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You are feverish." "Just go to Mother Vauquer's," said Rastignac; "that scoundrel Vautrin has dropped down like one dead." "Aha!" said Bianchon, leaving Rastignac to his reflections, "you confirm my suspicions, and now I mean to make sure for myself." The law student's long walk was a memorable one for him. He made in some sort a survey of his conscience.
Then find Europe and Paccard; those two thieves must be at my orders, and ready to play any part I may set them. "Go to Rastignac; tell him, from the man he met at the opera-ball, to come and swear that the Abbe Carlos Herrera has no resemblance to Jacques Collin who was apprehended at Vauquer's. Do the same with Dr. Bianchon, and get Lucien's two women to work to the same end."
It was as if a sudden light had pierced the obscurity of this upper world of Paris, and he began to see, though everything was indistinct as yet. Mme. Vauquer's lodging-house and Father Goriot were very far remote from his thoughts. "I thought that the Marcillacs were extinct," the Comte de Restaud said, addressing Eugene. "Yes, they are extinct," answered the law student.
Vauquer's messes, and we like grand dinners in the Faubourg Saint-Germain; we sleep on a truckle-bed, and dream of a mansion! I do not blame you for wanting these things. What sort of men do the women run after? Men of ambition. Men of ambition have stronger frames, their blood is richer in iron, their hearts are warmer than those of ordinary men.
Vauquer's ideas as to Goriot were cordially approved by Mme. de l'Ambermesnil; it was a capital notion, which for that matter she had guessed from the very first; in her opinion the vermicelli maker was an excellent man. "Ah! my dear lady, such a well-preserved man of his age, as sound as my eyesight a man who might make a woman happy!" said the widow.
Vauquer's astonished eyes beheld no less than eighteen cambric-fronted shirts, the splendor of their fineness being enhanced by a pair of pins each bearing a large diamond, and connected by a short chain, an ornament which adorned the vermicelli-maker's shirt front.
Father Goriot raised his head at the words, and gave the two speakers a glance so full of intelligence and uneasiness that the lodgers beheld him with astonishment. "Then Christophe was too late, and she must have gone to him!" cried Goriot, with anguish in his voice. "It is just as I guessed," said Vautrin, leaning over to whisper in Mme. Vauquer's ear.
"I acknowledge myself to be Jacques Collin, otherwise known as Trompe-la-Mort, condemned to twenty years' penal servitude, and I have just proved that I have come fairly by my nickname. If I had as much as raised my hand," he went on, addressing the other lodgers, "those three sneaking wretches yonder would have drawn claret on Mamma Vauquer's domestic hearth.
Every one came down in dressing-gown and slippers, and the conversation usually turned on anything that had happened the evening before; comments on the dress or appearance of the dinner contingent were exchanged in friendly confidence. These seven lodgers were Mme. Vauquer's spoiled children.
There were usually eighteen people at dinner, and there was room, if need be, for twenty at Mme. Vauquer's table; at breakfast, however, only the seven lodgers appeared. It was almost like a family party.
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