“Quite lately our Baron was walking along the Rue de Rivoli on his way to the Bois when he met the Baroness d’Aldrigger under the colonnade. The little old lady wore a tiny green bonnet with a rose-colored lining, a flowered gown, and a mantilla; altogether, she was more than ever the Shepherdess of the Alps. She could no more be made to understand the causes of her poverty than the sources of her wealth. As she went along, leaning upon poor Malvina, that model of heroic devotion, she seemed to be the young girl and Malvina the old mother. Wirth followed them, carrying an umbrella.
“‘Dere are beoples whose vordune I vound it imbossible to make,’ said the Baron, addressing his companion (M. Cointet, a cabinet minister). ‘Now dot de baroxysm off brincibles haf bassed off, chust reinshtate dot boor Peautenord.’
“So Beaudenord went back to his desk, thanks to Nucingen’s good offices; and the d’Aldriggers extol Nucingen as a hero of friendship, for he always sends the little Shepherdess of the Alps and her daughters invitations to his balls. No creature whatsoever can be made to understand that the Baron yonder three times did his best to plunder the public without breaking the letter of the law, and enriched people in spite of himself. No one has a word to say against him. If anybody should suggest that a big capitalist often is another word for a cut-throat, it would be a most egregious calumny. If stocks rise and fall, if property improves and depreciates, the fluctuations of the market are caused by a common movement, a something in the air, a tide in the affairs of men subject like other tides to lunar influences. The great Arago is much to blame for giving us no scientific theory to account for this important phenomenon. The only outcome of all this is an axiom which I have never seen anywhere in print — — ”
“And that is?”
“The debtor is more than a match for the creditor.”
“Oh!” said Blondet. “For my own part, all that we have been saying seems to me to be a paraphrase of the epigram in which Montesquieu summed up l’Esprit des Lois.”
“What?” said Finot.
“Laws are like spiders’ webs; the big flies get through, while the little ones are caught.”
“Then, what are you for?” asked Finot.
“For absolute government, the only kind of government under which enterprises against the spirit of the law can be put down. Yes. Arbitrary rule is the salvation of a country when it comes to the support of justice, for the right of mercy is strictly one-sided. The king can pardon a fraudulent bankrupt; he cannot do anything for the victims. The letter of the law is fatal to modern society.”
“Just get that into the electors’ heads!” said Bixiou.
“Some one has undertaken to do it.”
“Who?”
“Time. As the Bishop of Leon said, ‘Liberty is ancient, but kingship is eternal; any nation in its right mind returns to monarchical government in one form or another.’”
“I say, there was somebody next door,” said Finot, hearing us rise to go.
“There always is somebody next door,” retorted Bixiou. “But he must have been drunk.”
PARIS, November 1837.
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Translated by James Waring
Splendeurs et misères des courtisanes was initially published in four parts from 1838-1847. It continues the story of Lucien de Rubempré, who was a main character in the preceding trilogy Illusions perdues. The narrative concerns Lucien de Rubempré and Abbé Herrera, who make a pact in which Lucien will arrive at success in Paris if he agrees to follow Vautrin’s instructions on how to do so. Esther Van Gobseck disrupts Vautrin’s plans, however, because of her love for Lucien.
An original illustration
DEDICATION
To His Highness
Prince Alfonso Serafino di Porcia.
Allow me to place your name at the beginning of an essentially Parisian work, thought out in your house during these latter days. Is it not natural that I should offer you the flowers of rhetoric that blossomed in your garden, watered with the regrets I suffered from home-sickness, which you soothed, as I wandered under the boschetti whose elms reminded me of the Champs-Elysees? Thus, perchance, may I expiate the crime of having dreamed of Paris under the shadow of the Duomo, of having longed for our muddy streets on the clean and elegant flagstones of Porta-Renza. When I have some book to publish which may be dedicated to a Milanese lady, I shall have the happiness of finding names already dear to your old Italian romancers among those of women whom we love, and to whose memory I would beg you to recall your sincerely affectionate
DE BALZAC.
July 1838.
ESTHER HAPPY: HOW A COURTESAN CAN LOVE
In 1824, at the last opera ball of the season, several masks were struck by the beauty of a youth who was wandering about the passages and greenroom with the air of a man in search of a woman kept at home by unexpected circumstances. The secret of this behavior, now dilatory and again hurried, is known only to old women and to certain experienced loungers. In this immense assembly the crowd does not trouble itself much to watch the crowd; each one’s interest is impassioned, and even idlers are preoccupied.
The young dandy was so much absorbed in his anxious quest that he did not observe his own success; he did not hear, he did not see the ironical exclamations of admiration, the genuine appreciation, the biting gibes, the soft invitations of some of the masks. Though he was so handsome as to rank among those exceptional persons who come to an opera ball in search of an adventure, and who expect it as confidently as men looked for a lucky coup at roulette in Frascati’s day, he seemed quite philosophically sure of his evening; he must be the hero of one of those mysteries with three actors which constitute an opera ball, and are known only to those who play a part in them; for, to young wives who come merely to say, “I have seen it,” to country people, to inexperienced youths, and to foreigners, the opera house must on those nights be the palace of fatigue and dulness. To these, that black swarm, slow and serried — coming, going, winding, turning, returning, mounting, descending, comparable only to ants on a pile of wood — is no more intelligible than the Bourse to a Breton peasant who has never heard of the Grand livre.
With a few rare exceptions, men wear no masks in Paris; a man in a domino is thought ridiculous. In this the spirit of the nation betrays itself. Men who want to hide their good fortune can enjoy the opera ball without going there; and masks who are absolutely compelled to go in come out again at once. One of the most amusing scenes is the crush at the doors produced as soon as the dancing begins, by the rush of persons getting away and struggling with those who are pushing in. So the men who wear masks are either jealous husbands who come to watch their wives, or husbands on the loose who do not wish to be watched by them — two situations equally ridiculous.
Now, our young man was followed, though he knew it not, by a man in a mask, dogging his steps, short and stout, with a rolling gait, like a barrel. To every one familiar with the opera this disguise betrayed a stock-broker, a banker, a lawyer, some citizen soul suspicious of infidelity. For in fact, in really high society, no one courts such humiliating proofs. Several masks had laughed as they pointed this preposterous figure out to each other; some had spoken to him, a few young men had made game of him, but his stolid manner showed entire contempt for these aimless shafts; he went on whither the young man led him, as a hunted wild boar goes on and pays no heed to the bullets whistling about his ears, or the dogs barking at his heels.
Though at first sight pleasure and anxiety wear the same livery — the noble black robe of Venice — and though all is confusion at an opera ball, the various circles composing Parisian society meet there, recognize, and watch each other. There are certain ideas so clear to the initiated that this scrawled medley of interests is as legible to them as any amusing novel. So, to these old hands, this man could not be here by appointment; he would infallibly have worn some token, red, white, or green, such as notifies a happy meeting previously agreed on. Was it a case of revenge?
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br /> Seeing the domino following so closely in the wake of a man apparently happy in an assignation, some of the gazers looked again at the handsome face, on which anticipation had set its divine halo. The youth was interesting; the longer he wandered, the more curiosity he excited. Everything about him proclaimed the habits of refined life. In obedience to a fatal law of the time we live in, there is not much difference, physical or moral, between the most elegant and best bred son of a duke and peer and this attractive youth, whom poverty had not long since held in its iron grip in the heart of Paris. Beauty and youth might cover him in deep gulfs, as in many a young man who longs to play a part in Paris without having the capital to support his pretensions, and who, day after day, risks all to win all, by sacrificing to the god who has most votaries in this royal city, namely, Chance. At the same time, his dress and manners were above reproach; he trod the classic floor of the opera house as one accustomed there. Who can have failed to observe that there, as in every zone in Paris, there is a manner of being which shows who you are, what you are doing, whence you come, and what you want?
“What a handsome young fellow; and here we may turn round to look at him,” said a mask, in whom accustomed eyes recognized a lady of position.
“Do you not remember him?” replied the man on whose arm she was leaning. “Madame du Chatelet introduced him to you — — ”
“What, is that the apothecary’s son she fancied herself in love with, who became a journalist, Mademoiselle Coralie’s lover?”
“I fancied he had fallen too low ever to pull himself up again, and I cannot understand how he can show himself again in the world of Paris,” said the Comte Sixte du Chatelet.
“He has the air of a prince,” the mask went on, “and it is not the actress he lived with who could give it to him. My cousin, who understood him, could not lick him into shape. I should like to know the mistress of this Sargine; tell me something about him that will enable me to mystify him.”
This couple, whispering as they watched the young man, became the object of study to the square-shouldered domino.
“Dear Monsieur Chardon,” said the Prefet of the Charente, taking the dandy’s hand, “allow me to introduce you to some one who wishes to renew acquaintance with you — — ”
“Dear Comte Chatelet,” replied the young man, “that lady taught me how ridiculous was the name by which you address me. A patent from the king has restored to me that of my mother’s family — the Rubempres. Although the fact has been announced in the papers, it relates to so unimportant a person that I need not blush to recall it to my friends, my enemies, and those who are neither — — You may class yourself where you will, but I am sure you will not disapprove of a step to which I was advised by your wife when she was still only Madame de Bargeton.”
This neat retort, which made the Marquise smile, gave the Prefet of la Charente a nervous chill. “You may tell her,” Lucien went on, “that I now bear gules, a bull raging argent on a meadow vert.”
“Raging argent,” echoed Chatelet.
“Madame la Marquise will explain to you, if you do not know, why that old coat is a little better than the chamberlain’s key and Imperial gold bees which you bear on yours, to the great despair of Madame Chatelet, nee Negrepelisse d’Espard,” said Lucien quickly.
“Since you recognize me, I cannot puzzle you; and I could never tell you how much you puzzle me,” said the Marquise d’Espard, amazed at the coolness and impertinence to which the man had risen whom she had formerly despised.
“Then allow me, madame, to preserve my only chance of occupying your thoughts by remaining in that mysterious twilight,” said he, with the smile of a man who does not wish to risk assured happiness.
“I congratulate you on your changed fortunes,” said the Comte du Chatelet to Lucien.
“I take it as you offer it,” replied Lucien, bowing with much grace to the Marquise.
“What a coxcomb!” said the Count in an undertone to Madame d’Espard. “He has succeeded in winning an ancestry.”
“With these young men such coxcombry, when it is addressed to us, almost always implies some success in high places,” said the lady; “for with you older men it means ill-fortune. And I should very much like to know which of my grand lady friends has taken this fine bird under her patronage; then I might find the means of amusing myself this evening. My ticket, anonymously sent, is no doubt a bit of mischief planned by a rival and having something to do with this young man. His impertinence is to order; keep an eye on him. I will take the Duc de Navarrein’s arm. You will be able to find me again.”
Just as Madame d’Espard was about to address her cousin, the mysterious mask came between her and the Duke to whisper in her ear:
“Lucien loves you; he wrote the note. Your Prefet is his greatest foe; how can he speak in his presence?”
The stranger moved off, leaving Madame d’Espard a prey to a double surprise. The Marquise knew no one in the world who was capable of playing the part assumed by this mask; she suspected a snare, and went to sit down out of sight. The Comte Sixte du Chatelet — whom Lucien had abridged of his ambitious du with an emphasis that betrayed long meditated revenge — followed the handsome dandy, and presently met a young man to whom he thought he could speak without reserve.
“Well, Rastignac, have you seen Lucien? He has come out in a new skin.”
“If I were half as good looking as he is, I should be twice as rich,” replied the fine gentleman, in a light but meaning tone, expressive of keen raillery.
“No!” said the fat mask in his ear, repaying a thousand ironies in one by the accent he lent the monosyllable.
Rastignac, who was not the man to swallow an affront, stood as if struck by lightning, and allowed himself to be led into a recess by a grasp of iron which he could not shake off.
“You young cockerel, hatched in Mother Vauquer’s coop — you, whose heart failed you to clutch old Taillefer’s millions when the hardest part of the business was done — let me tell you, for your personal safety, that if you do not treat Lucien like the brother you love, you are in our power, while we are not in yours. Silence and submission! or I shall join your game and upset the skittles. Lucien de Rubempre is under the protection of the strongest power of the day — the Church. Choose between life and death — Answer.”
Rastignac felt giddy, like a man who has slept in a forest and wakes to see by his side a famishing lioness. He was frightened, and there was no one to see him; the boldest men yield to fear under such circumstances.
“No one but HE can know — or would dare — — ” he murmured to himself.
The mask clutched his hand tighter to prevent his finishing his sentence.
“Act as if I were he,” he said.
Rastignac then acted like a millionaire on the highroad with a brigand’s pistol at his head; he surrendered.
“My dear Count,” said he to du Chatelet, to whom he presently returned, “if you care for your position in life, treat Lucien de Rubempre as a man whom you will one day see holding a place far above where you stand.”
The mask made a imperceptible gesture of approbation, and went off in search of Lucien.
“My dear fellow, you have changed your opinion of him very suddenly,” replied the Prefet with justifiable surprise.
“As suddenly as men change who belong to the centre and vote with the right,” replied Rastignac to the Prefet-Depute, whose vote had for a few days failed to support the Ministry.
“Are there such things as opinions nowadays? There are only interests,” observed des Lupeaulx, who had heard them. “What is the case in point?”
“The case of the Sieur de Rubempre, whom Rastignac is setting up as a person of consequence,” said du Chatelet to the Secretary-General.
“My dear Count,” replied des Lupeaulx very seriously, “Monsieur de Rubempre is a young man of the highest merit, and has such good interest at his back that I should be delighted to renew my acquaintance with him.”
The three speakers looked towards a corner where a group of recognized wits had gathered, men of more or less celebrity, and several men of fashion. These gentlemen made common stock of their jests, their remarks, and their scandal, trying to amuse themselves till something should amuse them. Among this strangely mingled party were some men with whom Lucien had had transactions, combining ostensibly kind offices with covert false dealing.
“Hallo! Lucien, my boy, why here we are patched up again — new stuffing and a new cover. Where have we come from? Have we mounted the high horse once more with little offerings from Florine’s boudoir? Bravo, old chap!” and Blondet released Finot to put his arm affectionately around Lucien and press him to his heart.
Andoche Finot was the proprietor of a review on which Lucien had worked for almost nothing, and to which Blondet gave the benefit of his collaboration, of the wisdom of his suggestions and the depth of his views. Finot and Blondet embodied Bertrand and Raton, with this difference — that la Fontaine’s cat at last showed that he knew himself to be duped, while Blondet, though he knew that he was being fleeced, still did all he could for Finot. This brilliant condottiere of the pen was, in fact, long to remain a slave. Finot hid a brutal strength of will under a heavy exterior, under polish of wit, as a laborer rubs his bread with garlic. He knew how to garner what he gleaned, ideas and crown-pieces alike, in the fields of the dissolute life led by men engaged in letters or in politics.
Works of Honore De Balzac Page 605