Adeline, amazed at learning her uncle was saved and at seeing a dowry included in the marriage contract, felt a kind of anxiety mingled with her happiness at the arrangement of Hortense’s marriage on such honourable terms. But the day before his daughter’s marriage, planned by the Baron to coincide with the day when Madame Marneffe was to take possession of her flat in the Rue Vaneau, Hector put an end to his wife’s astonishment by this ministerial announcement.
‘Adeline, our daughter is now about to be married, so all our worries on that score are at an end. The moment has come for us to withdraw from society, for I’ll now stay barely three more years in my position; at the end of that period I’ll have qualified for my retirement pension. Why should we continue with expenses that are no longer necessary? Our rent is six thousand francs a year; we have four servants; we spend thirty thousand francs a year. If you want me to fulfil my obligations, for I have mortgaged my salary for three years in exchange for the sums required to establish Hortense and to pay your uncle …’
‘Oh, you were quite right to do so, my dear,’ she said, interrupting her husband and kissing his hands.
This confession put an end to Adeline’s fears.
‘I have a few little sacrifices to ask of you,’ he continued, withdrawing his hands and kissing his wife on the forehead. ‘I have been told of a very nice first-floor flat in the Rue Plumet; it’s handsome, with fine wood panelling, and costs only fifteen hundred francs a year. You’d need only one maid for yourself there, and as for me, I’d be satisfied with a boy.’
‘Yes, my dear.’
‘By maintaining a simple household, though keeping up appearances, you’ll spend barely six thousand francs a year, apart from my personal expenses that I’ll take care of.’
The generous woman, entirely happy, threw her arms round her husband’s neck.
‘What joy to be able to show you again how much I love you,’ she cried. ‘And what a resourceful man you are!’
‘We’ll have our family to dinner once a week and, as you know, I don’t often dine at home. Without anyone taking exception, you can dine twice a week with Victorin and twice with Hortense, and as I think I’ll be able to make it up completely with Crevel, we’ll have dinner with him once a week. These five dinners and our own will fill the week, allowing for some invitations outside the family.’
‘I’ll make savings for you,’ said Adeline.
‘Oh, you are the pearl of women,’ he exclaimed.
‘My good divine Hector! I’ll bless you to my dying day for having made such a good marriage for our dear Hortense,’ she replied.
It was in this way that the household of the beautiful Madame Hulot began to be reduced, and she herself to be deserted in accordance with the solemn promise made to Madame Marneffe.
Portly little Père Crevel, naturally invited to be present at the signing of the marriage contract, behaved as if the scene with which this story opens had never taken place, as if he had no grievance against Baron Hulot. Célestin Crevel was cordial, still a little too much the ex-perfumer, but, now that he was a major, he was beginning to assume a majestic bearing. He spoke of dancing at the wedding.
‘Fair lady,’ he said graciously to Baroness Hulot, ‘people like us know how to forget. Don’t banish me from your home, and deign to adorn my house sometimes by coming there with your children. Don’t worry. I’ll never say a word of what lies at the bottom of my heart. I behaved like a fool, for I should lose too much if I never saw you again.’
‘Monsieur, a virtuous woman has no ears for the speeches you refer to, and if you keep your word you may be sure that I shall be delighted to see an end to dissension of a kind that is always distressing in families.’
‘Well, you big sulky fellow,’ said Baron Hulot, forcibly taking Crevel off to the garden, ‘you avoid me everywhere, even in my own house. Should two lovers of the fair sex quarrel over a petticoat? Really, that’s just too stupid.’
‘Monsieur, I’m not as handsome a man as you, and my scant powers of attraction prevent me from making good my losses as easily as you do.’
‘You’re being sarcastic,’ replied the Baron.
‘That is the privilege of the vanquished against the victors.’
Begun on this tone, the conversation concluded with a complete reconciliation. But Crevel insisted on his right to take his revenge.
Madame Marneffe wanted to be invited to Mademoiselle Hulot’s wedding.
In order to see his future mistress in his drawing-room, the Councillor of State had to invite the staff of his department down to and including the assistant-managers. This meant that he had to give a big ball. As a good housekeeper, the Baroness calculated that an evening party would cost less than a dinner and would allow them to invite more people. So Hortense’s wedding created quite a stir.
The Maréchal Prince de Wissembourg and the Baron de Nucingen were the witnesses on behalf of the bride, the Counts de Rastignac and Popinot for Steinbock. Moreover, since Count Steinbock had become famous, the most distinguished of the Polish exiles had sought his company, so that the artist felt obliged to invite them.
The Council of State, the Baron’s Government department, and the Army, which wanted to do honour to the Comte de Forzheim, were to be represented at the highest level. The Hulots calculated that they had to send two hundred invitations. Who then can fail to understand little Madame Marneffe’s concern to appear in all her glory in the midst of such an assembly?
A month earlier, the Baroness had sold her diamonds, using the money to furnish her daughter’s house, but retaining the finest stones for the trousseau. This sale brought in fifteen thousand francs, of which five thousand were used for Hortense’s trousseau. What were ten thousand francs towards furnishing the young couple’s flat, if we consider the requirements of modern luxury? But young Monsieur and Madame Hulot, Père Crevel, and the Comte de Forzheim gave valuable presents, for the old uncle had kept a sum in reserve to buy the silverware.
Thanks to all this help, a fastidious Parisian woman would have been satisfied with the young couple’s furnishings and equipment in the flat they had chosen in the Rue Saint-Dominique near the Esplanade des Invalides. Everything in it was in harmony with their love, so pure, so open, and so sincere on both sides.
At last the great day arrived, for it was to be as great a day for the father as for Hortense and Wenceslas: Madame Marneffe had decided to have her house-warming party the day after her lapse from virtue and the wedding of the two lovers.
Who has not, at least once in his life, been at a wedding ball? Everyone can think back to his own memories and will certainly smile as he recalls all those people in their Sunday best, with faces to match their conventional dress. If ever a social event proves the influence of environment, surely a wedding party does. Indeed, those who are dressed up for the day have such an effect on the others that people who are quite used to formal dress look as if they belong to the group for whom the wedding is a landmark in their lives. Then remember those solemn old men who are so indifferent to everything that they have not changed their everyday black suits; and the old married men whose faces show the sad experience of life, which the young are just beginning. And there are the pleasurable excitements of the occasion, like the bubbles of carbon dioxide in the champagne, and the envious girls, and the women taken up with the success of their wedding outfits, and the poor relations whose meagre finery is in contrast to the people in full dress rig, and the gluttons who think only of the supper, and the card-players only of playing cards. All types are there, rich and poor, the envious and the envied, the realists and the idealists, all gathered together like the flowers in a bouquet around one rare flower, the bride. A wedding ball is the world in miniature.