You are not to be pitied!" said Rastignac.
"I did not see her," said Raoul.
"Oh! but you will see her, you scamp!" cried Emile Blondet, who was standing by.

"Lady Dudley is going to ask you to her grand ball, that you may meet the pretty countess." Raoul and Blondet went off with Rastignac, who offered them his carriage.

All three laughed at the combination of an eclectic under-secretary of State, a ferocious republican, and a political atheist.
"Suppose we sup at the expense of the present order of things ?" said Blondet, who would fain recall suppers to fashion.
Rastignac took them to Very's, sent away his carriage, and all three sat down to table to analyze society with Rabelaisian laughs.

During the supper, Rastignac and Blondet advised their provisional enemy not to neglect such a capital chance of advancement as the one now offered to him.

The two "roues" gave him, in fine satirical style, the history of Madame Felix de Vandenesse; they drove the scalpel of epigram and the sharp points of much good wit into that innocent girlhood and happy marriage.