soul, —
but no, enough of prostitution ; it would profane the sacra-
ment and besides, I think I am washed in the water of sin-
cere repentance. God will do with me as he will.
But let us be done with tears ; 1 want to be your Esther to
you up to my last moment, and not fret you about my death,
or the future, or the good God, who could n't be good if he
tortured me in another world when I have suffered such
bitter sorrow in this.
I have your dear portrait painted by Madame Mirbel be-
fore me. That ivory leaf consoles me for your absence ; I
look at it with delirium as I write you my last thoughts, as
316 Lucien de EubemprS.
I make you feel the last beatings of my heart. I shall put
the portrait under cover of this letter ; for I will not leave it
to be stolen or sold. The mere thought that what has been
my joy could be shown in the window of a shop with the
ladies and officers of the Empire and Chinese images gives
me a cold shudder. My Lucien, destroy it, give it to no
other woman — unless it could win you back the heart
of that lath in petticoats, that Clotilde, who will give
you nightmares with her sharp bones — Yes, I consent
that she should have it, and then I '11 still be doing you
some good, as in my lifetime. Ah ! to give you pleasure
— or were it only to make you laugh — I 'd have stood be-
fore a fire with an apple in my mouth to bake it for you !
My death will be useful to you, too. Living I should have
troubled your home. Ah ! that Clotilde, I can't understand
her ! Able to be your wife, to bear your name, never to
leave you night or day, to be your own, and yet make difficul-
ties ! One must be high-bred and faubourg Saint-Germain
for that ! and not have an ounce of flesh on her bones.
Poor Lucien ! dear, balked ambitious one, I think of your
future. Ah, me ! you '11 regret, more than once, your poor
faithful little dog, that good girl who stole for you, who
would have let them drag her into a police-court could that
have made you happy ; whose sole occupation was to think
of your pleasures and plan them for you ; who had love for
you in her hair, her feet, her ears; your little ballerina,
whose looks meant blessings ; who for six years thought
only of you ; who was so utterly yours that I have been but
the emanation of my Lucien's soul as light is that of the sun.
But alas, for want of money and virtue I could not be your
wife. I have always thought of your future in giving you
all that I possessed : I do now. Come, as soon as you re-
ceive this letter, and take what is placed for you under my
pillow ; for I distrust the servants of the house.
Ah I I want you to see me beautiful in death ; I will lie
down, stretched on my bed ; I will pose for you, ah ! Then
Zucien de Bubempre. 317
I shall press the little currant against the roof of my mouth,
and there '11 be no disfigurement, no convulsions, no ridicu-
lous posture.
I know that Madame de Serizy has quarrelled with you
on my account ; but don't you see, my sweet, that when she
knows I 'm dead she '11 forgive you; you must cultivate her,
and she '11 marry you well if those Grandlieus persist in
their refusal.
My nini, I don't want you to give great sighs, alas ! and
alas ! when you hear of my death. In the first place, I ought
to tell you that this hour of eleven o'clock Monday morning,
May 13, is but the ending of a long malady which began
that day on the terrace at Saint-Germain, when you flung
me back into my old career. There are maladies of the soul
as there are of the body. Only, the soul cannot go on suf-
fering stupidly like the body ; the body never sustains the
soul as the soul the body, — no, the soul has a means of
cure in the thought that makes a grisette have recourse to
charcoal. Dear, you gave me all of life last night when you
told me that if the Grandlieus still refused you, you would
marry me. 'T would have been for both a great misfor-
tune ; I should have died far more — if one can say so.
I mean there are deaths that are more — or less — bitter.
Never, never would the world have accepted us.
It is now some months that I have reflected deeply on many
things. See ! a poor girl is in the mud as 1 was before I
went into the convent ; men think her beautiful, they make
her serve their pleasures, excusing themselves from consid-
ering her ; they fetch her in a carriage, but they send her
away on foot ; if they do not spit in her face it is only because
her beauty saves her from that outrage, but morally they do
worse. Well, let that girl inherit five or six millions, and
princes will ask her hand ; she is saluted respectfully where-
ever she passes in her carriage ; she may choose her husband
from the noblest blood of France and of Navarre. This world
of social life, which would ever have cried " Raca ! " to us, —
318 Lucien de Eubempre.
to us, beautiful, united, and loving, — bowed low to Madame
de Stael, in spite of her ways of living, because she had a
fortune. Yes, this world, that bends the knee to money and
to fame, grants nothing to happiness or virtue — for I was
virtuous, I would have done good. Oh ! how many tears
would I have wiped away! — as many as I have shed. Yes,
I would have lived only for you and for charity.
These reflections have made death welcome to me. And
so, don't lament for me, my own darling ; say to yourself,
often, " There were two kind girls, two lovable creatures,
who both died for me, without ever blaming me, for they
adored me." Raise a memorial in your heart to Coralie,
and to Esther, and go your way! be happy ! Do you remem-
ber the day when you showed me an old shrivelled creat-
ure, in a melon-green hood and a brown pelisse covered with
black grease-spots, the mistress of a poet before the Revolu-
tion, trying to get warm in the sun, on a bench in the
Tuileries, and fretting about a horrible pug, — she who once
had servants and carriages and houses? And I said to
you — don't you remember ? — " Better die at thirty."
Well, that day, afterwards, you found me thoughtful, and
you talked follies to cheer me up, but, between two kisses,
I said again, " Pretty women leave the play before it ends."
And so I don't want to see the last act, that 's all.
" How she runs on ! " you '11 say ; but this is my last chatter.
I write as I used to talk to you, as I want to talk still,
gayly, for you liked it. Grisettes who bemoan themselves
were always a horror to me. You know I did die well once
before, — that night of the masked ball when they let you
know I had been a prostitute.
Oh ! no, no, my nini, don't give away this portrait ; if
you knew with what floods of love I have plunged into those
eyes — for I stopped writing to look at them with rapture —
you 'd think, as you gather up the love I have left upon the
ivory, that the soul of your little Esther is there. No,
Lucien, do not part with it.
Lucien de Bubempre. 319
A dead woman asking alms ! — how comical ! Come,
come! let us be peaceful in our grave.
My death would seem heroic to fools if they knew that
to-day Nucingen offered me millions if I would love him
as I love you. Ah ! he '11 be finely robbed when he finds
I have kept my word and have died of him. I did my
best to still breathe the air that you breathe. I said to
that robber of women and orphans, " Do you wish me to
love you as you say? I will even promise never to speak
to Lucien again." "What shall I do?" he asked. "Give
me two millions for him." No ! if you could only have
seen his face ! Ah ! I could have laughed, if it had n't been
so tragic for me. " Save yourself the trouble of a refusal,"
I said. " I see now that two millions are more to you than
I am ; it is good for a woman to know what she is worth ; "
and I turned my back upon him. He '11 know in a few
hours that I was not joking.
Who will part your hair for you as I did ? Bah ! I don't
want to think of anything more in life. I have but five
minutes left and I go to God. I want to speak to him of
you, and ask for your happiness at the price of my death
and my punishment in the other world, — it troubles me
that I must go to hell. I would like to be among the
angels, where I could think of you.
Adieu, my nini, adieu! I bless you for all my misery.
To the grave, I am
Your Esther.
Eleven o'clock is striking ; I have said my last prayer,
and I am going now to lie down. Once more, adieu ! I
would that the warmth of my hand could leave my soul
upon this paper where I place my last kiss. Once more I
want to call you my little minet, though you have caused
the death of your
Esther.
320 Lucien de BubemprS.
A spasm of jealous}' was in the heart of the judge
as he ended the reading of the only letter written by
a suicide in which he had found such gayety, albeit
a feverish gayety and the last effort of a blinded love.
" AVhat is there in him to be loved thus?" he
thought, repeating what is said by all men who have
not the gift of pleasing women.
"If you are able to prove not only that 3-011 are not
Jacques Collin, an escaped convict, but that you are
really Don Carlos Herrera, canon of Toledo, and envoy
of his Majesty Ferdinand VII.," said the judge to
Jacques Collin, "you will be set at liberty at once;
for the impartiality which my office demands obliges me
to tell }'ou that I have this moment received a letter
from Mademoiselle Esther Gobseck, in which she avows
her intention of committing suicide, and expresses such
suspicion of her servants as would seem to show that
they are guilty of the robber}" of seven hundred and
fifty thousand francs which were under her pillow."
While speaking, Monsieur Camusot was comparing
the writing of the letter with that of the will, and to
his mind it was evident that the letter had been written
by the same person who wrote the will.
" Monsieur, you have been too hasty in suspecting
a murder ; may 30U not also be mistaken in suspecting
a theft."
" Ha!" said Camusot, casting the look of a judge
on the prisoner.
" Do not think that I compromise myself when I
say that the sum missing can probably be found,"
replied Jacques Collin, letting the judge see that he
understood his suspicion. " This poor girl was beloved
Lucien de Rubempre. 321
by her servants. If I were free, I should make it my
business to search for property which now belongs to
the being I love best in the world, — to Lucien. Will
you have the kindness to let me read the letter? It
will not take long ; it is a precious proof of the inno-
cence of m}' dear child ; therefore 3-011 cannot fear that
I should injure it — or speak of it, for I am in soli-
tary confinement."
" Solitary confinement ! " cried the judge ; " of course
you will not remain there. I beg you to establish your
identity at once. Have recourse to your ambassador,
if you like."
He held out the letter to Jacques Collin. Camusot
was delighted to get rid of his perplexities, — to sat-
isfy the attorne3'-general, and Mesdames de Maufri-
gneuse and Serizy. Nevertheless, he examined coldly
and critically the face of his prisoner while the latter
read Esther's letter, and, in spite of the sincerit3 r of
the feelings that were now depicted on it, he said to
himself: —
" That certainly is the physiognomy of a convict."
"This is love!" said Jacques Collin, returning the
letter and letting Camusot see his face, which was
bathed in tears.
" If you knew him ! " he said. " A soul so 3 r oung,
so fresh, a beaut3 T so magnificent, a child, a poet ! One
feels an irresistible need of sacrificing one's self to
him, of satisfying even his slightest wishes. This dear
Lucien is so winning when he chooses to be caressing
that — "
" Well,"- said the magistrate, making one more effort
to get at the truth," 3-ou can hardly be Jacques Collin."
21
322 Lucien de Bubempre.
" No, monsieur, I am not."
And Jacques Collin made himself more than ever
Don Carlos Herrera. In his desire to finish his work,
he approached the judge, drew him aside to the recess
of the window, and took the manners of a prince of the
Church making a confidence.
" I love that boy so much, monsieur, that if I had to
remain the criminal for whom you take me in order to
avoid disaster to that idol of my heart, I would accuse
myself," he said, in a low voice. "I would imitate
that poor girl who killed herself for his benefit. Mon-
sieur, I entreat you to grant me a favor, — set Lucien
at liberty at once."
"My duty is against it," said Camusot, kindly;
"but it is with justice as with heaven, a way might
be found — can you give me an}- good reason? Speak
frankly ; 3-our words will not be taken down."
" Well, then," replied Jacques Collin, deceived by
the judge's apparent kindliness, " I know what that
poor boy must suffer at this moment; he is capable of
trying to kill himself at the mere thought that he is in
prison — "
"Oh, as for that!" said the judge, shrugging his
shoulders.
" And you know not whom you oblige in doing me
this service," added Jacques Collin, who wanted to
touch other cords. " You render a service to an Order
more powerful than the Comtesse de Serizy, or the
Duchesse de Maufrigneuse, who will not forgive the
fact that their letters have been in your office," — and
he pointed to two perfumed packages. " My Order has
a memory."
Lucien de Bubempre. 323
"Monsieur," said Camusot, u enough ! Find other
reasons. I have a duty toward accused persons, as I
have toward the prosecution of crime."
" Then believe me, I know Lucien. His is the soul
of a woman, — a poet, Southern born, without steadfast-
ness, without will," said Jacques Collin, thinking that
the judge was wholly won. M You are now certain of
the innocence of this young man ; do not harass him
bj' questions. Give him this letter ; tell him he is
Esther's heir, and set him at liberty. If you do other-
wise you will regret it ; whereas, if 30U will release
him, I will myself explain to you (and keep me if you
will in solitary confinement) to-morrow, to-night, all
that seems mysterious in this affair, and the reasons of
the rancorous persecution of which I am the object.
In doing this I shall risk my life, which they have
sought to take for five years past; but Lucien free,
rich, and married to Clotilde de Grandlieu, my task in
this world is accomplished. I do not care to save my
skin ; my persecutor is a spy of your late king."
"Ah! Corentin!"
" Is that his name? thank you. Well, monsieur, will
3 7 ou promise to do what I have asked of you ? "
" A judge neither can nor ought to promise anything.
Coquart, tell the usher and the gendarmes to take the
accused back to the Conciergerie. I will give orders
this evening to place you in the Pistole," he added,
kindly, making a slight inclination of his head to the
prisoner.
Struck by the request made b} T Jacques Collin, re-
membering the urgency with which he had asked to be
examined first, — giving his illness as a reason, — all
324 Lucien de Rubempre.
the judge's distrust came back to him. As he again
listened to his vague suspicions, he saw the pretended
sick man leaving the room, and walking like a Hercu-
les, with none of the mimicry of illness with which he
entered it.
44 Monsieur! " he called out.
Jacques Collin turned round.
44 In spite of your refusal to sign the record of your
examination, my clerk will read to you."
The prisoner was plainly in perfect health ; the mo-
tion with which he went to the clerk's table and sat
down by him was a last flash of light to the judge.
44 You have been quickly cured,'* he said.
44 Caught!" thought Jacques Collin; then he said
aloud, " Joj*, monsieur, is the ou\y panacea that exists.
That letter, the proof of an innocence I never doubted
— ah, that is indeed a remedy ! "
The judge watched the accused with pensive eyes as
the usher and the gendarmes surrounded him ; then he
made the motion of a man who wakes up, and, throw-
ing Pother's letter upon his clerk's desk, he said : —
44 Coquart, copy that ! "
If it is in the nature of every man to distrust the
thing he is entreated to do when that thing is against
his interests and against his duty, and even when it is
wholly indifferent to him, this feeling is pre-eminently
the law of an examining judge. The more the accused,
whose own status was not yet clear, let the judge see
clouds on the horizon in case Lucien was examined,
the more that examination seemed necessary to Camu-
sot. Even though this formality was not indispensable
according to the Code and legal custom, it seemed re-
Lucien de Bubempre. 325
quired b} 7 the question of the abbe's identity. In all
employments there is the conseience of our work. In
default of curiosity, Camusot would have questioned
Lucien, as he had questioned Jacques Collin, displaj'-
ing a craftiness which an honorable judge thinks right.
But now the duty to be done, even his own advancement,
all became secondary, in Camusot's mind, to the desire
to know the truth, to obtain it, if only to be silent
about it.
He stood drumming on the window panes, com-
pletely abandoned to the flood of his conjectures ; for
thought is like a river that flows through many lands.
Lovers of truth, magistrates, have much in common
with jealous women ; they give themselves up to count-
less suppositions ; they dig into them with the dagger
of suspicion, as the sacrificing high-priest disembowels
the victims of the altar ; moreover, they stop, not at
truth, but at probability, and they end by a perception
of the truth. A woman questions a man she loves very
much as a judge interrogates a criminal. With such
intentions, a flash of the eye, a word, an intonation of
the voice, a hesitation, suffices to indicate the fact, the
betrayal, the hidden crime.
" The manner in which he described his devotion to
his son (if it is his son) makes me believe that he went
to the house of that girl to secure the money ; and, not
knowing of the will that was under her pillow, he prob-
ably 7 took, for his son, the seven hundred and fifty-
thousand francs, provisionally. That must be the rea-
son why 7 he says he can and will recover that money'.
Monsieur "de Rubempre owes it to himself, as well as
to justice, to clear up the civil status of his father.
326 Zucien de RubemprL
And to promise me the protection of his Order — his
Order ! — if I would refrain from examining the young
man."
He dwelt on that thought.
As we have already seen, an examining judge carries
on the examination as he pleases. He is free to use
craft, or to la} T it aside. The inquiry may be nothing,
or it maj' be all. In that lies favor.
Camusot rang the bell. His usher had returned ; he
ordered him to fetch Monsieur Lucien de Rubempre,
and to be careful that the accused did not communicate
with an} 7 one, no matter who, on the way. It was now
two o'clock in the afternoon.
" There is some secret there," said the judge to him-
self, "and it must be a secret of importance. The
reasoning of that amphibious being, who is neither
priest, nor layman, nor convict, nor Spaniard, and who
wants to prevent some dreadful thing from coming out
of his protege's mouth is this : ' The poet is weak ; he
is effeminate ; he is not like me, who am a Hercules in
diplomac}* ; if 30U examine him you can snatch our
secret from him easily.' Well, now we will get the
truth out of innocence."
And he sat there tapping the edge of his table with
an ivory paper-knife, while his clerk went on copying
Esther's letter. How many capricious things occur in
the exercise of our faculties ! Camusot had supposed
all possible crimes, but he passed unnoticed the only
one which Jacques Collin had really committed. —
namely, the forged will in favor of Lucien. Let those
whose envy fastens on the position of these magistrates
reflect upon their lives passed in perpetual suspicion,
Zucien de Eubempre. 327
in craft forced upon their minds, — for civil affairs
are not less tortuous than criminal inquiries, — and
they will perhaps come to the conclusion that the priest
and the magistrate bear an equally heavy harness, brist-
ling with spikes within it. All professions have their
hair-shirts and their thumbscrews.
328 Lucien de EubemprS.
XXIII.
THE JUDGE APPLIES THE TORTURE.
A few minutes after two o'clock Monsieur Camusot
saw Lucien de Rubempre brought to his office — pale,
limp, undone, his eyes red and swollen, in a state of
prostration, which enabled him to compare nature with
art, — the really fainting man with the fainting actor.
The passage from the Conciergerie to the judge's room,
made between two gendarmes preceded bj T an usher,
had brought despair to its acme in Lucien. It is in the
nature of a poet to prefer death to punishment. Be-
holding this nature utterly devoid of mental courage, —
a courage so powerfully manifested in the other pris-
oner, — Monsieur Camusot felt scorn for his easy vic-
tory, and a contempt which enabled him to deliver
decisive blows, while it left his mind in that terri-
ble freedom which characterizes the famous shot at a
pigeon-match.
" Recover yourself, Monsieur de Rubempre ; you are
in presence of a magistrate eager to repair the wrong
involuntarily done by arresting you on a suspicion
which has proved unfounded. I believe you innocent,
and you are about to be set at liberty. Here is the
proof of your innocence, — a letter held by your por-
tress in consequence of 3'our absence, which she has
now brought to me. In the trouble caused by the news
of your arrest at Fontainebleau, and the visits of the
Lucien de Bubempre. 329
police at your house, she forgot the letter, which is from
the Demoiselle Esther Gobseck. Read it."
Lucien took the letter, read it, and burst into tears.
He sobbed, without being able to articulate a word. At
the end of some fifteen minutes, during which time
Lucien had great difficulty in maintaining an} T strength
at all, the clerk presented to him a copy of the letter,
and requested him to sign it as w i certified copy of the
original, to be delivered up on demand so long as the
examinations in the case should continue," — offering
to read it over and collate it with the original for him ;
but Lucien was, naturally enough, content to trust
Coquart's exactness.
" Monsieur," said the judge, in a very kindly man-
ner, " it is, nevertheless, difficult to set you at liberty
without fulfilling certain formalities, and putting a few
questions to you. It is almost as a witness that I shall
now require you to answer. To a man like you, I think
it useless to remark that the oath to tell the truth is
not only an appeal to your conscience, but it is also a
necessity of your position, which has been for a short
time ambiguous. The truth, no matter what it is, can-
not injure you ; but falsehood would send you to the
court of assizes, and will oblige me now to send you
back to the Conciergerie, whereas, if you answer
frankly, j t ou will sleep at home to-night, and you shall
be publicly vindicated in the public journals by the fol-
lowing notice : ' Monsieur de Rubempre, arrested yes-
terday at Fontainebleau, was immediately released after
a very short examination.' "
This speech produced a lively impression on Lucien.
Seeing this, the judge continued : —
330 Lucien de Eubempre.
" 1 repeat, you have been suspected of complicity
in the murder, by poison, of the Demoiselle Esther.
There is, however, proof of her suicide, and that ends
the question of murder. But a sum of money has been
taken from the house, — seven hundred and fifty thou-
sand francs, — which now forms part of your inheri-
tance. Here, unfortunately, there is a crime. The
crime precedes the discovery of the will. Now the law
has reason to think that a person who loves you as
much as the Demoiselle Esther loved you has been
guilty of this crime, for your sake. No, do not inter-
rupt me," said the judge, imposing silence on Lucien,
who wished to speak, by a motion of his hand. " I am
not questioning you yet. I wish to make you under-
stand how much your honor is concerned in this mat-
ter. Abandon the false, the miserable point of honor
which binds accomplices together, and tell the whole
truth."
Our readers must already have observed the extreme
disproportion of weapons existing between accused per-
sons and examining judges. It is true that denial,
cleverly managed, has on its side completeness of form,
and is sufficient for a criminal's defence ; but, for all
that, it is a sort of panoply which becomes a crushing
weight when some turn in the examination discloses a
rent in it. As soon as denial is insufficient against
evident facts, the accused person is absolutely at the
mercy of the judge. Suppose, now, that a semi-criminal,
such as Lucien, saved from the first wreck of his virtue,
might amend his ways, and become of use to his coun-
try ; he would perish among these nets and wiles of
examination. The judge draws up a brief and dry re-
Lucien de Eubempre. 331
port (proces-verbal), — a faithful record of the questions
and answers ; but of his insidious paternal persua-
sions, his captious remonstrances, like those we have
given, nothing remains. The judges of the upper
courts and the juries see and know nothing of the
means by which these replies have been obtained.
Therefore, according to some opinions, it would be
better if the examination were conducted, as in Eng-
land, before the jury. France did practise that system
for a short time. Under the Code Brumaire, of the
year VI., there was what was called a jury of inquiry
[jury $ accusation], to distinguish it from the judge's
juiy [jury du judgment]. As to the final trial of a
case, if it passed the jury of inquiry, it went to the
Royal courts without the concurrence of the other
juiy-
" Now," said Camusot, after a pause, " what is your
name ? Monsieur Coquart, attention ! " he said to the
clerk.
" Lucien Chardon de Rubempre."
" Where born?"
" Angouleme."
And Lucien gave the day, month, and year.
" You had no property from your father?"
" None."
" You did, nevertheless, during your first residence
in Paris, live at considerable expense, compared with
your small means?"
" Yes, monsieur; but I had at that time a devoted
friend, in Mademoiselle Coralie, whom I had the mis-
fortune to lose. It was grief, caused by her death,
which took me back to my former home."
332 Lucien de RubemprS.
44 Good, monsieur," said Camusot ; "I commend
your frankness ; it will be appreciated."
Lucien was entering, as we see, upon the path of gen-
eral confession.
"You incurred far greater expenses after your re-
turn from Angouleme to Paris," resumed Camusot.
44 You have lived like a man who spends from fifty to
sixty thousand francs a year."
44 Yes, monsieur."
44 Who supplied you with that money?"
44 My protector, the Abbe Carlos Herrera."
44 Where did you first know him?"
44 1 met him on the high-road, at a moment when I
was about to rid myself of life by suicide."
44 You had never heard your family mention him, or
your mother?"
44 Never."
4 4 Can you remember the month and year when you
first became connected with Mademoiselle Esther?"
44 Toward the end of 1823, at a little theatre on the
boulevard."
44 At first she cost you money? "
44 Yes, monsieur."
44 Lately, in the hope of marrying Mademoiselle de
Grandlieu, you bought the remains of the chateau de
Rubempre, to which you have added lands worth about
a million. You told the Grandlieu family that your
sister and brother-in-law had lately inherited a large
fortune and that you owed the sum for the payment of
your purchase to their liberality. Did you say that,
monsieur, to the Grandlieu family?"
44 Yes, monsieur."
Lucien de Eubempre. 333
" You are ignorant of the reasons why jour marriage
was broken off ? "
4 'Entirely."
44 Well, the Grandlieu family sent one of the most
trusty lawyers in Paris to 3 T our brother-in-law, in order
to obtain information. This law} T er learned at Angou-
leme, from the statements of your sister and your
brother-in-law, not only that the\ r had lent you noth-
ing, but that their inheritance was chiefly in land, and
that the personal property amounted to little more
than two hundred thousand francs. You cannot think
it strange that a family like that of Grandlieu should
draw back when they find your fortune such that j'ou
dare not explain its origin. You see, monsieur, the
position in which a lie has placed }*ou."
Lucien was struck dumb 03- this revelation ; and the
little strength of mind he still retained abandoned him.
" The police and the legal authorities know all thej r
wish to know, remember that," said Camusot. "Now,"
he resumed, after a pause, thinking of the abbe's claim
to be Lucien's father, "do you know who this so-
called Carlos Herrera is ? "
" Yes, monsieur ; but I knew it too late."
14 Too late? how do 30U mean? Explain yourself."
4 ' He is not a priest, he is not a Spaniard, he is —
44 An escaped convict?" said the judge, quickly.
44 Yes," replied Lucien. 44 But when the fatal se-
cret was revealed to me I was already under obligations
to him . I thought I had allied m3 f self with a respect-
able ecclesiastic — "
44 Jacques Collin — " said the judge, beginning a
sentence.
334 Lucien de Bubempre.
"Jacques Collin," said Lucien, interrupting him,
44 yes, that is his name."
4 'Good. Jacques Collin," resumed Camusot, "has
just been recognized here by two persons ; but he still
denies his identity — in your interests, I think. I
asked you if }X>u knew who he was for another purpose,
to expose what may prove to be another imposture of
Jacques Collin."
Instantly Lucien felt as if hot irons were plunged
into him.
44 Are 3'ou ignorant," continued the judge, " that he
pretends to be your father, to explain the extraordinary
relation in which you stand to him ? "
44 He ! my father ! Oh, monsieur, did he say that?"
" Have you suspected where the sums of money
which he gave you came from ? It is to be believed from
the letter which you hold in your hand that Mademoiselle
Esther, that poor girl, did, later, render you the same
services as Mademoiselle Coralie ; but you were, as you
have just said, living in Paris and living luxuriously for
some years before you received anything from her. Can
you tell me where the money came from ? "
" Ah ! monsieur, it is you who must tell me," cried
Lucien, " where convicts get their money — Jacques
Collin my father ! Oh ! my poor mother ! "
And he burst into tears.
44 Clerk, read that part of the examination in which
the pretended Carlos Herrera declares himself the
father of Lucien de Rubempre."
The poet listened to the reading in silence and with a
countenance it was painful to witness.
' ' I am lost ! n he cried.
Lucien de Rubempre. 335
" No man is lost in the path of truth and honor,"
said the judge.
M But you will send Jacques Collin to the assizes,"
said Lucien.
" Undoubtedly," replied Camusot, who wished to
make Lucien say more. " Continue ; say what you
think."
But, in spite of the efforts and remonstrances of the
judge, Lucien no longer answered. Reflection had
come, — too late, as it does in all men who are slaves
to feeling. There lies the difference between the poet
and the man of action : one delivers himself over to feel-
ing to reproduce his living images, he judges nothing
until later ; whereas the other judges and feels together.
Lucien sat pale and dumb ; he saw himself at the bot-
tom of the precipice down which the judge had rolled
him, while he, the poet, had let himself be trapped by
apparent kindness. He had betrayed, not his bene-
factor but his accomplice, — him, who had defended
their position with the courage of a lion and an ability
without a flaw. Just there, where Jacques Collin had
saved Lucien by his audacit}', Lucien, the man of mind,
had lost all by his want of intelligence and his lack of
reflection. The infamous lie, which had so shocked
him, was the screen of a truth, for him more infamous.
Confounded by the subtlety of the judge, terrified b} r his
cruel cleverness, by the rapidity of the blows given, by
the exposure of the faults of all his life thus brought to
light like so many grapnels to drag his conscience,
Lucien was like an animal which the club of the
slaughter-house has missed. Free and innocent in the
eye of the law when he entered that room, in one hour
336 Lucien de Rubempre.
he saw himself a criminal by his own confession. The
final, horrible mockery came when the judge, cold and
calm, let him see that the revelation he had made was
the result of a blunder. Camusot was thinking of
Jacques Collin's claim as a father, while Lucien, im-
pelled by the fear of seeing his connection with a
convict made public, had imitated the celebrated inad-
vertence of the murderers of Ibycus.
One of the claims to glory of Royer-Collard is that
he maintained the constant triumph of natural sentf-
ments over imposed sentiments ; and he maintained,
also, the inviolability of pledges, declaring that the
law of hospitality was binding even to the point of
annulling the value of a judicial oath. He confessed
this theory in the face of all the world from the French
chambers ; he bravely defended conspirators, and
showed that it was human to obey the demands of
friendship rather than the tyrannical laws drawn from
social arsenals for such or such cases. In short,
Natural Right has laws which have never yet been
promulgated; which are more efficacious and better
known than those forged by society. Lucien had just
betrayed — to his own detriment, as it proved — the
law of solidarity, which obliged him to be silent, and
let Jacques Collin defend himself; but, worse than
that, he had accused him ! For his own sake, in his
own interests, the man should have been, then and
always, Carlos Herrera.
Monsieur Camusot enjoyed his triumph. He held
two guilty men ; with the hand of the law he had
struck down an idol of fashionable society, and he
had found the hitherto unfindable Jacques Collin. He
Lucien de Bubempre. 337
would, undoubtedly, be considered one of the ablest of
examining judges. So he let the unhappy prisoner
keep silence ; but he studied that silence of consterna-
tion ; he saw the drops of sweat accumulating on that
anguished face, swelling and rolling down to mingle
with two streams of tears.
"Why weep, Monsieur de Rubempre," he said at
last. "You are, as I have told }ou, the heir of
Mademoiselle Esther, who had no direct or collateral
heirs ; and her estate amounts to nearly eight mil-
lions, if the seven hundred and fifty thousand francs
are found."
This was a last blow to the wretched man. Had he
borne himself firmly for ten minutes, as Jacques Collin
had said in his note, Lucien would have attained to the
height of his desires. He could have paid his debt to
Jacques Collin, and parted from him ; he was rich, and
could have married Clotilde. Nothing shows more elo-
quently than this scene the power given to examining
judges by the isolation in which accused persons are
kept previous to and during the period of their exam-
inations, and the value of such a communication as Asia
had been able to convey to Jacques Collin.
"Ah, monsieur!" replied Lucien, with the bitter-
ness and iron} T of a man who makes a pedestal of his
accomplished misfortune, " how justly } r ou say in your
legal language, ' undergo an examination.' Between
the physical torture of former times and the mental
torture of to-day I would not, for m} 7 part, hesitate. I
prefer the sufferings inflicted by an executioner. What
more do you want of me ? " he added, proudly.
" In this place," replied the magistrate, becoming
22
338 Lucien de Rubempre.
haughty and disdainful in reply to the poet's pride, " I
alone have the right to ask questions."
" But I had the right not to answer," murmured poor
Lueien, whose intelligence had now come full}- back to
him.
" Clerk, read his examination to the accused."
u Again * accused ' ! " said Lucien to himself.
"While the clerk read the document, Lucien came to a
resolution which obliged him to fawn upon Monsieur
Camusot. When the murmur of Coquart's voice ceased,
the poet quivered like a man who has slept through a
noise to which his senses were accustomed, and who is
waked by its cessation.
"You must sign that report of your examination,"
said the judge.
44 And then will you set me at liberty?" asked Lu-
cien, with some irony.
" Not yet," replied Camusot ; " but to-morrow, after
you have been confronted with Jacques Collin, you will
no doubt be free. Justice must first know whether you
are or are not an accomplice in the crimes committed
by that individual since his escape in 1820. However,
you will no longer be kept in solitary confinement. I
will write to the director to put you in one of the best
rooms in the Pistole."
" Can I have writing materials? "
" They will give you whatever } T ou ask for; I will
send the order b} 7 the usher who takes you back."
Lucien signed the report mechanically, and he marked
certain passages in obedience to Coquart's directions
with the meekness of a resigned victim. A single de-
tail will do more to show the condition in which he now
Lucien de Bubempre. 339
was than any lengthened description. The announce-
ment that he would be confronted with Jacques Collin
had dried the drops of sweat upon his face ; his dry
eyes shone with intolerable brilliancy. In short, he
became, in a moment that was rapid as lightning, what
Jacques Collin was, a man of iron.
In natures like that of Lucien, which Jacques Collin
had so truly analyzed, these sudden passings from a
state of complete demoralization to an almost metallic
condition (so tremendous is the tension of human force)
are among the most striking phenomena in the life of
ideas. Will returns, like water to a dried-up spring ;
it infuses itself into the apparatus prepared for the ac-
tion of its mysterious constitutive substance, — then the
dead body becomes a man, and the man springs forth
armed with full strength for mighty struggles.
Lucien put Esther's letter and the miniature it en-
closed upon his heart. Then he bowed haughtily to
Monsieur Camusot, and walked with a firm step through
the corridors between two gendarmes.
" That is an utter scoundrel ! " said the judge to his
clerk, as the door closed on Lucien. "He thought to
save himself by sacrificing his accomplice."
"Of the two," replied Coquart, timidly, "the con-
vict is the better man."
"I give you your liberty for to-day, Coquart," said
the judge. "We have done enough of this. Send away
the people who are waiting ; tell them to come back
to-morrow. Stay ! go first to the attorney-general, and
see if he is still in his office. If he is, ask him to give
me five minutes' audience. Oh, he is certainly there ! "
added the judge, looking at a shabby clock of green-
34:0 Lucien de BubemprS.
painted wood with gilt lines ; " it is only a quarter to
four."
These examinations, which are read so rapidly, take
an immense amount of time, for the questions and an-
swers are all written down at full length. This is one
of the causes of the great delays in criminal cases, and
of the length of an accused person's confinement. To
persons in any small business it is often ruin ; to the rich
and prosperous, shame ; for to them a prompt release
repairs, as far it can be repaired, the misfortune of an
arrest. This is why the two scenes just enacted in the
judge's office had taken all the time consumed by Asia
in deciphering her master's missives, in bringing a
duchess from her boudoir, and inspiring energy and a
course of action to Madame de Serizy.
Lucien de BubemprL 341
XXIV.
WHAT WOMEN CAN DO IN PARIS.
Camusot, now alone and considering how his clever-
ness could be made to conduce to his own advance-
ment, took up the reports of the two examinations,
reread them, and resolved to show them to the attorne} T -
general, ostensibly to ask his advice. While he was
meditating thus, his usher entered to say the footman
of Madame de Serizy wished to speak to him very par-
ticularly. On a sign from Camusot, a man-servant,
dressed like a master, presented himself, looked alter-
nately at the judge and the usher, and said: " Is it
Monsieur Camusot to whom I have the honor — "
u Yes," replied the judge and the usher together.
Camusot took a note which the servant presented
to him, and read as follows : —
In behalf of several interests, which you will readily com-
prehend, dear Monsieur Camusot, do not examine Monsieur
de Rubempre ; we will bring you proofs of his innocence, so
that he may be at once set at liberty.
D. de Maufrigneuse.
L. de Se'rizy.
Burn this note before the bearer.
Camusot perceived too late that he had made an
immense mistake in setting traps for Lucien. He be-
gan to obe} 7 the two great ladies by lighting a candle
342 Lucien de Rubempre.
and burning the letter, which was written by the duch-
ess. The valet bowed respectfully.
" Is Madame de Serizy coming here?" asked the
judge.
" Yes, monsieur, immediately," replied the man.
Coquart here returned and informed his master that
the attorney-general was awaiting him.
Under pressure of the blunder he had committed,
against his ambition but to the profit of justice, the
judge, in whom seven }'ears' practice had developed a
shrewdness of which no man who has measured swords
with grisettes during his legal studies is devoid,
remembered certain weapons which might yet pro-
tect him from the resentment of the two ladies. The
candle at which he had burned their note was still
lighted; he used it to seal up thirty letters from
Madame de Maufrigneuse to Lucien and the still more
voluminous correspondence of Madame de Serizy. Tak-
ing these packets and the reports of the examinations
with him, he went to his meeting with the attorney-
general.
The Palais de Justice is a mass of confused struct-
ures heaped one upon another, — some parts grand,
some mean ; each injuring the others by want of har-
mony. The Salle des Pas-Perdus is the largest of all
known halls ; but its bareness is a horror and discour-
agement to the eye. This vast cathedral of chicanery
crushes the Royal Court. In the Galerie Marchande
is a stairway with two balusters, beneath which opens
a large double door. The stairway leads to the court
of assizes ; the door to a second court of the same
kind ; for in some years the crimes committed in the
Lucien de Rulemjpre. 343
department of the Seine require the session of two
courts. Here too is the office of the attorney-general,
the barristers' room, their library, the offices of the so-
licitor-general, and the assistants of the attorney-gen-
eral. All these premises, for we must use a generic
term, are connected by dark passages, and corkscrew
staircases which are the disgrace of architecture, of
Paris, and of France. A painter of manners and cus-
toms actually shrinks from describing the miserable pas-
sage three feet wide where the witnesses to the upper
court of assizes are made to wait. As for the stove
which heats the court-room it would disgrace a cafe
on the Boulevard Montparnasse. The office of the
attorney-general is in an octagon wing which flanks
the Galerie Marchande. This part of the Palais de
Justice is overshadowed by the lofty and magnificent
elevations of the Sainte-Chapelle. All is silent and
gloomy.
Monsieur de Granville, a worthy successor to the
great magistrates of the old parliament, had not felt
willing to leave the Palais until he knew how Lucien's
affair had ended. He expected news from Camusot,
and the judge's message had thrown him into that in-
voluntary revery which a period of waiting gives to the
firmest minds. He was seated in the recess of a win-
dow ; but he now rose, and walked up and down ; for
he had found Camusot that morning, when he met him
intentionally, very dull of comprehension, and he felt
vaguely uneasy ; for, in addition to his own good-will to
Lucien, there was another reason why he should wish to
see him cleared. The interests of his best friend and
one of his warmest protectors, the Comte de Serizy, a
344 Lucien de Bubempre.
minister of State, a member of the Privy Council, and
the future chancellor of France, were concerned in the
affair. The world knew that Lucien de Rubempre was
an intimate at the count's house, and the attorney-gen-
eral foresaw the scandal that would be made, both in
public, in society, and at court, if the guilt of a man
whose name had already been ill-naturedly coupled with
that of the countess was proved. The dignity of his own
function, however, forbade his attempting to interfere
with the absolute independence of the examining judge.
" Ah !" he said to himself, crossing his arms, "for-
merly power had the right to assume jurisdiction where
necessary. Our mania for equality " (he dared not say
" legalit}'," as a poet lately declared with great courage
in the Chamber) " will be the ruin of our present era."
At the moment when the attorney-general, pursu-
ing his train of thought, had just said to himself:
" Camusot will be sure to commit some stupidity," the
examining judge himself tapped at the door of the
office.
" Well! my dear Camusot, how has that affair gone
about which we were speaking this morning?"
"Badly for the accused, monsieur le comte ; read
the reports and judge for yourself."
He offered the reports to the attorney-general, who
took out his eyeglasses and retired to the window ; the
reading was soon over.
"You have done your duty," said the attorney-
general, in a curt tone. "Those reports settle the
matter ; justice must take its course. You have shown
such ability that your services as an examining judge
can never be dispensed with."
Lucien de Biibempre. 345
If Monsieur de Granville had said to Camusot:
"You will be all your life an examining judge and
nothing more," he could not have been more explicit
than he was in that compliment. Camusot turned cold
to the marrow of his bones.
-- Madame la Duchesse de Maufrigneuse, to whom I
owe — "
" Ah! the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse! " said Gran-
ville, interrupting the judge. " True, 30U have not
3*ielded, I see, to an}* influence. You have done well,
monsieur. You will be a great magistrate."
At this moment Comte Octave de Bauvan opened
the door without knocking, and said to the Comte de
Granville : —
" My dear count, I bring you a pretty woman, who
does n't know where to turn, and has lost her way in
our labyrinth."
And he came in, leading by the hand the Comtesse
de Serizy.
". You here, madame ! " exclaimed the attornej'-gen-
eral, offering her his own arm-chair, — "and at this
moment ! Here is Monsieur Camusot, madame," he
said, motioning to the judge. " Bauvan," he added,
addressing that illustrious orator of the Restoration,
'* wait for me in the room of the chief-justice, — he is
still there ; and I'll join you."
The Comte de Bauvan understood not only that it
was too late, but that the attorney-general had some
reason for wanting an excuse to leave his office.
Madame de Se'rizy had not committed the mistake of
coming to the Palais in her own carriage, with its hand-
some hammer-cloth and armorial bearings and two foot-
346 Lucien de Bubempre.
men behind it in white silk stockings. On the contrary,
she arrived in a hackney-coach, wearing a plain brown
dress, a black shawl, and a velvet bonnet the flowers of
which had been replaced by a black lace veil.
M Did you receive our letter? " she said to Camusot,
whose bewildered air surprised her.
" Too late, alas ! Madame la comtesse," replied the
judge, who had no tact or presence of mind except in
his own office and among his prisoners.
"Why too late?"
She looked at Monsieur de Granville and saw mis-
fortune on his face.
" It must not be too late," she added in a despotic
tone.
Women, pretty women, in Madame de Serizy's posi-
tion, are the spoilt children of French civilization. If
women in other countries knew what a fashionable,
rich, and titled woman is in Paris, they would all want
to come and share such splendid royalty. Women,
bound only by the laws of decorum and good-manners,
by what may be called, in short, the Code Feminine,
laugh at the laws that men have made. They say any-
thing ; they refrain from no caprice, no wilfulness ; for
they thoroughly understand that they are responsible
for nothing except their feminine honor and their chil-
dren. They will say, laughing, the most preposterous
things and expect to make them law ; like the pretty
Madame de Bauvan, who, coming to the Palais to fetch
her husband in the early cla3'S of their marriage, was
heard to say, " Make haste and get through judging, —
I want you."
"Madame," said the attorney-general, "Monsieur
Lucien de Rubempre. 347
Lucien de Rubempre is not guilty of robbery or mur-
der, but Monsieur Camusot has made him confess
another crime that is almost as great."
" What crime? " she demanded.
" He has admitted," said the attorney -general in her
ear, " that he is the friend and pensioner of an escaped
convict. The Abbe Carlos Herrera who has lived with
him for the last seven years is the famous Jacques
Collin — "
Madame de Serizy felt as if she were branded with
hot irons herself while the count was speaking.
" And the upshot?" she asked.
u The upshot," said Monsieur de Granville, continu-
ing her sentence and still speaking in a low voice, " is
that the convict will be brought before the court of
assizes, and if Lucien does not stand by his side as
guilty of having profited knowingly hy the thefts of his
accomplice, he must certainly appear as a witness pain-
fully compromised."
"Never! " she cried aloud, with amazing decision.
11 1 will never see a man whom the world knows to be
my best friend declared in a court of law the comrade
of a convict — The King is devoted to my husband."
M Madame," said the attorney-general, aloud, and
smiling, " the King has not the slightest power over
the most insignificant examining judge in his kingdom.
That is the grandeur of our new institutions. I have
myself just congratulated Monsieur Camusot on his
ability — "
" Say rather his clumsiness," said the countess,
sharply, who was less disturbed by Lucien's intimacy
with an outlaw than by his relations with Esther.
348 Lucien de Rubempre.
" If you will read the report of the examinations to
which Monsieur Camusot subjected the two accused
persons, you will see that everything depends on him."
After this hint, the only interference the attorney-
general could allow himself, and after receiving a look
of feminine subtlety, the attorney -general went toward
the door of his office. There he turned, and added :
" Excuse me, madame, but I have a word or two I
must say to Bauvan."
This, in the language of societ} r , signified to the
countess : " I don't want to witness what passes be-
tween you and Camusot."
"What are these reports of examinations?" said
the countess, ver} T sweetly, looking at Camusot, who
stood all abashed before the wife of one of the greatest
personages in the State.
" Madame," replied Camusot, " a clerk takes down
in writing the questions of the judge and the answers
of the accused ; the report is then signed by the clerk,
the judge, and the accused. These reports form the
basis of the case ; they determine whether or not
the accused person shall be sent before the court of
assizes."
"Oh! " she said, " and suppose these reports were
suppressed ? "
" Madame, a judge would commit a crime — "
" It was a much greater crime to have written them,"
she said. " But, at this moment, they appear to be the
only proof against Lucien. Read me those reports,
that I may see what means we still have to save him ;
it is a matter in which my happiness and that of Mon-
sieur de Serizy are concerned."
Lucien de Bubempre. 349
"Madame," said Camusot, " do not think that I have
forgotten the consideration I owe to you. Had this
examination been confided to Monsieur Popinot, for
instance, you would have been much less safe than you
are with me. The police seized all papers in Monsieur
Lucien's house, even your letters — "
"Oh! my letters."
"Here they are, sealed up," said the judge, giving
her the packet.
The countess rang the bell, as if she had been in her
own house. The office servant of the attorney-general
entered.
" A light," she said.
The servant lighted a candle, and put it on the
mantel-shelf, while the countess looked over her let-
ters, counted them, crumpled them up, and threw them
on the hearth. Then she twisted up the last, lit it at
the candle, and set fire to the heap below. Camusot
stood gazing rather vacantly at the flaming papers,
still holding the reports in his hand. The countess,
who appeared to be wholly intent on destroying the
proofs of her affection, was observing the judge cau-
tiously out of the corner of her eye. She took her
time, calculated her movements, and then, with the
agility of a cat, she seized the two reports and flung
them into the flames. Camusot snatched them out ;
the countess sprang upon him, and seized the burning
papers. Then followed a struggle, in which Camusot
cried out, "Madame! madame ! you are attempting
a — Madame ! "
A man rushed into the room ; the countess could not
restrain a cry of surprise as she recognized her hus-
350 Lucien de Eubempre.
band, followed by Monsieur de Granville and Monsieur
de Bauvan. Nevertheless, determined to save Lucien
at any cost, she did not loosen her grip upon the terri-
ble papers, which she held with the strength of pincers,
though the flames had already seared her delicate skin.
At last Camusot, whose own fingers were burned,
seemed ashamed of the situation, and relinquished the
papers, of which little now remained but the parts cov-
ered by the grasp of the two wrestlers. This scene
passed in a moment of time much less than that which
it takes to read it.
" What is all this between you and Madame de
Seriz} 7 ? " said the cabinet minister to Camusot.
Before the judge could answer, the countess had
applied the fragments of the reports to the flame of
the candle and thrown them upon the heap that was
smouldering on the hearth.
"I shall be obliged," said Camusot, "to enter a
complaint against Madame la comtesse."
" What has she done?" asked the attorney-general,
looking alternately at the judge and the countess.
u I have burned the examinations," said the woman
of the world, laughing, so delighted with her high-
handed measure that she did not yet feel her burns ;
" and if it is a crime, — well, monsieur can do his hor-
rible scribblings over again ! "
"True," said Camusot, endeavoring to recover his
dignity.
"Well, well, it is all for the best! " said the attor-
ney-general. "But, my dear countess, you mustn't
often take such liberties with the magistracy, for you
might not always be recognized for what you are."
Lucien de Eubempre. 351
" Monsieur Camusot has bravely resisted a woman
whom no one resists ; the honor of the robe is therefore
safe ! " said the Comte de Bauvan, laughing.
" Ah ! Monsieur Camusot resisted, did he?" said the
attorney-general, laughing ; " he is very strong."
Thus a serious, if not criminal, proceeding was turned
into the joke of a pretty woman, at which even Camusot
himself was now laughing.
But the attorney general caught sight of a man who
did not laugh, and he took the Comte de Serizy apart.
" My friend," he whispered in his ear, ''this unfor-
tunate affair compels me to compromise for the first and
last time in my life with my official duty."
He rang the bell, and the servant came.
M Go to the office of the 'Gazette des Tribuneaux,'
and tell Maitre Massol to come here, if you can find
him. My dear judge," he said to Camusot, taking him
apart from the others, "go back to your office, and
make your clerk rewrite the examination of the Abbe
Carlos Herrera ; this can be done without impropriety,
as he did not sign the first. To-morrow you must con-
front this Spanish diplomatist with Messieurs de Ras-
tignac and Bianchon, who will not recognize in him our
Jacques Collin. Certain of being set at liberty, the
abbe will sign the papers. Set Lucien de Rubempre
at liberty at once. You may be certain that he will
never speak of the examination he has undergone.
The ' Gazette des Tribuneaux ' will announce his re-
lease to-morrow. And now let us see whether justice
and the law are injured in any way by these proceedings.
If the Spaniard is the convict, we have a hundred
ways, now that our eyes are on him, of retaking him.
352 Lucien de Rubeinpri.
We have already sought for diplomatic enlightenment
as to his conduct In Spain. Corentin is on his traces.
As for Lucien, there is no charge against him. The
robbery of the seven hundred thousand francs is, in
point of fact, to his injury. He had much better lose
that money than lose his reputation by recovering it.
That young man is a spotted orange, m} T dear Camusot ;
but we need n't make him rotten. This matter can all
be settled in half an hour. Go now ; we will await you
here. It is only half-past four ; the judges are still at
the Palais. Let me know if you can get an order of
release at once, or whether Lucien must wait till to-
morrow."
Camusot left the room after bowing to all present.
Madame de Serizy, who by this time was suffering from
her burns, did not return his bow. Monsieur de Serizy
had rushed from the room while the attorney-general
was talking with the judge, and now returned with a
little pot of cerate, with which he dressed his wife's
burns as he whispered in her ear : —
" Leontine, why did you come here without letting
me know?"
" Oh, my friend," she whispered, " forgive me ! I
was beside myself ; but it was in your interests as well
as mine."
" Be fond of that young man, since fate wills it," said
her husband; "but don't take the whole world into
3'our confidence."
" Well, my dear countess," said Monsieur de Gran-
ville, after talking for a time with Octave de Beauvan,
"I hope that 30U will be able to carry Monsieur de
Rubempre home to dinner this very evening."
Lucien de Rubempre. 353
This half-promise produced such a reaction in Ma-
dame de Seriz} T that she wept.
M I'll try to find some ushers to bring him here, so
that you may not see him escorted hy gendarmes,"
added Monsieur de Granville.
"Oh, you are good!" she said, with an effusion of
gratitude that made her voice divinely musical.
354 Lucien de Bubempre.
XXV.
HOW IT ENDED.
While pretty women, cabinet ministers, and magis-
trates conspired to save Lucien, let us see what was
happening in the Conciergerie.
As he passed through the guichet Lucien said to the
clerk that Monsieur Camusot had permitted him to write,
and he asked for pens, ink, and paper ; which a turn-
key received the order to take to him after a word said
in the director's ear by the judge's usher.
During the time the turnkey took in obtaining and
bringing up to Lucien the things he had asked for,
the unfortunate young man, to whom the idea of be-
ing confronted with Jacques Collin was intolerable,
fell into one of those meditations in which the idea of
suicide, to which he had already yielded without accom-
plishment, attains to mania. According to some great
alienists, suicide in certain organizations is the termi-
nation of a mental alienation. Since his arrest Lucien
had fastened on that idea. Esther's letter increased
his desire to die, bj r reminding him of Romeo rejoin-
ing Juliet. When materials were brought to him, he
wrote as follows : —
This is my Testament.
I, the undersigned, give and bequeath to the children of
my sister, Madame l£ve Chardon, wife of David Sechard,
formerly a printer at Angouleme, all the property, real or
Zucien de Bubempre. 355
personal, of which I die possessed, excepting such as may-
be required to pay my debts and the following legacies,
which I request my executor to do.
I entreat Monsieur de Serizy to accept the office of execu-
tor of this my will.
There shall be paid : (1) to Monsieur l'Abbe Carlos
Herrera the sum of three hundred thousand francs ; (2) to
Monsieur le Baron de Nucingen fourteen hundred thousand
francs, which sum is to be reduced by seven hundred and
fifty thousand francs, in case the money lost from Made-
moiselle Esther's apartment be recovered.
I give and bequeath, as heir of Mademoiselle Esther
Gobseck, the sum of seven hundred and sixty thousand
francs to the Religious Houses of Paris to found an asylum
to be specially devoted to public prostitutes who may desire
to quit their career of vice and perdition.
In addition, I bequeath to the said Religious Houses the
sum necessary to purchase an investment in the Funds at
five per cent, producing thirty thousand francs a year, — the
said interest to be employed semi-annually in the release
of prisoners for debt, when their indebtedness amounts to
a maximum of two thousand francs.
I request Monsieur de Serizy to devote the sum of forty
thousand francs to a monument to be erected in the East-
ern Cemetery over Mademoiselle Esther ; and I direct that
I be buried beside her. This monument is to be made like
the tombs of antiquity; it shall be square, and our two
forms in white marble shall lie upon the lid, the heads rest-
ing on cushions, the hands clasped and raised to heaven.
This tomb is to have no inscription.
I request Monsieur de Serizy to give to Monsieur Eugene
de Rastignac the toilet-set in gold which will be found in
my room, as a remembrance.
Lastly, I request my executor to accept from me the gift
I make him of my library.
Lucien Chardon de Rubempr^.
356 Lucien de EubemprS.
This will was enclosed in a letter addressed to Mon-
sieur le Comte de Granville, attorney-general of the
Royal Court of Paris, and thus worded : —
Monsieur le Comte, — I intrust to you my will. When
you open this letter I shall be no more. In the hope of
recovering my liberty I replied so basely to the insidious
questions of Monsieur Camusot that, in spite of my in-
nocence, I may be involved in an infamous trial. Even
supposing me to be acquitted of all blame, life would be
impossible according to the susceptibilities of the world.
Forward, I beg of you, the enclosed letter to the Abbe Don
Carlos Herrera, without opening it ; and send to Monsieur
Camusot the formal retractation of my testimony which I
enclose.
I think that the authorities will not dare to break the
seal of a package directed to you. Confident of this, I bid
you farewell, offering you for the last time my respects, and
begging you to believe that in thus writing I have meant
to give you a mark of gratitude for all the many kindnesses
you have shown to
Your servitor,
Lucien de R.
To the Abbe Carlos Herrera :
My dear Abbe", — I have received nothing but bene-
fits from you, and I have betrayed you. This involuntary
ingratitude kills me, and when you read these lines I shall
no longer exist, — you are no longer here to save me.
You gave me full right, in case I found an advantage
in it, to sacrifice you, and throw you away like the end of
a cigar; but I have sacrificed you foolishly. To get my.
self out of difficulty, misled by the captious questioning
of the examining judge, I, your spiritual. son, whom you
adopted, went over to the side of those who wish at any
Lucien de Rubempre. 357
cost to destroy you by discovering an identity (which I
know to be impossible) between you and a French criminal.
All is over.
Between a man of your power and me, of whom you have
tried to make a greater person than I could be, there should
be no silly sentiment at the moment of our final parting.
You have wished to make me powerful and famous ; you
have flung me into the gulf of suicide — that is all. I have
long seen its vertigo approaching me.
There is, as you once said, a posterity of Cain, and one of
Abel. Cain, in the grand drama of humanity, is Opposi-
tion. You are descended from Adam by that line, into which
the devil has continued to blow his flame, the first sparks
of which were cast on Eve. Among the demons of this
descent some appear, from time to time, of terrible vigor,
of vast organization, combining all human forces, and re-
sembling those rampant animals of the desert whose life
requires the great spaces in which they are found. These
men are dangerous to society, as lions would be dangerous
in Normandy : they must have food ; they devour common
men, and suck the gold of fools ; even their games are so
perilous that they end by killing the poor dog of whom
they make a companion, an idol. When God wills it, these
mysterious beings are named Moses, Attila, Charlemagne,
Robespierre, Napoleon ; but when he lets a generation of
these gigantic instruments rust in the depths of ocean they
are nothing more than Pugatcheff, Fouche, Louvel, and
Carlos Herrera. Gifted with a mighty power over tender
souls, they attract and knead them. 'T is grand, 't is fine
in its way; 'tis the poisonous plant with glowing colors
that entices children in a wood ; 't is the poesy of Evil.
Men like you should live in lairs and never leave them.
You made me live within the circle of this stupendous life,
and I have had my fill of existence. Therefore I withdraw
my head from the Gordian knot of your policy to fasten it
in the running noose of my cravat.
358 Lucien de RubemprS.
To repair my fault, I transmit to the attorney-general a
formal retractation of my testimony. You will see to its
being of service to you.
In pursuance of my will you will receive, Monsieur Tab be,
the sums belonging to your Order which you spent, most
imprudently, on me, in consequence of the paternal affection
you have always shown me.
Farewell, then, farewell, grandiose statue of Evil and cor-
ruption ; farewell, you, who in the path of Good would have
been greater than Ximenes, greater than Richelieu. You
have kept your promises ; I find myself once more on the
banks of the Charente, after owing to you the enchantments
of a dream ; but, unfortunately, it is not the river of mine
own country in which I was about to drown the peccadilloes
of my youth, — it is the Seine, and my pool is a cell ill the
Conciergerie.
Do not regret me. My contempt for you is equal to my
admiration.
Lucien.
Declaration.
I, the undersigned, do hereby retract entirely all that is
contained in the report of the examination, which I was
made to undergo this day by Monsieur Camusot.
The Abbe Carlos Herrera was in the habit of calling him-
self my spiritual father ; and I mistook the word when used
by the judge in another sense, no doubt erroneously.
I know that, for political reasons and to destroy the ex-
istence of certain secrets which concern the cabinets of
Spain and the Tuileries, obscure diplomatic agents are en-
deavoring to show that the Abbe* Carlos Herrera is an
escaped convict named Jacques Collin ; but the said Abbe
Carlos Herrera never made me any other confidence on this
subject beyond that of his efforts to prove either the de-
cease or the existence of the said Jacques Collin.
At the Conciergerie, May 15, 1830.
Lucien de Rubempke\
Laden de Eicbempre. 359
The fever of suicide gave to Lucien the same lucid-
ity of ideas and activity of hand which are known to
authors in the heat and fever of composition. So great
was this impulse in him that these four papers were
written in the space of half an hour. He made them
into a package, fastened the package with wafers and
stamped them, with the force of delirium, with a seal
bearing his coat-of-arms that he wore on his finger.
Then he placed the package conspicuously on the floor
in the middle of the room.
Certainly it would have been difficult to act with
more dignity in the false position to which infamy had
brought Lucien. He saved his own memory, and he
repaired the wrong done to his accomplice, so far as
the mind of the man of the world could annul the
effects of his actions.
If Lucien had been placed in one of the secret-con-
finement cells, he would have found it impossible to
carry out his design ; for those boxes of smooth stone
have no furniture but a species of camp-bedstead and a
bucket. There is not a nail, not a chair, not even a
stool. The camp bedstead is so securely fastened that
it is impossible to remove it from its place without a
labor that would soon be noticed by the turnke}' through
the iron grating, which is always open. In the rooms
of the Pistole, and especially in that where Lucien had
been placed by the judge's orders out of regard for a
young man belonging to the highest class of Parisian
societ} T , the movable bedstead, a table, and a chair
could all serve the purpose of suicide, without, how-
ever, making it easy. Lucien wore a long black silk
cravat, and, on his waj' back from examination he rec-
360 Lucien de Eubempre.
ollected the manner in which Pichegru, more or less
voluntarily, killed himself. Death by hanging requires
a strong support and sufficient space between the body
and the ground to prevent the feet from touching any-
thing. Now the window of his cell looking on the
preau had no fastening, and the iron bars that pro-
tected it on the outside were the whole width of a thick
wall awa} r from the room, and gave him therefore no
point of support.
The plan that his faculty of invention suggested
rapidly to Lucien's mind was as follows : The high
and deep recess of the window, which resembled a fun-
nel, prevented Lucien from looking out into the preau,
but it also prevented the turnkey from seeing what
took place about it. Now, though the lower window-
panes had been replaced by wooden planks, the glass
remained in the upper portion of the sash, divided into
small panes with a heavy frame and cross-bars. By
mounting on the table, Lucien could reach the glazed
portion of the window, and, by removing or breaking
two panes, he could use the strong cross-bar between
them as his point of support. He resolved to do this :
to pass his cravat around the bar, making a turn about
his own neck and fastening the end securety, and then
to knock away the table from under him with his feet.
He moved the table to the window noiselessly, took
off his coat and waistcoat, and mounted the table with-
out the least hesitation, to remove the panes above and
below the first cross-bar. When he was thus raised
he could look into the preau, and there he beheld a
magic spectacle, seen by him for the first time ; for
the director of the Conciergerie, following Monsieur
Lucien de Rubempre. 361
Camusot's order, had sent Lucien to his cell through the
underground passages, so as not to expose him to the
gaze of the prisoners who were walking in the preau.
The reader shall judge whether the sight of that prome-
nade was of a nature to strongly affect the soul of a
poet.
The preau of the Conciergerie is flanked on the quay
by the Tour d'Argent and the Tour Bonbec, — the
space between the two towers being exacth* the width
of the preau. The Galerie de Saint Louis, which leads
from the Galerie Marchande to the Court of Appeals
and to the Bonbec tower (in which, they say, St. Louis'
study still exists) gives the length of the preau pre-
cisely. The solitarj-confinement cells and the pistoles
are under the Galerie Marchande. Marie Antoinette,
whose dungeon was beneath the present secret cells,
was led to the revolutionary tribunal, which held its sit-
tings in the Court of Appeals, b} r a dreadful staircase
cut in the thickness of the wall of the Galerie Mar-
chande. One side of the preau, the side of the Galerie
de Saint Louis, presents to the eye a perspective of
Gothic columns, between which the architects of I
know not what epoch have constructed two rows of
cells to accommodate as man}' accused persons as pos-
sible, — filling up with brick and plaster the beautiful
capitals, the pointed arches, and the shafts of columns
of the glorious gallery. Beneath the room said to be
Saint Louis' study, in the Bonbec tower, is a cork-
screw staircase which leads to the cells. This prostitu-
tion of the noblest memories of France has a hideous
effect.
At the height where Lucien now stood, his eye took
362 Zucien de Rubempre.
in the length of the beautiful gallery, and the details of
the structure which united it to the two towers of which
he saw the pointed roofs. He paused, amazed ; his
suicide was delayed by admiration. To-day the phe-
nomena of hallucination are so fully admitted by sci-
ence that this mirage of our senses, this strange faculty
of our mind, is no longer disputed. Man, having under
the pressure of a sentiment reached the point of be-
coming a monomaniac because of its intensity, often
falls into the condition produced by opium, hashish, or
the protoxide of nitrogen. Then appear to him spec-
tres, phantoms ; dreams take shapes ; things ruined or
deca}*ed resume their primitive conditions. What had
been but a mere idea in the brain becomes an animated
creation. Science has come to believe in these days
that under the effort of passions in their paroxysm the
brain injects itself with blood, and that this congestion
produces the play of visions in our waking state, — so
reluctant is it to admit that thought is a living force !
Lucien saw the Palais in all its primitive beaut}'.
The colonnade was young, and lithesome, and fresh.
The dwelling of Saint Louis reappeared as it had been ;
he admired the Babylonian proportions and the Oriental
fantasies of that cradle of our kings. He accepted
this sublime vision as the poetic farewell to him of
civilized creation. While arranging his means of death,
he asked himself how it was that this marvellous sight
existed unknown in Paris. He was two Luciens, —
Lucien, the poet, moving through the middle- ages,
beneath the arches and the towers of Saint Louis ; and
Lucien, making readj r his suicide.
When Monsieur de Granville left his office to find, as
Lucien de Rubempre. 363
he had said, the ushers to fetch Lucien, the director
of the Conciergerie met him, with an expression on his
face that induced the attorney-general to re-enter it.
In his hand the director held a packet, which he offered
to Monsieur de Granville, sa}ing : —
"Monsieur, here is a letter addressed to you by an
accused person whose sad fate brings me here."
" Can it be Monsieur Lucien de Rubempre?" asked
Monsieur de Granville, struck by a presentiment.
" Yes, monsieur. The warder in the preau heard
the breaking of glass in the Pistole, and the person in
the adjoining cell, hearing the death groans of the un-
fortunate 3 r oung man, screamed violently. The warder
came to me quite pale with the sight that had struck
his eyes, — he had seen the prisoner hanging at the
window by means of his cravat."
Though the director spoke in a low voice, the terrible
cry uttered by Madame de Serizy proved that in cru-
cial circumstances our organs have incalculable power.
The countess heard, or divined, the truth ; and before
Monsieur de Granville could turn round, before Mon-
sieur de Serizy or Monsieur de Bauvan could oppose
her rapid movements, she had slipped, like a flash,
through the door, and had reached the Galerie Mar-
chande, along which she ran till she came to the stair-
case that leads to the rue de la Barillerie.
A lawyer was taking off his robe at the door of one
of the booths in the galleiy, where at that time they
sold shoes, or leased robes and wigs. The countess
asked him the way to the Conciergerie.
"Down there, and turn to the left; the entrance is
on the Quai de l'Horloge, first arcade."
364 Lucien de RubemprL
" That woman is mad," said the keeper of the booth ;
" some one should follow her."
No one could have followed her; she flew. Physi-
cians must explain how women of society, whose
strength is never used, can find in the crises of life
the extraordinary power which they show. She rushed
along the arcade toward the guichet with such rapidity
that the sentinel did not see her enter. There she fell
against the iron railing like a feather driven by the
wind, and shook the iron bars with such fur} T that she
broke the one she had seized. The two ends struck
her on the breast, from which the blood flowed, and she
sank down, crying, "Open! open!" in a voice which
horrified the jailers.
The turnkeys ran to her.
" Open ! I am sent by the attorney-general to save
the dead ! "
While the countess was going round by the rue de la
Barillerie and the Quai de l'Horloge, her husband and
Monsieur de Granville had hurried through the interior
of the Palais to the Conciergerie, feeling sure of her
intentions. In spite of their haste, the}' did not get
there until she had fallen, fainting, at the railing, and
was being lifted by the gendarmes, who came down
from the guard-room. When the director, who accom-
panied the two gentlemen, appeared, the guichet was
opened, and the countess carried into the office. There
she sprang up, clasping her hands, and crying out : —
M To see him ! to see him ! Oh, messieurs, I will do
no harm! But let me see him, dead or living! Ah!
there you are, my friend. Oh, you are good ! " she said
to her husband, sinking down again.
Lucien de fiubempre. 365
" Let us carry her away," said Monsieur de Bauvan.
"No, let us go to Lucien's cell," said Monsieur de
Granville, reading that wish in the alarmed eyes of
Monsieur de Serizy.
He lifted the countess, and took one arm, while Mon-
sieur de Bauvan took the other.
" Monsieur," said the Comte de Serizy to the director,
"you will be as silent as death about all this."
" Be sure of that," replied the director. " You have
done wisely. This lady — "
" She is my wife."
"Ah, excuse me! Well, she will certainly faint
away entirely when she sees the body, and you can
carry her while unconscious to a carriage."
"That is what I was thinking," said the count.
" Will you send one of your men to tell my people in
the rue du Harley to come round to the guichet?
There is only one carriage there."
" We can save him," said the countess, walking with
a courage and energ} r that surprised her companions.
"There are manj- ways of restoring life," and she
dragged along the two magistrates, crying out to the
warder, " Go on, go on ! quicker, quicker ! one second
may save his life ! "
When the door of the cell was opened, and the
countess saw Lucien hanging as his clothes might have
hung in a wardrobe, she made a bound forward as if to
seize him, but fell, with her face to the floor of the cell,
uttering stifled cries that were like a gurgle.
Five minutes later she was being taken in the count's
carriage to her own house, her husband kneeling beside
her. The Comte de Bauvan had gone to summon her
physician.
366 Lucien de Eubempre.
The director of the Conciergerie examined the broken
iron bar of the outer gate of the guichet, and said to
his clerk : —
"Nothing was spared to make those gates strong;
the bars are wrought iron. They cost an immense sum ;
there must have been a straw in that bar."
The attorne} r -general, on reaching his office, said to
Massol, whom he found waiting for him in the ante-
chamber : —
"Monsieur, I wish you to put what I shall now dic-
tate to you in the ' Gazette ' to-morrow morning. You
can write the beginning of the article, but this statement
must be contained in it."
And he dictated as follows : —
" It is now admitted that Mademoiselle Esther killed
herself voluntarily.
" The alibi, amply proved, of Monsieur Lucien de Ru-
bempre, and his innocence, make it the more regrettable
that he should have been arrested, because at the very
moment the examining judge was about to sign the order
for his release, the young man died suddenly."
" Your future, monsieur," said the count to Massol,
" depends upon your discreetness as to the little service
I now ask of } 7 ou."
" As Monsieur le comte does me the honor to place
confidence in me, I shall take the liberty," replied
Massol, ' ' of offering him a suggestion. This article
may excite injurious comments upon the judiciar}\"
u The judiciary is strong enough to bear them," said
the magistrate.
"Permit me, monsieur le comte! With a trifling
change of phrase all danger can be avoided."
Lucien de Bubempre. 367
And he wrote as follows : —
" The legal proceedings had nothing to do with this sad
event. The autopsy, which was immediately performed,
showed that death was due to aneurism in its last stages.
Had Monsieur de Rubempre been affected by his arrest, his
death would have occurred earlier. We are able to declare
that so far from being troubled by that arrest, he laughed
at it, and told those who accompanied him from Fontaine-
bleau to Paris that as soon as he appeared before a magis-
trate his innocence would appear."
' ' Will not that protect all ? " asked the lawyer-
journalist.
^ I thank }'ou, monsieur," replied the attorney-
general.
Thus we see how great events of life are presented
in the "local items," more or less veracious, of the
daily press.
Balzac in English.
PIERRETTE
AND
The Vicar ok Tours.
BY HONORS DE BALZAC.
Translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley.
In Pierrette, which Miss Wormeley has added to her series of felicitous
translations from the French master-fictionists, Balzac has made within
brief compass a marvellously sympathetic study of the martyrdom of a
young girl. Pierrette, a flower of Brittany, beautiful, pale, and fair and
sweet, is taken as an undesired charge by sordid-minded cousins in Pro-
vins, and like an exotic transplanted into a harsh and sour so>l she withers
and fades under the cruel conditions of her new environment. Inciden-
tally Balzac depicts in vivid colors the struggles of two shop-keepers — a
brother and sister, who have amassed a little fortune in Paris — to gain a
foothold among the bourgeoisie of their native town. These two become
the prey of conspirators for political advancement, and the rivalries thus
engendered shake the small provincial society to its centre. Put the
charm of the tale is in the portrayal of the character of PierretLe, who
understands only how to love, and who cannot live in an atmosphere of
suspicion and ill-treatment. The story is of course sad, but its fidelity to
life and the pathos of it are elements of unfailing interest. Balzac brings
a score or more of people upon the stage, shows each one as he or she
really is both in outward appearance and inward nature, and then allows
motives and circumstances to work out an inevitable result. To watch
this process is like being present at some wonderful chemical experiment
where the ingredients are mixed with a deft and careful hand, and combine
to produce effects of astonishing significance. The social genesis of the
old maid in her most abhorrent form occupies much of Balzac's attention
in Pierrette, and this theme also has a place in the story of The Vicar of
Tours, bound up in this same volume. The vicar is a simple-minded
priest who is happy enough till he takes up his quarters with an old maid
landlady, who pesters and annoys him in many ways, and finally sends him
forth despoiled of his worldly goods and a laughing-stock for the country-
side. There is a great deal of humor in the tale, but one must confess
that the humor is of a rather heavy sort, it being weighed down by a domi-
nant satirical purpose. — The Beacon.
One handsome i2mo volume, uniform with " Pere Goriot,"
" The Duchesse de Langeais," " Cesar Birotteau," " Eugenie
Grandet," "Cousin Pons," "the Country Doctor," "The Tw«
Brothers," and " The Alkahest." Half morocco, French style.
Price, $1.50.
ROBERTS BROTHERS, Publishers, Boston.
Messrs. Roberts Brothers' Publications.
BALZAC IN ENGLISH.
Lost Illusions : The Two Poets, and Eve and David.
By HONORE DE BALZAC.
Being the twenty-third volume of Miss Wormeley's translation of
Balzac's novels. i2mo. Half Russia. Price, $1.50.
For her latest translation of the Balzac fiction cycle, Miss Wormeley gives us
the first and third parts of " Illusion Perdue," under the caption of " Lost
Illusions," namely, "The Two Poets "and " Eve and David." This arrange-
ment is no doubt a good one, for the readers are thus enabled to follow the consecu-
tive fortunes of the Angouleme folk, while the adventures of Eve's poet-brother,
Lucien, which occur in Paris and make a tale by themselves, are thus left for a
separate publication. The novel, as we have it, then, belongs to the category of
those scenes from provincial life which Balzac found so stimulating to his genius.
This story, certainly, in some respects takes high rank among them. The
character-drawing is fine: Lucien, the ambitious, handsome, weak-willed, selfish,
and easily-sinning young bourgeois, is contrasted with David, — a touching picture
of the struggling inventor, born of the people and sublimely one-purposed and
pure in his life. Eve, the type of a faithful large-brained and larger-hearted wife,
who supports her husband through all his hardships with unfaltering courage and
kindness, is another noble creation. David inherits a poorish printing business
from his skin-flint of a father, neglects it while devoting all his time and energy to
his discovery of an improved method of making paper; and through the evil,
machinations of the rival printing firm of the Cointets, as well as the debts foisted
on him by Lucien in Paris, he is brought into money difficulties and even into
prisou. But his invention, although sold at a sacrifice to the cunning Cointets,
gets him out of the hole at last, and he and his good wife retire on a comfortable
competency, which is augmented at the death of his father into a good-sized
fortune. The seamy side of law in the provinces is shown up in Balzac's keen,
inimitable way in the description of the winding of the coils around the unsuspect-
ing David and the depiction of such men as the brothers Cointets and the shrewd
little petifogging rascal, Petit Claud. The pictures of Angouleme aristocratic
circles, too, with Lucien as high priest, are vivacious, and show the novelist's
wonderful observation in all ranks of life. The bit of wild romance by which
Lucien becomes the secretary of a Spanish grandee lends a fairy-tale flavor to tne
main episodes. Balzac, in whom is united the most lynx-eyed realism and the
most extravagant romanticism, is ever and always one of the great masters in
fiction of our century.
Sold by all booksellers. Mailed, post-paid, on receipt of
the price by the Publishers,
ROBERTS BROTHERS, Boston.
Messrs. Roberts Brothers' Publications.
BALZAC IN ENGLISH.
A GREAT MAN m PROVINCES IN PARIS.
By HONORE DE BALZAC.
Being the second part of " Lost Illusions." Translated by Kath-
arine Prescott Wormeley. i2mo. Half Russia. Price,
$1.50.
" A Great Man of the Provinces in Paris " (Part Second of " Lost Illusions ")
is a formidable revelation of journalistic "enterprise" under the Restoration,
such as only an eye-witness or a real sufferer could give. The thread of the
story of "Lost Illusions" is again taken up, with the weak and brilliant figure
of Lucien Chardon, and carried through all the complications and entanglements
of Parisian newspaper life. He elopes with a " married flirt," and is speedily
disillusioned when he arrives in the metropolis, by finding his goddess old,
ugly, and ridiculous in comparison with the style and charm of the Parisian
elegante. He himself, handsome as an angel, gifted, poetic, but shifty, is a
true type of the provincial Apollo Belvedere marching forth to conquer the
worlds of fashion and literature, without any resources but his beauty and bis wit.
Balzac, the matchless delineator of the Empire and the Restoration, introduces
this curled darling (wonderfully like Alfred de Musset !) into the arcana of jour-
nalism, makes him the pivot of suppers and scenes characteristic of the time of
Louis XVIII. , shows him every variety of the genus publisher then flourishing,
gives us fascinating glimpses of the great world of the Bourbons, and sets
Lucien in an entrancing environment of gorgeous vice in which one illusion after
another is mercilessly dispelled. Noble and beautiful chapters and faces occur
by the way to redeem the ugliness and unrighteousness of the rest. Balzac has
never painted a more pathetic face than poor fallen Coralie's, or a more striking
and noble-minded group than the Brotherhood. Such features redeem a book
charged with the foulness of a life inconceivable to Anglo-Saxon minds, and unfit
for any pure soul to become familiar with, even through the brilliant, mirage-
producing medium of a genius like Balzac's. — The Critic.
The art of Balzac, the wonderful power of his contrast, the depth of his
knowledge of life and men and things, this tremendous story illustrates. How
admirably the rise of the poet is traced; the crescendo is perfect in gradation, yet
as inexorable as fate. As for the fall, the effect is more depressing than a
personal catastrophe. This is a book to read over and over, an epic of life in
prose, more tremendous than the blank verse of " Paradise Lost " or the
'' Divine Comedy." Miss Wormeley and the publishers deserve not congratula-
tions alone, but thanks for adding this book and its predecessor, " Lost Illusions,"
to the literature of English. — San Francisco Wave.
Sold by all booksellers. Mailed, post-paid, by the
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BALZAC IN ENGLISH.
THE BROTHERHOOD OF CONSOLATION.
(L'ENVERS DE L'HISTOIRE CON7EMPORAINE.)
By HONORE DE BALZAC.
t. Madame de la Chanterie. 2. The Initiate. Translated by
Katharine Prescott Wormeley. i2mo. Half Russia. Price,
$1.50.
There is no book of Balzac which is informed by a loftier spirit than
" L'Envers de l'Histoire Contemporaine," which has just been added by Miss
Wormeley to her admirable series of translations under the title, " The Brother-
hood of Consolation." The title which is given to the translation is, to our
thinking, a happier one than that which the work bears in the original, since, after
all, the political and historical portions of the book are only the background of the
other and more absorbing theme, — the development of the brotherhood over
which Madame de la Chanterie presided. It is true that there is about it all
something theatrical, something which shows the French taste for making godli-
ness itself histrionically effective, that quality of mind which would lead a Parisian
to criticise the coming of the judgment angels if their entrance were not happily
arranged and properly executed ; but in spite of this there is an elevation such as
it is rare to meet with in literature, and especially in the literature of Balzac's age
and land. The story is admirably told, and the figure of the Baron Bourlac is
really noble in its martyrdom of self-denial and heroic patience. The picture of
the Jewish doctor is a most characteristic piece of work, and shows Balzac's
intimate touch in every line. Balzac was always attracted by the mystical side
of the physical nature ; and it might almost be said that everything that savored
of mystery, even though it ran obviously into quackery, had a strong attraction
for him. He pictures Halpersohn with a few strokes, but his picture of him has
a striking vitality and reality. The volume is a valuable and attractive addition to
the series to which it belongs ; and the series comes as near to fulfilling the ideal
of what translations should be as is often granted to earthly things. — Boston
Courier.
The book, which is one of rare charm, is one of the most refined, while at the
same time tragic, of all his works. — Public Opinion.
His present work is a fiction beautiful in its conception, just one of those
practical ideals which Balzac nourished and believed in. There never was greater
homage than he pays to the book of books, "The Imitation of Jesus Christ."
Miss Wormeley has here accomplished her work just as cleverly as in her other
volumes of Balzac. —N. Y. Times.
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25al3ac in <£ngii£f)*
THE VILLAGE RECTOR.
By Honore de Balzac.
Translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley. i2mo.
Half Russia. Price, #1.50.
Once more that wonderful acquaintance which Balzac had with all callings
appears manifest in this work. Would you get to the bottom of the engineer's
occupation in France? Balzac presents it in the whole system, with its aspects,
disadvantages, and the excellence of the work accomplished. We write to-day
of irrigation and of arboriculture as if they were novelties ; yet in the waste lands
of Montagnac, Balzac found these topics ; and what he wrote is the clearest
exposition of the subjects.
But, above all, in "The Village Rector" is found the most potent of religious
ideas, — the one that God grants pardon to sinners. Balzac had studied and
appreciated the intensely human side of Catholicism and its adaptiveness to the
wants of mankind. It is religion, with Balzac, " that opens to us an inexhaustible
treasure of indulgence." It is true repentance that saves.
The drama which is unrolled in "The Village Rector " is a terrible one, and
perhaps repugnant to our sensitive minds. The selection of such a plot, pitiless
as it is, Balzac made so as to present the darkest side of human nature, and to
show how, through God's pity, a soul might be saved. The instrument of mercy
is the Rector Bonnet, and in the chapter entitled " The Rector at Work" he
shows how religion " extends a man's life beyond the world." It is not sufficient
to weep and moan. "That is but the beginning; the end is action." The
rector urges the woman whose sins are great to devote what remains of her life
to work for the benefit of her brothers and sisters, and so she sets about reclaim-
ing the waste lands which surround her chateau. With a talent of a superlative
order, which gives grace to Veronique, she is like the Madonna of some old panel
of Van Eyck's. Doing penance, she wears close to her tender skin a haircloth
vestment. For love of her, a man has committed murder and died and kept his
secret. In her youth, Veronique's face had been pitted, but her saintly life had
obliterated that spotted mantle of smallpox. Tears had washed out every blemish.
If through true repentance a soul was ever saved, it was Veronique's. This
work, too, has afforded consolation to many miserable sinners, and showed them
the way to grace.
The present translation is to be cited for its wonderful accuracy and its literary
distinction. We can hardly think of a more difficult task than the Englishing of
Balzac, and a general reading public should be grateful for the admirable manner
in which Miss Wormeley has performed her task. — New York Times.
Sold by all booksellers. Mailed, post-paid, on receipt
of price by the Publishers,
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2M?ac in <£tt0ligf).
Memoirs of Two Young Married Women.
By Honore de Balzac.
Translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley. 12 mo.
Half Russia. Price, $1.50.
" There are," says Henry James in one of his essays, "two writers in
Balzac, — the spontaneous one and the reflective one, the former of
which is much the more delightful, while the latter is the more extraordi-
nary." It is the reflective Balzac, the Balzac with a theory, whom we
get in the "Deux Jeunes Mariees," now translated by Miss Wormeley
under the title of " Memoirs of Two Young Married Women." The
theory of Balzac is that the marriage of convenience, properly regarded,
is far preferable to the marriage simply from love, and he undertakes to
prove this proposition by contrasting the careers of two young girls who
have been fellow-students at a convent. One of them, the ardent and
passionate Louise de Chaulieu, has an intrigue with a Spanish refugee,
finally marries him, kills him, as she herself confesses, by her perpetual
jealousy and exaction, mourns his loss bitterly, then marries a golden-
haired youth, lives with him in a dream of ecstasy for a year or so, and
this time kills herself through jealousy wrongfully inspired. As for her
friend, Ren6e de Maucombe, she dutifully makes a marriage to please her
parents, calculates coolly beforehand how many children she will have and
how they shall be trained; insists, however, that the marriage shall be
merely a civil contract till she and her husband find that their hearts are
indeed one; and sees all her brightest visions realized, — her Louis an
ambitious man for her sake and her children truly adorable creatures.
The story, which is told in the form of letters, fairly scintillates with
brilliant sayings, and is filled with eloquent discourses concerning the
nature of love, conjugal and otherwise. Louise and Ren6e are both
extremely sophisticated young women, even in their teens ; and those
who expect to find in their letters the demure innocence of the Anglo-
Saxon type will be somewhat astonished. The translation, under the
circumstances, was rather a daring attempt, but it has been most felicit-
ously done. — The Beacon.
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price by the Publishers,
ROBERTS BROTHERS, Boston. Mass.
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