During the last
days of my prosperity, I spent every night in the most incredible
excesses; but every morning death cast me back upon life again. I
would have taken a conflagration with as little concern as any man
with a life annuity. However, I at last found myself alone with a
twenty-franc piece; I bethought me then of Rastignac's luck----
"Eh, eh!----" Raphael exclaimed, interrupting himself, as he
remembered the talisman and drew it from his pocket. Perhaps he was
wearied by the long day's strain, and had no more strength left
wherewith to pilot his head through the seas of wine and punch; or
perhaps, exasperated by this symbol of his own existence, the torrent
of his own eloquence gradually overwhelmed him. Raphael became excited
and elated and like one completely deprived of reason.
"The devil take death!" he shouted, brandishing the skin; "I mean to
live! I am rich, I have every virtue; nothing will withstand me. Who
would not be generous, when everything is in his power? Aha! Aha! I
wished for two hundred thousand livres a year, and I shall have them.
Bow down before me, all of you, wallowing on the carpets like swine in
the mire! You all belong to me--a precious property truly! I am rich;
I could buy you all, even the deputy snoring over there.
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