The Red and the Black: A Chronicle of 1830
saying. The marquise scarcely deigned to look at him. There were
several men there, among whom Julien recognised with an inexpressible
pleasure the young bishop of Agde who had deigned to speak to him some
months before at the ceremony of Bray-le-Haut. This young prelate was
doubtless frightened by the tender look which the timidity of Julien
fixed on him, and did not bother to recognise "the provincial."
The men assembled in this salon seemed to Julien to have a certain
element of gloom and constraint. Conversation takes place in a low
voice in Paris and little details are not exaggerated.
A handsome young man with moustaches, came in about half-past six. He
was very pale, and had a very small head.
"You always keep us waiting" said the marquise, as he kissed her hand.
Julien realised that it was the Count de la Mole. From the very first
he thought he was charming.
"Is it possible," he said to himself "that this is the man whose
offensive jests are going to drive me out of the house."
As the result of scrutinising count Norbert, Julien noticed that he
was in boots and spurs. "And I have got to be in shoes just like
an inferior apparently." They sat down at table, Julien heard the
marquise raising her voice a little and saying something severe. Almost
simultaneously he noticed an extremely blonde and very well developed
young person who had just sat down opposite him. Nevertheless she
made no appeal to him. Looking at her attentively he thought that he
had never seen such beautiful eyes, although they betokened a great
coldness of soul. Subsequently Julien thought that, though they
looked bored and sceptical, they were conscious of the duty of being
impressive. "Madame de Rênal of course had very fine eyes" he said to
himself, "she used to be universally complimented on them, but they had
nothing in common with these." Julien did not know enough of society
to appreciate that it was the fire of repartee which from time to time
gave their brilliancy to the eyes of Mademoiselle Mathilde (for that
was the name he heard her called by). When Madame de Rênal's eyes
became animated, it was with the fire of passion, or as the result of a
generous indignation on hearing of some evil deed. Towards the end of
the meal Julien found a word to express Mademoiselle de la Mole's type
of beauty. Her eyes are scintillating, he said to himself. Apart from
her eyes she was cruelly like her mother, whom he liked less and less,
and he ceased looking at her. By way of compensation he thought Count
Norbert admirable in every respect. Julien was so fascinated that the
idea never occurred to him of being jealous, and hating him because he
was richer and of nobler birth than he was himself.
Julien thought that the marquis looked bored.
About the second course he said to his son: "Norbert, I ask all your
good offices for M. Julien Sorel, whom I have just taken into my staff
and of whom I hope to make a man _si cella se peut_."
"He is my secretary," said the marquis to his neighbour, "and he spells
cela with two ll's." Everybody looked at Julien, who bowed to Norbert
in a manner that was slightly too marked, but speaking generally they
were satisfied with his expression.
The marquis must have spoken about the kind of education which Julien
had received for one of the guests tackled him on Horace. "It was
just by talking about Horace that I succeeded with the bishop of
Besançon," said Julien to himself. Apparently that is the only author
they know. From that instant he was master of himself. This transition
was rendered easy because he had just decided that he would never look
upon Madamoiselle de la Mole as a woman after his own taste. Since the
seminary he had the lowest opinion of men, and was not to be easily
intimidated by them. He would have enjoyed all his self-possession if
the dining-room had been furnished with less magnificence. It was,
as a matter of fact, two mirrors each eight feet high in which he
would look from time to time at the man who was speaking to him about
Horace, which continued to impress him. His phrases were not too long
for a provincial, he had fine eyes whose brilliancy was doubled by his
quavering timidity, or by his happy bashfulness when he had given a
good answer. They found him pleasant. This kind of examination gave
a little interest to a solemn dinner. The marquis signed to Julien's
questioner to press him sharply. "Can he possibly know something?" he
thought.
Julien answered and thought out new ideas. He lost sufficient of his
nervousness, not indeed to exhibit any wit, for that is impossible
for any one ignorant of the special language which is used in Paris,
but to show himself possessed of ideas which, though presented out of
place and ungracefully, were yet original. They saw that he knew Latin
perfectly.
Julien's adversary was a member of the Academy Inscriptions who chanced
to know Latin. He found Julien a very good humanist, was not frightened
of making him feel uncomfortable, and really tried to embarrass him. In
the heat of the controversy Julien eventually forgot the magnificent
furniture of the dining-room. He managed to expound theories concerning
the Latin poets which his questioner had never read of anywhere. Like
an honest man, he gave the young secretary all due credit for them.
As luck would have it, they started a discussion on the question
of whether Horace was poor or rich, a good humoured and careless
voluptuary who made verses to amuse himself, like Chapelle the friend
of Molière and de la Fontaine, or a poor devil of a poet laureate who
wrote odes for the king's birthday like Southey, the accuser of Lord
Byron. They talked about the state of society under Augustus and under
George IV. At both periods the aristocracy was all-powerful, but,
while at Rome it was despoiled of its power by Maecenas who was only a
simple knight, it had in England reduced George IV practically to the
position of a Venetian doge. This discussion seemed to lift the marquis
out of that state of bored torpor in which he had been plunged at the
beginning of the dinner.
Julien found meaningless such modern names as Southey, Lord Byron,
and George IV, which he now heard pronounced for the first time. But
every one noticed that whenever the conversation dealt with events that
had taken place in Rome and about which knowledge could be obtained
by a perusal of the works of Horace, Martial or Tacitus, etc., he
showed an indisputable superiority. Julien coolly appropriated several
ideas which he had learnt from the bishop of Besançon in the historic
conversation which he had had with that prelate. These ideas were not
the least appreciated.
When every one was tired of talking about poets the marquise, who
always made it a rule to admire whatever amused her husband, deigned
to look at Julien. "Perhaps an educated man lies hid beneath the
clumsy manners of this young abbé," said the Academician who happened
to be near the marquise. Julien caught a few words of what he said.
Ready-made phrases suited the intellect of the mistress of the house
quite well. She adopted this one about Julien, and was very pleased
with herself for having invited the academician to dinner. "He has
amused M. de la Mole" she thought.
CHAPTER XXXIII
THE FIRST STEPS
This immense valley, filled with brilliant lights and so
many thousands of men dazzles my sight. No one knows me.
All are superior to me. I lose my head. _Poemi dell' av.
REINA_.
Julien was copying letters in the library very early the next day
when Mademoiselle Mathilde came in by a little dummy door very well
masked by the backs of the books. While Julien was admiring the
device, Mademoiselle Mathilde seemed astonished and somewhat annoyed
at finding him there: Julien saw that she was in curl-papers and had
a hard, haughty, and masculine expression. Mademoiselle de la Mole
had the habit of surreptitiously stealing books from her father's
library. Julien's presence rendered this morning's journey abortive,
a fact which annoyed her all the more as she had come to fetch the
second volume of Voltaire's _Princess of Babylon_, a worthy climax to
one of the most eminently monarchical and religious educations which
the convent of the Sacred Heart had ever provided. This poor girl of
nineteen already required some element of spiciness in order to get up
an interest in a novel.
Count Norbert put in an appearance in the library about three o'clock.
He had come to study a paper so as to be able to talk politics in the
evening, and was very glad to meet Julien, whose existence he had
forgotten. He was charming, and offered him a ride on horseback.
"My father will excuse us until dinner."
Julien appreciated the us and thought it charming.
"Great heavens! M. le Comte," said Julien, "if it were a question of
felling an eighty-foot tree or hewing it out and making it into planks
I would acquit myself all right, I daresay, but as for riding a horse,
I haven't done such a thing six times in my life."
"Well, this will be the seventh," said Norbert.
As a matter of fact, Julien remembered the king of ----'s entry into
Verrières, and thought he rode extremely well. But as they were
returning from the Bois de Boulogne he fell right in the middle of the
Rue du Bac, as he suddenly tried to get out of the way of a cabriolet,
and was spattered all over with mud. It was lucky that he had two
suits. The marquis, wishing to favour him with a few words at dinner,
asked him for news of his excursion. Norbert began immediately to
answer him in general terms.
"M. le Comte is extremely kind to me," answered Julien. "I thank him
for it, and I fully appreciate it. He was good enough to have the
quietest and prettiest horse given to me, but after all he could
not tie me on to it, and owing to the lack of that precaution, I
had a fall right in the middle of that long street near the bridge.
Madame Mathilde made a futile effort to hide a burst of laughter, and
subsequently was indiscreet enough to ask for details. Julien acquitted
himself with much simplicity. He had grace without knowing it.
"I prophesy favourably about that little priest," said the marquis to
the academician. "Think of a provincial being simple over a matter like
that. Such a thing has never been witnessed before, and will never be
witnessed again; and what is more, he describes his misfortune before
ladies."
Julien put his listeners so thoroughly at their ease over his
misfortune that at the end of the dinner, when the general conversation
had gone off on to another subject, Mademoiselle Mathilde asked her
brother some questions over the details of the unfortunate occurrence.
As she put numerous questions, and as Julien met her eyes several
times, he ventured to answer himself, although the questions had not
been addressed to him, and all three of them finished up by laughing
just as though they had all been inhabitants of some village in the
depths of a forest.
On the following day Julien attended two theology lectures, and then
came back to copy out about twenty letters. He found a young man, who
though very carefully dressed, had a mean appearance and an envious
expression, established near him in the library.
The marquis entered, "What are you doing here, M. Tanbeau?" he said
severely to the new-comer.
"I thought--" answered the young man, with a base smile.
"No, monsieur, you thought nothing of the kind. This is a try-on, but
it is an unfortunate one."
Young Tanbeau got up in a rage and disappeared. He was a nephew of the
academician who was a friend of Madame de la Mole, and intended to take
up the profession of letters. The academician had induced the marquis