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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from At the Sign of the Cat & Racket by Honore de Balzac: happiness, since she was the cause of her present wretchedness.
So one day Augustine, timid as she was, but armed with supernatural
courage, got into her carriage at two in the afternoon to try for
admittance to the boudoir of the famous coquette, who was never
visible till that hour. Madame de Sommervieux had not yet seen any of
the ancient and magnificent mansions of the Faubourg Saint-Germain. As
she made her way through the stately corridors, the handsome
staircases, the vast drawing-rooms--full of flowers, though it was in
the depth of winter, and decorated with the taste peculiar to women
born to opulence or to the elegant habits of the aristocracy,
Augustine felt a terrible clutch at her heart; she coveted the secrets
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