more than once he found himself at the house of a friend’s mistress in the heart of bohemia.  He again saw women brilliantly young and splendidly dressed, in whom economy seemed treason to their youth and power.  Dinah, in spite of her striking beauty, after nursing her baby for three months, could not stand comparison with these perishable blossoms, so soon faded, but so showy as long as they live rooted in opulence.

Home life had, nevertheless, a strong attraction for Etienne.  In three months the mother and daughter, with the help of the cook from Sancerre and of little Pamela, had given the apartment a quite changed appearance.  The journalist found his breakfast and his dinner served with a sort of luxury.  Dinah, handsome and nicely dressed, was careful to anticipate her dear Etienne’s wishes, and he felt himself the king of his home, where everything, even the baby, was subject to his selfishness.  Dinah’s affection was to be seen in every trifle, Lousteau could not possibly cease the entrancing deceptions of his unreal passion.

Dinah, meanwhile, was aware of a source of ruin, both to her love and to the household, in the kind of life into which Lousteau had allowed himself to drift.  At the end of ten months she weaned her baby, installed her mother in the upstairs rooms, and restored the family intimacy which indissolubly links a man and woman when the woman is loving and clever.  One of the most striking circumstances in Benjamin Constant’s novel, one of the explanations of Ellenore’s desertion, is the want of daily—­or, if you will, of nightly—­intercourse between her and Adolphe.  Each of the lovers has a separate home; they have both submitted to the world and saved appearances.  Ellenore, repeatedly left to herself, is compelled to vast labors of affection to expel the thoughts of release which captivate Adolphe when absent.  The constant exchange of glances and thoughts in domestic life gives a woman such power that a man needs stronger reasons for desertion than she will ever give him so long as she loves him.

This was an entirely new phase both to Etienne and to Dinah.  Dinah intended to be indispensable; she wanted to infuse fresh energy into this man, whose weakness smiled upon her, for she thought it a security.  She found him subjects, sketched the treatment, and at a pinch, would write whole chapters.  She revived the vitality of this dying talent by transfusing fresh blood into his veins; she supplied him with ideas and opinions.  In short, she produced two books which were a success.  More than once she saved Lousteau’s self-esteem by dictating, correcting, or finishing his articles when he was in despair at his own lack of ideas.  The secret of this collaboration was strictly preserved; Madame Piedefer knew nothing of it.

This mental galvanism was rewarded by improved pay, enabling them to live comfortably till the end of 1838.  Lousteau became used to seeing Dinah do his work, and he paid her—­as the French people say in their vigorous lingo—­in “monkey money,” nothing for her pains.  This expenditure in self-sacrifice becomes a treasure which generous souls prize, and the more she gave the more she loved Lousteau; the time soon came when Dinah felt that it would be too bitter a grief ever to give him up.