with whom Lucien had had transactions, combining ostensibly kind
offices with covert false dealing.

"Hallo! Lucien, my boy, why here we are patched up again--new stuffing
and a new cover. Where have we come from? Have we mounted the high
horse once more with little offerings from Florine's boudoir? Bravo,
old chap!" and Blondet released Finot to put his arm affectionately
around Lucien and press him to his heart.

Andoche Finot was the proprietor of a review on which Lucien had
worked for almost nothing, and to which Blondet gave the benefit of
his collaboration, of the wisdom of his suggestions and the depth of
his views. Finot and Blondet embodied Bertrand and Raton, with this
difference--that la Fontaine's cat at last showed that he knew himself
to be duped, while Blondet, though he knew that he was being fleeced,
still did all he could for Finot. This brilliant condottiere of the
pen was, in fact, long to remain a slave. Finot hid a brutal strength
of will under a heavy exterior, under polish of wit, as a laborer rubs
his bread with garlic. He knew how to garner what he gleaned, ideas
and crown-pieces alike, in the fields of the dissolute life led by men
engaged in letters or in politics.

Blondet, for his sins, had placed his powers at the service of Finot's
vices and idleness. Always at war with necessity, he was one of the
race of poverty-stricken and superior men who can do everything for
the fortune of others and nothing for their own, Aladdins who let
other men borrow their lamp. These excellent advisers have a clear and
penetrating judgment so long as it is not distracted by personal
interest. In them it is the head and not the arm that acts. Hence the
looseness of their morality, and hence the reproach heaped upon them