Thérèse withdrew. The student took Delphine in his arms and wept for joy. This final contrast between what he was seeing and what he had seen, on a day when his heart and mind had been exhausted by so much turmoil, caused a rush of overwhelming emotion.
‘I knew he loved you, I knew,’ old Goriot said softly to his daughter, while Eugène, drained, sank onto the love-seat incapable of saying a word nor as yet of realizing precisely how this magic wand had been waved.
‘Come and look,’ said Madame de Nucingen, taking him by the hand and leading him into a bedroom whose rugs, furniture and minutest details reminded him of Delphine’s, only smaller.
‘There’s no bed,’ said Rastignac.
‘That’s right, Monsieur,’ she said, flushing and squeezing his hand.
Eugène looked at her, and understood, young though he was, how much genuine modesty there is in the heart of a woman in love.
‘You’re one of those beings who must always be adored,’ he whispered in her ear. ‘Yes, I’m daring to say this because we understand each other so well: the more sincere and strong our love is, the more veiled and mysterious it must be. Let’s not tell anybody our secret.’
‘Oh! I won’t be anybody, not me,’ grunted old man Goriot.
‘You know perfectly well that you count as one of us …’
‘Ah! That’s what I wanted to hear. You won’t take any notice of me, will you? I’ll come and go like a guardian spirit who is present everywhere but never seen. So, Delphinette, my Ninette, my Dedel! I was right, wasn’t I, to say: “There’s a lovely apartment in the Rue d’Artois, let’s furnish it for him!” You didn’t want to. Ah! I’m the author of your joy, just as I’m the author of your days. Fathers must always be giving to be happy. Always to be giving, that’s what makes you a father.’
‘What?’ said Eugène.
‘Yes, she had cold feet, she was scared of what people might say, as if society mattered next to her happiness! But every woman dreams of this …’
Old Goriot was talking to himself. Madame de Nucingen had taken Rastignac into the closet and a kiss was heard, although lightly bestowed. This room was as elegant as the rest of the apartment, which lacked for nothing.
‘Have we managed to divine your wishes?’ she said, as they came back into the drawing room for dinner.
‘Yes,’ he said, ‘only too well. Alas! Such consummate luxury, such beautiful dreams-come-true, all the poetry of a life of youth and fashion – I set too much store by these things to be entirely undeserving, but I can’t accept them from you and I’m still too poor to …’
‘A-ha! You’re resisting me already,’ she said with an air of mock authority, pouting prettily as a woman does when she wants to make fun of some scruple or other, the better to dismiss it.
Eugène had questioned his motives only too soberly that day, and Vautrin’s arrest, having shown him the depth of the abyss into which he had almost fallen, had strengthened his sense of decency and delicacy to such an extent that it was impossible for him to yield to this affectionate refusal of his noble ideas. He felt overwhelmed with sadness.
‘What!’ said Madame de Nucingen, ‘you’re considering turning me down? Do you know what your refusal would mean? That you have doubts about the future, you’re reluctant to attach yourself to me. So you’re afraid that you might betray my affection? If you love me, if I … love you, why should you be put off by such a small obligation? If you knew how much pleasure it has given me to fit out these bachelor rooms, you wouldn’t hesitate, and you’d ask me to forgive you. I had money which belonged to you: I spent it wisely, that’s all there is to it. You think you’re being magnanimous, but you’re being petty. You could ask for so much more …’ (‘Ah!’ she said, catching sight of Eugène’s passionate expression), ‘and you’re making a fuss about the silliest things. If you don’t love me, then yes! yes! don’t accept. My fate hangs on a word from you. Speak to me! Father, give him some good reasons,’ she added, turning towards her father after a pause. ‘Does he think that I’m any less concerned about our honour than he is?’
Old Goriot watched and listened to this lovers’ tiff with the beatific smile of an opium-smoker.
‘Child! You’re on the threshold of life,’ she continued, taking Eugène’s hand; ‘you come up against a barrier many find insurmountable, a woman’s hand opens a way for you – and you shrink back! But you will succeed, you’ll make a brilliant fortune, success is written all over your handsome face. Won’t you be able to return to me then what I’m lending you today? In olden times, didn’t ladies give their knights armour, swords, helmets, chainmail coats and horses so they could fight tournaments in their name? Well, Eugène, I’m offering you the weapons of our times, the tools needed by any man who wants to make something of himself. It must be delightful, the attic you sleep in, if Papa’s room is anything to go by. So, shall we have dinner? Do you want to make me sad? Answer, will you?’ she said, shaking his hand. ‘Lord, Papa, help him decide, or I’ll leave and never see him again.’
‘I’ll make you decide,’ said old man Goriot, coming out of his ecstatic trance. ‘My dear Monsieur Eugène, you borrow money from Jews, don’t you?’
‘I have to,’ he said.
‘Good, I’ve got you there,’ the old fellow went on, pulling out a worn and shabby leather wallet. ‘I’ve made myself a Jew. I paid all the bills – here they are. You don’t owe her a centime for anything in here. It doesn’t amount to much: five thousand francs in all. I’ll lend it to you! You won’t refuse me, I’m not a woman. Write me an IOU on a scrap of paper and pay me back some other time.’
Eugène and Delphine looked at each other in surprise, their eyes brimming with tears. Rastignac reached out and took the old man’s hand in his.
‘Well, what of it! You’re my children, aren’t you?’ said Goriot.
‘But, my poor, dear Father,’ said Madame de Nucingen; ‘how did you do it?’
‘Ah! We’re coming to that,’ he replied. ‘Once I’d convinced you to set him up near you, I watched you buying him his trousseau, so to speak, and I said to myself: “She’s going to get in a pickle!” The solicitor tells me that the legal proceedings against your husband, to make him return your fortune, will take at least six months. So. I sold my perpetuity of thirteen hundred and fifty livres; with fifteen thousand francs I got myself a well-secured life annuity193 of twelve hundred francs; and I used the rest of the capital to pay for your purchases, my children. I have a room up there which will cost me fifty écus a year; I can live like a prince on forty sous a day and I’ll still have some left over. I never wear anything out and I barely need any clothes. I’ve been chuckling away to myself for a fortnight now, saying: “Won’t they be happy!” Well, aren’t you happy?’
‘Oh! Papa, Papa!’ said Madame de Nucingen, throwing herself at her father, who took her on his lap. She showered him with kisses, her blonde hair brushing his cheeks, and wet his radiant and delighted old face with her tears.
‘Dear Father, what a good father you are to me! No, there’s no other father on earth like you. Eugène already loves you so dearly, what will he feel now!’
‘Why, children,’ said old Goriot, who hadn’t felt his daughter’s heart beat next to his for ten years; ‘why, Delphinette, you’ll make me die of happiness. My poor heart is breaking. Now, Monsieur Eugène, we’re already quits!’ And the old man pressed his daughter to him so wildly, so intensely, that she said: ‘Ah! You’re hurting me.’ – ‘I’ve hurt you!’ he said, turning white. He looked at her with an expression of superhuman pain. To paint a true portrait of this Christ of Paternity, one would need to draw comparisons with those images created by princes of the palette to show the sufferings endured by the Saviour of mankind for the sake of the world. Old man Goriot gently kissed the waist that his fingers had dug into.
‘No, no, I’ve not hurt you,’ he went on, with a questioning smile; ‘it was you crying out that hurt me. It cost more than that,’ he whispered in his
daughter’s ear, kissing it carefully, ‘but I had to haul him in or he’d have kept struggling.’
Eugène, stunned by the old man’s inexhaustible devotion, stared at him with that naive admiration which, at a tender age, is akin to trust.
‘I’ll be worthy of all this,’ he cried.
‘O Eugène, you’ve just said the most beautiful thing.’ And Madame de Nucingen kissed the student’s brow.
‘He turned down Mademoiselle Taillefer and her millions for you,’ said old man Goriot. ‘Yes, she loved you, the young lady; and now, with her brother dead, she’s as rich as Croesus.’194
‘Oh! Why mention that?’ cried Rastignac.
‘Eugène,’ Delphine said in his ear, ‘that’s the only regret I’ve felt all evening. Ah! I’ll love you too, I will! and always.’
‘This is the most wonderful day I’ve had since you were both married,’ cried old man Goriot. ‘The good Lord can make me suffer all he pleases, as long as it’s not through you. I’ll just say to myself: “In February of this year, I was happier for one moment than some men are in their whole lives.” Look at me, Fifine!’ he said to his daughter. ‘Isn’t she beautiful? Now tell me, have you met many women with her pretty colour and her sweet dimple? No, of course you haven’t. Well, I made this darling woman. She’ll be a thousand times more beautiful now that she has you to make her happy. I won’t mind going to hell, neighbour,’ he said; ‘if you need my share of paradise, I’ll give it to you. Let’s eat, let’s eat,’ he went on, no longer knowing what he was saying; ‘all of this is ours.’
‘Poor old Father!’
‘If only you knew, child,’ he said, standing up and going to where she sat, taking hold of her head and kissing the crown of her hair braids, ‘how little it costs you to make me happy! Come and see me sometimes; I’ll be upstairs, just a step away. Promise me you will!’
‘Yes, dearest Father.’
‘Say it again.’
‘Yes, sweetest Father.’
‘Shush! I’d make you say that a hundred times if I let myself. Let’s eat.’
They spent the whole evening behaving like children and old Goriot was by no means the least silly of the three. He lay down at his daughter’s feet to kiss them; he kept gazing into her eyes; he rubbed his head against her dress: in all, he was as playful as the youngest and most tender lover.
‘You see how it is?’ said Delphine to Eugène; ‘when my father is with us, he must have all of me. But it will be rather a nuisance sometimes.’
Eugène, who had already felt several pangs of jealousy, couldn’t blame her for these words, which enshrined the principle of every ingratitude.
‘And when will the apartment be finished?’ said Eugène, looking around the room. ‘We must part this evening, then?’
‘Yes, but tomorrow you’ll come and dine with me,’ she said, delicately. ‘Tomorrow is a day for the Italiens.’
‘I’ll be there too, in the stalls,’ said old man Goriot.
It was midnight. Madame de Nucingen’s carriage was waiting. On their way back to the Maison Vauquer, old Goriot and the student talked about Delphine in increasingly enthusiastic terms, which led to a curious battle of words, as each sought to express the intensity of his own passion. Eugène could not help but see that the father’s love, untainted by self-interest, far outstripped his own in scope and persistence. The idol was always beautiful and pure in the father’s eyes and his adoration was nourished as much by the past as the future. They found Madame Vauquer sitting alone by her stove, between Sylvie and Christophe. The old landlady had the tragic air of Marius among the ruins of Carthage.195 She had been waiting up for her last two remaining lodgers, bewailing her lot to Sylvie. Although Lord Byron has put some fine lamentations into the mouth of Tasso,196 they fall a long way short of the profound truth of those that now poured out of Madame Vauquer’s.
‘So, Sylvie, only three cups of coffee for you to make tomorrow morning. Eh! My boarding house, deserted – isn’t that enough to break your heart? What’s my life without my lodgers? Nothing. The house is unfurnished, stripped of its people. Life is in the furniture. What in heaven have I done to bring down so much disaster upon my head? I’ve laid in enough
beans and potatoes for twenty people. The police, in my house! Well, in that case all we’ll eat is potatoes! I’ll have to sack Christophe!’
The Savoyard, who was asleep, woke up with a start and said: ‘Madame?’
‘Poor lad! He’s like a great mastiff,’ said Sylvie.
‘It’s the slack season; everyone has found a place to stay. They’re not going to drop into my lap, are they, these lodgers? I’ll go mad. And that witch of a Michonneau making off with my Poiret! What did she do to the man for him to go trotting after her like a little dog?’
‘Pah! I don’t know,’ exclaimed Sylvie, shaking her head; ‘they’re up to all kinds of tricks, them old maids.’
‘And then that poor Monsieur Vautrin they’ve gone and made a convict,’ the widow went on. ‘Well, Sylvie, I can’t help myself, I still don’t believe it. A gay dog like him, who drank his gloria for fifteen francs a month and always paid cash on the nail!’
‘And gave good tips!’ said Christophe.
‘It’s all a mistake,’ said Sylvie.
‘But, no: he confessed of his own accord,’ continued Madame Vauquer. ‘And to think it all happened in my house, in a street where you never see so much as a cat having a scratch! Upon my word, sure as I’m an honest woman, I must be dreaming. Because, look at it this way: we saw Louis XVI have his little accident, we saw the Emperor go, we saw him come back and go again – that was all within the realm of possibility; but what are the odds against boarding houses? We can do without a king, but we always need to eat; and when an honest woman, née de Conflans, puts a decent dinner on the table, as long as it’s not the end of the world … Why, that must be it: it’s the end of the world.’
‘And to think that Mademoiselle Michonneau, who done this to you, will get a thousand écus a year for it, so I’ve heard!’ exclaimed Sylvie.
‘Don’t mention her, I can’t bear it, she’s a strumpet, that’s what!’ said Madame Vauquer. ‘And to top it all, she’s gone knocking on Buneaud’s door! Why, there’s nothing she wouldn’t stoop to. I’ll bet she’s done some terrible things in her time, killing and thieving. They ought to pack her off to prison instead of that poor dear man …’
At this point Eugène and old Goriot rang the bell.
‘Ah! Here come my two old faithfuls,’ said the widow, sighing.
The two old faithfuls, who only dimly remembered the disasters that had struck the boarding house, unceremoniously announced to their hostess that they were moving to the Chaussée d’Antin.
‘Ah! Sylvie!’ said the widow, ‘that’s my last card played. You’ve struck the death-blow, Gentlemen! It has hit me right in the stomach. You’ve knocked all the stuffing out of me. I must have aged ten years in one day. I’ll lose my mind, I swear! What am I going to do with those beans? Dear, dear! Well, if I’m going to be here all alone, you’ll have to leave tomorrow, Christophe. Farewell, Gentlemen, good night.’
‘What’s the matter with her?’ Eugène asked Sylvie.
‘Bless me if all her lodgers haven’t gone and left, after that business today. It’s made her lose her head. Listen, she’s crying. It’ll do her good to have a bit of a weep. This is the first time she’s ever shed a tear since I’ve been working for her.’
The next day, Madame Vauquer, as she herself put it, was finally reconcealed. Although she seemed distressed, as any woman would be who has just lost all her lodgers and whose life has fallen apart, she was clearly herself again and showed that her true grief was, at bottom, the grief of dented self-interest and disrupted routine. It goes without saying that the last lingering look a departing lover gives his mistress’s house is nowhere near as tragic as the one Madame Vauquer now cast over her empty table. Eugène consoled her, saying that Bianchon, whose residency as
house doctor ended in a few days’ time, was bound to come and replace him; that the museum clerk had often expressed a wish to have Madame Couture’s apartment and that in a few days’ time she’d have a full house once again.
‘May God hear your prayer, dear Monsieur! But misfortune has moved in. Death will follow within ten days, you’ll see,’ she said to him, staring lugubriously around the dining room. ‘Who will he take?’
‘I’m so glad we’re moving out,’ said Eugène to old man Goriot, under his breath.
‘Madame,’ said Sylvie, running in, looking worried; ‘I haven’t seen Mistigris for three days.’
‘Ah! Well, if my cat is dead, if he’s left us, I …’
The poor widow broke off, wringing her hands, and sank back in her chair, overwhelmed by this portent of doom.
V
THE TWO DAUGHTERS
At around twelve, by which time postmen make it up to the Panthéon and its surrounding area, Eugène received a letter in an elegant envelope, embossed with the de Beauséant coat-of-arms. It contained an invitation, addressed to Monsieur and Madame de Nucingen, to the great ball announced a month previously, which would be held at the vicomtesse’s house. Also enclosed was a short note for Eugène:
‘I thought, Monsieur, that you would gladly undertake to communicate my sentiments to Madame de Nucingen; I am sending you the invitation you requested and would be delighted to make the acquaintance of Madame de Restaud’s sister. Be sure to bring me that charming lady and try not to let her have all your affection, for you owe me a good deal in return for that which I feel towards you.
Vicomtesse de BEAUSEANT.’
‘I see,’ Eugène said to himself, as he read the note a second time; ‘Madame de Beauséant is quite clearly telling me that she wants nothing to do with the Baron de Nucingen.’ He promptly set off for Delphine’s house, happy to be procuring her a pleasure for which he would no doubt be rewarded.