The Best Works of Balzac. Оноре де Бальзак

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СКАЧАТЬ “To Messrs. Farry, Breilmann, & Co., carriage-makers”; “To Monsieur Buisson, tailor,” etc.

      “He has been settling all his affairs, so as to leave France at once,” she thought. Her eyes fell upon two open letters. The words, “My dear Annette,” at the head of one of them, blinded her for a moment. Her heart beat fast, her feet were nailed to the floor.

      “His dear Annette! He loves! he is loved! No hope! What does he say to her?”

      These thoughts rushed through her head and heart. She saw the words everywhere, even on the bricks of the floor, in letters of fire.

      “Resign him already? No, no! I will not read the letter. I ought to go away—What if I do read it?”

      She looked at Charles, then she gently took his head and placed it against the back of the chair; he let her do so, like a child which, though asleep, knows its mother’s touch and receives, without awaking, her kisses and watchful care. Like a mother Eugenie raised the drooping hand, and like a mother she gently kissed the chestnut hair—“Dear Annette!” a demon shrieked the words in her ear.

      “I am doing wrong; but I must read it, that letter,” she said. She turned away her head, for her noble sense of honor reproached her. For the first time in her life good and evil struggled together in her heart. Up to that moment she had never had to blush for any action. Passion and curiosity triumphed. As she read each sentence her heart swelled more and more, and the keen glow which filled her being as she did so, only made the joys of first love still more precious.

      My dear Annette,—Nothing could ever have separated us but the

       great misfortune which has now overwhelmed me, and which no human

       foresight could have prevented. My father has killed himself; his

       fortune and mine are irretrievably lost. I am orphaned at an age

       when, through the nature of my education, I am still a child; and

       yet I must lift myself as a man out of the abyss into which I am

       plunged. I have just spent half the night in facing my position.

       If I wish to leave France an honest man,—and there is no doubt of

       that,—I have not a hundred francs of my own with which to try my

       fate in the Indies or in America. Yes, my poor Anna, I must seek

       my fortune in those deadly climates. Under those skies, they tell

       me, I am sure to make it. As for remaining in Paris, I cannot do

       so. Neither my nature nor my face are made to bear the affronts,

       the neglect, the disdain shown to a ruined man, the son of a

       bankrupt! Good God! think of owing two millions! I should be

       killed in a duel the first week; therefore I shall not return

       there. Your love—the most tender and devoted love which ever

       ennobled the heart of man—cannot draw me back. Alas! my beloved,

       I have no money with which to go to you, to give and receive a

       last kiss from which I might derive some strength for my forlorn

       enterprise.

      “Poor Charles! I did well to read the letter. I have gold; I will give it to him,” thought Eugenie.

      She wiped her eyes, and went on reading.

      I have never thought of the miseries of poverty. If I have the

       hundred louis required for the mere costs of the journey, I have

       not a sou for an outfit. But no, I have not the hundred louis, not

       even one louis. I don’t know that anything will be left after I

       have paid my debts in Paris. If I have nothing, I shall go quietly

       to Nantes and ship as a common sailor; and I will begin in the new

       world like other men who have started young without a sou and

       brought back the wealth of the Indies. During this long day I have

       faced my future coolly. It seems more horrible for me than for

       another, because I have been so petted by a mother who adored me,

       so indulged by the kindest of fathers, so blessed by meeting, on

       my entrance into life, with the love of an Anna! The flowers of

       life are all I have ever known. Such happiness could not last.

       Nevertheless, my dear Annette, I feel more courage than a careless

       young man is supposed to feel,—above all a young man used to the

       caressing ways of the dearest woman in all Paris, cradled in

       family joys, on whom all things smiled in his home, whose wishes

       were a law to his father—oh, my father! Annette, he is dead!

       Well, I have thought over my position, and yours as well. I have

       grown old in twenty-four hours. Dear Anna, if in order to keep me

       with you in Paris you were to sacrifice your luxury, your dress,

       your opera-box, we should even then not have enough for the

       expenses of my extravagant ways of living. Besides, I would never

       accept such sacrifices. No, we must part now and forever—

      “He gives her up! Blessed Virgin! What happiness!”

      Eugenie quivered with joy. Charles made a movement, and a chill of terror ran through her. Fortunately, he did not wake, and she resumed her reading.

      When shall I return? I do not know. The climate of the West Indies

       ages a European, so they say; especially a European who works

       hard. Let us think what may happen ten years hence. In ten years

       your daughter will be eighteen; she will be your companion, your

       spy. To you society will be cruel, and your daughter perhaps more

       cruel still. We have seen cases of the harsh social judgment and

       ingratitude of daughters; let us take warning by them. Keep in the

       depths of your soul, as I shall in mine, the memory of four years

       of happiness, and be faithful, if you can, to the memory of your

       poor friend. I cannot exact such faithfulness, because, do you

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