Dumont. O no, far from it.
Goriot. Then who the devil’s son be he?
Dumont. O, I don’t know. It’s an odd tale, a romantic tale: it may amuse you. It was twenty years ago, when I kept the Golden Head at Lyons: Charles was left upon my doorstep in a covered basket, with sufficient money to support the child till he should come of age. There was no mark upon the linen, nor any clue but one: an unsigned letter from the father of the child, which he strictly charged me to preserve. It was to prove his identity: he, of course, would know the contents, and he only; so I keep it safe in the third compartment of my cash-box, with the ten thousand francs I’ve saved for his dowry. Here is the key; it’s a patent key. To-day the poor boy is twenty-one, to-morrow to be married. I did perhaps hope the father would appear: there was a Marquis coming; he wrote me for a room; I gave him the best, Number Thirteen, which you have all heard of: I did hope it might be he, for a Marquis, you know, is always genteel. But no, you see. As for me, I take you all to witness I’m as innocent of him as the babe unborn.
Macaire. Ahem! I think you said the linen bore an M?
Dumont. Pardon me: the markings were cut off.
Macaire. True. The basket white, I think?
Dumont. Brown, brown.
Macaire. Ah! brown—a whitey-brown.
Goriot. I tell ’ee what, Dumont, this is all very well; but in that case, I’ll be danged if he gets my daater. (General consternation.)
Dumont. O Goriot, let’s have happy faces!