id floor; not a wave, however rebellious,
however high it may toss itself, but its powerful crest must sink to the
level of the mass of waters, stronger by the momentum of its course than
the revolt of the surges it bears with it.

And just as you watch the current flow, seeing in it a confused sheet
of images, so perhaps you would like to measure the pressure exerted
by social energy on the vortex called Vautrin; to see how far away the
rebellious eddy will be carried ere it is lost, and what the end will
be of this really diabolical man, human still by the power of loving--so
hardly can that heavenly grace perish, even in the most cankered heart.

This wretched convict, embodying the poem that has smiled on many a
poet's fancy--on Moore, on Lord Byron, on Mathurin, on Canalis--the
demon who has drawn an angel down to hell to refresh him with dews
stolen from heaven,--this Jacques Collin will be seen, by the reader who
has understood that iron soul, to have sacrificed his own life for
seven years past. His vast powers, absorbed in Lucien, acted solely for
Lucien; he lived for his progress, his loves, his ambitions. To him,
Lucien was his own soul made visible.

It was _Trompe-la-Mort_ who dined with the Grandlieus, stole into
ladies' boudoirs, and loved Esther by proxy. In fact, in Lucien he saw
Jacques Collin, young, handsome, noble, and rising to the dignity of an
ambassador.

_Trompe-la-Mort_ had realized the German superstition of a doppelganger
by means of a spiritual paternity, a phenomenon which will be quite
intelligible to those women who have ever truly loved, who have felt
their soul merge in that of the man they adore, who have lived his life,
whether noble or infamous, happy or unhappy, obscure or brilliant;
who, in defiance of distance, have felt a pain in their leg if he were
wounded in his; who if he fought a duel would have been aware of it;
and who, to put the matter in a nutshell, did not need to be told he was
unfaithful to know it.

As he went back to his cell Jacques Collin said to himself, "The boy is
being examined."

And he shivered--he who thought no more of killing a man than a laborer
does of drinking.

"Has he been able to see his mistresses?" he wondered. "Has my aunt
succeeded in catching those damned females? Have the Duchesses and
Countesses bestirred themselves and prevented his being examined? Has
Lucien had my instructions? And if ill-luck will have it that he is
cross-quest