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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Purse by Honore de Balzac: a man who followed at the old gallant's heels as a lady companion
does at an old lady's? Did he fill a place midway between a dog,
a parrot, and a friend? Had he saved his patron's fortune, or
only his life? Was he the Trim to another Captain Toby?
Elsewhere, as at the Baronne de Rouville's, he always piqued
curiosity without satisfying it. Who, after the Restoration,
could remember the attachment which, before the Revolution, had
bound this man to his friend's wife, dead now these twenty year?
The leader, who appeared the least dilapidated of these wrecks,
came gallantly up to Madame de Rouville, kissed her hand, and sat
down by her. The other bowed and placed himself not far from his
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