Honore de Balzac: Cousin Betty

1. PART I: THE PRODIGAL FATHER (continued)

"So off I went to Leon de Lora, and told him, for a joke, that you could not leave your country quarters for lack of four thousand francs, and that you would spoil your future prospects if you did not make your bow to your royal patron. Happily, Bridau was there --a man of genius, who has known what it is to be poor, and has heard your story. My boy, between them they have found the money, and I went off to pay the Turk who committed treason against genius by putting you in quod. As I had to be at the Tuileries at noon, I could not wait to see you sniffing the outer air. I know you to be a gentleman, and I answered for you to my two friends-- but look them up to-morrow.

"Leon and Bridau do not want your cash; they will ask you to do them each a group--and they are right. At least, so thinks the man who wishes he could sign himself your rival, but is only your faithful ally,

"STIDMANN.

"P. S.--I told the Prince you were away, and would not return till to-morrow, so he said, 'Very good--to-morrow.' "

Count Wenceslas went to bed in sheets of purple, without a rose-leaf to wrinkle them, that Favor can make for us--Favor, the halting divinity who moves more slowly for men of genius than either Justice or Fortune, because Jove has not chosen to bandage her eyes. Hence, lightly deceived by the display of impostors, and attracted by their frippery and trumpets, she spends the time in seeing them and the money in paying them which she ought to devote to seeking out men of merit in the nooks where they hide.

It will now be necessary to explain how Monsieur le Baron Hulot had contrived to count up his expenditure on Hortense's wedding portion, and at the same time to defray the frightful cost of the charming rooms where Madame Marneffe was to make her home. His financial scheme bore that stamp of talent which leads prodigals and men in love into the quagmires where so many disasters await them. Nothing can demonstrate more completely the strange capacity communicated by vice, to which we owe the strokes of skill which ambitious or voluptuous men can occasionally achieve--or, in short, any of the Devil's pupils.