Works of Honore De Balzac

by Honoré de Balzac

  “You are not going?” cried Adam.

  “Yes, I shall go, my dear fellow. Captain I came, and captain I return. We shall dine together to-morrow for the last time. If I don’t start at once for St. Petersburg I shall have to make the journey by land, and I am not rich, and I must leave Malaga a little independence. I ought to think of the only woman who has been able to understand me; she thinks me grand, superior. I dare say she is faithless, but she would jump — ”

  “Through the hoop, for your sake and come down safely on the back of her horse,” said Clementine sharply.

  “Oh, you don’t know Malaga,” said the captain, bitterly, with a sarcastic look in his eyes which made Clementine thoughtful and uneasy.

  “Good-by to the young trees of this beautiful Bois, which you Parisians love, and the exiles who find a home here love too,” he said, presently. “My eyes will never again see the evergreens of the avenue de Mademoiselle, nor the acacias nor the cedars of the rond-points. On the borders of Asia, fighting for the Emperor, promoted to the command, perhaps, by force of courage and by risking my life, it may happen that I shall regret these Champs-Elysees where I have driven beside you, and where you pass. Yes, I shall grieve for Malaga’s hardness — the Malaga of whom I am now speaking.”

  This was said in a manner that made Clementine tremble.

  “Then you do love Malaga very much?” she asked.

  “I have sacrificed for her the honor that no man should ever sacrifice.”

  “What honor?”

  “That which we desire to keep at any cost in the eyes of our idol.”

  After that reply Thaddeus said no more; he was silent until, as they passed a wooden building on the Champs Elysees, he said, pointing to it, “That is the Circus.”

  He went to the Russian Embassy before dinner, and thence to the Foreign office, and the next morning he had started for Havre before the count and countess were up.

  “I have lost a friend,” said Adam, with tears in his eyes, when he heard that Paz had gone, — ”a friend in the true meaning of the word. I don’t know what has made him abandon me as if a pestilence were in my house. We are not friends to quarrel about a woman,” he said, looking intently at Clementine. “You heard what he said yesterday about Malaga. Well, he has never so much as touched the little finger of that girl.”

  “How do you know that?” said Clementine.

  “I had the natural curiosity to go and see Mademoiselle Turquet, and the poor girl can’t explain even to herself the absolute reserve which Thad — ”

  “Enough!” said the countess, retreating into her bedroom. “Can it be that I am the victim of some noble mystification?” she asked herself. The thought had hardly crossed her mind when Constantin brought her the following letter written by Thaddeus during the night: —

  “Countess, — To seek death in the Caucasus and carry with me your

  contempt is more than I can bear. A man should die untainted. When

  I saw you for the first time I loved you as we love a woman whom

  we shall love forever, even though she be unfaithful to us. I

  loved you thus, — I, the friend of the man you had chosen and were

  about to marry; I, poor; I, the steward, — a voluntary service, but

  still the steward of your household.

  “In this immense misfortune I found a happy life. To be to you an

  indispensable machine, to know myself useful to your comfort, your

  luxury, has been the source of deep enjoyments. If these

  enjoyments were great when I thought only of Adam, think what they

  were to my soul when the woman I loved was the mainspring of all I

  did. I have known the pleasures of maternity in my love. I

  accepted life thus. Like the paupers who live along the great

  highways, I built myself a hut on the borders of your beautiful

  domain, though I never sought to approach you. Poor and lonely,

  struck blind by Adam’s good fortune, I was, nevertheless, the

  giver. Yes, you were surrounded by a love as pure as a

  guardian-angel’s; it waked while you slept; it caressed you with a

  look as you passed; it was happy in its own existence, — you were

  the sun of my native land to me, poor exile, who now writes to you

  with tears in his eyes as he thinks of the happiness of those first

  days.

  “When I was eighteen years old, having no one to love, I took for

  my ideal mistress a charming woman in Warsaw, to whom I confided

  all my thoughts, my wishes; I made her the queen of my nights and

  days. She knew nothing of all this; why should she? I loved my

  love.

  “You can fancy from this incident of my youth how happy I was

  merely to live in the sphere of your existence, to groom your

  horse, to find the new-coined gold for your purse, to prepare the

  splendor of your dinners and your balls, to see you eclipsing the

  elegance of those whose fortunes were greater than yours, and all

  by my own good management. Ah! with what ardor I have ransacked

  Paris when Adam would say to me, ‘She wants this or that.’ It was

  a joy such as I can never express to you. You wished for a trifle

  at one time which kept me seven hours in a cab scouring the city;

  and what delight it was to weary myself for you. Ah! when I saw

  you, unseen by you, smiling among your flowers, I could forget

  that no one loved me. On certain days, when my happiness turned my

  head, I went at night and kissed the spot where, to me, your feet

  had left their luminous traces. The air you had breathed was

  balmy; in it I breathed in more of life; I inhaled, as they say

  persons do in the tropics, a vapor laden with creative principles.

  “I must tell you these things to explain the strange presumption

  of my involuntary thoughts, — I would have died rather than avow it

  until now.

  “You will remember those few days of curiosity when you wished to

  know the man who performed the household miracles you had

  sometimes noticed. I thought, — forgive me, madame, — I believed you

  might love me. Your good-will, your glances interpreted by me, a

  lover, seemed to me so dangerous — for me — that I invented that

  story of Malaga, knowing it was the sort of liaison which women

  cannot forgive. I did it in a moment when I felt that my love

  would be communicated, fatally, to you. Despise me, crush me with

  the contempt you have so often cast upon me when I did not deserve

  it; and yet I am certain that, if, on that evening when your aunt

  took Adam away from you, I had said what I have now written to

  you, I should, like the tamed tiger that sets his teeth once more

  in living flesh, and scents the blood, and —

  “Midnight.

  “I could not go on; the memory of that hour is still too living.

  Yes, I was maddened. Was there hope for me in your eyes? then

  victory with its scarlet banners would have flamed in mine and

  fascinated yours. My crime has been to think all this; perhaps

  wrongly. You alone can judge of that dreadful scene when I drove

  back love, desire, all the most invincible forces of our manhood,

  with the cold hand of gratitude, — gratitude which must be eternal.

  “Your terrible contempt has been my punishment. You have shown me

  there is no return from loathing or disdain. I love you madly. I

  should have gone had Adam died; all the more must I go because he

  lives. A man does not tear his friend from the arms of death to

  betray him. Besid
es, my going is my punishment for the thought

  that came to me that I would let him die, when the doctors said

  that his life depended on his nursing.

  “Adieu, madame; in leaving Paris I lose all, but you lose nothing

  now in my being no longer near you.

  “Your devoted

  “Thaddeus Paz.”

  “If my poor Adam says he has lost a friend, what have I lost?” thought Clementine, sinking into a chair with her eyes fixed on the carpet.

  The following letter Constantin had orders to give privately to the count: —

  “My dear Adam, — Malaga has told me all. In the name of all your

  future happiness, never let a word escape you to Clementine about

  your visits to that girl; let her think that Malaga has cost me a

  hundred thousand francs. I know Clementine’s character; she will

  never forgive you either your losses at cards or your visits to

  Malaga.

  “I am not going to Khiva, but to the Caucasus. I have the spleen;

  and at the pace at which I mean to go I shall be either Prince

  Paz in three years, or dead. Good-by; though I have taken

  sixty-thousand francs from Nucingen, our accounts are even.

  “Thaddeus.”

  “Idiot that I was,” thought Adam; “I came near to cutting my throat just now, talking about Malaga.”

  It is now three years since Paz went away. The newspapers have as yet said nothing about any Prince Paz. The Comtesse Laginska is immensely interested in the expeditions of the Emperor Nicholas; she is Russian to the core, and reads with a sort of avidity all the news that comes from that distant land. Once or twice every winter she says to the Russian ambassador, with an air of indifference, “Do you know what has become of our poor Comte Paz?”

  Alas! most Parisian women, those beings who think themselves so clever and clear-sighted, pass and repass beside a Paz and never recognize him. Yes, many a Paz is unknown and misconceived, but — horrible to think of! — some are misconceived even though they are loved. The simplest women in society exact a certain amount of conventional sham from the greatest men. A noble love signifies nothing to them if rough and unpolished; it needs the cutting and setting of a jeweller to give it value in their eyes.

  In January, 1842, the Comtesse Laginska, with her charm of gentle melancholy, inspired a violent passion in the Comte de La Palferine, one of the most daring and presumptuous lions of the day. La Palferine was well aware that the conquest of a woman so guarded by reserve as the Comtesse Laginska was difficult, but he thought he could inveigle this charming creature into committing herself if he took her unawares, by the assistance of a certain friend of her own, a woman already jealous of her.

  Quite incapable, in spite of her intelligence, of suspecting such treachery, the Comtesse Laginska committed the imprudence of going with her so-called friend to a masked ball at the Opera. About three in the morning, led away by the excitement of the scene, Clementine, on whom La Palferine had expended his seductions, consented to accept a supper, and was about to enter the carriage of her faithless friend. At this critical moment her arm was grasped by a powerful hand, and she was taken, in spite of her struggles, to her own carriage, the door of which stood open, though she did not know it was there.

  “He has never left Paris!” she exclaimed to herself as she recognized Thaddeus, who disappeared when the carriage drove away.

  Did any woman ever have a like romance in her life? Clementine is constantly hoping she may again see Paz.

  A DAUGHTER OF EVE

  Translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley

  This short novel was initially published in 1838 and introduces two married sisters, Marie-Angelique and Marie-Eugenie. As the novel opens, Angelique is weeping and Eugenie is trying to comfort her, but admits that her marriage is not a happy one and Angelique should not look to her for help. Balzac then explains their background, detailing their lives and the marriages they have had.

  An original illustration

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER I. THE TWO MARIES

  CHAPTER II. A CONFIDENCE BETWEEN SISTERS

  CHAPTER III. THE HISTORY OF A FORTUNATE WOMAN

  CHAPTER IV. A CELEBRATED MAN

  CHAPTER V. FLORINE

  CHAPTER VI. ROMANTIC LOVE

  CHAPTER VII. SUICIDE

  CHAPTER VIII. A LOVER SAVED AND LOST

  CHAPTER IX. THE HUSBAND’S TRIUMPH

  DEDICATION

  To Madame la Comtesse Bolognini, nee Vimercati.

  If you remember, madame, the pleasure your conversation gave to a traveller by recalling Paris to his memory in Milan, you will not be surprised to find him testifying his gratitude for many pleasant evenings passed beside you by laying one of his works at your feet, and begging you to protect it with your name, as in former days that name protected the tales of an ancient writer dear to the Milanese.

  You have an Eugenie, already beautiful, whose intelligent smile gives promise that she has inherited from you the most precious gifts of womanhood, and who will certainly enjoy during her childhood and youth all those happinesses which a rigid mother denied to the Eugenie of these pages. Though Frenchmen are taxed with inconstancy, you will find me Italian in faithfulness and memory.

  While writing the name of “Eugenie,” my thoughts have often led me back to that cool stuccoed salon and little garden in the Vicolo dei Cappucini, which echoed to the laughter of that dear child, to our sportive quarrels and our chatter. But you have left the Corso for the Tre Monasteri, and I know not how you are placed there; consequently, I am forced to think of you, not among the charming things with which no doubt you have surrounded yourself, but like one of those fine figures due to Raffaelle, Titian, Correggio, Allori, which seem abstractions, so distant are they from our daily lives.

  If this book should wing its way across the Alps, it will prove to you the lively gratitude and respectful friendship of

  Your devoted servant,

  De Balzac.

  CHAPTER I. THE TWO MARIES

  In one of the finest houses of the rue Neuve-des-Mathurins, at half-past eleven at night, two young women were sitting before the fireplace of a boudoir hung with blue velvet of that tender shade, with shimmering reflections, which French industry has lately learned to fabricate. Over the doors and windows were draped soft folds of blue cashmere, the tint of the hangings, the work of one of those upholsterers who have just missed being artists. A silver lamp studded with turquoise, and suspended by chains of beautiful workmanship, hung from the centre of the ceiling. The same system of decoration was followed in the smallest details, and even to the ceiling of fluted blue silk, with long bands of white cashmere falling at equal distances on the hangings, where they were caught back by ropes of pearl. A warm Belgian carpet, thick as turf, of a gray ground with blue posies, covered the floor. The furniture, of carved ebony, after a fine model of the old school, gave substance and richness to the rather too decorative quality, as a painter might call it, of the rest of the room. On either side of a large window, two etageres displayed a hundred precious trifles, flowers of mechanical art brought into bloom by the fire of thought. On a chimney-piece of slate-blue marble were figures in old Dresden, shepherds in bridal garb, with delicate bouquets in their hands, German fantasticalities surrounding a platinum clock, inlaid with arabesques. Above it sparkled the brilliant facets of a Venice mirror framed in ebony, with figures carved in relief, evidently obtained from some former royal residence. Two jardinieres were filled with the exotic product of a hot-house, pale, but divine flowers, the treasures of botany.

  In this cold, orderly boudoir, where all things were in place as if for sale, no sign existed of the gay and capricious disorder of a happy home. At the present moment, the two young women were weeping. Pain seemed to predominate. The name of the owner, Ferdinand du Tillet, one of the richest bankers in Paris, is enough to explain the luxury of the whole h
ouse, of which this boudoir is but a sample.

  Though without either rank or station, having pushed himself forward, heaven knows how, du Tillet had married, in 1831, the daughter of the Comte de Granville, one of the greatest names in the French magistracy, — a man who became peer of France after the revolution of July. This marriage of ambition on du Tillet’s part was brought about by his agreeing to sign an acknowledgment in the marriage contract of a dowry not received, equal to that of her elder sister, who was married to Comte Felix de Vandenesse. On the other hand, the Granvilles obtained the alliance with de Vandenesse by the largeness of the “dot.” Thus the bank repaired the breach made in the pocket of the magistracy by rank. Could the Comte de Vandenesse have seen himself, three years later, the brother-in-law of a Sieur Ferdinand DU Tillet, so-called, he might not have married his wife; but what man of rank in 1828 foresaw the strange upheavals which the year 1830 was destined to produce in the political condition, the fortunes, and the customs of France? Had any one predicted to Comte Felix de Vandenesse that his head would lose the coronet of a peer, and that of his father-in-law acquire one, he would have thought his informant a lunatic.

  Bending forward on one of those low chairs then called “chaffeuses,” in the attitude of a listener, Madame du Tillet was pressing to her bosom with maternal tenderness, and occasionally kissing, the hand of her sister, Madame Felix de Vandenesse. Society added the baptismal name to the surname, in order to distinguish the countess from her sister-in-law, the Marquise Charles de Vandenesse, wife of the former ambassador, who had married the widow of the Comte de Kergarouet, Mademoiselle Emilie de Fontaine.

  Half lying on a sofa, her handkerchief in the other hand, her breathing choked by repressed sobs, and with tearful eyes, the countess had been making confidences such as are made only from sister to sister when two sisters love each other; and these two sisters did love each other tenderly. We live in days when sisters married into such antagonist spheres can very well not love each other, and therefore the historian is bound to relate the reasons of this tender affection, preserved without spot or jar in spite of their husbands’ contempt for each other and their own social disunion. A rapid glance at their childhood will explain the situation.