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Vladislav Vančura: balíček 16 elektronických knih (PDF+ePub)     za 622  249 Kč (-60%)

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You were going rather too far, dear M. Derville,” said the Vicomtesse, “an attorney is not a mother of daughters nor yet a preacher.”

But any newspaper is a thousand times——”

Poor Derville!” exclaimed the Vicomtesse, “what has come over you? Do you really imagine that I allow a daughter of mine to read the newspapers?—Go on,” she added after a pause.

Three months after everything was signed and sealed between the Count and Gobseck——”

You can call him the Comte de Restaud, now that Camille is not here,” said the Vicomtesse.

So be it! Well, time went by, and I saw nothing of the counter-deed, which by rights should have been in my hands. An attorney in Paris lives in such a whirl of business that with certain exceptions which we make for ourselves, we have not the time to give each individual client the amount of interest which he himself takes in his affairs. Still, one day when Gobseck came to dine with me, I asked him as we left the table if he knew how it was that I had heard no more of M. de Restaud.

‘There are excellent reasons for that,’ he said; ‘the noble Count is at death’s door. He is one of the soft stamp that cannot learn how to put an end to chagrin, and allow it to wear them out instead. Life is a craft, a profession; every man must take the trouble to learn that business. When he has learned what life is by dint of painful experiences, the fibre of him is toughened, and acquires a certain elasticity, so that he has his sensibilities under his own control; he disciplines himself till his nerves are like steel springs, which always bend, but never break; given a sound digestion, and a man in such training ought to live as long as the cedars of Lebanon, and famous trees they are.’

‘Then is the Count actually dying?’ I asked.

‘That is possible,’ said Gobseck; ‘the winding up of his estate will be a juicy bit of business for you.’

I looked at my man, and said, by way of sounding him:

‘Just explain to me how it is that we, the Count and I, are the only men in whom you take an interest?’

‘Because you are the only two who have trusted me without finessing,’ he said.

Although this answer warranted my belief that Gobseck would act fairly even if the counter-deed were lost, I resolved to go to see the Count. I pleaded a business engagement, and we separated.

I went straight to the Rue du Helder, and was shown into a room where the Countess sat playing with her children. When she heard my name, she sprang up and came to meet me, then she sat down and pointed without a word to a chair by the fire. Her face wore the inscrutable mask beneath which women of the world conceal their most vehement emotions. Trouble had withered that face already. Nothing of its beauty now remained, save the marvelous outlines in which its principal charm had lain.

(...)

(Honoré de Balzac, Gobseck)

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