ne more
for you," retorted Lousteau, somewhat nettled, "but I won't answer for
Finot. Scores of sharp fellows will besiege Finot for the next two days
with offers to work for low pay. I have promised for you, but you can
draw back if you like.--You little know how lucky you are," he added
after a pause. "All those in our set combine to attack an enemy in
various papers, and lend each other a helping hand all round."

"Let us go in the first place to Felicien Vernou," said Lucien. He was
eager to conclude an alliance with such formidable birds of prey.

Lousteau sent for a cab, and the pair of friends drove to Vernou's house
on the second floor up an alley in the Rue Mandar. To Lucien's great
astonishment, the harsh, fastidious, and severe critic's surroundings
were vulgar to the last degree. A marbled paper, cheap and shabby, with
a meaningless pattern repeated at regular intervals, covered the walls,
and a series of aqua tints in gilt frames decorated the apartment, where
Vernou sat at table with a woman so plain that she could only be the
legitimate mistress of the house, and two very small children perched
on high chairs with a bar in front to prevent the infants from tumbling
out. Felicien Vernou, in a cotton dressing-gown contrived out of the
remains of one of his wife's dresses, was not over well pleased by this
invasion.

"Have you breakfasted, Lousteau?" he asked, placing a chair for Lucien.

"We have just left Florine; we have been breakfasting with her."

Lucien could not take his eyes off Mme. Vernou. She looked like a stout,
homely cook, with a tolerably fair complexion, but commonplace to
the last degree. The lady wore a bandana tied over her night-cap, the
strings of the latter article of dress being tied so tightly under
the chin that her puffy cheeks stood out on either side. A shapeless,
beltless garment, fastened by a single button at the throat, enveloped
her from head to foot in such a fashion that a comparison to a milestone
at once suggested itself. Her health left no room for hope; her cheeks
were almost purple; her fingers looked like sausages. In a moment it
dawned upon Lucien how it was that Vernou was always so ill at ease in
society; here was the living explanation of his misanthropy. Sick of his
marriage, unable to bring himself to abandon his wife and family, he had
yet sufficient of the artistic temper to suffer continually from their
presence; Vernou was an actor by nature bound never