tell Sylvie to get the poultices ready," said
Bianchon. "They ought to go on at once."

Rastignac was left alone with the old man. He sat at the foot of the
bed, and gazed at the face before him, so horribly changed that it was
shocking to see.

"Noble natures cannot dwell in this world," he said; "Mme de Beauseant
has fled from it, and there he lies dying. What place indeed is there in
the shallow petty frivolous thing called society for noble thoughts and
feelings?"

Pictures of yesterday's ball rose up in his memory, in strange contrast
to the deathbed before him. Bianchon suddenly appeared.

"I say, Eugene, I have just seen our head surgeon at the hospital, and I
ran all the way back here. If the old man shows any signs of reason, if
he begins to talk, cover him with a mustard poultice from the neck to
the base of the spine, and send round for us."

"Dear Bianchon," exclaimed Eugene.

"Oh! it is an interesting case from a scientific point of view," said
the medical student, with all the enthusiasm of a neophyte.

"So!" said Eugene. "Am I really the only one who cares for the poor old
man for his own sake?"

"You would not have said so if you had seen me this morning," returned
Bianchon, who did not take offence at this speech. "Doctors who have
seen a good deal of practice never see anything but the disease, but, my
dear fellow, I can see the patient still."

He went. Eugene was left alone with the old man, and with an
apprehension of a crisis that set in, in fact, before very long.

"Ah! dear boy, is that you?" said Father Goriot, recognizing Eugene.

"Do you feel better?" asked the law student, taking his hand.

"Yes. My head felt as if it were being screwed up in a vise, but now it
is set free again. Did you see my girls? They will be here directly; as
soon as they know that I am ill they will hurry here at once; they used
to take such care of me in the Rue de la Jussienne! Great Heavens! if
only my room was fit for them to come into! There has been a young man
here, who has burned up all my bark fuel."

"I can hear Christophe coming upstairs," Eugene answered. "He is
bringing up some firewood that that young man has sent you."

"Good, but how am I to pay for the wood. I have not a penny left, dear
boy. I have given everything, everything. I am a pauper now. Well, at
least the golden gown was grand, was it not? (Ah! what pain this is!)
Thanks, Christophe! God will reward you, my boy; I have nothin