cleanliness of the banisters, walls, and carpets, and counted the
footmen in livery who, as the bell rang, appeared on the landing. His
eyes, which only yesterday in his parlor had sounded the dignity of
misery under the muddy clothing of the poor, now studied with the same
penetrating vision the furniture and splendor of the rooms he passed
through, to pierce the misery of grandeur.

"M. Popinot--M. Bianchon."

The two names were pronounced at the door of the boudoir where the
Marquise was sitting, a pretty room recently refurnished, and looking
out on the garden behind the house. At the moment Madame d'Espard was
seated in one of the old rococo armchairs of which Madame had set the
fashion. Rastignac was at her left hand on a low chair, in which he
looked settled like an Italian lady's "cousin." A third person was
standing by the corner of the chimney-piece. As the shrewd doctor had
suspected, the Marquise was a woman of a parched and wiry
constitution. But for her regimen her complexion must have taken the
ruddy tone that is produced by constant heat; but she added to the
effect of her acquired pallor by the strong colors of the stuffs she
hung her rooms with, or in which she dressed. Reddish-brown, marone,
bistre with a golden light in it, suited her to perfection. Her
boudoir, copied from that of a famous lady then at the height of
fashion in London, was in tan-colored velvet; but she had added
various details of ornament which moderated the pompous splendor of
this royal hue. Her hair was dressed like a girl's in bands ending in
curls, which emphasized the rather long oval of her face; but an oval
face is as majestic as a round one is ignoble. The mirrors, cut with
facets to lengthen or flatten the face at will, amply proved the rule
as applied to the physiognomy.