And when her fingers, slowlier at the last,
  Of a rich Future, now become the Past,
    Seek count of me,
  Oh Love, when swift, thick-coming memories rise,
    I pray of Thee. 
  May they bring visions fair as cloudless skies
  Of happy voyage o’er a summer sea!

“Was it really I who inspired those lines?” she asked.

The doubt suggested by coquetry to a woman who amused herself by playing with fire brought tears to Lucien’s eyes; but her first kiss upon his forehead calmed the storm.  Decidedly Lucien was a great man, and she meant to form him; she thought of teaching him Italian and German and perfecting his manners.  That would be pretext sufficient for having him constantly with her under the very eyes of her tiresome courtiers.  What an interest in her life!  She took up music again for her poet’s sake, and revealed the world of sound to him, playing grand fragments of Beethoven till she sent him into ecstasy; and, happy in his delight, turned to the half-swooning poet.

“Is not such happiness as this enough?” she asked hypocritically; and poor Lucien was stupid enough to answer, “Yes.”

In the previous week things had reached such a point, that Louise had judged it expedient to ask Lucien to dine with M. de Bargeton as a third.  But in spite of this precaution, the whole town knew the state of affairs; and so extraordinary did it appear, that no one would believe the truth.  The outcry was terrific.  Some were of the opinion that society was on the eve of cataclysm.  “See what comes of Liberal doctrines!” cried others.

Then it was that the jealous du Chatelet discovered that Madame Charlotte, the monthly nurse, was no other than Mme. Chardon, “the mother of the Chateaubriand of L’Houmeau,” as he put it.  The remark passed muster as a joke.  Mme. de Chandour was the first to hurry to Mme. de Bargeton.

“Nais, dear,” she said, “do you know what everybody is talking about in Angouleme?  This little rhymster’s mother is the Madame Charlotte who nursed my sister-in-law through her confinement two months ago.”

“What is there extraordinary in that, my dear?” asked Mme. de Bargeton with her most regal air.  “She is a druggist’s widow, is she not?  A poor fate for a Rubempre.  Suppose that you and I had not a penny in the world, what should either of us do for a living?  How would you support your children?”

Mme. de Bargeton’s presence of mind put an end to the jeremiads of the noblesse.  Great natures are prone to make a virtue of misfortune; and there is something irresistibly attractive about well-doing when persisted in through evil report; innocence has the piquancy of the forbidden.