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Updated: May 31, 2025
"'Ah, ha! cried Rastignac, as he saw me enter his lodging at nine o'clock in the morning. 'I know what brings you here. Foedora has dismissed you. Some kind souls, who were jealous of your ascendency over the countess, gave out that you were going to be married. Heaven only knows what follies your rivals have equipped you with, and what slanders have been directed at you.
I used all my time, and exerted every effort and all my powers of observation, to penetrate the impenetrable character of Foedora. Alternate hope and despair had swayed my opinions; for me she was sometimes the tenderest, sometimes the most unfeeling of women. But these transitions from joy to sadness became unendurable; I sought to end the horrible conflict within me by extinguishing love.
"I was greatly tempted to show myself suddenly among the railers, like the shade of Banquo in Macbeth. I should have lost a mistress, but I had a friend! But love inspired me all at once, with one of those treacherous and fallacious subtleties that it can use to soothe all our pangs. "If Foedora loved me, I thought, she would be sure to disguise her feelings by some mocking jest.
Here was the accomplished mistress he had so often dreamed of, the intelligent young girl with the loving nature and artistic temperament, who understood poets, who understood poetry, and lived in luxurious surroundings. Here, in short, was Foedora, gifted with a great soul; or Pauline become a countess, and twice a millionaire, as Foedora had been.
If you have any sense, my dear fellow, you will ensure the success of your "Theory," by a better understanding of the theory of success. To-morrow evening you shall go to see that queen of the moment the beautiful Countess Foedora.... "'I have never heard of her.... "'You Hottentot! laughed Rastignac; 'you do not know Foedora?
If Foedora would none of love to-day, she had had strong passions at some time; past experience of pleasure showed itself in the attitudes she chose in conversation, in her coquettish way of leaning against the panel behind her; she seemed scarcely able to stand alone, and yet ready for flight from too bold a glance.
"'Foedora must be shielded by some talisman, I thought to myself as I went back, 'or she could not resist the love of a man of my age, the infectious fever of that splendid malady of the soul. Is Foedora, like Lady Delacour, a prey to a cancer? Her life is certainly an unnatural one. "I shuddered at the thought.
You have been a friend to me, you have shown me kindness and great indulgence; know, therefore, that to-morrow I must bid you farewell. Do not take back your word, I exclaimed, seeing her about to speak, and I went away. "At eight o'clock one evening towards the end of May, Foedora and I were alone together in her gothic boudoir. I feared no longer; I was secure of happiness.
The questions Foedora raised showed a certain keenness of intellect. I took a pleasure in deciding some of them in her favor, in order to flatter her; then I confuted her feminine reasoning with a word, and roused her curiosity by drawing her attention to an everyday matter to sleep, a thing so apparently commonplace, that in reality is an insoluble problem for science.
These pictures of Foedora and her luxurious surroundings haunted me even in my bare, cold garret, when at last I reached it, as disheveled as any naturalist's wig. The contrast suggested evil counsel; in such a way crimes are conceived. I cursed my honest, self-respecting poverty, my garret where such teeming fancies had stirred within me.
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