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"Desroches' mother had a friend, a druggist's wife," continued Bixiou. "Said druggist had retired with a fat fortune. These druggist folk have absurdly crude notions; by way of giving his daughter a good education, he had sent her to a boarding-school! Well, Matifat meant the girl to marry well, on the strength of two hundred thousand francs, good hard coin with no scent of drugs about it."
And mind that scene in the second act, make the irony tell, bring out that subtle touch; say, 'I do not love you, just as we agreed." "Why do you take parts in which you have to say such things?" asked Matifat. The druggist's remark was received with a general shout of laughter. "What does it matter to you," said Florine, "so long as I don't say such things to you, great stupid?
"What is the matter with you?" asked Etienne Lousteau. "I see poetry fallen into the mire." "Ah! you have still some illusions left, my dear fellow." "Is there nothing for it but to cringe and submit to thickheads like Matifat and Camusot, as actresses bow down to journalists, and we ourselves to the booksellers?"
Bixiou. "By cochineal." Vimeux. "Yes, cochineal; he's a partner in the house of Matifat, rue des Lombards. Well, he is retired; so is Poiret. Neither is to be replaced. So much is certain; the rest is all conjecture. The appointment of Monsieur Rabourdin is to be announced this morning; they are afraid of intrigues." Bixiou. "What intrigues?" Fleury. "Baudoyer's, confound him!
Blackmailing with regard to private life is the terror of the richest Englishman, and a great source of wealth to the press in England, which is infinitely more corrupt than ours. We are children in comparison! In England they will pay five or six thousand francs for a compromising letter to sell again." "Then how can you lay hold of Matifat?" asked Lucien.
As he watched Florine on the stage he almost envied Lousteau his good fortune; already, for a few moments he had forgotten Matifat in the background. He was not left alone for long, perhaps for not more than five minutes, but those minutes seemed an eternity. Thoughts rose within him that set his soul on fire, as the spectacle on the stage had heated his senses.
It was even said that, in imitation of Cadot and the rich Camusot, he kept a mistress. Sometimes Madame Matifat, seeing him about to relate some questionable anecdote, would hasten to interrupt him by screaming out: "Take care what you are saying, old man!" She called him habitually her "old man."
The curtain rose, Vignol reappeared between the two actresses; Matifat and Camusot flung wreaths on the stage, and Coralie stooped for her flowers and held them out to Lucien. For him those two hours spent in the theatre seemed to be a dream.
Matifat were of the opinion that an attorney's position 'gave some guarantee for a wife's happiness, to use their own expression; and as for Desroches, he was prepared to fall in with his mother's views in case he could do no better for himself. Wherefore, he kept up his acquaintance with the druggists in the Rue du Cherche-Midi.
Brigaut, Major The Chouans Desplein The Atheist's Mass Cousin Pons Lost Illusions The Thirteen The Government Clerks A Bachelor's Establishment The Seamy Side of History Modeste Mignon Scenes from a Courtesan's Life Honorine Gouraud, General, Baron Cousin Pons Keller, Adolphe The Middle Classes Cesar Birotteau Matifat, Mademoiselle Cesar Birotteau The Firm of Nucingen
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