章节正文
possession, but I cannot accept it from you, and I am too poor as
yet to----"
"Ah! ah! you say me nay already," she said with arch
imperiousness, and a charming little pout of the lips, a woman's
way of laughing away scruples.
But Eugene had submitted so lately to that solemn self-
questioning, and Vautrin's arrest had so plainly shown him the
depths of the pit that lay ready to his feet, that the instincts
of generosity and honor had been strengthened in him, and he
could not allow himself to be coaxed into abandoning his high-
minded determinations. Profound melancholy filled his mind.
"Do you really mean to refuse?" said Mme. de Nucingen. "And do
you know what such a refusal means? That you are not sure of
yourself, that you do not dare to bind yourself to me. Are you
really afraid of betraying my affection? If you love me, if I--
love you, why should you shrink back from such a slight
obligation? If you but knew what a pleasure it has been to see
after all the arrangements of this bachelorestablishment, you
would not hesitate any longer, you would ask me to forgive you
for your hesitation. I had some money that belonged to you, and I
have made good use of it, that is all. You mean this for
magnanimity, but it is very little of you. You are asking me for
far more than this. . . . Ah!" she cried, as Eugene's passionate
glance was turned on her, "and you are making difficulties about
the merest trifles. Of, if you feel no love whatever for me,
refuse, by all means. My fate hangs on a word from you. Speak!--
Father," she said after a pause, "make him listen to reason. Can
he imagine that I am less nice than he is on the point of honor?"
Father Goriot was looking on and listening to this pretty quarrel
with a placid smile, as if he had found some balm for all the
sorrows of life.
"Child that you are!" she cried again, catching Eugene's hand.
"You are just beginning life; you find barriers at the outset
that many a man finds insurmountable; a woman's hand opens the
way and you shrink back! Why, you are sure to succeed! You will
have a brilliant future. Success is written on that broad
forehead of yours, and will you not be able to repay me my loan
of today? Did not a lady in olden times arm her knight with sword
and helmet and coat of mail, and find him a charger, so that he
might fight for her in the tournament? Well, then, Eugene, these
things that I offer you are the weapons of this age; every one
who means to be something must have such tools as these. A pretty
place your garret must be if it is like papa's room! See, dinner
is waiting all this time. Do you want to make me unhappy?--Why
don't you answer?" she said, shaking his hand. "MON DIEU! papa,
make up his mind for him, or I will go away and never see him any
more."
"I will make up your mind," said Goriot, coming down from the
clouds. "Now, my dear M. Eugene, the next thing is to borrow
money of the Jews, isn't it?"
"There is positively no help for it," said Eugene.
"All right, I will give you credit," said the other, drawing out
a cheap leather pocket-book, much the worse for wear. "I have
turned Jew myself; I paid for everything; here are the invoices.
You do not owe a penny for anything here. It did not come to very
much--five thousand francs at most, and I am going to lend you
the money myself. I am not a woman--you can refuse me. You shall
give me a receipt on a scrap of paper, and you can return it some
time or other."
Delphine and Eugene looked at each other in amazement, tears
sprang to their eyes. Rastignac held out his hand and grasped
Goriot's warmly.
"Well, what is all this about? Are you not my children?"
"Oh! my poor father," said Mme. de Nucingen, "how did you do
it?"
"Ah! now you ask me. When I made up my mind to move him nearer to
you, and saw you buying things as if they were wedding presents,
I said to myself, 'She will never be able to pay for them.' The
attorney says that those law proceedings will last quite six
months before your husband can be made to disgorge your fortune.
Well and good. I sold out my property in the funds that brought
in thirteen hundred and fifty livres a year, and bought a safe
annuity of twelve hundred francs a year for fifteen thousand
francs. Then I paid your tradesmen out of the rest of the
capital. As for me, children, I have a room upstairs for which I
pay fifty crowns a year; I can live like a prince on two francs a
day, and still have something left over. I shall not have to
spend anything much on clothes, for I never wear anything out.
This fortnight past I have been laughing in my sleeve, thinking
to myself, 'How happy they are going to be!' and--well, now, are
you not happy?"
"Oh papa! papa!" cried Mme. de Nucingen, springing to her father,
who took her on his knee. She covered him with kisses, her fair
hair brushed his cheek, her tears fell on the withered face that
had grown so bright and radiant.
"Dear father, what a father you are! No, there is not another
father like you under the sun. If Eugene loved you before, what
must he feel for you now?"
"Why, children, why Delphinette!" cried Goriot, who had not felt
his daughter's heart beat against his breast for ten years, "do
you want me to die of joy? My poor heart will break! Come,
Monsieur Eugene, we are quits already." And the old man strained
her to his breast with such fierce and passionate force that she
cried out.
"Oh! you are hurting me!" she said.
"I am hurting you!" He grew pale at the words. The pain expressed
in his face seemed greater than it is given to humanity to know.
The agony of this Christ of paternity can only be compared with
the masterpieces of those princes of the palette who have left
for us the record of their visions of an agony suffered for a
whole world by the Saviour of men. Father Goriot pressed his lips
very gently against the waist than his fingers had grasped too
roughly.
"Oh! no, no," he cried. "I have not hurt you, have I?" and his
smile seemed to repeat the question. "YOU have hurt me with that
cry just now.--The things cost rather more than that," he said in
her ear, with another gentle kiss, "but I had to deceive him
about it, or he would have been angry."
Eugene sat dumb with amazement in the presence of this
inexhaustible love; he gazed at Goriot, and his face betrayed the
artless admiration which shapes the beliefs of youth.
"I will be worthy of all this," he cried.
"Oh! my Eugene, that is nobly said," and Mme. de Nucingen kissed
the law student on the forehead.
"He gave up Mlle. Taillefer and her millions for you," said
Father Goriot. "Yes, the little thing was in love with you, and
now that her brother is dead she is as rich as Croesus."
"Oh! why did you tell her?" cried Rastignac.
"Eugene," Delphine said in his ear, "I have one regret now this
evening. Ah! how I will love you! and for ever!"
"This is the happiest day I have had since you two were married!"
cried Goriot. "God may send me any suffering, so long as I do not
suffer through you, and I can still say, 'In this short month of
February I had more happiness than other men have in their whole
lives.'--Look at me, Fifine!" he said to his daughter. "She is
very beautiful, is she not? Tell me, now, have you seen many
women with that pretty soft color--that little dimple of hers?
No, I thought not. Ah, well, and but for me this lovely woman
would never have been. And very soon happiness will make her a
thousand times lovelier, happiness through you. I could give up
my place in heaven to you, neighbor, if needs be, and go down to
hell instead. Come, let us have dinner," he added, scarcely
knowing what he said, "everything is ours."
"Poor dear father!"
He rose and went over to her, and took her face in his hands, and
set a kiss on the plaits of hair. "If you only knew, little one,
how happy you can make me--how little it takes to make me happy!
Will you come and see me sometimes? I shall be just above, so it
is only a step. Promise me, say that you will!"
"Yes, dear father."
"Say it again."
"Yes, I will, my kind father."
"Hush! hush! I should make you say it a hundred times over if I
followed my own wishes. Let us have dinner."
The three behaved like children that evening, and Father Goriot's
spirits were certainly not the least wild. He lay at his
daughter's feet, kissed them, gazed into her eyes, rubbed his
head against her dress; in short, no young lover could have been
more extravagant or more tender.
"You see!" Delphine said with a look at Eugene, "so long as my
father is with us, he monopolizes me. He will be rather in the
way sometimes."
Eugene had himself already felt certain twinges of jealousy, and
could not blame this speech that contained the germ of all
ingratitude.
"And when will the rooms be ready?" asked Eugene, looking round.
"We must all leave them this evening, I suppose."
"Yes, but to-morrow you must come and dine with me," she
answered, with an eloquent glance. "It is our night at the
Italiens."
"I shall go to the pit," said her father.
It was midnight. Mme. de Nucingen's carriage was waiting for her,
and Father Goriot and the student walked back to the Maison
Vauquer, talking of Delphine, and warming over their talk till
there grew up a curious rivalry between the two violent passions.
Eugene could not help seeing that the father's self-less love was
deeper and more steadfast than his own. For this worshiper
Delphine was always pure and fair, and her father's adoration
drew its fervor from a whole past as well as a future of love.
They found Mme. Vauquer by the stove, with Sylvie and Christophe
to keep her company; the old landlady, sitting like Marius among
the ruins of Carthage, was waiting for the two lodgers that yet
remained to her, and bemoaning her lot with the sympathetic
Sylvie. Tasso's lamentations as recorded in Byron's poem are
undoubtedly eloquent, but for sheer force of truth they fall far
short of the widow's cry from the depths.
"Only three cups of coffee in the morning, Sylvie! Oh dear! to
have your house emptied in this way is enough to break your
heart. What is life, now my lodgers are gone? Nothing at all.
Just think of it! It is just as if all the furniture had been
taken out of the house, and your furniture is your life. How have
I offended heaven to draw down all this trouble upon me? And
haricot beans and potatoes laid in for twenty people! The police
in my house too! We shall have to live on potatoes now, and
Christophe will have to go!"
The Savoyard, who was fast asleep, suddenly woke up at this, and
said, "Madame," questioningly.
"Poor fellow!" said Sylvie, "he is like a dog."
"In the dead season, too! Nobody is moving now. I would like to
know where the lodgers are to drop down from. It drives me
distracted. And that old witch of a Michonneau goes and takes
Poiret with her! What can she have done to make him so fond of
her? He runs about after her like a little dog."
"Lord!" said Sylvie, flinging up her head, "those old maids are
up to all sorts of tricks."
"There's that poor M. Vautrin that they made out to be a
convict," the widow went on. "Well, you know that is too much for
me, Sylvie; I can't bring myself to believe it. Such a lively man
as he was, and paid fifteen francs a month for his coffee of an
evening, paid you very penny on the nail too."
"And open-handed he was!" said Christophe.
yet to----"
"Ah! ah! you say me nay already," she said with arch
imperiousness, and a charming little pout of the lips, a woman's
way of laughing away scruples.
But Eugene had submitted so lately to that solemn self-
questioning, and Vautrin's arrest had so plainly shown him the
depths of the pit that lay ready to his feet, that the instincts
of generosity and honor had been strengthened in him, and he
could not allow himself to be coaxed into abandoning his high-
minded determinations. Profound melancholy filled his mind.
"Do you really mean to refuse?" said Mme. de Nucingen. "And do
you know what such a refusal means? That you are not sure of
yourself, that you do not dare to bind yourself to me. Are you
really afraid of betraying my affection? If you love me, if I--
love you, why should you shrink back from such a slight
obligation? If you but knew what a pleasure it has been to see
after all the arrangements of this bachelorestablishment, you
would not hesitate any longer, you would ask me to forgive you
for your hesitation. I had some money that belonged to you, and I
have made good use of it, that is all. You mean this for
magnanimity, but it is very little of you. You are asking me for
far more than this. . . . Ah!" she cried, as Eugene's passionate
glance was turned on her, "and you are making difficulties about
the merest trifles. Of, if you feel no love whatever for me,
refuse, by all means. My fate hangs on a word from you. Speak!--
Father," she said after a pause, "make him listen to reason. Can
he imagine that I am less nice than he is on the point of honor?"
Father Goriot was looking on and listening to this pretty quarrel
with a placid smile, as if he had found some balm for all the
sorrows of life.
"Child that you are!" she cried again, catching Eugene's hand.
"You are just beginning life; you find barriers at the outset
that many a man finds insurmountable; a woman's hand opens the
way and you shrink back! Why, you are sure to succeed! You will
have a brilliant future. Success is written on that broad
forehead of yours, and will you not be able to repay me my loan
of today? Did not a lady in olden times arm her knight with sword
and helmet and coat of mail, and find him a charger, so that he
might fight for her in the tournament? Well, then, Eugene, these
things that I offer you are the weapons of this age; every one
who means to be something must have such tools as these. A pretty
place your garret must be if it is like papa's room! See, dinner
is waiting all this time. Do you want to make me unhappy?--Why
don't you answer?" she said, shaking his hand. "MON DIEU! papa,
make up his mind for him, or I will go away and never see him any
more."
"I will make up your mind," said Goriot, coming down from the
clouds. "Now, my dear M. Eugene, the next thing is to borrow
money of the Jews, isn't it?"
"There is positively no help for it," said Eugene.
"All right, I will give you credit," said the other, drawing out
a cheap leather pocket-book, much the worse for wear. "I have
turned Jew myself; I paid for everything; here are the invoices.
You do not owe a penny for anything here. It did not come to very
much--five thousand francs at most, and I am going to lend you
the money myself. I am not a woman--you can refuse me. You shall
give me a receipt on a scrap of paper, and you can return it some
time or other."
Delphine and Eugene looked at each other in amazement, tears
sprang to their eyes. Rastignac held out his hand and grasped
Goriot's warmly.
"Well, what is all this about? Are you not my children?"
"Oh! my poor father," said Mme. de Nucingen, "how did you do
it?"
"Ah! now you ask me. When I made up my mind to move him nearer to
you, and saw you buying things as if they were wedding presents,
I said to myself, 'She will never be able to pay for them.' The
attorney says that those law proceedings will last quite six
months before your husband can be made to disgorge your fortune.
Well and good. I sold out my property in the funds that brought
in thirteen hundred and fifty livres a year, and bought a safe
annuity of twelve hundred francs a year for fifteen thousand
francs. Then I paid your tradesmen out of the rest of the
capital. As for me, children, I have a room upstairs for which I
pay fifty crowns a year; I can live like a prince on two francs a
day, and still have something left over. I shall not have to
spend anything much on clothes, for I never wear anything out.
This fortnight past I have been laughing in my sleeve, thinking
to myself, 'How happy they are going to be!' and--well, now, are
you not happy?"
"Oh papa! papa!" cried Mme. de Nucingen, springing to her father,
who took her on his knee. She covered him with kisses, her fair
hair brushed his cheek, her tears fell on the withered face that
had grown so bright and radiant.
"Dear father, what a father you are! No, there is not another
father like you under the sun. If Eugene loved you before, what
must he feel for you now?"
"Why, children, why Delphinette!" cried Goriot, who had not felt
his daughter's heart beat against his breast for ten years, "do
you want me to die of joy? My poor heart will break! Come,
Monsieur Eugene, we are quits already." And the old man strained
her to his breast with such fierce and passionate force that she
cried out.
"Oh! you are hurting me!" she said.
"I am hurting you!" He grew pale at the words. The pain expressed
in his face seemed greater than it is given to humanity to know.
The agony of this Christ of paternity can only be compared with
the masterpieces of those princes of the palette who have left
for us the record of their visions of an agony suffered for a
whole world by the Saviour of men. Father Goriot pressed his lips
very gently against the waist than his fingers had grasped too
roughly.
"Oh! no, no," he cried. "I have not hurt you, have I?" and his
smile seemed to repeat the question. "YOU have hurt me with that
cry just now.--The things cost rather more than that," he said in
her ear, with another gentle kiss, "but I had to deceive him
about it, or he would have been angry."
Eugene sat dumb with amazement in the presence of this
inexhaustible love; he gazed at Goriot, and his face betrayed the
artless admiration which shapes the beliefs of youth.
"I will be worthy of all this," he cried.
"Oh! my Eugene, that is nobly said," and Mme. de Nucingen kissed
the law student on the forehead.
"He gave up Mlle. Taillefer and her millions for you," said
Father Goriot. "Yes, the little thing was in love with you, and
now that her brother is dead she is as rich as Croesus."
"Oh! why did you tell her?" cried Rastignac.
"Eugene," Delphine said in his ear, "I have one regret now this
evening. Ah! how I will love you! and for ever!"
"This is the happiest day I have had since you two were married!"
cried Goriot. "God may send me any suffering, so long as I do not
suffer through you, and I can still say, 'In this short month of
February I had more happiness than other men have in their whole
lives.'--Look at me, Fifine!" he said to his daughter. "She is
very beautiful, is she not? Tell me, now, have you seen many
women with that pretty soft color--that little dimple of hers?
No, I thought not. Ah, well, and but for me this lovely woman
would never have been. And very soon happiness will make her a
thousand times lovelier, happiness through you. I could give up
my place in heaven to you, neighbor, if needs be, and go down to
hell instead. Come, let us have dinner," he added, scarcely
knowing what he said, "everything is ours."
"Poor dear father!"
He rose and went over to her, and took her face in his hands, and
set a kiss on the plaits of hair. "If you only knew, little one,
how happy you can make me--how little it takes to make me happy!
Will you come and see me sometimes? I shall be just above, so it
is only a step. Promise me, say that you will!"
"Yes, dear father."
"Say it again."
"Yes, I will, my kind father."
"Hush! hush! I should make you say it a hundred times over if I
followed my own wishes. Let us have dinner."
The three behaved like children that evening, and Father Goriot's
spirits were certainly not the least wild. He lay at his
daughter's feet, kissed them, gazed into her eyes, rubbed his
head against her dress; in short, no young lover could have been
more extravagant or more tender.
"You see!" Delphine said with a look at Eugene, "so long as my
father is with us, he monopolizes me. He will be rather in the
way sometimes."
Eugene had himself already felt certain twinges of jealousy, and
could not blame this speech that contained the germ of all
ingratitude.
"And when will the rooms be ready?" asked Eugene, looking round.
"We must all leave them this evening, I suppose."
"Yes, but to-morrow you must come and dine with me," she
answered, with an eloquent glance. "It is our night at the
Italiens."
"I shall go to the pit," said her father.
It was midnight. Mme. de Nucingen's carriage was waiting for her,
and Father Goriot and the student walked back to the Maison
Vauquer, talking of Delphine, and warming over their talk till
there grew up a curious rivalry between the two violent passions.
Eugene could not help seeing that the father's self-less love was
deeper and more steadfast than his own. For this worshiper
Delphine was always pure and fair, and her father's adoration
drew its fervor from a whole past as well as a future of love.
They found Mme. Vauquer by the stove, with Sylvie and Christophe
to keep her company; the old landlady, sitting like Marius among
the ruins of Carthage, was waiting for the two lodgers that yet
remained to her, and bemoaning her lot with the sympathetic
Sylvie. Tasso's lamentations as recorded in Byron's poem are
undoubtedly eloquent, but for sheer force of truth they fall far
short of the widow's cry from the depths.
"Only three cups of coffee in the morning, Sylvie! Oh dear! to
have your house emptied in this way is enough to break your
heart. What is life, now my lodgers are gone? Nothing at all.
Just think of it! It is just as if all the furniture had been
taken out of the house, and your furniture is your life. How have
I offended heaven to draw down all this trouble upon me? And
haricot beans and potatoes laid in for twenty people! The police
in my house too! We shall have to live on potatoes now, and
Christophe will have to go!"
The Savoyard, who was fast asleep, suddenly woke up at this, and
said, "Madame," questioningly.
"Poor fellow!" said Sylvie, "he is like a dog."
"In the dead season, too! Nobody is moving now. I would like to
know where the lodgers are to drop down from. It drives me
distracted. And that old witch of a Michonneau goes and takes
Poiret with her! What can she have done to make him so fond of
her? He runs about after her like a little dog."
"Lord!" said Sylvie, flinging up her head, "those old maids are
up to all sorts of tricks."
"There's that poor M. Vautrin that they made out to be a
convict," the widow went on. "Well, you know that is too much for
me, Sylvie; I can't bring myself to believe it. Such a lively man
as he was, and paid fifteen francs a month for his coffee of an
evening, paid you very penny on the nail too."
"And open-handed he was!" said Christophe.
- charming [´tʃɑ:miŋ]
a.可爱的；极好的 (初中英语单词) - lately [´leitli] ad.近来，不久前 (初中英语单词)
- solemn [´sɔləm] a.严肃的；隆重的 (初中英语单词)
- arrest [ə´rest] vt.逮捕 n.逮捕；停止 (初中英语单词)
- plainly [´pleinli] ad.平坦地；简单地 (初中英语单词)
- affection [ə´fekʃən] n.友爱；慈爱 (初中英语单词)
- establishment [i´stæbliʃmənt] n.建(成)立；研究所 (初中英语单词)
- hesitate [´heziteit] vi.犹豫，踌躇 (初中英语单词)
- forgive [fə´giv] vt.原谅，谅解，宽恕 (初中英语单词)
- whatever [wɔt´evə] pron.&a.无论什么 (初中英语单词)
- beginning [bi´giniŋ] n.开始，开端；起源 (初中英语单词)
- brilliant [´briliənt] a.灿烂的；杰出的 (初中英语单词)
- helmet [´helmit] n.钢盔 (初中英语单词)
- waiting [´weitiŋ] n.等候；伺候 (初中英语单词)
- receipt [ri´si:t] n.收到；收据 (初中英语单词)
- amazement [ə´meizmənt] n.惊愕；惊奇 (初中英语单词)
- wedding [´wediŋ] n.婚礼，结婚 (初中英语单词)
- prince [´prins] n.王子；亲王；君主 (初中英语单词)
- sleeve [sli:v] n.袖子；袖套 (初中英语单词)
- fierce [fiəs] a.残忍的；强烈的 (初中英语单词)
- humanity [hju:´mæniti] n.人类；人性；仁慈 (初中英语单词)
- christ [kraist] n.基督 int.天啊! (初中英语单词)
- gently [´dʒentli] ad.温和地；静静地 (初中英语单词)
- deceive [di´si:v] vt.欺骗，欺诈 (初中英语单词)
- admiration [,ædmə´reiʃən] n.赞赏，钦佩 (初中英语单词)
- worthy [´wə:ði] a.有价值的；值得的 (初中英语单词)
- suffering [´sʌfəriŋ] n.痛苦；灾害 (初中英语单词)
- midnight [´midnait] n.午夜；漆黑 (初中英语单词)
- carriage [´kæridʒ] n.马车；客车；货运 (初中英语单词)
- violent [´vaiələnt] a.强暴的；猛烈的 (初中英语单词)
- lively [´laivli] a.活泼的；热烈的 (初中英语单词)
- generosity [,dʒenə´rɔsiti] n.慷慨；慷慨的行为 (高中英语单词)
- profound [prə´faund] a.深奥的；渊博的 (高中英语单词)
- melancholy [´melənkəli] n.忧郁 a.忧郁的 (高中英语单词)
- refusal [ri´fju:zəl] n.拒绝；优先取舍权 (高中英语单词)
- shrink [ʃriŋk] v.收缩；退缩；畏缩 (高中英语单词)
- bachelor [´bætʃələ] n.未婚男子；学士 (高中英语单词)
- hesitation [,hezi´teiʃən] n.犹豫，踌躇 (高中英语单词)
- knight [nait] n.骑士；爵士 (高中英语单词)
- tournament [´tuənəmənt] n.比赛，锦标赛 (高中英语单词)
- positively [´pɔzətivli] ad.确实；断然；绝对 (高中英语单词)
- fortnight [´fɔ:tnait] n.两星期 (高中英语单词)
- passionate [´pæʃənit] a.易动情的；易怒的 (高中英语单词)
- extravagant [ik´strævəgənt] a.奢侈的；过度的 (高中英语单词)
- jealousy [´dʒeləsi] n.妒忌；猜忌 (高中英语单词)
- seeing [si:iŋ] see的现在分词 n.视觉 (高中英语单词)
- landlady [´lænd,leidi] n.女房东；女店主 (高中英语单词)
- placid [´plæsid] a.平静的；温和的 (英语四级单词)
- garret [´gærit] n.阁楼，顶楼 (英语四级单词)
- drawing [´drɔ:iŋ] n.画图；制图；图样 (英语四级单词)
- upstairs [,ʌp´steəz] ad.在楼上 a.楼上的 (英语四级单词)
- saviour [´seiviə] n.救星；救助者 (英语四级单词)
- eloquent [´eləkwənt] a.流利的；雄辩的 (英语四级单词)
- warming [´wɔ:miŋ] n.暖和；加温 (英语四级单词)
- charger [´tʃɑ:dʒə] n.军马；委托者；控诉者 (英语六级单词)
- dimple [´dimpəl] n.酒窝 v.(使)现酒窝 (英语六级单词)
- rivalry [´raivəlri] n.竞争；竞赛；敌对 (英语六级单词)
- steadfast [´stedfɑ:st, -fæst] a.坚定的，不动摇的 (英语六级单词)
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