pense,
Mme. Vauquer (not yet dressed) heard the rustle of a silk dress and
a young woman's light footstep on the stair; some one was going to
Goriot's room. He seemed to expect the visit, for his door stood ajar.
The portly Sylvie presently came up to tell her mistress that a girl too
pretty to be honest, "dressed like a goddess," and not a speck of mud
on her laced cashmere boots, had glided in from the street like a snake,
had found the kitchen, and asked for M. Goriot's room. Mme. Vauquer
and the cook, listening, overheard several words affectionately spoken
during the visit, which lasted for some time. When M. Goriot went
downstairs with the lady, the stout Sylvie forthwith took her basket
and followed the lover-like couple, under pretext of going to do her
marketing.

"M. Goriot must be awfully rich, all the same, madame," she reported
on her return, "to keep her in such style. Just imagine it! There was a
splendid carriage waiting at the corner of the Place de l'Estrapade, and
_she_ got into it."

While they were at dinner that evening, Mme. Vauquer went to the window
and drew the curtain, as the sun was shining into Goriot's eyes.

"You are beloved of fair ladies, M. Goriot--the sun seeks you out," she
said, alluding to his visitor. "_Peste!_ you have good taste; she was
very pretty."

"That was my daughter," he said, with a kind of pride in his voice, and
the rest chose to consider this as the fatuity of an old man who wishes
to save appearances.

A month after this visit M. Goriot received another. The same daughter
who had come to see him that morning came again after dinner, this time
in evening dress. The boarders, in deep discussion in the dining-room,
caught a glimpse of a lovely, fair-haired woman, slender, graceful, and
much too distinguished-looking to be a daughter of Father Goriot's.

"Two of them!" cried the portly Sylvie, who did not recognize the lady
of the first visit.

A few days later, and another young lady--a tall, well-moulded brunette,
with dark hair and bright eyes--came to ask for M. Goriot.

"Three of them!" said Sylvie.

Then the second daughter, who had first come in the morning to see her
father, came shortly afterwards in the evening. She wore a ball dress,
and came in a carriage.

"Four of them!" commented Mme. Vauquer and her plump handmaid. Sylvie
saw not a trace of resemblance between this great lady and the girl in
her simple morning dress who had entered her kitche