“Eugene, Eugene! if you have sold it already or lost it.... Oh! it would be very wrong of you!”
The student bent over Delphine and said in her ear, “Do you want to know? Very well, then, you shall know. Your father has nothing left to pay for the shroud that they will lay him in this evening. Your watch has been pawned, for I had nothing either.”
Delphine sprang out of bed, ran to her desk, and took out her purse. She gave it to Eugene, and rang the bell, crying:
“I will go, I will go at once, Eugene. Leave me, I will dress. Why, I should be an unnatural daughter! Go back; I will be there before you.—Therese,” she called to the waiting-woman, “ask M. de Nucingen to come upstairs at once and speak to me.”
Eugene was almost happy when he reached the Rue Nueve-Sainte-Genevieve; he was so glad to bring the news to the dying man that one of his daughters was coming. He fumbled in Delphine’s purse for money, so as to dismiss the cab at once; and discovered that the young, beautiful, and wealthy woman of fashion had only seventy francs in her private purse. He climbed the stairs and found Bianchon supporting Goriot, while the house surgeon from the hospital was applying moxas to the patient’s back—under the direction of the physician, it was the last expedient of science, and it was tried in vain.
“Can you feel them?” asked the physician. But Goriot had caught sight of Rastignac, and answered, “They are coming, are they not?”
“There is hope yet,” said the surgeon; “he can speak.”
“Yes,” said Eugene, “Delphine is coming.”
“Oh! that is nothing!” said Bianchon; “he has been talking about his daughters all the time. He calls for them as a man impaled calls for water, they say——”
“We may as well give up,” said the physician, addressing the surgeon. “Nothing more can be done now; the case is hopeless.”