"I shall never make a name, sis." "Nonsense! with such books, any one could make a name." He raised his head; his features relaxed; the sombre tints vanished from his face. "You are right, by Jove! . . . these books must live. . . . Besides, there is Chance. It can protect a Balzac as well as it can a fool. Indeed, one has only to invent this chance. Let some one of my millionaire friends (and I have a few), or a banker not knowing what to do with his money, come and say to me: 'I am aware of your immense talent and your anxieties; you need such and such a sum to be free; accept it without scruple; you will pay it back some day or other; your pen is worth my millions!' That's all I require, my dear sister." Laure, being accustomed to the appearance of these illusions which brought back his cheerfulness, never exhibited any surprise at such soaring notes. Having created the fable, her imaginative brother continued: "Those people spend such sums on whims. . . . A handsome deed is a whim, like any other, and gives joy perpetually. It is something to say: 'I have saved a Balzac.' Humanity has good impulses of the sort; and there are people who, without being English, are capable of like eccentricities. 'Either a millionaire or a banker,' he cried, thumping on his chest, 'one of them I will have.'" By dint of talking he had come to accredit the thing, and gleefully strode about the room, lifting and waving his arms. "Ah! Balzac is free! You shall see, my dear friends, and my dear enemies, what his progress is." In fancy, he entered the Academy! From there it was only a step to the House of Peers. He beheld himself admitted thither. Why shouldn't he be a member of the Upper Chamber? This and that person had been created a peer. Then he was appointed a minister. There was nothing extraordinary about it. Presidents existed. Were not people who had boxed the compass of ideas the fittest to govern their fellows? A programme, a policy was evolved and carried out; and, as everything was going on smoothly, he had time to think of the millionaire friend or banker who had assisted him. The generous Maecenas should be rewarded. He understood the novelist, had lent him money on the security of his talent, had enabled him to obtain his well-deserved honours. The benefactor should now have his share in the honour, a share in the immortality. After a peregrination of this magnitude and dreams to match, he alighted from his Pegasus, and spoke as an ordinary mortal--he had enjoyed himself, and his fit of the dumps was exorcised. Putting the last touch to his proof-correcting, he left the house with his face wreathed in smiles. "Good-bye," he said to his sister, at the door; "I am off home to see if the banker is there, waiting for me. If he isn't, I shall find some work to do all the same; and work is my real money-lender." CHAPTER V LETTERS TO "THE STRANGER," 1831, 1832