He would not stay any longer on the scene of his collapse and defeat, and went towards the Palais Royal.  He did not know the topography of his quarter yet, and was obliged to ask his way.  Then he went to Very’s and ordered dinner by way of an initiation into the pleasures of Paris, and a solace for his discouragement.  A bottle of Bordeaux, oysters from Ostend, a dish of fish, a partridge, a dish of macaroni and dessert,—­this was the ne plus ultra of his desire.  He enjoyed this little debauch, studying the while how to give the Marquise d’Espard proof of his wit, and redeem the shabbiness of his grotesque accoutrements by the display of intellectual riches.  The total of the bill drew him down from these dreams, and left him the poorer by fifty of the francs which were to have gone such a long way in Paris.  He could have lived in Angouleme for a month on the price of that dinner.  Wherefore he closed the door of the palace with awe, thinking as he did so that he should never set foot in it again.

“Eve was right,” he said to himself, as he went back under the stone arcading for some more money.  “There is a difference between Paris prices and prices in L’Houmeau.”

He gazed in at the tailors’ windows on the way, and thought of the costumes in the Garden of the Tuileries.

“No,” he exclaimed, “I will not appear before Mme. d’Espard dressed out as I am.”

He fled to his inn, fleet as a stag, rushed up to his room, took out a hundred crowns, and went down again to the Palais Royal, where his future elegance lay scattered over half a score of shops.  The first tailor whose door he entered tried as many coats upon him as he would consent to put on, and persuaded his customer that all were in the very latest fashion.  Lucien came out the owner of a green coat, a pair of white trousers, and a “fancy waistcoat,” for which outfit he gave two hundred francs.  Ere long he found a very elegant pair of ready-made shoes that fitted his foot; and, finally, when he had made all necessary purchases, he ordered the tradespeople to send them to his address, and inquired for a hairdresser.  At seven o’clock that evening he called a cab and drove away to the Opera, curled like a Saint John of a Procession Day, elegantly waistcoated and gloved, but feeling a little awkward in this kind of sheath in which he found himself for the first time.

In obedience to Mme. de Bargeton’s instructions, he asked for the box reserved for the First Gentleman of the Bedchamber.  The man at the box office looked at him, and beholding Lucien in all the grandeur assumed for the occasion, in which he looked like a best man at a wedding, asked Lucien for his order.

“I have no order.”

“Then you cannot go in,” said the man at the box office drily.

“But I belong to Mme. d’Espard’s party.”

“It is not our business to know that,” said the man, who could not help exchanging a barely perceptible smile with his colleague.