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Unconscious Comedians-Part7_Honore de Balzac(1799-1850)_Translated Works(翻译文学)-第2页

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have right on your side, and on that of the prefect there are (so you

suppose) secret motives."



"Do you think that a man of intellect having once understood the

nature of Paris could live elsewhere?" said Leon to his cousin.



"Suppose we take Gazonal to old Mere Fontaine?" said Bixiou, making a

sign to the driver of a citadine to draw up; "it will be a step from



the real to the fantastic. Driver, Vieille rue du Temple."

And all three were presently rolling in the direction of the Marais.



"What are you taking me to see now?" asked Gazonal.

"The proof of what Bixiou told you," replied Leon; "we shall show you



a woman who makes twenty thousand francs a year by working a fantastic

idea."



"A fortune-teller," said Bixiou, interpreting the look of the

Southerner as a question. "Madame Fontaine is thought, by those who



seek to pry into the future, to be wiser in her wisdom than

Mademoiselle Lenormand."



"She must be very rich," remarked Gazonal.

"She was the victim of her own idea, as long as lotteries existed,"



said Bixiou; "for in Paris there are no great gains without

corresponding outlays. The strongest heads are liable to crack there,



as if to give vent to their steam. Those who make much money have

vices or fancies,--no doubt to establish an equilibrium."



"And now that the lottery is abolished?" asked Gazonal.

"Oh! now she has a nephew for whom she is hoarding."



When they reached the Vieille rue du Temple the three friends entered

one of the oldest houses in that street and passed up a shaking



staircase, the steps of which, caked with mud, led them in semi-

darkness, and through a stench peculiar to houses on an alley, to the



third story, where they beheld a door which painting alone could

render; literature would have to spend too many nights in suitably



describing it.

An old woman, in keeping with that door, and who might have been that



door in human guise, ushered the three friends into a room which

served as an ante-chamber, where, in spite of the warm atmosphere



which fills the streets of Paris, they felt the icy chill of crypts

about them. A damp air came from an inner courtyard which resembled a



huge air-shaft; the light that entered was gray, and the sill of the

window was filled with pots of sickly plants. In this room, which had



a coating of some greasy, fuliginous substance, the furniture, the

chairs, the table, were all most abject. The floor tiles oozed like a



water-cooler. In short, every accessory was in keeping with the

fearful old woman of the hooked nose, ghastly face, and decent rags



who directed the "consulters" to sit down, informing them that only

one at a time could be admitted to Madame.



Gazonal, who played the intrepid, entered bravely, and found himself

in presence of one of those women forgotten by Death, who no doubt



forgets them intentionally in order to leave some samples of Itself

among the living. He saw before him a withered face in which shone



fixed gray eyes of wearying immobility; a flattened nose, smeared with

snuff; knuckle-bones well set up by muscles that, under pretence of



being hands, played nonchalantly with a pack of cards, like some

machine the movement of which is about to run down. The body, a



species of broom-handle decently covered with clothes, enjoyed the

advantages of death and did not stir. Above the forehead rose a coif



of black velvet. Madame Fontaine, for it was really a woman, had a

black hen on her right hand and a huge toad, named Astaroth, on her



left. Gazonal did not at first perceive them.

The toad, of surprising dimensions, was less alarming in himself than



through the effect of two topaz eyes, large as a ten-sous piece, which

cast forth vivid gleams. It was impossible to endure that look. The



toad is a creature as yet unexplained. Perhaps the whole animal

creation, including man, is comprised in it; for, as Lassailly said,



the toad exists indefinitely; and, as we know, it is of all created

animals the one whose marriage lasts the longest.



The black hen had a cage about two feet distant from the table,

covered with a green cloth, to which she came along a plank which



formed a sort of drawbridge between the cage and the table.

When the woman, the least real of the creatures in this Hoffmanesque






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