30 Sep This man will die the same way he lived (HONORE DE BALZAC)
“My daughters told you that they were coming, didn’t they, Christophe?
Go again to them, and I will give you five francs. Tell them that I am not
feeling well, that I should like to kiss them both and see them once again
before I die. Tell them that, but don’t alarm them more than you can
help.”
Rastignac signed to Christophe to go, and the man went.
“They will come before long,” the old man went on. “I know them so well.
My tender-hearted Delphine! If I am going to die, she will feel it so
much! And so will Nasie. I do not want to die; they will cry if I die; and if
I die, dear Eugene, I shall not see them any more. It will be very dreary
there where I am going. For a father it is hell to be without your children;
I have served my apprenticeship already since they married. My heaven
was in the Rue de la Jussienne. Eugene, do you think that if I go to
heaven I can come back to earth, and be near them in spirit? I have
heard some such things said. It is true? It is as if I could see them at this
moment as they used to be when we all lived in the Rue de la Jussienne.
They used to come downstairs of a morning. ‘Good-morning, papa!’ they
used to say, and I would take them on my knees; we had all sorts of little
games of play together, and they had such pretty coaxing ways. We
always had breakfast together, too, every morning, and they had dinner
with me — in fact, I was a father then. I enjoyed my children. They did
not think for themselves so long as they lived in the Rue de la Jussienne;
they knew nothing of the world; they loved me with all their hearts. Mon
Dieu! why could they not always be little girls? (Oh! my head! this
racking pain in my head!) Ah! ah! forgive me, children, this pain is
fearful; it must be agony indeed, for you have used me to endure
pain. Mon Dieu!if only I held their hands in mine, I should not feel it at
all. — Do you think that they are on the way? Christophe is so stupid; I
ought to have gone myself. He will see them. But you went to the ball
yesterday; just tell me how they looked. They did not know that I was ill,
did they, or they would not have been dancing, poor little things? Oh! I
must not be ill any longer. They stand too much in need of me; their
fortunes are in danger. And such husbands as they are bound to! I must
get well! (Oh! what pain this is! what pain this is! . . . ah! ah!)— I must
get well, you see; for they must have money, and I know how to set about
making some. I will go to Odessa and manufacture starch there. I am an
old hand, I will make millions. (Oh! this is agony!)”
Goriot was silent for a moment; it seemed to require his whole strength
to endure the pain.
“If they were here, I should not complain,” he said. “So why should I
complain now?”
He seemed to grow drowsy with exhaustion, and lay quietly for a long
time. Christophe came back; and Rastignac, thinking that Goriot was
asleep, allowed the man to give his story aloud.
“First of all, sir, I went to Madame la Comtesse,” he said; “but she and
her husband were so busy that I couldn’t get to speak to her. When I
insisted that I must see her, M. de Restaud came out to me himself, and
went on like this: ‘M. Goriot is dying, is he? Very well, it is the best thing
he can do. I want Mme. de Restaud to transact some important business,
when it is all finished she can go.’ The gentleman looked angry, I
thought. I was just going away when Mme. de Restaud came out into an
ante-chamber through a door that I did not notice, and said, ‘Christophe,
tell my father that my husband wants me to discuss some matters with
him, and I cannot leave the house, the life or death of my children is at
stake; but as soon as it is over, I will come.’ As for Madame la Baronne,
that is another story! I could not speak to her either, and I did not even
see her. Her waiting-woman said, ‘Ah yes, but madame only came back
from a ball at a quarter to five this morning; she is asleep now, and if I
wake her before mid-day she will be cross. As soon as she rings, I will go
and tell her that her father is worse. It will be time enough then to tell
her bad news!’ I begged and I prayed, but, there! it was no good. Then I
asked for M. le Baron, but he was out.”
“To think that neither of his daughters should come!” exclaimed
Rastignac. “I will write to them both.”
“Neither of them!” cried the old man, sitting upright in bed. “They are
busy, they are asleep, they will not come! I knew that they would not. Not
until you are dying do you know your children. . . . Oh! my friend, do not
marry; do not have children! You give them life; they give you your
deathblow. You bring them into the world, and they send you out of it.
No, they will not come. I have known that these ten years. Sometimes I
have told myself so, but I did not dare to believe it.”
The tears gathered and stood without overflowing the red sockets.
“Ah! if I were rich still, if I had kept my money, if I had not given all to
them, they would be with me now; they would fawn on me and cover my
cheeks with their kisses! I should be living in a great mansion; I should
have grand apartments and servants and a fire in my room;
and theywould be about me all in tears, and their husbands and their
children. I should have had all that; now — I have nothing. Money brings
everything to you; even your daughters. My money. Oh! where is my
money? If I had plenty of money to leave behind me, they would nurse
me and tend me; I should hear their voices, I should see their faces. Ah,
God! who knows? They both of them have hearts of stone. I loved them
too much; it was not likely that they should love me. A father ought
always to be rich; he ought to keep his children well in hand, like unruly
horses. I have gone down on my knees to them. Wretches! this is the
crowning act that brings the last ten years to a proper close. If you but
knew how much they made of me just after they were married. (Oh! this
is cruel torture!) I had just given them each eight hundred thousand
francs; they were bound to be civil to me after that, and their husbands
too were civil. I used to go to their houses: it was ‘My kind father’ here,
‘My dear father’ there. There was always a place for me at their tables. I
used to dine with their husbands now and then, and they were very
respectful to me. I was still worth something, they thought. How should
they know? I had not said anything about my affairs. It is worth while to
be civil to a man who has given his daughters eight hundred thousand
francs apiece; and they showed me every attention then — but it was all
for my money. Grand people are not great. I found that out by
experience! I went to the theatre with them in their carriage; I might stay
as long as I cared to stay at their evening parties. In fact, they
acknowledged me their father; publicly they owned that they were my
daughters. But I was always a shrewd one, you see, and nothing was lost
upon me. Everything went straight to the mark and pierced my heart. I
saw quite well that it was all sham and pretence, but there is no help for
such things as these. I felt less at my ease at their dinner-table than I did
downstairs here. I had nothing to say for myself. So these grand folks
would ask in my son-in-law’s ear, ‘Who may that gentleman be?’—‘The
father-in-law with the money bags; he is very rich.’—‘The devil, he is!’
they would say, and look again at me with the respect due to my money.
Well, if I was in the way sometimes, I paid dearly for my mistakes. And
besides, who is perfect? (My head is one sore!) Dear Monsieur Eugene, I
am suffering so now, that a man might die of the pain; but it is nothing
to be compared with the pain I endured when Anastasie made me feel,
for the first time, that I had said something stupid. She looked at me, and
that glance of hers opened all my veins. I used to want to know everything, to be learned; and one thing I did learn thoroughly — I knew
that I was not wanted here on earth.
“The next day I went to Delphine for comfort, and what should I do there
but make some stupid blunder that made her angry with me. I was like
one driven out of his senses. For a week I did not know what to do; I did
not dare to go to see them for fear they should reproach me. And that
was how they both turned me out of the house.
“Oh God! Thou knowest all the misery and anguish that I have endured;
Thou hast counted all the wounds that have been dealt to me in these
years that have aged and changed me and whitened my hair and drained
my life; why dost Thou make me to suffer so to-day? Have I not more
than expiated the sin of loving them too much? They themselves have
been the instruments of vengeance; they have tortured me for my sin of
affection.
“Ah, well! fathers know no better; I loved them so; I went back to them
as a gambler goes to the gaming table. This love was my vice, you see, my
mistress — they were everything in the world to me. They were always
wanting something or other, dresses and ornaments, and what not; their
maids used to tell me what they wanted, and I used to give them the
things for the sake of the welcome that they bought for me. But, at the
same time, they used to give me little lectures on my behavior in society;
they began about it at once. Then they began to feel ashamed of me. That
is what comes of having your children well brought up. I could not go to
school again at my time of life. (This pain is fearful! Mon Dieu!These
doctors! these doctors! If they would open my head, it would give me
some relief!) Oh, my daughters, my daughters! Anastasie! Delphine! If I
could only see them! Send for the police, and make them come to me!
Justice is on my side, the whole world is on my side, I have natural
rights, and the law with me. I protest! The country will go to ruin if a
father’s rights are trampled under foot. That is easy to see. The whole
world turns on fatherly love; fatherly love is the foundation of society; it
will crumble into ruin when children do not love their fathers. Oh! if I
could only see them, and hear them, no matter what they said; if I could
simply hear their voices, it would soothe the pain. Delphine! Delphine
most of all. But tell them when they come not to look so coldly at me as
they do. Oh! my friend, my good Monsieur Eugene, you do not know that it is when all the golden light in a glance suddenly turns to a leaden gray.
It has been one long winter here since the light in their eyes shone no
more for me. I have had nothing but disappointments to devour.
Disappointment has been my daily bread; I have lived on humiliation
and insults. I have swallowed down all the affronts for which they sold
me my poor stealthy little moments of joy; for I love them so! Think of it!
a father hiding himself to get a glimpse of his children! I have given all
my life to them, and to-day they will not give me one hour! I am
hungering and thirsting for them, my heart is burning in me, but they
will not come to bring relief in the agony, for I am dying now, I feel that
this is death. Do they not know what it means to trample on a father’s
corpse? There is a God in heaven who avenges us fathers whether we will
or no.
“Oh! they will come! Come to me, darlings, and give me one more kiss;
one last kiss, the Viaticum for your father, who will pray God for you in
heaven. I will tell Him that you have been good children to your father,
and plead your cause with God! After all, it is not their fault. I tell you
they are innocent, my friend. Tell every one that it is not their fault, and
no one need be distressed on my account. It is all my own fault, I taught
them to trample upon me. I loved to have it so. It is no one’s affair but
mine; man’s justice and God’s justice have nothing to do in it. God would
be unjust if He condemned them for anything they may have done to me.
I did not behave to them properly; I was stupid enough to resign my
rights. I would have humbled myself in the dust for them. What could
you expect? The most beautiful nature, the noblest soul, would have been
spoiled by such indulgence. I am a wretch, I am justly punished. I, and I
only, am to blame for all their sins; I spoiled them. To-day they are as
eager for pleasure as they used to be for sugar-plums. When they were
little girls I indulged them in every whim. They had a carriage of their
own when they were fifteen. They have never been crossed. I am guilty,
and not they — but I sinned through love.
“My heart would open at the sound of their voices. I can hear them; they
are coming. Yes! yes! they are coming. The law demands that they should
be present at their father’s deathbed; the law is on my side. It would only
cost them the hire of a cab. I would pay that. Write to them, tell them
that I have millions to leave to them! On my word of honor, yes. I am
going to manufacture Italian paste foods at Odessa. I understand the trade. There are millions to be made in it. Nobody has thought of the
scheme as yet. You see, there will be no waste, no damage in transit, as
there always is with wheat and flour. Hey! hey! and starch too; there are
millions to be made in the starch trade! You will not be telling a lie.
Millions, tell them; and even if they really come because they covet the
money, I would rather let them deceive me; and I shall see them in any
case. I want my children! I gave them life; they are mine, mine!” and he
sat upright. The head thus raised, with its scanty white hair, seemed to
Eugene like a threat; every line that could still speak spoke of menace.
“There, there, dear father,” said Eugene, “lie down again; I will write to
them at once. As soon as Bianchon comes back I will go for them myself,
if they do not come before.”
“If they do not come?” repeated the old man, sobbing. “Why, I shall be
dead before then; I shall die in a fit of rage, of rage! Anger is getting the
better of me. I can see my whole life at this minute. I have been cheated!
They do not love me — they have never loved me all their lives! It is all
clear to me. They have not come, and they will not come. The longer they
put off their coming, the less they are likely to give me this joy. I know
them. They have never cared to guess my disappointments, my sorrows,
my wants; they never cared to know my life; they will have no
presentiment of my death; they do not even know the secret of my
tenderness for them. Yes, I see it all now. I have laid my heart open so
often, that they take everything I do for them as a matter of course. They
might have asked me for the very eyes out of my head and I would have
bidden them to pluck them out. They think that all fathers are like theirs.
You should always make your value felt. Their own children will avenge
me. Why, for their own sakes they should come to me! Make them
understand that they are laying up retribution for their own deathbeds.
All crimes are summed up in this one. . . . Go to them; just tell them that
if they stay away it will be parricide! There is enough laid to their charge
already without adding that to the list. Cry aloud as I do now, ‘Nasie!
Delphine! here! Come to your father; the father who has been so kind to
you is lying ill!’— Not a sound; no one comes! Then am I do die like a
dog? This is to be my reward — I am forsaken at the last. They are
wicked, heartless women; curses on them, I loathe them. I shall rise at
night from my grave to curse them again; for, after all, my friends, have I
done wrong? They are behaving very badly to me, eh? . . . What am I saying? Did you not tell me just now that Delphine is in the room? She is
more tender-hearted than her sister. . . . Eugene, you are my son, you
know. You will love her; be a father to her! Her sister is very unhappy.
And there are their fortunes! Ah, God! I am dying, this anguish is almost
more than I can bear! Cut off my head; leave me nothing but my heart.”
“Christophe!” shouted Eugene, alarmed by the way in which the old man
moaned, and by his cries, “go for M. Bianchon, and send a cab here for
me. — I am going to fetch them, dear father; I will bring them back to
you.”
“Make them come! Compel them to come! Call out the Guard, the
military, anything and everything, but make them come!” He looked at
Eugene, and a last gleam of intelligence shone in his eyes. “Go to the
authorities, to the Public Prosecutor, let them bring them here; come
they shall!”
“But you have cursed them.”
“Who said that!” said the old man in dull amazement. “You know quite
well that I love them, I adore them! I shall be quite well again if I can see
them. . . . Go for them, my good neighbor, my dear boy, you are kind-
hearted; I wish I could repay you for your kindness, but I have nothing to
give you now, save the blessing of a dying man. Ah! if I could only see
Delphine, to tell her to pay my debt to you. If the other cannot come,
bring Delphine to me at any rate. Tell her that unless she comes, you will
not love her any more. She is so fond of you that she will come to me
then. Give me something to drink! There is a fire in my bowels. Press
something against my forehead! If my daughters would lay their hands
there, I think I should get better. . . . Mon Dieu!who will recover their
money for them when I am gone? . . . I will manufacture vermicelli out in
Odessa; I will go to Odessa for their sakes.”
“Here is something to drink,” said Eugene, supporting the dying man on
his left arm, while he held a cup of tisane to Goriot’s lips.
“How you must love your own father and mother!” said the old man, and
grasped the student’s hand in both of his. It was a feeble, trembling
grasp. “I am going to die; I shall die without seeing my daughters; do you
understand? To be always thirsting, and never to drink; that has been my
life for the last ten years. . . . I have no daughters, my sons-in-law killed them. No, since their marriages they have been dead to me. Fathers
should petition the Chambers to pass a law against marriage. If you love
your daughters, do not let them marry. A son-in-law is a rascal who
poisons a girl’s mind and contaminates her whole nature. Let us have no
more marriages! It robs us of our daughters; we are left alone upon our
deathbeds, and they are not with us then. They ought to pass a law for
dying fathers. This is awful! It cries for vengeance! They cannot come,
because my sons-in-law forbid them! . . . Kill them! . . . Restaud and the
Alsatian, kill them both! They have murdered me between them! . . .
Death or my daughters! . . . Ah! it is too late, I am dying, and they are not
here!.. . Dying without them! . . . Nasie! Fifine! Why do you not come to
me? Your papa is going —”
“Dear Father Goriot, calm yourself. There, there, lie quietly and rest;
don’t worry yourself, don’t think.”
“I shall not see them. Oh! the agony of it!”
“You shall see them.”
“Really?” cried the old man, still wandering. “Oh! shall I see them; I shall
see them and hear their voices. I shall die happy. Ah! well, after all, I do
not wish to live; I cannot stand this much longer; this pain that grows
worse and worse. But, oh! to see them, to touch their dresses — ah!
nothing but their dresses, that is very little; still, to feel something that
belongs to them. Let me touch their hair with my fingers . . . their hair
. . . ”
His head fell back on the pillow, as if a sudden heavy blow had struck
him down, but his hands groped feebly over the quilt, as if to find his
daughters’ hair.
“My blessing on them . . . ” he said, making an effort, “my blessing . . . ”
His voice died away. Just at that moment Bianchon came into the room.
“I met Christophe,” he said; “he is gone for your cab.”
Then he looked at the patient, and raised the closed eyelids with his
fingers. The two students saw how dead and lustreless the eyes beneath
had grown. “He will not get over this, I am sure,” said Bianchon. He felt the old
man’s pulse, and laid a hand over his heart.
“The machinery works still; more is the pity, in his state it would be
better for him to die.”
“Ah! my word, it would!”
“What is the matter with you? You are as pale as death.”
“Dear fellow, the moans and cries that I have just heard. . . . There is a
God! Ah! yes, yes, there is a God, and He has made a better world for us,
or this world of ours would be a nightmare. I could have cried like a
child; but this is too tragical, and I am sick at heart.
“We want a lot of things, you know; and where is the money to come
from?”
Rastignac took out his watch.
“There, be quick and pawn it. I do not want to stop on the way to the Rue
du Helder; there is not a moment to lose, I am afraid, and I must wait
here till Christophe comes back. I have not a farthing; I shall have to pay
the cabman when I get home again.”
Rastignac rushed down the stairs, and drove off to the Rue du Helder.
The awful scene through which he had just passed quickened his
imagination, and he grew fiercely indignant. He reached Mme. de
Restaud’s house only to be told by the servant that his mistress could see
no one.
“But I have brought a message from her father, who is dying,” Rastignac
told the man.
“The Count has given us the strictest orders, sir —”
“If it is M. de Restaud who has given the orders, tell him that his father-
in-law is dying, and that I am here, and must speak with him at once.”
The man went out.
Eugene waited for a long while. “Perhaps her father is dying at this
moment,” he thought.
Then the man came back, and Eugene followed him to the little drawing-
room. M. de Restaud was standing before the fireless grate, and did not
ask his visitor to seat himself.
“Monsieur le Comte,” said Rastignac, “M. Goriot, your father-in-law, is
lying at the point of death in a squalid den in the Latin Quarter. He has
not a penny to pay for firewood; he is expected to die at any moment,
and keeps calling for his daughter —”
“I feel very little affection for M. Goriot, sir, as you probably are aware,”
the Count answered coolly. “His character has been compromised in
connection with Mme. de Restaud; he is the author of the misfortunes
that have embittered my life and troubled my peace of mind. It is a
matter of perfect indifference to me if he lives or dies. Now you know my
feelings with regard to him. Public opinion may blame me, but I care
nothing for public opinion. Just now I have other and much more
important matters to think about than the things that fools and
chatterers may say about me. As for Mme. de Restaud, she cannot leave
the house; she is in no condition to do so. And, besides, I shall not allow
her to leave it. Tell her father that as soon as she has done her duty by
her husband and child she shall go to see him. If she has any love for her
father, she can be free to go to him, if she chooses, in a few seconds; it
lies entirely with her —”
“Monsieur le Comte, it is no business of mine to criticise your conduct;
you can do as you please with your wife, but may I count upon your
keeping your word with me? Well, then, promise me to tell her that her
father has not twenty-four hours to live; that he looks in vain for her, and
has cursed her already as he lies on his deathbed — that is all I ask.”
“You can tell her yourself,” the Count answered, impressed by the thrill
of indignation in Eugene’s voice.
The Count led the way to the room where his wife usually sat. She was
drowned in tears, and lay crouching in the depths of an armchair, as if
she were tired of life and longed to die. It was piteous to see her. Before
venturing to look at Rastignac, she glanced at her husband in evident
and abject terror that spoke of complete prostration of body and mind;
she seemed crushed by a tyranny both mental and physical. The Count
jerked his head towards her; she construed this as a permission to speak.
“I heard all that you said, monsieur. Tell my father that if he knew all he
would forgive me. . . . I did not think there was such torture in the world
as this; it is more than I can endure, monsieur! — But I will not give way
as long as I live,” she said, turning to her husband. “I am a mother. —
Tell my father that I have never sinned against him in spite of
appearances!” she cried aloud in her despair.
Eugene bowed to the husband and wife; he guessed the meaning of the
scene, and that this was a terrible crisis in the Countess’ life. M. de
Restaud’s manner had told him that his errand was a fruitless one; he
saw that Anastasie had no longer any liberty of action. He came away
mazed and bewildered, and hurried to Mme. de Nucingen. Delphine was
in bed.
“Poor dear Eugene, I am ill,” she said. “I caught cold after the ball, and I
am afraid of pneumonia. I am waiting for the doctor to come.”
“If you were at death’s door,” Eugene broke in, “you must be carried
somehow to your father. He is calling for you. If you could hear the
faintest of those cries, you would not feel ill any longer.”
“Eugene, I dare say my father is not quite so ill as you say; but I cannot
bear to do anything that you do not approve, so I will do just as you wish.
As for HIM, he would die of grief I know if I went out to see him and
brought on a dangerous illness. Well, I will go as soon as I have seen the
doctor. — Ah!” she cried out, “you are not wearing your watch, how is
that?”
Eugene reddened.
“Eugene, Eugene! if you have sold it already or lost it. . . . Oh! it would be
very wrong of you!”
The student bent over Delphine and said in her ear, “Do you want to
know? Very well, then, you shall know. Your father has nothing left to
pay for the shroud that they will lay him in this evening. Your watch has
been pawned, for I had nothing either.”
Delphine sprang out of bed, ran to her desk, and took out her purse. She
gave it to Eugene, and rang the bell, crying:
“I will go, I will go at once, Eugene. Leave me, I will dress. Why, I should
be an unnatural daughter! Go back; I will be there before you. —
Therese,” she called to the waiting-woman, “ask M. de Nucingen to come
upstairs at once and speak to me.”
Eugene was almost happy when he reached the Rue Nueve-Sainte-
Genevieve; he was so glad to bring the news to the dying man that one of
his daughters was coming. He fumbled in Delphine’s purse for money, so
as to dismiss the cab at once; and discovered that the young, beautiful,
and wealthy woman of fashion had only seventy francs in her private
purse. He climbed the stairs and found Bianchon supporting Goriot,
while the house surgeon from the hospital was applying moxas to the
patient’s back — under the direction of the physician, it was the last
expedient of science, and it was tried in vain.
“Can you feel them?” asked the physician. But Goriot had caught sight of
Rastignac, and answered, “They are coming, are they not?”
“There is hope yet,” said the surgeon; “he can speak.”
“Yes,” said Eugene, “Delphine is coming.”
“Oh! that is nothing!” said Bianchon; “he has been talking about his
daughters all the time. He calls for them as a man impaled calls for
water, they say —”
“We may as well give up,” said the physician, addressing the surgeon.
“Nothing more can be done now; the case is hopeless.”
Bianchon and the house surgeon stretched the dying man out again on
his loathsome bed.
“But the sheets ought to be changed,” added the physician. “Even if there
is no hope left, something is due to human nature. I shall come back
again, Bianchon,” he said, turning to the medical student. “If he
complains again, rub some laudanum over the diaphragm.”
He went, and the house surgeon went with him.
“Come, Eugene, pluck up heart, my boy,” said Bianchon, as soon as they
were alone; “we must set about changing his sheets, and put him into a clean shirt. Go and tell Sylvie to bring some sheets and come and help us
to make the bed.”
Eugene went downstairs, and found Mme. Vauquer engaged in setting
the table; Sylvie was helping her. Eugene had scarcely opened his mouth
before the widow walked up to him with the acidulous sweet smile of a
cautious shopkeeper who is anxious neither to lose money nor to offend
a customer.
“My dear Monsieur Eugene,” she said, when he had spoken, “you know
quite as well as I do that Father Goriot has not a brass farthing left. If
you give out clean linen for a man who is just going to turn up his eyes,
you are not likely to see your sheets again, for one is sure to be wanted to
wrap him in. Now, you owe me a hundred and forty-four francs as it is,
add forty francs for the pair of sheets, and then there are several little
things, besides the candle that Sylvie will give you; altogether it will all
mount up to at least two hundred francs, which is more than a poor
widow like me can afford to lose. Lord! now, Monsieur Eugene, look at it
fairly. I have lost quite enough in these five days since this run of ill-luck
set in for me. I would rather than ten crowns that the old gentlemen had
moved out as you said. It sets the other lodgers against the house. It
would not take much to make me send him to the workhouse. In short,
just put yourself in my place. I have to think of my establishment first,
for I have my own living to make.”
Eugene hurried up to Goriot’s room.
“Bianchon,” he cried, “the money for the watch?”
“There it is on the table, or the three hundred and sixty odd francs that
are left of it. I paid up all the old scores out of it before they let me have
the things. The pawn ticket lies there under the money.”
Rastignac hurried downstairs.
“Here, madame” he said in disgust, “let us square accounts. M. Goriot
will not stay much longer in your house, nor shall I—”
“Yes, he will go out feet foremost, poor old gentleman,” she said,
counting the francs with a half-facetious, half-lugubrious expression.
“Let us get this over,” said Rastignac.
“Sylvie, look out some sheets, and go upstairs to help the gentlemen.”
“You won’t forget Sylvie,” said Mme. Vauquer in Eugene’s ear; “she has
been sitting up these two nights.”
As soon as Eugene’s back was turned, the old woman hurried after her
handmaid.
“Take the sheets that have had the sides turned into the middle, number
7. Lord! they are plenty good enough for a corpse,” she said in Sylvie’s
ear.
Eugene, by this time, was part of the way upstairs, and did not overhear
the elderly economist.
“Quick,” said Bianchon, “let us change his shirt. Hold him upright.”
Eugene went to the head of the bed and supported the dying man, while
Bianchon drew off his shirt; and then Goriot made a movement as if he
tried to clutch something to his breast, uttering a low inarticulate
moaning the while, like some dumb animal in mortal pain.
“Ah! yes!” cried Bianchon. “It is the little locket and the chain made of
hair that he wants; we took it off a while ago when we put the blisters on
him. Poor fellow! he must have it again. There it lies on the chimney-
piece.”
Eugene went to the chimney-piece and found the little plait of faded
golden hair — Mme. Goriot’s hair, no doubt. He read the name on the
little round locket, ANASTASIE on the one side, DELPHINE on the
other. It was the symbol of his own heart that the father always wore on
his breast. The curls of hair inside the locket were so fine and soft that is
was plain they had been taken from two childish heads. When the old
man felt the locket once more, his chest heaved with a long deep sigh of
satisfaction, like a groan. It was something terrible to see, for it seemed
as if the last quiver of the nerves were laid bare to their eyes, the last
communication of sense to the mysterious point within whence our
sympathies come and whither they go. A delirious joy lighted up the
distorted face. The terrific and vivid force of the feeling that had survived
the power of thought made such an impression on the students, that the dying man felt their hot tears falling on him, and gave a shrill cry of
delight.
“Nasie! Fifine!”
“There is life in him yet,” said Bianchon.
“What does he go on living for?” said Sylvie.
“To suffer,” answered Rastignac.
Bianchon made a sign to his friend to follow his example, knelt down and
pressed his arms under the sick man, and Rastignac on the other side did
the same, so that Sylvie, standing in readiness, might draw the sheet
from beneath and replace it with the one that she had brought. Those
tears, no doubt, had misled Goriot; for he gathered up all his remaining
strength in a last effort, stretched out his hands, groped for the students’
heads, and as his fingers caught convulsively at their hair, they heard a
faint whisper:
“Ah! my angels!”
Two words, two inarticulate murmurs, shaped into words by the soul
which fled forth with them as they left his lips.
“Poor dear!” cried Sylvie, melted by that exclamation; the expression of
the great love raised for the last time to a sublime height by that most
ghastly and involuntary of lies.
The father’s last breath must have been a sigh of joy, and in that sigh his
whole life was summed up; he was cheated even at the last. They laid
Father Goriot upon his wretched bed with reverent hands.
Thenceforward there was no expression on his face, only the painful
traces of the struggle between life and death that was going on in the
machine; for that kind of cerebral consciousness that distinguishes
between pleasure and pain in a human being was extinguished; it was
only a question of time — and the mechanism itself would be destroyed.
“He will lie like this for several hours, and die so quietly at last, that we
shall not know when he goes; there will be no rattle in the throat. The
brain must be completely suffused.”
As he spoke there was a footstep on the staircase, and a young woman
hastened up, panting for breath.
“She has come too late,” said Rastignac.
But it was not Delphine; it was Therese, her waiting-woman, who stood
in the doorway.
“Monsieur Eugene,” she said, “monsieur and madame have had a terrible
scene about some money that Madame (poor thing!) wanted for her
father. She fainted, and the doctor came, and she had to be bled, calling
out all the while, ‘My father is dying; I want to see papa!’ It was
heartbreaking to hear her —”
“That will do, Therese. If she came now, it would be trouble thrown
away. M. Goriot cannot recognize any one now.”
“Poor, dear gentleman, is he as bad at that?” said Therese.
“You don’t want me now, I must go and look after my dinner; it is half-
past four,” remarked Sylvie. The next instant she all but collided with
Mme. de Restaud on the landing outside.
There was something awful and appalling in the sudden apparition of the
Countess. She saw the bed of death by the dim light of the single candle,
and her tears flowed at the sight of her father’s passive features, from
which the life had almost ebbed. Bianchon with thoughtful tact left the
room.
“I could not escape soon enough,” she said to Rastignac.
The student bowed sadly in reply. Mme. de Restaud took her father’s
hand and kissed it.
“Forgive me, father! You used to say that my voice would call you back
from the grave; ah! come back for one moment to bless your penitent
daughter. Do you hear me? Oh! this is fearful! No one on earth will ever
bless me henceforth; every one hates me; no one loves me but you in all
the world. My own children will hate me. Take me with you, father; I will
love you, I will take care of you. He does not hear me . . . I am mad . . . ”
She fell on her knees, and gazed wildly at the human wreck before her.
“My cup of misery is full,” she said, turning her eyes upon Eugene. “M.
de Trailles has fled, leaving enormous debts behind him, and I have
found out that he was deceiving me. My husband will never forgive me,
and I have left my fortune in his hands. I have lost all my illusions. Alas!
I have forsaken the one heart that loved me (she pointed to her father as
she spoke), and for whom? I have held his kindness cheap, and slighted
his affection; many and many a time I have given him pain, ungrateful
wretch that I am!”
“He knew it,” said Rastignac.
Just then Goriot’s eyelids unclosed; it was only a muscular contraction,
but the Countess’ sudden start of reviving hope was no less dreadful than
the dying eyes.
“Is it possible that he can hear me?” cried the Countess. “No,” she
answered herself, and sat down beside the bed. As Mme. de Restaud
seemed to wish to sit by her father, Eugene went down to take a little
food. The boarders were already assembled.
“Well,” remarked the painter, as he joined them, “it seems that there is to
be a death-orama upstairs.”
“Charles, I think you might find something less painful to joke about,”
said Eugene.
“So we may not laugh here?” returned the painter. “What harm does it
do? Bianchon said that the old man was quite insensible.”
“Well, then,” said the employe from the Museum, “he will die as he has
lived.”
“My father is dead!” shrieked the Countess.
The terrible cry brought Sylvie, Rastignac, and Bianchon; Mme. de
Restaud had fainted away. When she recovered they carried her
downstairs, and put her into the cab that stood waiting at the door.
Eugene sent Therese with her, and bade the maid take the Countess to
Mme. de Nucingen.
Bianchon came down to them.
“Yes, he is dead,” he said.
“Come, sit down to dinner, gentlemen,” said Mme. Vauquer, “or the soup
will be cold.”
The two students sat down together.
“What is the next thing to be done?” Eugene asked of Bianchon.
“I have closed his eyes and composed his limbs,” said Bianchon. “When
the certificate has been officially registered at the Mayor’s office, we will
sew him in his winding sheet and bury him somewhere. What do you
think we ought to do?”
“He will not smell at his bread like this any more,” said the painter,
mimicking the old man’s little trick.
“Oh, hang it all!” cried the tutor, “let Father Goriot drop, and let us have
something else for a change. He is a standing dish, and we have had him
with every sauce this hour or more. It is one of the privileges of the good
city of Paris that anybody may be born, or live, or die there without
attracting any attention whatsoever. Let us profit by the advantages of
civilization. There are fifty or sixty deaths every day; if you have a mind
to do it, you can sit down at any time and wail over whole hecatombs of
dead in Paris. Father Goriot has gone off the hooks, has he? So much the
better for him. If you venerate his memory, keep it to yourselves, and let
the rest of us feed in peace.”
“Oh, to be sure,” said the widow, “it is all the better for him that he is
dead. It looks as though he had had trouble enough, poor soul, while he
was alive.”
And this was all the funeral oration delivered over him who had been for
Eugene the type and embodiment of Fatherhood.
The fifteen lodgers began to talk as usual. When Bianchon and Eugene
had satisfied their hunger, the rattle of spoons and forks, the boisterous
conversation, the expressions on the faces that bespoke various degrees
of want of feeling, gluttony, or indifference, everything about them made
them shiver with loathing. They went out to find a priest to watch that
night with the dead. It was necessary to measure their last pious cares by
the scanty sum of money that remained. Before nine o’clock that evening
the body was laid out on the bare sacking of the bedstead in the desolate room; a lighted candle stood on either side, and the priest watched at the
foot. Rastignac made inquiries of this latter as to the expenses of the
funeral, and wrote to the Baron de Nucingen and the Comte de Restaud,
entreating both gentlemen to authorize their man of business to defray
the charges of laying their father-in-law in the grave. He sent Christophe
with the letters; then he went to bed, tired out, and slept.
Next day Bianchon and Rastignac were obliged to take the certificate to
the registrar themselves, and by twelve o’clock the formalities were
completed. Two hours went by, no word came from the Count nor from
the Baron; nobody appeared to act for them, and Rastignac had already
been obliged to pay the priest. Sylvie asked ten francs for sewing the old
man in his winding-sheet and making him ready for the grave, and
Eugene and Bianchon calculated that they had scarcely sufficient to pay
for the funeral, if nothing was forthcoming from the dead man’s family.
So it was the medical student who laid him in a pauper’s coffin,
despatched from Bianchon’s hospital, whence he obtained it at a cheaper
rate.
“Let us play those wretches a trick,” said he. “Go to the cemetery, buy a
grave for five years at Pere-Lachaise, and arrange with the Church and
the undertaker to have a third-class funeral. If the daughters and their
husbands decline to repay you, you can carve this on the headstone —
‘HERE LIES M. GORIOT, FATHER OF THE COMTESSE DE RESTAUD
AND THE BARONNE DE NUCINGEN, INTERRED AT THE EXPENSE
OF TWO STUDENTS.’ ”
FATHER GORIOT
BY
HONORE DE BALZAC
