第 二十八 章 · 第28章

“Devil take me, I’m sure, if I have a glimmer of a notion of what I am

about, but I will obey you,” he added, with inward exultation, as he

thought, “She has gone too far to draw back--she can refuse me nothing

now!”

Eugene took the dainty little purse, inquired the way of a second-hand

clothes-dealer, and hurried to number 9, which happened to be the

nearest gaming-house. He mounted the staircase, surrendered his hat, and

asked the way to the roulette-table, whither the attendant took him, not

a little to the astonishment of the regular comers. All eyes were fixed

on Eugene as he asked, without bashfulness, where he was to deposit his

stakes.

“If you put a louis on one only of those thirty-six numbers, and it

turns up, you will win thirty-six louis,” said a respectable-looking,

white-haired old man in answer to his inquiry.

Eugene staked the whole of his money on the number 21 (his own age).

There was a cry of surprise; before he knew what he had done, he had

won.

“Take your money off, sir,” said the old gentleman; “you don’t often win

twice running by that system.”

Eugene took the rake that the old man handed to him, and drew in his

three thousand six hundred francs, and, still perfectly ignorant of

what he was about, staked again on the red. The bystanders watched him

enviously as they saw him continue to play. The disc turned, and again

he won; the banker threw him three thousand six hundred francs once

more.

“You have seven thousand, two hundred francs of your own,” the old

gentleman said in his ear. “Take my advice and go away with your

winnings; red has turned up eight times already. If you are charitable,

you will show your gratitude for sound counsel by giving a trifle to an

old prefect of Napoleon who is down on his luck.”

Rastignac’s head was swimming; he saw ten of his louis pass into the

white-haired man’s possession, and went down-stairs with his seven

thousand francs; he was still ignorant of the game, and stupefied by his

luck.

“So, that is over; and now where will you take me?” he asked, as soon as

the door was closed, and he showed the seven thousand francs to Mme. de

Nucingen.

Delphine flung her arms about him, but there was no passion in that wild

embrace.

“You have saved me!” she cried, and tears of joy flowed fast.

“I will tell you everything, my friend. For you will be my friend, will

you not? I am rich, you think, very rich; I have everything I want, or

I seem as if I had everything. Very well, you must know that M. de

Nucingen does not allow me the control of a single penny; he pays all

the bills for the house expenses; he pays for my carriages and opera

box; he does not give me enough to pay for my dress, and he reduces

me to poverty in secret on purpose. I am too proud to beg from him. I

should be the vilest of women if I could take his money at the price at

which he offers it. Do you ask how I, with seven hundred thousand francs

of my own, could let myself be robbed? It is because I was proud, and

scorned to speak. We are so young, so artless when our married life

begins! I never could bring myself to ask my husband for money; the

words would have made my lips bleed, I did not dare to ask; I spent my

savings first, and then the money that my poor father gave me, then I

ran into debt. Marriage for me is a hideous farce; I cannot talk about

it, let it suffice to say that Nucingen and I have separate rooms, and

that I would fling myself out of the window sooner than consent to any

other manner of life. I suffered agonies when I had to confess to my

girlish extravagance, my debts for jewelry and trifles (for our poor

father had never refused us anything, and spoiled us), but at last I

found courage to tell him about them. After all, I had a fortune of my

own. Nucingen flew into a rage; he said that I should be the ruin of

him, and used frightful language! I wished myself a hundred feet down

in the earth. He had my dowry, so he paid my debts, but he stipulated at

the same time that my expenses in future must not exceed a certain fixed

sum, and I gave way for the sake of peace. And then,” she went on, “I

wanted to gratify the self-love of some one whom you know. He may have

deceived me, but I should do him the justice to say that there was

nothing petty in his character. But, after all, he threw me over

disgracefully. If, at a woman’s utmost need, _somebody_ heaps gold upon

her, he ought never to forsake her; that love should last for ever!

But you, at one-and-twenty, you, the soul of honor, with the unsullied

conscience of youth, will ask me how a woman can bring herself to accept

money in such a way? _Mon Dieu_! is it not natural to share everything

with the one to whom we owe our happiness? When all has been given, why

should we pause and hesitate over a part? Money is as nothing between

us until the moment when the sentiment that bound us together ceases to

exist. Were we not bound to each other for life? Who that believes in

love foresees such an end to love? You swear to love us eternally; how,

then, can our interests be separate?

“You do not know how I suffered to-day when Nucingen refused to give

me six thousand francs; he spends as much as that every month on his

mistress, an opera dancer! I thought of killing myself. The wildest

thoughts came into my head. There have been moments in my life when I

have envied my servants, and would have changed places with my maid. It

was madness to think of going to our father, Anastasie and I have bled

him dry; our poor father would have sold himself if he could have raised

six thousand francs that way. I should have driven him frantic to no

purpose. You have saved me from shame and death; I was beside myself

with anguish. Ah! monsieur, I owed you this explanation after my mad

ravings. When you left me just now, as soon as you were out of sight, I

longed to escape, to run away... where, I did not know. Half the women

in Paris lead such lives as mine; they live in apparent luxury, and in

their souls are tormented by anxiety. I know of poor creatures even

more miserable than I; there are women who are driven to ask their

tradespeople to make out false bills, women who rob their husbands. Some

men believe that an Indian shawl worth a thousand louis only cost five

hundred francs, others that a shawl costing five hundred francs is worth

a hundred louis. There are women, too, with narrow incomes, who scrape

and save and starve their children to pay for a dress. I am innocent

of these base meannesses. But this is the last extremity of my torture.

Some women will sell themselves to their husbands, and so obtain their

way, but I, at any rate, am free. If I chose, Nucingen would cover me

with gold, but I would rather weep on the breast of a man whom I can

respect. Ah! tonight, M. de Marsay will no longer have a right to think

of me as a woman whom he has paid.” She tried to conceal her tears from

him, hiding her face in her hands; Eugene drew them away and looked at

her; she seemed to him sublime at that moment.

“It is hideous, is it not,” she cried, “to speak in a breath of money

and affection. You cannot love me after this,” she added.

The incongruity between the ideas of honor which make women so great,

and the errors in conduct which are forced upon them by the constitution

of society, had thrown Eugene’s thoughts into confusion; he uttered

soothing and consoling words, and wondered at the beautiful woman before

him, and at the artless imprudence of her cry of pain.

“You will not remember this against me?” she asked; “promise me that you

will not.”

“Ah! madame, I am incapable of doing so,” he said. She took his hand and

held it to her heart, a movement full of grace that expressed her deep

gratitude.

“I am free and happy once more, thanks to you,” she said. “Oh! I have

felt lately as if I were in the grasp of an iron hand. But after this

I mean to live simply and to spend nothing. You will think me just as

pretty, will you not, my friend? Keep this,” she went on, as she took

only six of the banknotes. “In conscience I owe you a thousand crowns,

for I really ought to go halves with you.”

Eugene’s maiden conscience resisted; but when the Baroness said, “I

am bound to look on you as an accomplice or as an enemy,” he took the

money.

“It shall be a last stake in reserve,” he said, “in case of misfortune.”

“That was what I was dreading to hear,” she cried, turning pale. “Oh,

if you would that I should be anything to you, swear to me that you will

never re-enter a gaming-house. Great Heaven! that I should corrupt you!

I should die of sorrow!”

They had reached the Rue Saint-Lazare by this time. The contrast between

the ostentation of wealth in the house, and the wretched condition of

its mistress, dazed the student; and Vautrin’s cynical words began to

ring in his ears.

“Seat yourself there,” said the Baroness, pointing to a low chair beside

the fire. “I have a difficult letter to write,” she added. “Tell me what

to say.”

“Say nothing,” Eugene answered her. “Put the bills in an envelope,

direct it, and send it by your maid.”

“Why, you are a love of a man,” she said. “Ah! see what it is to have

been well brought up. That is the Beauseant through and through,” she

went on, smiling at him.

“She is charming,” thought Eugene, more and more in love. He looked

round him at the room; there was an ostentatious character about the

luxury, a meretricious taste in the splendor.

“Do you like it?” she asked, as she rang for the maid.

“Therese, take this to M. de Marsay, and give it into his hands

yourself. If he is not at home, bring the letter back to me.”

Therese went, but not before she had given Eugene a spiteful glance.

Dinner was announced. Rastignac gave his arm to Mme. de Nucingen, she

led the way into a pretty dining-room, and again he saw the luxury of

the table which he had admired in his cousin’s house.

“Come and dine with me on opera evenings, and we will go to the Italiens

afterwards,” she said.

“I should soon grow used to the pleasant life if it could last, but I am

a poor student, and I have my way to make.”