Gambara | Page 3

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Etext prepared by Dagny, [email protected] and John Bickers,
[email protected]

Gambara
by Honore de Balzac
Translated by Clara Bell and James Waring

DEDICATION
To Monsieur le Marquis de Belloy
It was sitting by the fire, in a mysterious and magnificent retreat,--now
a thing of the past but surviving in our memory,-- whence our eyes
commanded a view of Paris from the heights of Belleville to those of
Belleville, from Montmartre to the triumphal Arc de l'Etoile, that one
morning, refreshed by tea, amid the myriad suggestions that shoot up
and die like rockets from your sparkling flow of talk, lavish of ideas,
you tossed to my pen a figure worthy of Hoffmann,--that casket of
unrecognized gems, that pilgrim seated at the gate of Paradise with ears
to hear the songs of the angels but no longer a tongue to repeat them,
playing on the ivory keys with fingers crippled by the stress of divine
inspiration, believing that he is expressing celestial music to his
bewildered listeners.
It was you who created GAMBARA; I have only clothed him. Let me
render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, regretting only that you
do not yourself take up the pen at a time when gentlemen ought to
wield it as well as the sword, if they are to save their country. You may
neglect yourself, but you owe your talents to us.

GAMBARA

New Year's Day of 1831 was pouring out its packets of sugared
almonds, four o'clock was striking, there was a mob in the Palais-Royal,
and the eating-houses were beginning to fill. At this moment a coupe
drew up at the /perron/ and a young man stepped out; a man of haughty
appearance, and no doubt a foreigner; otherwise he would not have
displayed the aristocratic /chasseur/ who attended him in a plumed hat,
nor the coat of arms which the heroes of July still attacked.
This gentleman went into the Palais-Royal, and followed the crowd
round the galleries, unamazed at the slowness to which the throng of
loungers reduced his pace; he seemed accustomed to the stately step
which is ironically nicknamed the ambassador's strut; still, his dignity
had a touch of the theatrical. Though his features were handsome and
imposing, his hat, from beneath which thick black curls stood out, was
perhaps tilted a little too much over the right ear, and belied his gravity
by a too rakish effect. His eyes, inattentive and half closed, looked
down disdainfully on the crowd.
"There goes a remarkably good-looking young man," said a girl in a
low voice, as she made way for him to pass.
"And who is only too well aware of it!" replied her companion aloud--
who was very plain.
After walking all round the arcades, the young man looked by turns at
the sky and at his watch, and with a shrug of impatience went into a
tobacconist's shop, lighted a cigar, and placed himself in front of a
looking-glass