A DISTINGUISHED PROVINCIAL AT PARIS
(Lost Illusions Part II)

by HONORE DE BALZAC

Translated By
Ellen Marriage

to-do traveler can find the surroundings to which he is accustomed at
home. To Lucien's just-awakened, sleep-dimmed eyes, Louise was hardly
recognizable in this cheerless, sunless room, with the shabby window-
curtains, the comfortless polished floor, the hideous furniture bought
second-hand, or much the worse for wear.

Some people no longer look the same when detached from the background
of faces, objects, and surroundings which serve as a setting, without
which, indeed, they seem to lose something of their intrinsic worth.
Personality demands its appropriate atmosphere to bring out its
values, just as the figures in Flemish interiors need the arrangement
of light and shade in which they are placed by the painter's genius if
they are to live for us. This is especially true of provincials. Mme.
de Bargeton, moreover, looked more thoughtful and dignified than was
necessary now, when no barriers stood between her and happiness.

Gentil and Albertine waited upon them, and while they were present
Lucien could not complain. The dinner, sent in from a neighboring
restaurant, fell far below the provincial average, both in quantity
and quality; the essential goodness of country fare was wanting, and
in point of quantity the portions were cut with so strict an eye to
business that they savored of short commons. In such small matters
Paris does not show its best side to travelers of moderate fortune.
Lucien waited till the meal was over. Some change had come over
Louise, he thought, but he could not explain it.

And a change had, in fact, taken place. Events had occurred while he
slept; for reflection is an event in our inner history, and Mme. de
Bargeton had been reflecting.

About two o'clock that afternoon, Sixte du Chatelet made his
appearance in the Rue de l'Echelle and asked for Albertine. The
sleeping damsel was roused, and to her he expressed his wish to speak
with her mistress. Mme. de Bargeton had scarcely time to dress before
he came back again. The unaccountable apparition of M. du Chatelet
roused the lady's curiosity, for she had kept her journey a profound
secret, as she thought. At three o'clock the visitor was admitted.

"I have risked a reprimand from headquarters to follow you," he said,
as he greeted her; "I foresaw coming events. But if I lose my post for
it, YOU, at any rate, shall not be lost."

"What do you mean?" exclaimed Mme. de Bargeton.

"I can see plainly that you love Lucien," he continued, with an air of
tender resignation. "You must love indeed if YOU can act thus
recklessly, and disregard the conventions which you know so well. Dear
adored Nais, can you really imagine that Mme. d'Espard's salon, or any
other salon in Paris, will not be closed to you as soon as it is known
that you have fled from Angouleme, as it were, with a young man,
especially after the duel between M. de Bargeton and M. de Chandour?
The fact that your husband has gone to the Escarbas looks like a
separation. Under such circumstances a gentleman fights first and
afterwards leaves his wife at liberty. By all means, give M. de
Rubempre your love and your countenance; do just as you please; but
you must not live in the same house. If anybody here in Paris knew
that you had traveled together, the whole world that you have a mind
to see would point the finger at you.

"And, Nais, do not make these sacrifices for a young man whom you have
as yet compared with no one else; he, on his side, has been put to no
proof; he may forsake you for some Parisienne, better able, as he may
fancy, to further his ambitions. I mean no harm to the man you love,
but you will permit me to put your own interests before his, and to
beg you to study him, to be fully aware of the serious nature of this
step that you are taking. And, then, if you find all doors closed
against you, and that none of the women call upon you, make sure at
least that you will feel no regret for all that you have renounced for
him. Be very certain first that he for whom you will have given up so
much will always be worthy of your sacrifices and appreciate them.

"Just now," continued Chatelet, "Mme. d'Espard is the more prudish and
particular because she herself is separated from her husband, nobody
knows why. The Navarreins, the Lenoncourts, the Blamont-Chauvrys, and
the rest of the relations have all rallied round her; the most strait-
laced women are seen at her house, and receive her with respect, and
the Marquis d'Espard has been put in the wrong. The first call that
you pay will make it clear to you that I am right; indeed, knowing
Paris as I do, I can tell you beforehand that you will no sooner enter
the Marquise's salon than you will be in despair lest she should find
out that you are staying at the Gaillard-Bois with an apothecary's
son, though he may wish to be called M. de Rubempre.

"You will have rivals here, women far more astute and shrewd than
Amelie; they will not fail to discover who you are, where you are,
where you come from, and all that you are doing. You have counted upon
your incognito, I see, but you are one of those women for whom an
incognito is out of the question. You will meet Angouleme at every
turn. There are the deputies from the Charente coming up for the
opening of the session; there is the Commandant in Paris on leave.
Why, the first man or woman from Angouleme who happens to see you
would cut your career short in a strange fashion. You would simply be
Lucien's mistress.

"If you need me at any time, I am staying with the Receiver-General in
the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore, two steps away from Mme. d'Espard's.
I am sufficiently acquainted with the Marechale de Carigliano, Mme. de
Serizy, and the President of the Council to introduce you to those
houses; but you will meet so many people at Mme. d'Espard's, that you
are not likely to require me. So far from wishing to gain admittance
to this set or that, every one will be longing to make your
acquaintance."

Chatelet talked on; Mme. de Bargeton made no interruption. She was
struck with his perspicacity. The queen of Angouleme had, in fact,
counted upon preserving her incognito.

"You are right, my dear friend," she said at length; "but what am I to
do?"

"Allow me to find suitable furnished lodgings for you," suggested
Chatelet; "that way of living is less expensive than an inn. You will
have a home of your own; and, if you will take my advice, you will
sleep in your new rooms this very night."

"But how did you know my address?" queried she.

"Your traveling carriage is easily recognized; and, besides, I was
following you. At Sevres your postilion told mine that he had brought
you here. Will you permit me to act as your harbinger? I will write as
soon as I have found lodgings."

"Very well, do so," said she. And in those seemingly insignificant
words, all was said. The Baron du Chatelet had spoken the language of
worldly wisdom to a woman of the world. He had made his appearance
before her in faultless dress, a neat cab was waiting for him at the
door; and Mme. de Bargeton, standing by the window thinking over the
position, chanced to see the elderly dandy drive away.

A few moments later Lucien appeared, half awake and hastily dressed.
He was handsome, it is true; but his clothes, his last year's nankeen
trousers, and his shabby tight jacket were ridiculous. Put Antinous or
the Apollo Belvedere himself into a water-carrier's blouse, and how
shall you recognize the godlike creature of the Greek or Roman chisel?
The eyes note and compare before the heart has time to revise the
swift involuntary judgment; and the contrast between Lucien and
Chatelet was so abrupt that it could not fail to strike Louise.

Towards six o'clock that evening, when dinner was over, Mme. de
Bargeton beckoned Lucien to sit beside her on the shabby sofa, covered
with a flowered chintz--a yellow pattern on a red ground.

"Lucien mine," she said, "don't you think that if we have both of us
done a foolish thing, suicidal for both our interests, it would only
be common sense to set matters right? We ought not to live together in
Paris, dear boy, and we must not allow anyone to suspect that we
traveled together. Your career depends so much upon my position that I
ought to do nothing to spoil it. So, to-night, I am going to remove
into lodgings near by. But you will stay on here, we can see each
other every day, and nobody can say a word against us."

And Louise explained conventions to Lucien, who opened wide eyes. He
had still to learn that when a woman thinks better of her folly, she
thinks better of her love; but one thing he understood--he saw that he
was no longer the Lucien of Angouleme. Louise talked of herself, of
HER interests, HER reputation, and of the world; and, to veil her
egoism, she tried to make him believe that this was all on his
account. He had no claim upon Louise thus suddenly transformed into
Mme. de Bargeton, and, more serious still, he had no power over her.
He could not keep back the tears that filled his eyes.

"If I am your glory," cried the poet, "you are yet more to me--you are
my one hope, my whole future rests with you. I thought that if you
meant to make my successes yours, you would surely make my adversity
yours also, and here we are going to part already."

"You are judging my conduct," said she; "you do not love me."

Lucien looked at her with such a dolorous expression, that in spite of
herself, she said:

"Darling, I will stay if you like. We shall both be ruined, we shall
have no one to come to our aid. But when we are both equally wretched,
and every one shuts their door upon us both, when failure (for we must
look all possibilities in the face), when failure drives us back to
the Escarbas, then remember, love, that I foresaw the end, and that at
the first I proposed that we should make your way by conforming to
established rules."

"Louise," he cried, with his arms around her, "you are wise; you
frighten me! Remember that I am a child, that I have given myself up
entirely to your dear will. I myself should have preferred to overcome
obstacles and win my way among men by the power that is in me; but if
I can reach the goal sooner through your aid, I shall be very glad to
owe all my success to you. Forgive me! You mean so much to me that I
cannot help fearing all kinds of things; and, for me, parting means
that desertion is at hand, and desertion is death."

"But, my dear boy, the world's demands are soon satisfied," returned
she. "You must sleep here; that is all. All day long you will be with