第 二十七 章 · 第27章

“Well,” said Father Goriot, “what are you thinking about?”

Eugene did not know the fever or vanity that possessed some women in

those days; how should he imagine that to open a door in the Faubourg

Saint-Germain a banker’s wife would go to almost any length. For the

coterie of the Faubourg Saint-Germain was a charmed circle, and the

women who moved in it were at that time the queens of society; and among

the greatest of these _Dames du Petit-Chateau_, as they were called,

were Mme. de Beauseant and her friends the Duchesse de Langeais and the

Duchesse de Maufrigneause. Rastignac was alone in his ignorance of the

frantic efforts made by women who lived in the Chausee-d’Antin to enter

this seventh heaven and shine among the brightest constellations of

their sex. But his cautious disposition stood him in good stead,

and kept his judgment cool, and the not altogether enviable power of

imposing instead of accepting conditions.

“Yes, I am going,” he replied.

So it was curiosity that drew him to Mme. de Nucingen; while, if she had

treated him disdainfully, passion perhaps might have brought him to her

feet. Still he waited almost impatiently for to-morrow, and the hour

when he could go to her. There is almost as much charm for a young

man in a first flirtation as there is in first love. The certainty of

success is a source of happiness to which men do not confess, and all

the charm of certain women lies in this. The desire of conquest springs

no less from the easiness than from the difficulty of triumph, and every

passion is excited or sustained by one or the other of these two motives

which divide the empire of love. Perhaps this division is one result of

the great question of temperaments; which, after all, dominates social

life. The melancholic temperament may stand in need of the tonic of

coquetry, while those of nervous or sanguine complexion withdraw if

they meet with a too stubborn resistance. In other words, the lymphatic

temperament is essentially despondent, and the rhapsodic is bilious.

Eugene lingered over his toilette with an enjoyment of all its little

details that is grateful to a young man’s self-love, though he will not

own to it for fear of being laughed at. He thought, as he arranged his

hair, that a pretty woman’s glances would wander through the dark curls.

He indulged in childish tricks like any young girl dressing for a dance,

and gazed complacently at his graceful figure while he smoothed out the

creases of his coat.

“There are worse figures, that is certain,” he said to himself.

Then he went downstairs, just as the rest of the household were sitting

down to dinner, and took with good humor the boisterous applause excited

by his elegant appearance. The amazement with which any attention to

dress is regarded in a lodging-house is a very characteristic trait. No

one can put on a new coat but every one else must say his say about it.

“Clk! clk! clk!” cried Bianchon, making the sound with his tongue

against the roof of his mouth, like a driver urging on a horse.

“He holds himself like a duke and a peer of France,” said Mme. Vauquer.

“Are you going a-courting?” inquired Mlle. Michonneau.

“Cock-a-doodle-doo!” cried the artist.

“My compliments to my lady your wife,” from the _employe_ at the Museum.

“Your wife; have you a wife?” asked Poiret.

“Yes, in compartments, water-tight and floats, guaranteed fast color,

all prices from twenty-five to forty sous, neat check patterns in the

latest fashion and best taste, will wash, half-linen, half-cotton,

half-wool; a certain cure for toothache and other complaints under the

patronage of the Royal College of Physicians! children like it! a remedy

for headache, indigestion, and all other diseases affecting the

throat, eyes, and ears!” cried Vautrin, with a comical imitation of the

volubility of a quack at a fair. “And how much shall we say for this

marvel, gentlemen? Twopence? No. Nothing of the sort. All that is left

in stock after supplying the Great Mogul. All the crowned heads of

Europe, including the Gr-r-rand Duke of Baden, have been anxious to get

a sight of it. Walk up! walk up! gentlemen! Pay at the desk as you go

in! Strike up the music there! Brooum, la, la, trinn! la, la, boum!

boum! Mister Clarinette, there you are out of tune!” he added gruffly;

“I will rap your knuckles for you!”

“Goodness! what an amusing man!” said Mme. Vauquer to Mme. Couture; “I

should never feel dull with him in the house.”

This burlesque of Vautrin’s was the signal for an outburst of merriment,

and under cover of jokes and laughter Eugene caught a glance from Mlle.

Taillefer; she had leaned over to say a few words in Mme. Couture’s ear.

“The cab is at the door,” announced Sylvie.

“But where is he going to dine?” asked Bianchon.

“With Madame la Baronne de Nucingen.”

“M. Goriot’s daughter,” said the law student.

At this, all eyes turned to the old vermicelli maker; he was gazing at

Eugene with something like envy in his eyes.

Rastignac reached the house in the Rue Saint-Lazare, one of those

many-windowed houses with a mean-looking portico and slender columns,

which are considered the thing in Paris, a typical banker’s house,

decorated in the most ostentatious fashion; the walls lined with stucco,

the landings of marble mosaic. Mme. de Nucingen was sitting in a little

drawing-room; the room was painted in the Italian fashion, and decorated

like a restaurant. The Baroness seemed depressed. The effort that she

made to hide her feelings aroused Eugene’s interest; it was plain

that she was not playing a part. He had expected a little flutter of

excitement at his coming, and he found her dispirited and sad. The

disappointment piqued his vanity.

“My claim to your confidence is very small, madame,” he said, after

rallying her on her abstracted mood; “but if I am in the way, please

tell me so frankly; I count on your good faith.”

“No, stay with me,” she said; “I shall be all alone if you go. Nucingen

is dining in town, and I do not want to be alone; I want to be taken out

of myself.”

“But what is the matter?”

“You are the very last person whom I should tell,” she exclaimed.

“Then I am connected in some way in this secret. I wonder what it is?”

“Perhaps. Yet, no,” she went on; “it is a domestic quarrel, which ought

to be buried in the depths of the heart. I am very unhappy; did I not

tell you so the day before yesterday? Golden chains are the heaviest of

all fetters.”

When a woman tells a young man that she is very unhappy, and when the

young man is clever, and well dressed, and has fifteen hundred francs

lying idle in his pocket, he is sure to think as Eugene said, and he

becomes a coxcomb.

“What can you have left to wish for?” he answered. “You are young,

beautiful, beloved, and rich.”

“Do not let us talk of my affairs,” she said shaking her head

mournfully. “We will dine together _tete-a-tete_, and afterwards we will

go to hear the most exquisite music. Am I to your taste?” she went on,

rising and displaying her gown of white cashmere, covered with Persian

designs in the most superb taste.

“I wish that you were altogether mine,” said Eugene; “you are charming.”

“You would have a forlorn piece of property,” she said, smiling

bitterly. “There is nothing about me that betrays my wretchedness;

and yet, in spite of appearances, I am in despair. I cannot sleep; my

troubles have broken my night’s rest; I shall grow ugly.”

“Oh! that is impossible,” cried the law student; “but I am curious to

know what these troubles can be that a devoted love cannot efface.”

“Ah! if I were to tell you about them, you would shun me,” she said.

“Your love for me is as yet only the conventional gallantry that men use

to masquerade in; and, if you really loved me, you would be driven to

despair. I must keep silence, you see. Let us talk of something else,

for pity’s sake,” she added. “Let me show you my rooms.”

“No; let us stay here,” answered Eugene; he sat down on the sofa

before the fire, and boldly took Mme. de Nucingen’s hand in his. She

surrendered it to him; he even felt the pressure of her fingers in one

of the spasmodic clutches that betray terrible agitation.

“Listen,” said Rastignac; “if you are in trouble, you ought to tell me

about it. I want to prove to you that I love you for yourself alone. You

must speak to me frankly about your troubles, so that I can put an end

to them, even if I have to kill half-a-dozen men; or I shall go, never

to return.”

“Very well,” she cried, putting her hand to her forehead in an agony of

despair, “I will put you to the proof, and this very moment. Yes,” she

said to herself, “I have no other resource left.”

She rang the bell.

“Are the horses put in for the master?” she asked of the servant.

“Yes, madame.”

“I shall take his carriage myself. He can have mine and my horses. Serve

dinner at seven o’clock.”

“Now, come with me,” she said to Eugene, who thought as he sat in

the banker’s carriage beside Mme. de Nucingen that he must surely be

dreaming.

“To the Palais-Royal,” she said to the coachman; “stop near the

Theatre-Francais.”

She seemed to be too troubled and excited to answer the innumerable

questions that Eugene put to her. He was at a loss what to think of her

mute resistance, her obstinate silence.

“Another moment and she will escape me,” he said to himself.

When the carriage stopped at last, the Baroness gave the law student a

glance that silenced his wild words, for he was almost beside himself.

“Is it true that you love me?” she asked.

“Yes,” he answered, and in his manner and tone there was no trace of the

uneasiness that he felt.

“You will not think ill of me, will you, whatever I may ask of you?”

“No.”

“Are you ready to do my bidding?”

“Blindly.”

“Have you ever been to a gaming-house?” she asked in a tremulous voice.

“Never.”

“Ah! now I can breathe. You will have luck. Here is my purse,” she said.

“Take it! there are a hundred francs in it, all that such a fortunate

woman as I can call her own. Go up into one of the gaming-houses--I do

not know where they are, but there are some near the Palais-Royal. Try

your luck with the hundred francs at a game they call roulette; lose

it all or bring me back six thousand francs. I will tell you about my

troubles when you come back.”