Father Goriot
decided his fate. Mlle. Michonneau had very nearly made up her mind to
warn the convict and to throw herself on his generosity, with the idea
of making a better bargain for herself by helping him to escape that
night; but as it was, she went out escorted by Poiret in search of the
famous chief of detectives in the Petite Rue Saint-Anne, still thinking
that it was the district superintendent--one Gondureau--with whom she
had to do. The head of the department received his visitors courteously.
There was a little talk, and the details were definitely arranged. Mlle.
Michonneau asked for the draught that she was to administer in order to
set about her investigation. But the great man’s evident satisfaction
set Mlle. Michonneau thinking; and she began to see that this business
involved something more than the mere capture of a runaway convict. She
racked her brains while he looked in a drawer in his desk for the
little phial, and it dawned upon her that in consequence of treacherous
revelations made by the prisoners the police were hoping to lay their
hands on a considerable sum of money. But on hinting her suspicions to
the old fox of the Petite Rue Saint-Anne, that officer began to smile,
and tried to put her off the scent.
“A delusion,” he said. “Collin’s _sorbonne_ is the most dangerous that
has yet been found among the dangerous classes. That is all, and the
rascals are quite aware of it. They rally round him; he is the backbone
of the federation, its Bonaparte, in short; he is very popular with them
all. The rogue will never leave his _chump_ in the Place de Greve.”
As Mlle. Michonneau seemed mystified, Gondureau explained the two
slang words for her benefit. _Sorbonne_ and _chump_ are two forcible
expressions borrowed from thieves’ Latin, thieves, of all people, being
compelled to consider the human head in its two aspects. A sorbonne is
the head of a living man, his faculty of thinking--his council; a chump
is a contemptuous epithet that implies how little a human head is worth
after the axe has done its work.
“Collin is playing us off,” he continued. “When we come across a man
like a bar of steel tempered in the English fashion, there is always one
resource left--we can kill him if he takes it into his head to make the
least resistance. We are reckoning on several methods of killing Collin
to-morrow morning. It saves a trial, and society is rid of him without
all the expense of guarding and feeding him. What with getting up the
case, summoning witnesses, paying their expenses, and carrying out the
sentence, it costs a lot to go through all the proper formalities before
you can get quit of one of these good-for-nothings, over and above the
three thousand francs that you are going to have. There is a saving
in time as well. One good thrust of the bayonet into Trompe-la-Mort’s
paunch will prevent scores of crimes, and save fifty scoundrels from
following his example; they will be very careful to keep themselves out
of the police courts. That is doing the work of the police thoroughly,
and true philanthropists will tell you that it is better to prevent
crime than to punish it.”
“And you do a service to our country,” said Poiret.
“Really, you are talking in a very sensible manner tonight, that you
are,” said the head of the department. “Yes, of course, we are serving
our country, and we are very hardly used too. We do society very great
services that are not recognized. In fact, a superior man must rise
above vulgar prejudices, and a Christian must resign himself to
the mishaps that doing right entails, when right is done in an
out-of-the-way style. Paris is Paris, you see! That is the explanation
of my life.--I have the honor to wish you a good-evening, mademoiselle.
I shall bring my men to the Jardin du Roi in the morning. Send
Christophe to the Rue du Buffon, tell him to ask for M. Gondureau in the
house where you saw me before.--Your servant, sir. If you should ever
have anything stolen from you, come to me, and I will do my best to get
it back for you.”
“Well, now,” Poiret remarked to Mlle. Michonneau, “there are idiots
who are scared out of their wits by the word police. That was a very
pleasant-spoken gentleman, and what he wants you to do is as easy as
saying ‘Good-day.’”
The next day was destined to be one of the most extraordinary in the
annals of the Maison Vauquer. Hitherto the most startling occurrence in
its tranquil existence had been the portentous, meteor-like apparition
of the sham Comtesse de l’Ambermesnil. But the catastrophes of this
great day were to cast all previous events into the shade, and supply an
inexhaustible topic of conversation for Mme. Vauquer and her boarders so
long as she lived.
In the first place, Goriot and Eugene de Rastignac both slept till close
upon eleven o’clock. Mme. Vauquer, who came home about midnight from
the Gaite, lay a-bed till half-past ten. Christophe, after a prolonged
slumber (he had finished Vautrin’s first bottle of wine), was behindhand
with his work, but Poiret and Mlle. Michonneau uttered no complaint,
though breakfast was delayed. As for Victorine and Mme. Couture, they
also lay late. Vautrin went out before eight o’clock, and only came back
just as breakfast was ready. Nobody protested, therefore, when Sylvie
and Christophe went up at a quarter past eleven, knocked at all the
doors, and announced that breakfast was waiting. While Sylvie and the
man were upstairs, Mlle. Michonneau, who came down first, poured the
contents of the phial into the silver cup belonging to Vautrin--it was
standing with the others in the bain-marie that kept the cream hot for
the morning coffee. The spinster had reckoned on this custom of the
house to do her stroke of business. The seven lodgers were at last
collected together, not without some difficulty. Just as Eugene came
downstairs, stretching himself and yawning, a commissionaire handed him
a letter from Mme. de Nucingen. It ran thus:--
“I feel neither false vanity nor anger where you are concerned, my
friend. Till two o’clock this morning I waited for you. Oh, that waiting
for one whom you love! No one that had passed through that torture could
inflict it on another. I know now that you have never loved before.
What can have happened? Anxiety has taken hold of me. I would have come
myself to find out what had happened, if I had not feared to betray the
secrets of my heart. How can I walk out or drive out at this time of
day? Would it not be ruin? I have felt to the full how wretched it is to
be a woman. Send a word to reassure me, and explain how it is that you
have not come after what my father told you. I shall be angry, but I
will forgive you. One word, for pity’s sake. You will come to me soon,
will you not? If you are busy, a line will be enough. Say, ‘I will
hasten to you,’ or else, ‘I am ill.’ But if you were ill my father would
have come to tell me so. What can have happened?...”
“Yes, indeed, what has happened?” exclaimed Eugene, and, hurrying down
to the dining-room, he crumpled up the letter without reading any more.
“What time is it?”
“Half-past eleven,” said Vautrin, dropping a lump of sugar into his
coffee.
The escaped convict cast a glance at Eugene, a cold and fascinating
glance; men gifted with this magnetic power can quell furious lunatics
in a madhouse by such a glance, it is said. Eugene shook in every limb.
There was the sound of wheels in the street, and in another moment a man
with a scared face rushed into the room. It was one of M. Taillefer’s
servants; Mme. Couture recognized the livery at once.
“Mademoiselle,” he cried, “your father is asking for you--something
terrible has happened! M. Frederic has had a sword thrust in the
forehead in a duel, and the doctors have given him up. You will scarcely
be in time to say good-bye to him! he is unconscious.”
“Poor young fellow!” exclaimed Vautrin. “How can people brawl when they
have a certain income of thirty thousand livres? Young people have bad
manners, and that is a fact.”
“Sir!” cried Eugene.
“Well, what then, you big baby!” said Vautrin, swallowing down his
coffee imperturbably, an operation which Mlle. Michonneau watched with
such close attention that she had no emotion to spare for the amazing
news that had struck the others dumb with amazement. “Are there not
duels every morning in Paris?” added Vautrin.
“I will go with you, Victorine,” said Mme. Couture, and the two women
hurried away at once without either hats or shawls. But before she
went, Victorine, with her eyes full of tears, gave Eugene a glance that
said--“How little I thought that our happiness should cost me tears!”
“Dear me, you are a prophet, M. Vautrin,” said Mme. Vauquer.
“I am all sorts of things,” said Vautrin.
“Queer, isn’t it?” said Mme. Vauquer, stringing together a succession of
commonplaces suited to the occasion. “Death takes us off without asking
us about it. The young often go before the old. It is a lucky thing
for us women that we are not liable to fight duels, but we have other
complaints that men don’t suffer from. We bear children, and it takes a
long time to get over it. What a windfall for Victorine! Her father will
have to acknowledge her now!”
“There!” said Vautrin, looking at Eugene, “yesterday she had not a
penny; this morning she has several millions to her fortune.”
“I say, M. Eugene!” cried Mme. Vauquer, “you have landed on your feet!”
At this exclamation, Father Goriot looked at the student, and saw the
crumpled letter still in his hand.
“You have not read it through! What does this mean? Are you going to be
like the rest of them?” he asked.
“Madame, I shall never marry Mlle. Victorine,” said Eugene, turning to
Mme. Vauquer with an expression of terror and loathing that surprised
the onlookers at this scene.
Father Goriot caught the student’s hand and grasped it warmly. He could
have kissed it.
“Oh, ho!” said Vautrin, “the Italians have a good proverb--_Col tempo_.”
“Is there any answer?” said Mme. de Nucingen’s messenger, addressing
Eugene.
“Say that I will come directly.”
The man went. Eugene was in a state of such violent excitement that he
could not be prudent.
“What is to be done?” he exclaimed aloud. “There are no proofs!”
Vautrin began to smile. Though the drug he had taken was doing its work,
the convict was so vigorous that he rose to his feet, gave Rastignac a
look, and said in hollow tones, “Luck comes to us while we sleep, young
man,” and fell stiff and stark, as if he were struck dead.
“So there is a Divine Justice!” said Eugene.
“Well, if ever! What has come to that poor dear M. Vautrin?”
“A stroke!” cried Mlle. Michonneau.
“Here, Sylvie! girl, run for the doctor,” called the widow. “Oh, M.
Rastignac, just go for M. Bianchon, and be as quick as you can; Sylvie
might not be in time to catch our doctor, M. Grimprel.”
Rastignac was glad of an excuse to leave that den of horrors, his hurry
for the doctor was nothing but a flight.
“Here, Christophe, go round to the chemist’s and ask for something
that’s good for the apoplexy.”
Christophe likewise went.
“Father Goriot, just help us to get him upstairs.”
Vautrin was taken up among them, carried carefully up the narrow
staircase, and laid upon his bed.
“I can do no good here, so I shall go to see my daughter,” said M.
Goriot.
“Selfish old thing!” cried Mme. Vauquer. “Yes, go; I wish you may die
like a dog.”
“Just go and see if you can find some ether,” said Mlle. Michonneau to
Mme. Vauquer; the former, with some help from Poiret, had unfastened the
sick man’s clothes.
Mme. Vauquer went down to her room, and left Mlle. Michonneau mistress
of the situation.
“Now! just pull down his shirt and turn him over, quick! You might be