The Celibates Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers

ke Rogron off to walk if the weather was fine. Sure of seeing the colonel and being able to question him, Sylvie dressed herself as coquettishly as she

ed herself in the salon with her brother, whom she had comp

step entered the room. "But I'm not dressed; my sister wanted to go ou

left Sylvie alon

ly," said Gouraud, who noticed a certain sole

t, but my little cousin is i

he matter

w; she had t

reat services; whereas Gouraud, a colonel on half-pay, could do nothing. Who was to be deputy? Vinet. Who was the chief authority in the party? Vinet. Whom did the liberals all consult? Vinet. Moreover, the colonel knew fully as well as Vinet himself the extent and depth of the passion suddenly aroused in Rogron by the beautiful Bathilde de Chargeboeuf. This passion had now bec

ed. When the lawyer told him of the priest's manoeuvre, and advised him to break with Sylvie and marry Pierrette, he certainly flattered Gouraud's foible; but after analyzing the inner purpose of that advice and examining

ng him some trick, he attributed the conference to the instigation of the lawyer, and was instantly on his guard, as he would have been in an enemy's country,-with an eye all about him, an ear to the faintest sound, his mind on the qui vive, and his hand on a weapon. The

pretty, that little thing,

tty," replied Ma

shop," continued the colonel. "She would make h

advice?" asked Sylvie

n't I been a captain of cavalry in the imperial guard, and carried my spurs into all the capitals of Europe, and known all the handsomest women of these capitals? Don't talk to me; I tell you youth and beauty are devilishly common and silly. At forty-eight," he went on, adding a few years to his age, to match Sylvie's, "after surviving the retreat from Moscow and going through that terrible campaign of France, a man is broken down; I'm not

olonel during this tirade, and her next

t love Pierret

cried. "Can those who have no teeth crack nuts? Thank

own hand, and thought herself very shrewd in

said, "thought

t is only a few days ago that, in order to find out his secrets,

s he love Bathil

he said, taking her hand and pressing it in a certain way, "since you have opened this matter" (he drew nearer to her), "well" (he kissed her hand; as a cavalry captain he had alr

y Pierrette? if I leave he

Julliard hovering round my wife and addressing verses to her in the newspapers. I'm too muc

hich she supposed to be full of love, though, in point of fact, it was a good deal like that of an ogr

nd carrying off the colonel, who bowe

d Celeste Habert. So, during their walk, he told Rogron he had been joking the other day; that he had no real intention of aspiring to Bathilde; that he was not rich enough to marry a woman w

nsent you have it with no further delay than the law require

the rest for herself and her husband; but she also resolved, in the true old-maidish spirit, to subject the colonel to certain proofs by which to judge of his hear

ner, and had sworn at that "cursed Pierrette" for a spot she had made on her gown,-wasn't it plain

e marshal who woke up as soon as the saucepans rattled.

this morning, therefore you lie in everything," was a hammer with which

the mind of an old maid. In this particular case, this particular old maid carried the day against politicians, lawyers, notaries, and all other self-interests. Sylvie determined to consu

nd gants de Suede; add to these things the manners of a queen and the coquetry of a young girl determined to capture Rogron. Her mother, calm and dignified, retained, as did her daughter, a certain aristocratic insolence, with which the two women hedged themselves and preserved the spirit of their caste. Bathilde was a woman of intelligence, a fact which V

-day be Keeper of the Seals. I should call myself Vinet

led "madame," and to act as men act. Rogron was nothing but a name to her; she expected to make something of the fool,-a voting deputy, for instance, whose instigator she would be; m

Tillet, a crony of Nucingen, and both of them allies of the Kellers. The administration is on the best of terms with those lynxes of the bank. There is no reason why Tiphaine should not be judge, through his wife, of a Royal court. Marry Rogron; we'll have him elected deputy from Provins as soon as I gain another precinct in the Seine-et-Marne. You can then get him a place as receiver-general, where he'll have nothing to do but sign his name. We shall belong to the opposition if the L

s, and a gold watch and chain, made up his apparel. In place of the former Vinet, pale and thin, snarling and gloomy, the present Vinet bore himself with the air and manner of a man of importance; he marched boldly forward, certain of success, with that peculiar show of security which belongs to lawyers who know the hidden places of the law. His sly little head was well-brushed, his chin well-shaved, wh

are you?" said Madame de C

bonnet, looked at herself in the glass, and placed her

directly in his face. "You have not bowed to me. Pray wh

r precedence, or any of the feminine rivalries, is raised. The "Thank you, mademoiselle," which Bathilde said to Pierrette was a poem in many strophes. She was named Bathilde, and the other Pierrette. She was a Chargeboeuf, the other a Lorrain. Pierrette was small and weak, Bathilde was tall and full of life. Pierrette was living on charity, Bathilde and her mother lived on their means. Pierrette wore a stuff gown with a chemisette, Bathilde made the velvet of hers undulate. Bathilde had the finest shoul

uf, from the height of her condescending grandeur, an

ooking fixedly at Pierrette and saying, in three key

child; "you should say

euf, not

he lawyer. "Isn't she, Rogron?" he added, turning

said

nothing about me pleases him. Isn't that true?" she added, going up to

ot, and gently closed his eyes like

utiful," he said

hy

fire and was silent.

he room, followe

vility and amiable attention because each was undermining her. Her brother, though no longer able to be on the scene of action, was well aware of

at are more than artificial; lying by in closets for years the cap is both new and old, even on the day it is first worn. These spinsters make it a point of honor to resemble the lay figures of a painter; they sit on their hips, never on their chairs. When any one speaks to them they turn their whole busts instead of simply turning their heads; and when their gowns creak one is tempted to believe that the mechanism

near her mother and Rogron. Sylvie placed Pierrette between herself and the colonel; Rogron had set out a second card-table, in case other company arrived. Two lam

id Sylvie, with treacherous softness, noticing

ly she undertook a grande misere in hearts, the pool being full of counters, besides containing twenty-seven sous. The rest of the company had now arrived; among them the deputy-judge Desfondrilles, who for the last two months had abandoned the Tiphaine party and connected himself more or less with the Vinets. He was standing before the chimney-piece, with his back to the fir

te to the colonel, pointi

ll lay between himself and Sylvie; the colonel won h

"Pierrette saw my hand, and

, "it was the colonel's game to p

as a keen mind, which found much amusement in watc

's game," said Cournant the notary

rt,-one of those glances which pass from

my hand," said Sylvie fi

cou

uty-judge, "and I can swear that Pierret

"little girls know how to sli

xclaime

y she looked into your hand to play

ldn't do such a thing; if I had, it wo

cried Sylvie. "After what happened this morning do

t of insults, she rushed away without a light and ran to her room. Sylvie tur

the misere?" said M

head against the door of the pas

t," cried Sylvie, as

hurt," said D

es it," rep

low," said Made

r misere if she went to see after Pierret

laughing; "you will forg

o more of Pierrette,-an indifference which surprised no one. When the game was over, about half past nine o'clock, she flung herself into an easy cha

e!" she cried, a

he ear, at the spot where young girls part their hair when they put th

disobeyed me; you treated me with disrespect in leaving the roo

n, "she ought to put on a

g at all, cousin,

int where even such a remark se