IV

Lucien did not answer. Eve took up a little plate, daintily garnished

with vine-leaves, and set it on the table with a jug full of cream.

"There, Lucien, I have had strawberries for you."

But Lucien was so absorbed in his letter that he did not hear a word.

Eve came to sit beside him without a murmur; for in a sister's love

for a brother it is an element of great pleasure to be treated without

ceremony.

"Oh! what is it?" she cried as she saw tears shining in her brother's

eyes.

"Nothing, nothing, Eve," he said, and putting his arm about her waist,

he drew her towards him and kissed her forehead, her hair, her throat,

with warmth that surprised her.

"You are keeping something from me."

"Well, then--she loves me."

"I knew very well that you kissed me for somebody else," the poor

sister pouted, flushing red.

"We shall all be happy," cried Lucien, swallowing great spoonfuls of

soup.

"WE?" echoed Eve. The same presentiment that had crossed David's mind

prompted her to add, "You will not care so much about us now."

"How can you think that, if you know me?"

Eve put out her hand and grasped his tightly; then she carried off the

empty plate and the brown earthen soup-tureen, and brought the dish

that she had made for him. But instead of eating his dinner, Lucien

read his letter over again; and Eve, discreet maiden, did not ask

another question, respecting her brother's silence. If he wished to

tell her about it, she could wait; if he did not, how could she ask

him to tell her? She waited. Here is the letter:--

"MY FRIEND,--Why should I refuse to your brother in science the

help that I have lent you? All merits have equal rights in my

eyes; but you do not know the prejudices of those among whom I

live. We shall never make an aristocracy of ignorance understand

that intellect ennobles. If I have not sufficient influence to

compel them to accept M. David Sechard, I am quite willing to

sacrifice the worthless creatures to you. It would be a perfect

hecatomb in the antique manner. But, dear friend, you would not,

of course, ask me to leave them all in exchange for the society of

a person whose character and manner might not please me. I know

from your flatteries how easily friendship can be blinded. Will

you think the worse of me if I attach a condition to my consent?

In the interests of your future I should like to see your friend,

and know and decide for myself whether you are not mistaken. What

is this but the mother's anxious care of my dear poet, which I am

in duty bound to take?

"LOUISE DE NEGREPELISSE."

Lucien had no suspicion of the art with which polite society puts

forward a "Yes" on the way to a "No," and a "No" that leads to a

"Yes." He took this note for a victory. David should go to Mme. de

Bargeton's house! David would shine there in all the majesty of his

genius! He raised his head so proudly in the intoxication of a victory

which increased his belief in himself and his ascendency over others,

his face was so radiant with the brightness of many hopes, that his

sister could not help telling him that he looked handsome.

"If that woman has any sense, she must love you! And if so, to-night

she will be vexed, for all the ladies will try all sorts of coquetries

on you. How handsome you will look when you read your Saint John in

Patmos! If only I were a mouse, and could just slip in and see it!

Come, I have put your clothes out in mother's room."

The mother's room bore witness to self-respecting poverty. There were

white curtains to the walnut wood bedstead, and a strip of cheap green

carpet at the foot. A chest of drawers with a wooden top, a looking-

glass, and a few walnut wood chairs completed the furniture. The clock

on the chimney-piece told of the old vanished days of prosperity.

White curtains hung in the windows, a gray flowered paper covered the

walls, and the tiled floor, colored and waxed by Eve herself, shone

with cleanliness. On the little round table in the middle of the room

stood a red tray with a pattern of gilt roses, and three cups and a

sugar-basin of Limoges porcelain. Eve slept in the little adjoining

closet, where there was just room for a narrow bed, an old-fashioned

low chair, and a work-table by the window; there was about as much

space as there is in a ship's cabin, and the door always stood open

for the sake of air. But if all these things spoke of great poverty,

the atmosphere was sedate and studious; and for those who knew the

mother and children, there was something touchingly appropriate in

their surroundings.

Lucien was tying his cravat when David's step sounded outside in the

little yard, and in another moment the young printer appeared. From

his manner and looks he seemed to have come down in a hurry.

"Well, David!" cried the ambitious poet, "we have gained the day! She

loves me! You shall come too."

"No," David said with some confusion, "I came down to thank you for

this proof of friendship, but I have been thinking things over

seriously. My own life is cut out for me, Lucien. I am David Sechard,

printer to His Majesty in Angouleme, with my name at the bottom of the

bills posted on every wall. For people of that class, I am an artisan,

or I am in business, if you like it better, but I am a craftsman who

lives over a shop in the Rue de Beaulieu at the corner of the Place du

Murier. I have not the wealth of a Keller just yet, nor the name of a

Desplein, two sorts of power that the nobles still try to ignore, and

--I am so far agreed with them--this power is nothing without a

knowledge of the world and the manners of a gentleman. How am I to

prove my claim to this sudden elevation? I should only make myself a

laughing-stock for nobles and bourgeoisie to boot. As for you, your

position is different. A foreman is not committed to anything. You are

busy gaining knowledge that will be indispensable by and by; you can

explain your present work by your future. And, in any case, you can

leave your place to-morrow and begin something else; you might study

law or diplomacy, or go into civil service. Nobody had docketed and

pigeon-holed YOU, in fact. Take advantage of your social maiden fame

to walk alone and grasp honors. Enjoy all pleasures gladly, even

frivolous pleasures. I wish you luck, Lucien; I shall enjoy your

success; you will be like a second self for me. Yes, in my own

thoughts I shall live your life. You shall have the holiday life, in

the glare of the world and among the swift working springs of

intrigue. I will lead the work-a-day life, the tradesman's life of

sober toil, and the patient labor of scientific research.

"You shall be our aristocracy," he went on, looking at Eve as he

spoke. "If you totter, you shall have my arm to steady you. If you

have reason to complain of the treachery of others, you will find a

refuge in our hearts, the love there will never change. And influence

and favor and the goodwill of others might fail us if we were two; we

should stand in each other's way; go forward, you can tow me after you

if it comes to that. So far from envying you, I will dedicate my life

to yours. The thing that you have just done for me, when you risked

the loss of your benefactress, your love it may be, rather than

forsake or disown me, that little thing, so great as it was--ah, well,

Lucien, that in itself would bind me to you forever if we were not

brothers already. Have no remorse, no concern over seeming to take the

larger share. This one-sided bargain is exactly to my taste. And,

after all, suppose that you should give me a pang now and again, who

knows that I shall not still be your debtor all my life long?"

He looked timidly towards Eve as he spoke; her eyes were full of

tears, she saw all that lay below the surface.

"In fact," he went on, turning to Lucien, who stood amazed at this,

"you are well made, you have a graceful figure, you wear your clothes

with an air, you look like a gentleman in that blue coat of yours with

the yellow buttons and the plain nankeen trousers; now I should look

like a workingman among those people, I should be awkward and out of

my element, I should say foolish things, or say nothing at all; but as

for you, you can overcome any prejudice as to names by taking your

mother's; you can call yourself Lucien de Rubempre; I am and always

shall be David Sechard. In this society that you frequent, everything

tells for you, everything would tell against me. You were born to

shine in it. Women will worship that angel face of yours; won't they,

Eve?"

Lucien sprang up and flung his arms about David. David's humility had

made short work of many doubts and plenty of difficulties. Was it

possible not to feel twice tenderly towards this friend, who by the

way of friendship had come to think the very thoughts that he, Lucien,

had reached through ambition? The aspirant for love and honors felt

that the way had been made smooth for him; the young man and the

comrade felt all his heart go out towards his friend.

It was one of those moments that come very seldom in our lives, when

all the forces in us are sweetly strung, and every chord vibrating

gives out full resonance.

And yet, this goodness of a noble nature increased Lucien's human

tendency to take himself as the centre of things. Do not all of us say

more or less, "L'Etat, c'est moi!" with Louis Quatorze? Lucien's

mother and sister had concentrated all their tenderness on him, David

was his devoted friend; he was accustomed to see the three making

every effort for him in secret, and consequently he had all the faults

of a spoiled eldest son. The noble is eaten up with the egoism which

their unselfishness was fostering in Lucien; and Mme. de Bargeton was

doing her best to develop the same fault by inciting him to forget all

that he owed to his sister, and mother, and David. He was far from

doing so as yet; but was there not ground for the fear that as his

sphere of ambition widened, his whole thought perforce would be how he

might maintain himself in it?

When emotion had subsided, David had a suggestion to make. He thought

that Lucien's poem, Saint John in Patmos, was possibly too biblical to

be read before an audience but little familiar with apocalyptic

poetry. Lucien, making his first appearance before the most exacting

public in the Charente, seemed to be nervous. David advised him to

take Andre de Chenier and substitute certain pleasure for a dubious

delight. Lucien was a perfect reader, the listeners would enjoy

listening to him, and his modesty would doubtless serve him well. Like

most young people, the pair were endowing the rest of the world with

their own intelligence and virtues; for if youth that has not yet gone

astray is pitiless for the sins of others, it is ready, on the other

hand, to put a magnificent faith in them. It is only, in fact, after a

good deal of experience of life that we recognize the truth of

Raphael's great saying--"To comprehend is to equal."

The power of appreciating poetry is rare, generally speaking, in

France; esprit soon dries up the source of the sacred tears of

ecstasy; nobody cares to be at the trouble of deciphering the sublime,

of plumbing the depths to discover the infinite. Lucien was about to

have his first experience of the ignorance and indifference of

worldlings. He went round by way of the printing office for David's

volume of poetry.

The two lovers were left alone, and David had never felt more

embarrassed in his life. Countless terrors seized upon him; he half

wished, half feared that Eve would praise him; he longed to run away,

for even modesty is not exempt from coquetry. David was afraid to

utter a word that might seem to beg for thanks; everything that he

could think of put him in some false position, so he held his tongue

and looked guilty. Eve, guessing the agony of modesty, was enjoying

the pause; but when David twisted his hat as if he meant to go, she

looked at him and smiled.

"Monsieur David," she said, "if you are not going to pass the evening

at Mme. de Bargeton's, we can spend the time together. It is fine;

shall we take a walk along the Charente? We will have a talk about

Lucien."

David longed to fling himself at the feet of this delicious girl. Eve

had rewarded him beyond his hopes by that tone in her voice; the

kindness of her accent had solved the difficulties of the position,

her suggestion was something better than praise; it was the first

grace given by love.

"But give me time to dress!" she said, as David made as if to go at

once.

David went out; he who all his life long had not known one tune from

another, was humming to himself; honest Postel hearing him with

surprise, conceived a vehement suspicion of Eve's feelings towards the

printer.

The most trifling things that happened that evening made a great

impression on Lucien, and his character was peculiarly susceptible to

first impressions. Like all inexperienced lovers he arrived so early

that Louise was not in the drawing-room; but M. de Bargeton was there,

alone. Lucien had already begun to serve his apprenticeship in the

practice of the small deceits with which the lover of a married woman

pays for his happiness--deceits through which, moreover, she learns

the extent of her power; but so far Lucien had not met the lady's

husband face to face.

M. de Bargeton's intellect was of the limited kind, exactly poised on

the border line between harmless vacancy, with some glimmerings of

sense, and the excessive stupidity that can neither take in nor give

out any idea. He was thoroughly impressed with the idea of doing his

duty in society; and, doing his utmost to be agreeable, had adopted

the smile of an opera dancer as his sole method of expression.

Satisfied, he smiled; dissatisfied, he smiled again. He smiled at good

news and evil tidings; with slight modifications the smile did duty on

all occasions. If he was positively obliged to express his personal

approval, a complacent laugh reinforced the smile; but he never

vouchsafed a word until driven to the last extremity. A tete-a-tete

put him in the one embarrassment of his vegetative existence, for then

he was obliged to look for something to say in the vast blank of his

vacant interior. He usually got out of the difficulty by a return to

the artless ways of childhood; he thought aloud, took you into his

confidence concerning the smallest details of his existence, his

physical wants, the small sensations which did duty for ideas with

him. He never talked about the weather, nor did he indulge in the

ordinary commonplaces of conversation--the way of escape provided for

weak intellects; he plunged you into the most intimate and personal

topics.

"I took veal this morning to please Mme. de Bargeton, who is very fond

of veal, and my stomach has been very uneasy since," he would tell

you. "I knew how it would be; it never suits me. How do you explain

it?" Or, very likely--

"I am just about to ring for a glass of eau sucree; will you have some

at the same time?"

Or, "I am going to take a ride to-morrow; I am going over to see my

father-in-law."

These short observations did not permit of discussion; a "Yes" or

"No," extracted from his interlocutor, the conversation dropped dead.

Then M. de Bargeton mutely implored his visitor to come to his

assistance. Turning westward his old asthmatic pug-dog countenance, he

gazed at you with big, lustreless eyes, in a way that said, "You were

saying?"

The people whom he loved best were bores anxious to talk about

themselves; he listened to them with an unfeigned and delicate

interest which so endeared him to the species that all the twaddlers

of Angouleme credited M. de Bargeton with more understanding than he

chose to show, and were of the opinion that he was underrated. So it

happened that when these persons could find nobody else to listen to

them, they went off to give M. de Bargeton the benefit of the rest of

the story, argument, or what not, sure beforehand of his eulogistic

smile. Madame de Bargeton's rooms were always crowded, and generally

her husband felt quite at ease. He interested himself in the smallest

details; he watched those who came in and bowed and smiled, and

brought the new arrivals to his wife; he lay in wait for departing

visitors, and went with them to the door, taking leave of them with

that eternal smile. When conversation grew lively, and he saw that

every one was interested in one thing or another, he stood, happy and

mute, planted like a swan on both feet, listening, to all appearance,

to a political discussion; or he looked over the card-players' hands

without a notion of what it was all about, for he could not play at

any game; or he walked about and took snuff to promote digestion.

Anais was the bright side of his life; she made it unspeakably

pleasant for him. Stretched out at full length in his armchair, he

watched admiringly while she did her part as hostess, for she talked

for him. It was a pleasure, too, to him to try to see the point in her

remarks; and as it was often a good while before he succeeded, his

smiles appeared after a delay, like the explosion of a shell which has

entered the earth and worked up again. His respect for his wife,

moreover, almost amounted to adoration. And so long as we can adore,

is there not happiness enough in life? Anais' husband was as docile as

a child who asks nothing better than to be told what to do; and,

generous and clever woman as she was, she had taken no undue advantage

of his weaknesses. She had taken care of him as you take care of a

cloak; she kept him brushed, neat, and tidy, looked closely after him,

and humored him; and humored, looked after, brushed, kept tidy, and

cared for, M. de Bargeton had come to feel an almost dog-like

affection for his wife. It is so easy to give happiness that costs

nothing! Mme. de Bargeton, knowing that her husband had no pleasure

but in good cheer, saw that he had good dinners; she had pity upon

him, she had never uttered a word of complaint; indeed, there were

people who could not understand that a woman might keep silence

through pride, and argued that M. de Bargeton must possess good

qualities hidden from public view. Mme. de Bargeton had drilled him

into military subordination; he yielded a passive obedience to his

wife. "Go and call on Monsieur So-and-So or Madame Such-an-One," she

would say, and he went forthwith, like a soldier at the word of

command. He stood at attention in her presence, and waited motionless

for his orders.

There was some talk about this time of nominating the mute gentleman

for a deputy. Lucien as yet had not lifted the veil which hid such an

unimaginable character; indeed, he had scarcely frequented the house

long enough. M. de Bargeton, spread at full length in his great chair,

appeared to see and understand all that was going on; his silence

added to his dignity, and his figure inspired Lucien with a prodigious

awe. It is the wont of imaginative natures to magnify everything, or

to find a soul to inhabit every shape; and Lucien took this gentleman,

not for a granite guard-post, but for a formidable sphinx, and thought

it necessary to conciliate him.

"I am the first comer," he said, bowing with more respect than people

usually showed the worthy man.

"That is natural enough," said M. de Bargeton.

Lucien took the remark for an epigram; the lady's husband was jealous,

he thought; he reddened under it, looked in the glass and tried to

give himself a countenance.

"You live in L'Houmeau," said M. de Bargeton, "and people who live a

long way off always come earlier than those who live near by."

"What is the reason of that?" asked Lucien politely.

"I don't know," answered M. de Bargeton, relapsing into immobility.

"You have not cared to find out," Lucien began again; "any one who

could make an observation could discover the cause."

"Ah!" said M. de Bargeton, "final causes! Eh! eh! . . ."

The conversation came to a dead stop; Lucien racked his brains to

resuscitate it.

"Mme. de Bargeton is dressing, no doubt," he began, shuddering at the

silliness of the question.

"Yes, she is dressing," her husband naturally answered.

Lucien looked up at the ceiling and vainly tried to think of something

else to say. As his eyes wandered over the gray painted joists and the

spaces of plaster between, he saw, not without qualms, that the little

chandelier with the old-fashioned cut-glass pendants had been stripped

of its gauze covering and filled with wax candles. All the covers had

been removed from the furniture, and the faded flowered silk damask

had come to light. These preparations meant something extraordinary.

The poet looked at his boots, and misgivings about his costume arose

in his mind. Grown stupid with dismay, he turned and fixed his eyes on

a Japanese jar standing on a begarlanded console table of the time of

Louis Quinze; then, recollecting that he must conciliate Mme. de

Bargeton's husband, he tried to find out if the good gentleman had a

hobby of any sort in which he might be humored.

"You seldom leave the city, monsieur?" he began, returning to M. de

Bargeton.

"Very seldom."

Silence again. M. de Bargeton watched Lucien's slightest movements

like a suspicious cat; the young man's presence disturbed him. Each

was afraid of the other.

"Can he feel suspicious of my attentions?" thought Lucien; "he seems

to be anything but friendly."

Lucien was not a little embarrassed by the uneasy glances that the

other gave him as he went to and fro, when luckily for him, the old

man-servant (who wore livery for the occasion) announced "M. du

Chatelet." The Baron came in, very much at ease, greeted his friend

Bargeton, and favored Lucien with the little nod then in vogue, which

the poet in his mind called purse-proud impertinence.

Sixte du Chatelet appeared in a pair of dazzling white trousers with

invisible straps that kept them in shape. He wore pumps and thread

stockings; the black ribbon of his eyeglass meandered over a white

waistcoat, and the fashion and elegance of Paris was strikingly

apparent in his black coat. He was indeed just the faded beau who

might be expected from his antecedents, though advancing years had

already endowed him with a certain waist-girth which somewhat exceeded

the limits of elegance. He had dyed the hair and whiskers grizzled by

his sufferings during his travels, and this gave a hard look to his

face. The skin which had once been so delicate had been tanned to the

copper-red color of Europeans from India; but in spite of his absurd

pretensions to youth, you could still discern traces of the Imperial

Highness' charming private secretary in du Chatelet's general

appearance. He put up his eyeglass and stared at his rival's nankeen

trousers, at his boots, at his waistcoat, at the blue coat made by the

Angouleme tailor, he looked him over from head to foot, in short, then

he coolly returned his eyeglass to his waistcoat pocket with a gesture

that said, "I am satisfied." And Lucien, eclipsed at this moment by

the elegance of the inland revenue department, thought that it would

be his turn by and by, when he should turn a face lighted up with

poetry upon the assembly; but this prospect did not prevent him from

feeling the sharp pang that succeeded to the uncomfortable sense of M.

de Bargeton's imagined hostility. The Baron seemed to bring all the

weight of his fortune to bear upon him, the better to humiliate him in

his poverty. M. de Bargeton had counted on having no more to say, and

his soul was dismayed by the pause spent by the rivals in mutual

survey; he had a question which he kept for desperate emergencies,

laid up in his mind, as it were, against a rainy day. Now was the

proper time to bring it out.

"Well, monsieur," he said, looking at Chatelet with an important air,

"is there anything fresh? anything that people are talking about?"

"Why, the latest thing is M. Chardon," Chatelet said maliciously. "Ask

him. Have you brought some charming poet for us?" inquired the

vivacious Baron, adjusting the side curl that had gone astray on his

temple.

"I should have asked you whether I had succeeded," Lucien answered;

"you have been before me in the field of verse."

"Pshaw!" said the other, "a few vaudevilles, well enough in their way,

written to oblige, a song now and again to suit some occasion, lines

for music, no good without the music, and my long Epistle to a Sister

of Bonaparte (ungrateful that he was), will not hand down my name to

posterity."

At this moment Mme. de Bargeton appeared in all the glory of an

elaborate toilette. She wore a Jewess' turban, enriched with an

Eastern clasp. The cameos on her neck gleamed through the gauze scarf

gracefully wound about her shoulders; the sleeves of her printed

muslin dress were short so as to display a series of bracelets on her

shapely white arms. Lucien was charmed with this theatrical style of

dress. M. du Chatelet gallantly plied the queen with fulsome

compliments, that made her smile with pleasure; she was so glad to be

praised in Lucien's hearing. But she scarcely gave her dear poet a

glance, and met Chatelet with a mortifying civility that kept him at a

distance.

By this time the guests began to arrive. First and foremost appeared

the Bishop and his Vicar-General, dignified and reverend figures both,

though no two men could well be more unlike, his lordship being tall

and attenuated, and his acolyte short and fat. Both churchmen's eyes

were bright; but while the Bishop was pallid, his Vicar-General's

countenance glowed with high health. Both were impassive, and

gesticulated but little; both appeared to be prudent men, and their

silence and reserve were supposed to hide great intellectual powers.

Close upon the two ecclesiastics followed Mme. de Chandour and her

husband, a couple so extraordinary that those who are unfamiliar with

provincial life might be tempted to think that such persons are purely

imaginary. Amelie de Chandour posed as the rival queen of Angouleme;

her husband, M. de Chandour, known in the circle as Stanislas, was a

ci-devant young man, slim still at five-and-forty, with a countenance

like a sieve. His cravat was always tied so as to present two menacing

points--one spike reached the height of his right ear, the other

pointed downwards to the red ribbon of his cross. His coat-tails were

violently at strife. A cut-away waistcoat displayed the ample,

swelling curves of a stiffly-starched shirt fastened by massive gold

studs. His dress, in fact, was exaggerated, till he looked almost like

a living caricature, which no one could behold for the first time with

gravity.

Stanislas looked himself over from top to toe with a kind of

satisfaction; he verified the number of his waistcoat buttons, and

followed the curving outlines of his tight-fitting trousers with fond

glances that came to a standstill at last on the pointed tips of his

shoes. When he ceased to contemplate himself in this way, he looked

towards the nearest mirror to see if his hair still kept in curl;

then, sticking a finger in his waistcoat pocket, he looked about him

at the women with happy eyes, flinging his head back in three-quarters

profile with all the airs of a king of the poultry-yard, airs which

were prodigiously admired by the aristocratic circle of which he was

the beau. There was a strain of eighteenth century grossness, as a

rule, in his talk; a detestable kind of conversation which procured

him some success with women--he made them laugh. M. du Chatelet was

beginning to give this gentleman some uneasiness; and, as a matter of

fact, since Mme. de Bargeton had taken him up, the lively interest

taken by the women in the Byron of Angouleme was distinctly on the

increase. His coxcomb superciliousness tickled their curiosity; he

posed as the man whom nothing can arouse from his apathy, and his

jaded Sultan airs were like a challenge.

Amelie de Chandour, short, plump, fair-complexioned, and dark-haired,

was a poor actress; her voice was loud, like everything else about

her; her head, with its load of feathers in winter and flowers in

summer, was never still for a moment. She had a fine flow of

conversation, though she could never bring a sentence to an end

without a wheezing accompaniment from an asthma, to which she would

not confess.

M. de Saintot, otherwise Astolphe, President of the Agricultural

Society, a tall, stout, high-colored personage, usually appeared in

the wake of his wife, Elisa, a lady with a countenance like a withered

fern, called Lili by her friends--a baby name singularly at variance

with its owner's character and demeanor. Mme. de Saintot was a solemn

and extremely pious woman, and a very trying partner at a game of

cards. Astolphe was supposed to be a scientific man of the first rank.

He was as ignorant as a carp, but he had compiled the articles on

Sugar and Brandy for a Dictionary of Agriculture by wholesale plunder

of newspaper articles and pillage of previous writers. It was believed

all over the department that M. Saintot was engaged upon a treatise on

modern husbandry; but though he locked himself into his study every

morning, he had not written a couple of pages in a dozen years. If

anybody called to see him, he always contrived to be discovered

rummaging among his papers, hunting for a stray note or mending a pen;

but he spent the whole time in his study on puerilities, reading the

newspaper through from end to end, cutting figures out of corks with

his penknife, and drawing patterns on his blotting-paper. He would

turn over the leaves of his Cicero to see if anything applicable to

the events of the day might catch his eye, and drag his quotation by

the heels into the conversation that evening saying, "There is a

passage in Cicero which might have been written to suit modern times,"

and out came his phrase, to the astonishment of his audience.

"Really," they said among themselves, "Astolphe is a well of

learning." The interesting fact circulated all over the town, and

sustained the general belief in M. de Saintot's abilities.

After this pair came M. de Bartas, known as Adrien among the circle.

It was M. de Bartas who boomed out his song in a bass voice, and made

prodigious claims to musical knowledge. His self-conceit had taken a

stand upon solfeggi; he began by admiring his appearance while he

sang, passed thence to talking about music, and finally to talking of

nothing else. His musical tastes had become a monomania; he grew

animated only on the one subject of music; he was miserable all

evening until somebody begged him to sing. When he had bellowed one of

his airs, he revived again; strutted about, raised himself on his

heels, and received compliments with a deprecating air; but modesty

did not prevent him from going from group to group for his meed of

praise; and when there was no more to be said about the singer, he

returned to the subject of the song, discussing its difficulties or

extolling the composer.

M. Alexandre de Brebian performed heroic exploits in sepia; he

disfigured the walls of his friends' rooms with a swarm of crude

productions, and spoiled all the albums in the department. M.

Alexandre de Brebian and M. de Bartas came together, each with his

friend's wife on his arm, a cross-cornered arrangement which gossip

declared to be carried out to the fullest extent. As for the two

women, Mesdames Charlotte de Brebian and Josephine de Bartas, or

Lolotte and Fifine, as they were called, both took an equal interest

in a scarf, or the trimming of a dress, or the reconciliation of

several irreconcilable colors; both were eaten up with a desire to

look like Parisiennes, and neglected their homes, where everything

went wrong. But if they dressed like dolls in tightly-fitting gowns of

home manufacture, and exhibited outrageous combinations of crude

colors upon their persons, their husbands availed themselves of the

artist's privilege and dressed as they pleased, and curious it was to

see the provincial dowdiness of the pair. In their threadbare clothes

they looked like the supernumeraries that represent rank and fashion

at stage weddings in third-rate theatres.

One of the queerest figures in the rooms was M. le Comte de Senonches,

known by the aristocratic name of Jacques, a mighty hunter, lean and

sunburned, a haughty gentleman, about as amiable as a wild boar, as

suspicious as a Venetian, and jealous as a Moor, who lived on terms of

the friendliest and most perfect intimacy with M. du Hautoy, otherwise

Francis, the friend of the house.

Madame de Senonches (Zephirine) was a tall, fine-looking woman, though

her complexion was spoiled already by pimples due to liver complaint,

on which grounds she was said to be exacting. With a slender figure

and delicate proportions, she could afford to indulge in languid

manners, savoring somewhat of affectation, but revealing passion and

the consciousness that every least caprice will be gratified by love.

Francis, the house friend, was rather distinguished-looking. He had

given up his consulship in Valence, and sacrificed his diplomatic

prospects to live near Zephirine (also known as Zizine) in Angouleme.

He had taken the household in charge, he superintended the children's

education, taught them foreign languages, and looked after the

fortunes of M. and Mme. de Senonches with the most complete devotion.

Noble Angouleme, administrative Angouleme, and bourgeois Angouleme

alike had looked askance for a long while at this phenomenon of the

perfect union of three persons; but finally the mysterious conjugal

trinity appeared to them so rare and pleasing a spectacle, that if M.

du Hautoy had shown any intention of marrying, he would have been

thought monstrously immoral. Mme. de Senonches, however, had a lady

companion, a goddaughter, and her excessive attachment to this Mlle.

de la Haye was beginning to raise surmises of disquieting mysteries;

it was thought, in spite of some impossible discrepancies in dates,

that Francoise de la Haye bore a striking likeness to Francis du

Hautoy.

When "Jacques" was shooting in the neighborhood, people used to

inquire after Francis, and Jacques would discourse on his steward's

little ailments, and talk of his wife in the second place. So curious

did this blindness seem in a man of jealous temper, that his greatest

friends used to draw him out on the topic for the amusement of others

who did not know of the mystery. M. du Hautoy was a finical dandy

whose minute care of himself had degenerated into mincing affectation

and childishness. He took an interest in his cough, his appetite, his

digestion, his night's rest. Zephirine had succeeded in making a

valetudinarian of her factotum; she coddled him and doctored him; she

crammed him with delicate fare, as if he had been a fine lady's lap-

dog; she embroidered waistcoats for him, and pocket-handkerchiefs and

cravats until he became so used to wearing finery that she transformed

him into a kind of Japanese idol. Their understanding was perfect. In

season and out of season Zizine consulted Francis with a look, and

Francis seemed to take his ideas from Zizine's eyes. They frowned and

smiled together, and seemingly took counsel of each other before

making the simplest commonplace remark.

The largest landowner in the neighborhood, a man whom every one

envied, was the Marquis de Pimentel; he and his wife, between them,

had an income of forty thousand livres, and spent their winters in

Paris. This evening they had driven into Angouleme in their caleche,

and had brought their neighbors, the Baron and Baroness de Rastignac

and their party, the Baroness' aunt and daughters, two charming young

ladies, penniless girls who had been carefully brought up, and were

dressed in the simple way that sets off natural loveliness.

These personages, beyond question the first in the company, met with a

reception of chilling silence; the respect paid to them was full of

jealousy, especially as everybody saw that Mme. de Bargeton paid

marked attention to the guests. The two families belonged to the very

small minority who hold themselves aloof from provincial gossip,

belong to no clique, live quietly in retirement, and maintain a

dignified reserve. M. de Pimentel and M. de Rastignac, for instance,

were addressed by their names in full, and no length of acquaintance

had brought their wives and daughters into the select coterie of

Angouleme; both families were too nearly connected with the Court to

compromise themselves through provincial follies.

The Prefect and the General in command of the garrison were the last

comers, and with them came the country gentleman who had brought the

treatise on silkworms to David that very morning. Evidently he was the

mayor of some canton or other, and a fine estate was his sufficient

title to gentility; but from his appearance, it was plain that he was

quite unused to polite society. He looked uneasy in his clothes, he

was at a loss to know what to do with his hands, he shifted about from

one foot to another as he spoke, and half rose and sat down again when

anybody spoke to him. He seemed ready to do some menial service; he

was obsequious, nervous, and grave by turns, laughing eagerly at every

joke, listening with servility; and occasionally, imagining that

people were laughing at him, he assumed a knowing air. His treatise

weighed upon his mind; again and again he tried to talk about

silkworms; but the luckless wight happened first upon M. de Bartas,

who talked music in reply, and next on M. de Saintot, who quoted

Cicero to him; and not until the evening was half over did the mayor

meet with sympathetic listeners in Mme. and Mlle. du Brossard, a

widowed gentlewoman and her daughter.

Mme. and Mlle. du Brossard were not the least interesting persons in

the clique, but their story may be told in a single phrase--they were

as poor as they were noble. In their dress there was just that tinge

of pretension which betrayed carefully hidden penury. The daughter, a

big, heavy young woman of seven-and-twenty, was supposed to be a good

performer on the piano, and her mother praised her in season and out

of season in the clumsiest way. No eligible man had any taste which

Camille did not share on her mother's authoritative statement. Mme. du

Brossard, in her anxiety to establish her child, was capable of saying

that her dear Camille liked nothing so much as a roving life from one

garrison to another; and before the evening was out, that she was sure

her dear Camille liked a quiet country farmhouse existence of all

things. Mother and daughter had the pinched sub-acid dignity

characteristic of those who have learned by experience the exact value

of expressions of sympathy; they belonged to a class which the world

delights to pity; they had been the objects of the benevolent interest

of egoism; they had sounded the empty void beneath the consoling

formulas with which the world ministers to the necessities of the

unfortunate.

M. de Severac was fifty-nine years old, and a childless widower.

Mother and daughter listened, therefore, with devout admiration to all

that he told them about his silkworm nurseries.

"My daughter has always been fond of animals," said the mother. "And

as women are especially interested in the silk which the little

creatures produce, I shall ask permission to go over to Severac, so

that my Camille may see how the silk is spun. My Camille is so

intelligent, she will grasp anything that you tell her in a moment.

Did she not understand one day the inverse ratio of the squares of

distances!"

This was the remark that brought the conversation between Mme. du

Brossard and M. de Severac to a glorious close after Lucien's reading

that night.

A few habitues slipped in familiarly among the rest, so did one or two

eldest sons; shy, mute young men tricked out in gorgeous jewelry, and

highly honored by an invitation to this literary solemnity, the

boldest men among them so far shook off the weight of awe as to

chatter a good deal with Mlle. de la Haye. The women solemnly arranged

themselves in a circle, and the men stood behind them. It was a quaint

assemblage of wrinkled countenances and heterogeneous costumes, but

none the less it seemed very alarming to Lucien, and his heart beat

fast when he felt that every one was looking at him. His assurance

bore the ordeal with some difficulty in spite of the encouraging

example of Mme. de Bargeton, who welcomed the most illustrious

personages of Angouleme with ostentatious courtesy and elaborate

graciousness; and the uncomfortable feeling that oppressed him was

aggravated by a trifling matter which any one might have foreseen,

though it was bound to come as an unpleasant shock to a young man with

so little experience of the world. Lucien, all eyes and ears, noticed

that no one except Louise, M. de Bargeton, the Bishop, and some few

who wished to please the mistress of the house, spoke of him as M. de

Rubempre; for his formidable audience he was M. Chardon. Lucien's

courage sank under their inquisitive eyes. He could read his plebeian

name in the mere movements of their lips, and hear the anticipatory

criticisms made in the blunt, provincial fashion that too often

borders on rudeness. He had not expected this prolonged ordeal of pin-

pricks; it put him still more out of humor with himself. He grew

impatient to begin the reading, for then he could assume an attitude

which should put an end to his mental torments; but Jacques was giving

Mme. de Pimentel the history of his last day's sport; Adrien was

holding forth to Mlle. Laure de Rastignac on Rossini, the newly-risen

music star, and Astolphe, who had got by heart a newspaper paragraph

on a patent plow, was giving the Baron the benefit of the description.

Lucien, luckless poet that he was, did not know that there was scarce

a soul in the room besides Mme. de Bargeton who could understand

poetry. The whole matter-of-fact assembly was there by a

misapprehension, nor did they, for the most part, know what they had

come out for to see. There are some words that draw a public as

unfailingly as the clash of cymbals, the trumpet, or the mountebank's

big drum; "beauty," "glory," "poetry," are words that bewitch the

coarsest intellect.