Rastignac received several invitations. His cousin presented him to
other women who were present; women who could claim to be of the
highest fashion; whose houses were looked upon as pleasant; and this
was the loftiest and most fashionable society in Paris into which he
was launched. So this evening had all the charm of a brilliant debut;
it was an evening that he was to remember even in old age, as a woman
looks back upon her first ball and the memories of her girlish
triumphs.
The next morning, at breakfast, he related the story of his success
for the benefit of Father Goriot and the lodgers. Vautrin began to
smile in a diabolical fashion.
"And do you suppose," cried that cold-blooded logician, "that a young
man of fashion can live here in the Rue Neuve-Sainte-Genevieve, in the
Maison Vauquer--an exceedingly respectable boarding-house in every
way, I grant you, but an establishment that, none the less, falls
short of being fashionable? The house is comfortable, it is lordly in
its abundance; it is proud to be the temporary abode of a Rastignac;
but, after all, it is in the Rue Neuve-Sainte-Genevieve, and luxury
would be out of place here, where we only aim at the purely
_patriarchalorama_.
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