I am worthy
of our friendship, and I mean to prove myself worthy of it. I have not
always been kind; I was in the wrong; forgive me, dearest; I wish I
could unsay anything that may have hurt you; I take back those words.
One common sorrow has brought us together again, for I do not know which
of us is the more miserable. M. de Montriveau was not here to-night;
do you understand what that means?--None of those who saw you to-night,
Clara, will ever forget you. I mean to make one last effort. If I fail,
I shall go into a convent. Clara, where are you going?"

"Into Normandy, to Courcelles. I shall love and pray there until the day
when God shall take me from this world.--M. de Rastignac!" called the
Vicomtesse, in a tremulous voice, remembering that the young man was
waiting there.

The student knelt to kiss his cousin's hand.

"Good-bye, Antoinette!" said Mme. de Beauseant. "May you be happy."--She
turned to the student. "You are young," she said; "you have some beliefs
still left. I have been privileged, like some dying people, to find
sincere and reverent feeling in those about me as I take my leave of
this world."

It was nearly five o'clock that morning when Rastignac came away. He had
put Mme. de Beauseant into her traveling carriage, and received her last
farewells, spoken amid fast-falling tears; for no greatness is so great
that it can rise above the laws of human affection, or live beyond
the jurisdiction of pain, as certain demagogues would have the people
believe. Eugene returned on foot to the Maison Vauquer through the cold
and darkness. His education was nearly complete.

"There is no hope for poor Father Goriot," said Bianchon, as Rastignac
came into the room. Eugene looked for a while at the sleeping man, then
he turned to his friend. "Dear fellow, you are content with the modest
career you have marked out for yourself; keep to it. I am in hell, and
I must stay there. Believe everything that you hear said of the world,
nothing is too impossibly bad. No Juvenal could paint the horrors hidden
away under the covering of gems and gold."

At two o'clock in the afternoon Bianchon came to wake Rastignac, and
begged him to take charge of Goriot, who had grown worse as the day wore
on. The medical student was obliged to go out.

"Poor old man, he has not two days to live, maybe not many hours," he
said; "but we must do our utmost, all the same, to fight the disease. It
will be a very troublesome case, and