"Dear fellow, you are content with the
modest career you have marked out for yourself; keep to it. I am in
hell, and I must stay there. Believe everything that you hear said of
the world, nothing is too impossibly bad. No Juvenal could paint the
horrors hidden away under the covering of gems and gold."
At two o'clock in the afternoon Bianchon came to wake Rastignac, and
begged him to take charge of Goriot, who had grown worse as the day
wore on. The medical student was obliged to go out.
"Poor old man, he has not two days to live, maybe not many hours," he
said; "but we must do our utmost, all the same, to fight the disease.
It will be a very troublesome case, and we shall want money. We can
nurse him between us, of course, but, for my own part, I have not a
penny. I have turned out his pockets, and rummaged through his
drawers--result, nix. I asked him about it while his mind was clear,
and he told me he had not a farthing of his own. What have you?"
"I have twenty francs left," said Rastignac; "but I will take them to
the roulette table, I shall be sure to win."
"And if you lose?"
"Then I shall go to his sons-in-law and his daughters and ask them for
money.
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