“Will she ever appreciate me?” he said to himself. “She does not even understand that she is the sole incentive of my whole work. How wrong-headed, and yet how excellent a mind! – If I had not married I might now have been high in office and rich. I could have saved half my salary; my savings well-invested would have given me to-day ten thousand francs a year outside of my office, and I might then have become, through a good marriage – Yes, that is all true,” he exclaimed, interrupting himself, “but I have Celestine and my two children.” The man flung himself back on his happiness. To the best of married lives there come moments of regret. He entered the salon and looked around him. “There are not two women in Paris who understand making life pleasant as she does. To keep such a home as this on twelve thousand francs a year!” he thought, looking at the flower-stands bright with bloom, and thinking of the social enjoyments that were about to gratify his vanity. “She was made to be the wife of a minister. When I think of his Excellency’s wife, and how little she helps him! the good woman is a comfortable middle-class dowdy, and when she goes to the palace or into society – ” He pinched his lips together. Very busy men are apt to have very ignorant notions about household matters, and you can make them believe that a hundred thousand francs afford little or that twelve thousand afford all.
Though impatiently expected, and in spite of the flattering dishes prepared for the palate of the gourmet-emeritus, des Lupeaulx did not come to dinner; in fact he came in very late, about midnight, an hour when company dwindles and conversations become intimate and confidential. Andoche Finot, the journalist, was one of the few remaining guests.
“I now know all,” said des Lupeaulx, when he was comfortably seated on a sofa at the corner of the fireplace, a cup of tea in his hand and Madame Rabourdin standing before him with a plate of sandwiches and some slices of cake very appropriately called “leaden cake.” “Finot, my dear and witty friend, you can render a great service to our gracious queen by letting loose a few dogs upon the men we were talking of. You have against you,” he said to Rabourdin, lowering his voice so as to be heard only by the three persons whom he addressed, “a set of usurers and priests – money and the church. The article in the liberal journal was instituted by an old money-lender to whom the paper was under obligations; but the young fellow who wrote it cares nothing about it. The paper is about to change hands, and in three days more will be on our side. The royalist opposition, – for we have, thanks to Monsieur de Chateaubriand, a royalist opposition, that is to say, royalists who have gone over to the liberals, – however, there’s no need to discuss political matters now, – these assassins of Charles X. have promised me to support your appointment at the price of our acquiescence in one of their amendments. All my batteries are manned. If they threaten us with Baudoyer we shall say to the clerical phalanx, ‘Such and such a paper and such and such men will attack your measures and the whole press will be against you’ (for even the ministerial journals which I influence will be deaf and dumb, won’t they, Finot?). ‘Appoint Rabourdin, a faithful servant, and public opinion is with you – ‘”
“Hi, hi!” laughed Finot.
“So, there’s no need to be uneasy,” said des Lupeaulx. “I have arranged it all to-night; the Grand Almoner must yield.”
“I would rather have had less hope, and you to dinner,” whispered Celestine, looking at him with a vexed air which might very well pass for an expression of wounded love.
“This must win my pardon,” he returned, giving her an invitation to the ministry for the following Tuesday.
Celestine opened the letter, and a flush of pleasure came into her face. No enjoyment can be compared to that of gratified vanity.
“You know what the countess’s Tuesdays are,” said des Lupeaulx, with a confidential air. “To the usual ministerial parties they are what the ‘Petit-Chateau’ is to a court ball. You will be at the heart of power! You will see there the Comtesse Feraud, who is still in favor notwithstanding Louis XVIII.‘s death, Delphine de Nucingen, Madame de Listomere, the Marquise d’Espard, and your dear Firmiani; I have had her invited to give you her support in case the other women attempt to black-ball you. I long to see you in the midst of them.”
Celestine threw up her head like a thoroughbred before the race, and re-read the invitation just as Baudoyer and Saillard had re-read the articles about themselves in the newspapers, without being able to quaff enough of it.
“/There/ first, and /next/ at the Tuileries,” she said to des Lupeaulx, who was startled by the words and by the attitude of the speaker, so expressive were they of ambition and security.
“Can it be that I am only a stepping-stone?” he asked himself. He rose, and went into Madame Rabourdin’s bedroom, where she followed him, understanding from a motion of his head that he wished to speak to her privately.
“Well, your husband’s plan,” he said; “what of it?”
“Bah! the useless nonsense of an honest man!” she replied. “He wants to suppress fifteen thousand offices and do the work with five or six thousand. You never heard of such nonsense; I will let you read the whole document when copied; it is written in perfect good faith. His analysis of the officials was prompted only by his honesty and rectitude, – poor dear man!”
Des Lupeaulx was all the more reassured by the genuine laugh which accompanied these jesting and contemptuous words, because he was a judge of lying and knew that Celestine spoke in good faith.
“But still, what is at the bottom of it all?” he asked.
“Well, he wants to do away with the land-tax and substitute taxes on consumption.”
“Why it is over a year since Francois Keller and Nucingen proposed some such plan, and the minister himself is thinking of a reduction of the land-tax.”
“There!” exclaimed Celestine, “I told him there was nothing new in his scheme.”
“No; but he is on the same ground with the best financier of the epoch, – the Napoleon of finance. Something may come of it. Your husband must surely have some special ideas in his method of putting the scheme into practice.”
“No, it is all commonplace,” she said, with a disdainful curl of her lip. “Just think of governing France with five or six thousand offices, when what is really needed is that everybody in France should be personally enlisted in the support of the government.”
Des Lupeaulx seemed satisfied that Rabourdin, to whom in his own mind he had granted remarkable talents, was really a man of mediocrity.
“Are you quite sure of the appointment? You don’t want a bit of feminine advice?” she said.
“You women are greater adepts than we in refined treachery,” he said, nodding.
“Well, then, say /Baudoyer/ to the court and clergy, to divert suspicion and put them to sleep, and then, at the last moment, write /Rabourdin/.”
“There are some women who say /yes/ as long as they need a man, and /no/ when he has played his part,” returned des Lupeaulx, significantly.
“I know they do,” she answered, laughing; “but they are very foolish, for in politics everything recommences. Such proceedings may do with fools, but you are a man of sense. In my opinion the greatest folly any one can commit is to quarrel with a clever man.”
“You are mistaken,” said des Lupeaulx, “for such a man pardons. The real danger is with the petty spiteful natures who have nothing to do but study revenge, – I spend my life among them.”
When all the guests were gone, Rabourdin came into his wife’s room, and after asking for her strict attention, he explained his plan and made her see that it did not cut down the revenue but on the contrary increased it; he showed her in what ways the public funds were employed, and how the State could increase tenfold the circulation of money by putting its own, in the proportion of a third, or a quarter, into the expenditures which would be sustained by private or local interests. He finally proved to her plainly that his plan was not mere theory, but a system teeming with methods of execution. Celestine, brightly enthusiastic, sprang into her husband’s arms and sat upon his knee in the chimney-corner.
“At last I find the husband of my dreams!” she cried. “My ignorance of your real merit has saved you from des Lupeaulx’s claws. I calumniated you to him gloriously and in good faith.”
The man wept with joy. His day of triumph had come at last. Having labored for many years to satisfy his wife, he found himself a great man in the eyes of his sole public.
“To one who knows how good you are, how tender, how equable in anger, how loving, you are tenfold greater still. But,” she added, “a man of genius is always more or less a child; and you are a child, a dearly beloved child,” she said, caressing him. Then she drew that invitation from that particular spot where women put what they sacredly hide, and showed it to him.
“Here is what I wanted,” she said; “Des Lupeaulx has put me face to face with the minister, and were he a man of iron, his Excellency shall be made for a time to bend the knee to me.”
The next day Celestine began her preparations for entrance into the inner circle of the ministry. It was her day of triumph, her own! Never courtesan took such pains with herself as this honest woman bestowed upon her person. No dressmaker was ever so tormented as hers. Madame Rabourdin forgot nothing. She went herself to the stable where she hired carriages, and chose a coupe that was neither old, nor bourgeois, nor showy. Her footman, like the footmen of great houses, had the dress and appearance of a master. About ten on the evening of the eventful Tuesday, she left home in a charming full mourning attire. Her hair was dressed with jet grapes of exquisite workmanship, – an ornament costing three thousand francs, made by Fossin for an Englishwoman who had left Paris before it was finished. The leaves were of stamped iron-work, as light as the vine-leaves themselves, and the artist had not forgotten the graceful tendrils, which twined in the wearer’s curls just as, in nature, they catch upon the branches. The bracelets, necklace, and earrings were all what is called Berlin iron-work; but these delicate arabesques were made in Vienna, and seemed to have been fashioned by the fairies who, the stories tell us, are condemned by a jealous Carabosse to collect the eyes of ants, or weave a fabric so diaphanous that a nutshell can contain it. Madame Rabourdin’s graceful figure, made more slender still by the black draperies, was shown to advantage by a carefully cut dress, the two sides of which met at the shoulders in a single strap without sleeves. At every motion she seemed, like a butterfly, to be about to leave her covering; but the gown held firmly on by some contrivance of the wonderful dressmaker. The robe was of mousseline de laine – a material which the manufacturers had not yet sent to the Paris markets; a delightful stuff which some months later was to have a wild success, a success which went further and lasted longer than most French fashions. The actual economy of mousseline de laine, which needs no washing, has since injured the sale of cotton fabrics enough to revolutionize the Rouen manufactories. Celestine’s little feet, covered with fine silk stockings and turk-satin shoes (for silk-satin is inadmissible in deep mourning) were of elegant proportions. Thus dressed, she was very handsome. Her complexion, beautified by a bran-bath, was softly radiant. Her eyes, suffused with the light of hope, and sparkling with intelligence, justified her claims to the superiority which des Lupeaulx, proud and happy on this occasion, asserted for her.
She entered the room well (women will understand the meaning of that expression), bowed gracefully to the minister’s wife, with a happy mixture of deference and of self-respect, and gave no offence by a certain reliance on her own dignity; for every beautiful woman has the right to seem a queen. With the minister himself she took the pretty air of sauciness which women may properly allow themselves with men, even when they are grand dukes. She reconnoitred the field, as it were, while taking her seat, and saw that she was in the midst of one of those select parties of few persons, where the women eye and appraise each other, and every word said echoes in all ears; where every glance is a stab, and conversation a duel with witnesses; where all that is commonplace seems commoner still, and where every form of merit or distinction is silently accepted as though it were the natural level of all present. Rabourdin betook himself to the adjoining salon in which a few persons were playing cards; and there he planted himself on exhibition, as it were, which proved that he was not without social intelligence.
“My dear,” said the Marquise d’Espard to the Comtesse Feraud, Louis XVIII.‘s last mistress, “Paris is certainly unique. It produces – whence and how, who knows? – women like this person, who seems ready to will and to do anything.”
“She really does will, and does do everything,” put in des Lupeaulx, puffed up with satisfaction.
At this moment the wily Madame Rabourdin was courting the minister’s wife. Carefully coached the evening before by des Lupeaulx, who knew all the countess’s weak spots, she was flattering her without seeming to do so. Every now and then she kept silence; for des Lupeaulx, in love as he was, knew her defects, and said to her the night before, “Be careful not to talk too much,” – words which were really an immense proof of attachment. Bertrand Barrere left behind him this sublime axiom: “Never interrupt a woman when dancing to give her advice,” to which we may add (to make this chapter of the female code complete), “Never blame a woman for scattering her pearls.”
The conversation became general. From time to time Madame Rabourdin joined in, just as a well-trained cat puts a velvet paw on her mistress’s laces with the claws carefully drawn in. The minister, in matters of the heart, had few emotions. There was not another statesman under the Restoration who had so completely done with gallantry as he; even the opposition papers, the “Miroir,” “Pandora,” and “Figaro,” could not find a single throbbing artery with which to reproach him. Madame Rabourdin knew this, but she knew also that ghosts return to old castles, and she had taken it into her head to make the minister jealous of the happiness which des Lupeaulx was appearing to enjoy. The latter’s throat literally gurgled with the name of his divinity. To launch his supposed mistress successfully, he was endeavoring to persuade the Marquise d’Espard, Madame de Nucingen, and the countess, in an eight-ear conversation, that they had better admit Madame Rabourdin to their coalition; and Madame de Camps was supporting him. At the end of the hour the minister’s vanity was greatly tickled; Madame Rabourdin’s cleverness pleased him, and she had won his wife, who, delighted with the siren, invited her to come to all her receptions whenever she pleased.
“For your husband, my dear,” she said, “will soon be director; the minister intends to unite the two divisions and place them under one director; you will then be one of us, you know.”
His Excellency carried off Madame Rabourdin on his arm to show her a certain room, which was then quite celebrated because the opposition journals blamed him for decorating it extravagantly; and together they laughed over the absurdities of journalism.
“Madame, you really must give the countess and myself the pleasure of seeing you here often.”
And he went on with a round of ministerial compliments.
“But, Monseigneur,” she replied, with one of those glances which women hold in reserve, “it seems to me that that depends on you.”
“How so?”
“You alone can give me the right to come here.”
“Pray explain.”
“No; I said to myself before I came that I would certainly not have the bad taste to seem a petitioner.”
“No, no, speak freely. Places asked in this way are never out of place,” said the minister, laughing; for there is no jest too silly to amuse a solemn man.
“Well, then, I must tell you plainly that the wife of the head of a bureau is out of place here; a director’s wife is not.”
“That point need not be considered,” said the minister, “your husband is indispensable to the administration; he is already appointed.”
“Is that a veritable fact?”
“Would you like to see the papers in my study? They are already drawn up.”
“Then,” she said, pausing in a corner where she was alone with the minister, whose eager attentions were now very marked, “let me tell you that I can make you a return.”
She was on the point of revealing her husband’s plan, when des Lupeaulx, who had glided noiselessly up to them, uttered an angry sound, which meant that he did not wish to appear to have overheard what, in fact, he had been listening to. The minister gave an ill-tempered look at the old beau, who, impatient to win his reward, had hurried, beyond all precedent, the preliminary work of the appointment. He had carried the papers to his Excellency that evening, and desired to take himself, on the morrow, the news of the appointment to her whom he was now endeavoring to exhibit as his mistress. Just then the minister’s valet approached des Lupeaulx in a mysterious manner, and told him that his own servant wished him to deliver to him at once a letter of the utmost importance.
The general-secretary went up to a lamp and read a note thus worded: —
Contrary to my custom, I am waiting in your ante-chamber to see you; you have not a moment to lose if you wish to come to terms with
Your obedient servant, Gobseck.
The secretary shuddered when he saw the signature, which we regret we cannot give in fac-simile, for it would be valuable to those who like to guess character from what may be called the physiognomy of signature. If ever a hieroglyphic sign expressed an animal, it was assuredly this written name, in which the first and the final letter approached each other like the voracious jaws of a shark, – insatiable, always open, seeking whom to devour, both strong and weak. As for the wording of the note, the spirit of usury alone could have inspired a sentence so imperative, so insolently curt and cruel, which said all and revealed nothing. Those who had never heard of Gobseck would have felt, on reading words which compelled him to whom they were addressed to obey, yet gave no order, the presence of the implacable money-lender of the rue des Gres. Like a dog called to heel by the huntsman, des Lupeaulx left his present quest and went immediately to his own rooms, thinking of his hazardous position. Imagine a general to whom an aide-de-camp rides up and says: “The enemy with thirty thousand fresh troops is attacking on our right flank.”
A very few words will serve to explain this sudden arrival of Gigonnet and Gobseck on the field of battle, – for des Lupeaulx found them both waiting. At eight o’clock that evening, Martin Falleix, returning on the wings of the wind, – thanks to three francs to the postboys and a courier in advance, – had brought back with him the deeds of the property signed the night before. Taken at once to the Cafe Themis by Mitral, these securities passed into the hands of the two usurers, who hastened (though on foot) to the ministry. It was past eleven o’clock. Des Lupeaulx trembled when he saw those sinister faces, emitting a simultaneous look as direct as a pistol shot and as brilliant as the flash itself.
“What is it, my masters?” he said.
The two extortioners continued cold and motionless. Gigonnet silently pointed to the documents in his hand, and then at the servant.
“Come into my study,” said des Lupeaulx, dismissing his valet by a sign.
“You understand French very well,” remarked Gigonnet, approvingly.
“Have you come here to torment a man who enabled each of you to make a couple of hundred thousand francs?”
“And who will help us to make more, I hope,” said Gigonnet.
“Some new affair?” asked des Lupeaulx. “If you want me to help you, consider that I recollect the past.”
“So do we,” answered Gigonnet.
“My debts must be paid,” said des Lupeaulx, disdainfully, so as not to seem worsted at the outset.
“True,” said Gobseck.
“Let us come to the point, my son,” said Gigonnet. “Don’t stiffen your chin in your cravat; with us all that is useless. Take these deeds and read them.”
The two usurers took a mental inventory of des Lupeaulx’s study while he read with amazement and stupefaction a deed of purchase which seemed wafted to him from the clouds by angels.
“Don’t you think you have a pair of intelligent business agents in Gobseck and me?” asked Gigonnet.
“But tell me, to what do I owe such able co-operation?” said des Lupeaulx, suspicious and uneasy.
“We knew eight days ago a fact that without us you would not have known till to-morrow morning. The president of the chamber of commerce, a deputy, as you know, feels himself obliged to resign.”
Des Lupeaulx’s eyes dilated, and were as big as daisies.
“Your minister has been tricking you about this event,” said the concise Gobseck.
“You master me,” said the general-secretary, bowing with an air of profound respect, bordering however, on sarcasm.
“True,” said Gobseck.
“Can you mean to strangle me?”
“Possibly.”
“Well, then, begin your work, executioners,” said the secretary, smiling.
“You will see,” resumed Gigonnet, “that the sum total of your debts is added to the sum loaned by us for the purchase of the property; we have bought them up.”
“Here are the deeds,” said Gobseck, taking from the pocket of his greenish overcoat a number of legal papers.
“You have three years in which to pay off the whole sum,” said Gigonnet.
“But,” said des Lupeaulx, frightened at such kindness, and also by so apparently fantastic an arrangement. “What do you want of me?”
“La Billardiere’s place for Baudoyer,” said Gigonnet, quickly.
“That’s a small matter, though it will be next to impossible for me to do it,” said des Lupeaulx. “I have just tied my hands.”
“Bite the cords with your teeth,” said Gigonnet.
“They are sharp,” added Gobseck.
“Is that all?” asked des Lupeaulx.
“We keep the title-deeds of the property till the debts are paid,” said Gigonnet, putting one of the papers before des Lupeaulx; “and if the matter of the appointment is not satisfactorily arranged within six days our names will be substituted in place of yours.”
“You are deep,” cried the secretary.
“Exactly,” said Gobseck.
“And this is all?” exclaimed des Lupeaulx.
“All,” said Gobseck.
“You agree?” asked Gigonnet.
Des Lupeaulx nodded his head.
“Well, then, sign this power of attorney. Within two days Baudoyer is to be nominated; within six your debts will be cleared off, and – ”
“And what?” asked des Lupeaulx.
“We guarantee – ”
“Guarantee! – what?” said the secretary, more and more astonished.
“Your election to the Chamber,” said Gigonnet, rising on his heels. “We have secured a majority of fifty-two farmers’ and mechanics’ votes, which will be thrown precisely as those who lend you this money dictate.”
Des Lupeaulx wrung Gigonnet’s hand.
“It is only such as we who never misunderstand each other,” he said; “this is what I call doing business. I’ll make you a return gift.”
“Right,” said Gobseck.
“What is it?” asked Gigonnet.
“The cross of the Legion of honor for your imbecile of a nephew.”
“Good,” said Gigonnet, “I see you know him well.”
The pair took leave of des Lupeaulx, who conducted them to the staircase.
“They must be secret envoys from foreign powers,” whispered the footmen to each other.
Once in the street, the two usurers looked at each other under a street lamp and laughed.
“He will owe us nine thousand francs interest a year,” said Gigonnet; “that property doesn’t bring him in five.”
“He is under our thumb for a long time,” said Gobseck.
“He’ll build; he’ll commit extravagancies,” continued Gigonnet; “Falleix will get his land.”
“His interest is only to be made deputy; the old fox laughs at the rest,” said Gobseck.
“Hey! hey!”
“Hi! hi!”
These dry little exclamations served as a laugh to the two old men, who took their way back (always on foot) to the Cafe Themis.
Des Lupeaulx returned to the salon and found Madame Rabourdin sailing with the wind of success, and very charming; while his Excellency, usually so gloomy, showed a smooth and gracious countenance.
“She performs miracles,” thought des Lupeaulx. “What a wonderfully clever woman! I must get to the bottom of her heart.”
“Your little lady is decidedly handsome,” said the Marquise to the secretary; “now if she only had your name.”
“Yes, her defect is that she is the daughter of an auctioneer. She will fail for want of birth,” replied des Lupeaulx, with a cold manner that contrasted strangely with the ardor of his remarks about Madame Rabourdin not half an hour earlier.
The marquise looked at him fixedly.
“The glance you gave them did not escape me,” she said, motioning towards the minister and Madame Rabourdin; “it pierced the mask of your spectacles. How amusing you both are, to quarrel over that bone!”
As the marquise turned to leave the room the minister joined her and escorted her to the door.
“Well,” said des Lupeaulx to Madame Rabourdin, “what do you think of his Excellency?”
“He is charming. We must know these poor ministers to appreciate them,” she added, slightly raising her voice so as to be heard by his Excellency’s wife. “The newspapers and the opposition calumnies are so misleading about men in politics that we are all more or less influenced by them; but such prejudices turn to the advantage of statesmen when we come to know them personally.”
“He is very good-looking,” said des Lupeaulx.
“Yes, and I assure you he is quite lovable,” she said, heartily.
“Dear child,” said des Lupeaulx, with a genial, caressing manner; “you have actually done the impossible.”
“What is that?”
“Resuscitated the dead. I did not think that man had a heart; ask his wife. But he may have just enough for a passing fancy. Therefore profit by it. Come this way, and don’t be surprised.” He led Madame Rabourdin into the boudoir, placed her on a sofa, and sat down beside her. “You are very sly,” he said, “and I like you the better for it. Between ourselves, you are a clever woman. Des Lupeaulx served to bring you into this house, and that is all you wanted of him, isn’t it? Now when a woman decides to love a man for what she can get out of him it is better to take a sexagenarian Excellency than a quadragenarian secretary; there’s more profit and less annoyance. I’m a man with spectacles, grizzled hair, worn out with dissipation, – a fine lover, truly! I tell myself all this again and again. It must be admitted, of course, that I can sometimes be useful, but never agreeable. Isn’t that so? A man must be a fool if he cannot reason about himself. You can safely admit the truth and let me see to the depths of your heart; we are partners, not lovers. If I show some tenderness at times, you are too superior a woman to pay any attention to such follies; you will forgive me, – you are not a school-girl, or a bourgeoise of the rue Saint-Denis. Bah! you and I are too well brought up for that. There’s the Marquise d’Espard who has just left the room; this is precisely what she thinks and does. She and I came to an understanding two years ago [the coxcomb!], and now she has only to write me a line and say, ‘My dear des Lupeaulx, you will oblige me by doing such and such a thing,’ and it is done at once. We are engaged at this very moment in getting a commission of lunacy on her husband. Ah! you women, you can get what you want by the bestowal of a few favors. Well, then, my dear child, bewitch the minister. I’ll help you; it is my interest to do so. Yes, I wish he had a woman who could influence him; he wouldn’t escape me, – for he does escape me quite often, and the reason is that I hold him only through his intellect. Now if I were one with a pretty woman who was also intimate with him, I should hold him by his weaknesses, and that is much the firmest grip. Therefore, let us be friends, you and I, and share the advantages of the conquest you are making.”
Madame Rabourdin listened in amazement to this singular profession of rascality. The apparent artlessness of this political swindler prevented her from suspecting a trick.
“Do you believe he really thinks of me?” she asked, falling into the trap.
“I know it; I am certain of it.”
“Is it true that Rabourdin’s appointment is signed?”
“I gave him the papers this morning. But it is not enough that your husband should be made director; he must be Master of petitions.”
“Yes,” she said.
“Well, then, go back to the salon and coquette a little more with his Excellency.”
“It is true,” she said, “that I never fully understood you till to-night. There is nothing commonplace about /you/.”
“We will be two old friends,” said des Lupeaulx, “and suppress all tender nonsense and tormenting love; we will take things as they did under the Regency. Ah! they had plenty of wit and wisdom in those days!”
“You are really strong; you deserve my admiration,” she said, smiling, and holding out her hand to him, “one does more for one’s friend, you know, than for one’s – ”
She left him without finishing her sentence.
“Dear creature!” thought des Lupeaulx, as he saw her approach the minister, “des Lupeaulx has no longer the slightest remorse in turning against you. To-morrow evening when you offer me a cup of tea, you will be offering me a thing I no longer care for. All is over. Ah! when a man is forty years of age women may take pains to catch him, but they won’t love him.”
He looked himself over in a mirror, admitting honestly that though he did very well as a politician he was a wreck on the shores of Cythera. At the same moment Madame Rabourdin was gathering herself together for a becoming exit. She wished to make a last graceful impression on the minds of all, and she succeeded. Contrary to the usual custom in society, every one cried out as soon as she was gone, “What a charming woman!” and the minister himself took her to the outer door.