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your career. If I have no children--which will probably be the

case, for I have no anxiety to raise slips of myself here--you



shall inherit my fortune. That is what you may call standing by a

man; but I myself have a liking for you. I have a mania, too, for



devoting myself to some one else. I have done it before. You see,

my boy, I live in a loftier sphere than other men do; I look on



all actions as means to an end, and the end is all that I look

at. What is a man's life to me? Not THAT," he said, and he



snapped his thumb-nail against his teeth. "A man, in short, is

everything to me, or just nothing at all. Less than nothing if



his name happens to be Poiret; you can crush him like a bug, he

is flat and he is offensive. But a man is a god when he is like



you; he is not a machine covered with a skin, but a theatre in

which the greatest sentiments are displayed--great thoughts and



feelings--and for these, and these only, I live. A sentiment--

what is that but the whole world in a thought? Look at Father



Goriot. For him, his two girls are the whole universe; they are

the clue by which he finds his way through creation. Well, for my



own part, I have fathomed the depths of life, there is only one

real sentiment--comradeship between man and man. Pierre and



Jaffier, that is my passion. I knew Venice Preserved by heart.

Have you met many men plucky enough when a comrade says, 'Let us



bury a dead body!' to go and do it without a word or plaguing him

by taking a high moral tone? I have done it myself. I should not



talk like this to just everybody, but you are not like an

ordinary man; one can talk to you, you can understand things. You



will not dabble about much longer among the tadpoles in these

swamps. Well, then, it is all settled. You will marry. Both of us



carry our point. Mine is made of iron, and will never soften, he!

he!"



Vautrin went out. He would not wait to hear the student's

repudiation, he wished to put Eugene at his ease. He seemed to



understand the secret springs of the faint resistance still made

by the younger man; the struggles in which men seek to preserve



their self-respect by justifying their blameworthy actions to

themselves.



"He may do as he likes; I shall not marry Mlle. Taillefer, that

is certain," said Eugene to himself.



He regarded this man with abhorrence, and yet the very cynicism

of Vautrin's ideas, and the audacious way in which he used other



men for his own ends, raised him in the student's eyes; but the

thought of a compact threw Eugene into a fever of apprehension,



and not until he had recovered somewhat did he dress, call for a

cab, and go to Mme. de Restaud's.



For some days the Countess had paid more and more attention to a

young man whose every step seemed a triumphal progress in the



great world; it seemed to her that he might be a formidable power

before long. He paid Messieurs de Trailles and d'Ajuda, played at



whist for part of the evening, and made good his losses. Most men

who have their way to make are more or less of fatalists, and



Eugene was superstitious; he chose to consider that his luck was

heaven's reward for his perseverance in the right way. As soon as



possible on the following morning he asked Vautrin whether the

bill he had given was still in the other's possession; and on



receiving a reply in the affirmative, he repaid the three

thousand francs with a not unnatural relief.



"Everything is going on well," said Vautrin.

"But I am not your accomplice," said Eugene.



"I know, I know," Vautrin broke in. "You are still acting like a

child. You are making mountains out of molehills at the outset."



Two days later, Poiret and Mlle. Michonneau were sitting together

on a bench in the sun. They had chosen a little frequented alley



in the Jardin des Plantes, and a gentleman was chatting with

them, the same person, as a matter of fact, about whom the



medical student had, not without good reason, his own suspicions.

"Mademoiselle," this M. Gondureau was saying, "I do not see any



cause for your scruples. His Excellency, Monseigneur the Minister

of Police----"



"Yes, his Excellency is taking a personal interest in the

matter," said Gondureau.



Who would think it probable that Poiret, a retired clerk,

doubtless possessed of some notions of civic virtue, though there



might be nothing else in his head--who would think it likely that




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