Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau, Honoré de Balzac [good fiction books to read .TXT] 📗

Foy a great one, Casimir Perier without ambition, Lafayette a political prophet, and Courier a worthy fellow. He had indeed some noble chimeras. The fine old man lived a family life; he went about among the Ragons, his niece Birotteau, the judge Popinot, Joseph Lebas, and his friend Matifat. Fifteen hundred francs a year sufficed for all his personal wants. As to the rest of his income he spent it on good deeds, and in presents to his great-niece; he gave a dinner four times a year to his friends, at Roland's, Rue du Hasard, and took them afterwards to the theatre. He played the part of those old bachelors on whom married women draw at sight for their amusements,--a country jaunt, the opera, the Montagnes-Beaujon, _et caetera_. Pillerault was made happy by the pleasure he gave; his joys were in the hearts of others. Though he had sold his business, he did not wish to leave the neighborhood to which all his habits tied him; and he took a small appartement of three rooms in the Rue des Bourdonnais on the fourth floor of an old house.

Just as the moral nature of Molineux could be seen in his strange interior, the pure and simple life of Pillerault was revealed by the arrangements of his modest home, consisting of an antechamber, a sitting-room, and a bed-room. Judged by dimensions, it was the cell of a Trappist. The antechamber, with a red-tiled floor, had only one window, screened by a cambric curtain with a red border; mahogany chairs, covered with reddish sheep's leather put on with gilt nails, walls hung with an olive-green paper, and otherwise decorated with the American Declaration of Independence, a portrait of Bonaparte as First Consul, and a representation of the battle of Austerlitz. The salon, decorated undoubtedly by an upholsterer, had a set of furniture with arched tops covered in yellow, a carpet, chimney ornaments of bronze without gilding, a painted chimney-board, a console bearing a vase of flowers under a glass case, a round table covered with a cloth, on which stood a liqueur-stand. The newness of this room proclaimed a sacrifice made by the old man to the conventions of the world; for he seldom received any one at home. In his bedroom, as plain as that of a monk or an old soldier (the two men best able to estimate life), a crucifix with a basin of holy-water first caught the eye. This profession of faith in a stoical old republican was strangely moving to the heart of a spectator.

An old woman came to do his household work; but his respect for women was so great that he would not let her black his boots, and he subscribed to a boot-black for that service. His dress was simple, and invariably the same. He wore a coat and trousers of dark-blue cloth, a waistcoat of some printed cotton fabric, a white cravat, high shoes, and on gala days he put on a coat with brass buttons. His habits of rising, breakfasting, going out, dining, his evening resorts, and his returning hours were all stamped with the strictest punctuality; for regular habits are the secret of long life and sound health. Politics never came to the surface in his intercourse with Cesar, the Ragons, or the Abbe Loraux; for the good people of that circle knew each other too well to care to enter the region of proselytism. Like his nephew and like the Ragons, he put implicit confidence in Roguin. To his mind the notary was a being worthy of veneration,--the living image of probity. In the affair of the lands about the Madeleine, Pillerault had undertaken a private examination, which was the real cause of the boldness with which Cesar had combated his wife's presentiments.

The perfumer went up the seventy-eight stairs which led to the little brown door of his uncle's appartement, thinking as he went that the old man must be very hale to mount them daily without complaining. He found a frock-coat and pair of trousers hanging on the hat-stand outside the door. Madame Vaillant brushed and cleaned them while this genuine philosopher, wrapped in a gray woollen garment, breakfasted in his chimney-corner and read the parliamentary debates in the "Constitutionnel" or the "Journal du Commerce."

"Uncle," said Cesar, "the matter is settled; they are drawing up their deeds; but you have any fears or regrets, there is still time to give it up."

"Why should I give it up? The thing is good; though it may be a long time before we realize anything, like all safe investments. My fifty thousand francs are in the bank. I received yesterday the last instalment, five thousand francs, from my business. As for the Ragons, they have put their whole fortune into the affair."

"How do they contrive to life?"

"Never mind how; they do live."

"Uncle, I understand!" said Birotteau, deeply moved, pressing the hand of the austere old man.

"How is the affair arranged?" asked Pillerault, brusquely.

"I am in for three eighths, you and the Ragons for one eighth. I shall credit you for that on my books until the question of registration is decided."

"Good! My boy, you must be getting rich to put three hundred thousand francs into it. It seems to me you are risking a good deal outside of your business. Won't the business suffer? However, that is your affair. If you get a set-back, why the Funds are at eighty, and I could sell two thousand francs worth of my consolidated stock. But take care, my lad; for if you have to come upon me, it will be your daughter's fortune that you will take."

"Ah! my uncle, how simply you say things! You touch my heart."

"General Foy was touching mine in quite another fashion just now. Well, go on; settle the business; lands can't fly away. We are getting them at half price. Suppose we do have to wait six years, there will always be some returns; there are wood-yards which will bring in a rent. We can't really lose anything. There is but one chance against us. Roguin might run off with the money."

"My wife told me so this very night. She fears--"

"That Roguin will carry off our funds?" said Pillerault, laughing. "Pray, why?"

"She says there is too much in his nose; and like men who can't have women, he is furious to--"

With a smile of incredulity, Pillerault tore a strip from a little book, wrote down an amount, and signed the paper.

"There," said he, "there's a cheque on the Bank of France for a hundred thousand francs for the Ragons and for me. Those poor folks have just sold to your scoundrel of a du Tillet their fifteen shares in the mines at Wortschin to make up the amount. Worthy people in trouble,--it wrings my heart; and such good, noble souls, the very flower of the old bourgeoisie! Their brother, Popinot, the judge, knows nothing about it; they hid it from him so that he may not feel obliged to give up his other works of charity. People who have worked, like me, for forty years!"

"God grant that the Oil of Comagene may triumph!" cried Birotteau. "I shall be doubly happy. Adieu; come and dine on Sunday with the Ragons, Roguin, and Monsieur Claparon. We shall sign the papers the day after to-morrow, for to-morrow is Friday, you know, and I shouldn't like--"

"You don't surely give in to such superstitions?"

"Uncle, I shall never believe that the day on which the Son of God was put to death by man can be a fortunate day. Why, we ourselves stop all business on the twenty-first of January."

"On Sunday, then," said Pillerault brusquely.

"If it were not for his political opinions," thought Birotteau as he went down stairs, "I don't believe he would have his equal here below. What are politics to him? He would be just as well off if he never thought of them. His obstinacy in that direction only shows that there can't be a perfect man."

"Three o'clock already!" cried Cesar, as he got back to "The Queen of Roses."

"Monsieur, do you mean to take these securities?" asked Celestin, showing him the notes of the umbrella-maker.

"Yes; at six per cent, without commission. Wife, get my dressing things all ready; I am going to see Monsieur Vauquelin,--you know why. A white cravat, of course."

Birotteau gave a few orders to the clerks. Not seeing Popinot, he concluded that his future partner had gone to dress; and he went gaily up to his room, where the Dresden Madonna, magnificently framed according to his orders, awaited him.

"Hey! that's pretty," he said to his daughter.

"Papa, you must say beautiful, or people will laugh at you."

"Upon my word! a daughter who scolds her father! Well, well! To my taste I like Hero and Leander quite as much. The Virgin is a religious subject, suitable for a chapel; but Hero and Leander, ah! I shall buy it, for that flask of oil gave me an idea--"

"Papa, I don't know what you are talking about."

"Virginie! a hackney-coach!" cried Cesar, in stentorian tones, as soon as he had trimmed his beard and seen little Popinot appear, who was dragging his foot timidly because Cesarine was there.

The lover had never yet perceived that his infirmity no longer existed in the eyes of his mistress. Delicious sign of love!--which they on whom chance has inflicted a bodily imperfection can alone obtain.

"Monsieur," he said, "the press will be ready to work to-morrow."

"Why, what's the matter, Popinot?" asked Cesar, as he saw Anselme blush.

"Monsieur, it is the joy of having found a shop, a back-shop, kitchen, chambers above them, and store-rooms,--all for twelve hundred francs a year, in the Rue des Cinq-Diamants."

"We must take a lease of eighteen years," said Birotteau. "But let us start for Monsieur Vauquelin's. We can talk as we go."

Cesar and Popinot got into the hackney-coach before the eyes of the astonished clerks, who did not know what to make of these gorgeous toilets and the abnormal coach, ignorant as they were of the great project revolving in the mind of the master of "The Queen of Roses."

"We are going to hear the truth about nuts," said Cesar, half to himself.

"Nuts?" said Popinot.

"There you have my secret," said the perfumer. "I've let loose the word _nuts_,--all is there. The oil of nuts is the only oil that has any real effect upon hair. No perfumer has ever dreamed of it. I saw an engraving of Hero and Leander, and I said to myself, If the ancients used all that oil on their heads they had some reason for it; for the ancients are the ancients, in spite of all the moderns may say; I stand by Boileau about the ancients. I took my departure from that point and got the oil of nuts, thanks to your relation, little Bianchon the medical student; he told me that at school his comrades used nut oil to promote the growth of their whiskers and mustachios. All we need is the approval of Monsieur Vauquelin; enlightened by his science, we shall mislead the public. I was in the markets just now, talking to a seller of nuts, so as to get hold of the raw material, and now I am about to meet one of the greatest scientific men in France, to get at the quintessence of that commodity. Proverbs are no fools; extremes meet. Now see, my boy, commerce is the intermediary between the productions of the vegetable kingdom and science. Angelique