embarrassments of all kinds, and the journey was postponed
until it was too late.

At this moment, the affair of the _Chronique_ was being liquidated;
and then Madame Bechet, his late publisher, was dunning him for some
arrears of copy that he owed her. His brother Henry, too, going from
bad to worse, was in a position that necessitated Madame de Balzac's
giving up the remnants of her capital; and, to crown all, a son of
Laurence, the dead sister, quitting an unhappy home, was living as a
vagabond on the streets of Paris, whence he had to be rescued. Since,
to these worries and griefs, there was added certain disquieting news
from Eve, whose aunt, from reading some of his books, supposed him to
be a gambler and debauchee and was trying to turn her niece against
him, it was not astonishing that he should have been completely
unnerved. While at Sache, where he had come to stay with some friends,
the de Margonnes, in order to terminate the work he was obliged to do
for Madame Bechet, he had an attack of apoplexy; and, on recovering
from it, was glad to seize an opportunity offered him of a journey to
Italy to escape for a while from the scene of his toiling and moiling
and to have a radical change. His good genius on this occasion was the
Count Visconti, who, having some legal business of a litigious nature
to settle at Turin and not being able to attend to it personally,
asked him to go instead. On this trip he was accompanied by Madame
Marbouty, a woman of letters, better known under her pseudonym, Claire
Brunne, whose acquaintance he had made some years back at Angouleme.
Madame Marbouty's exterior had much in common with that of George
Sand, and the resemblance between the two women gave rise to the
report that it was the authoress of _Indiana_ who accompanied Balzac
to Italy at this date.

The journey back to Paris was effected through Switzerland, which
enabled him to see Geneva again, though under less agreeable auspices
than those of 1833. His prospects on returning to France were no
better than when he left. Indeed, they were worse, for Werdet's bad
circumstances forced him to pledge himself in several quarters in
order to raise some ready money for his immediate wants; and, being
pledged, he was bound to produce at high pressure. His _Old Maid_,
which he sold to the _Presse_ for eight thousand francs, was written
in three nights, _Facino Cane_, in one night, and the _Secret of the
Ruggieri_, in one night also.