the Rue Pirouette where she had resided for the last forty years,
probably on a small private income; but of that she never spoke. She
had, however, one day talked of Cherbourg, mentioning that she had been
born there. Nothing further was ever known of her antecedents. All her
conversation was about other people; she could tell the whole story of
their daily lives, even to the number of things they sent to be washed
each month; and she carried her prying curiosity concerning her
neighbours’ affairs so far as to listen behind their doors and open
their letters. Her tongue was feared from the Rue Saint Denis to the
Rue Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and from the Rue Saint Honoré to the Rue
Mauconseil. All day long she went ferreting about with her empty bag,
pretending that she was marketing, but in reality buying nothing, as
her sole purpose was to retail scandal and gossip, and keep herself
fully informed of every trifling incident that happened. Indeed, she
had turned her brain into an encyclopaedia brimful of every possible
particular concerning the people of the neighbourhood and their homes.
Quenu had always accused her of having spread the story of his Uncle
Gradelle’s death on the chopping-block, and had borne her a grudge ever
since. She was extremely well posted in the history of Uncle Gradelle
and the Quenus, and knew them, she would say, by heart. For the last
fortnight, however, Florent’s arrival had greatly perplexed her, filled
her, indeed, with a perfect fever of curiosity. She became quite ill
when she discovered any unforeseen gap in her information. And yet she
could have sworn that she had seen that tall lanky fellow somewhere or
other before.
She remained standing in front of the counter, examining the dishes one
after another, and saying in a shrill voice:
“I hardly know what to have. When the afternoon comes I feel quite
famished for my dinner, and then, later on, I don’t seem able to fancy
anything at all. Have you got a cutlet rolled in bread-crumbs left,
Madame Quenu?”
Without waiting for a reply, she removed one of the covers of the
heater. It was that of the compartment reserved for the chitterlings,
sausages, and black-puddings. However, the chafing-dish was quite cold,
and there was nothing left but one stray forgotten sausage.
“Look under the other cover, Mademoiselle Saget,” said Lisa. “I believe
there’s a cutlet there.”
“No, it doesn’t tempt me,” muttered the little old woman, poking her
nose under the other cover, however, all the same. “I felt rather a
fancy for one, but I’m afraid a cutlet would be rather too heavy in the
evening. I’d rather have something, too, that I need not warm.”
While speaking she had turned towards Florent and looked at him; then
she looked at Gavard, who was beating a tattoo with his finger-tips on
the marble table. She smiled at them, as though inviting them to
continue their conversation.
“Wouldn’t a little piece of salt pork suit you?” asked Lisa.
“A piece of salt pork? Yes, that might do.”
Thereupon she took up the fork with plated handle, which was lying at
the edge of the dish, and began to turn all the pieces of pork about,
prodding them, lightly tapping the bones to judge of their thickness,
and minutely scrutinising the shreds of pinky meat. And as she turned
them over she repeated, “No, no; it doesn’t tempt me.”
“Well, then, have a sheep’s tongue, or a bit of brawn, or a slice of
larded veal,” suggested Lisa patiently.
Mademoiselle Saget, however, shook her head. She remained there for a
few minutes longer, pulling dissatisfied faces over the different
dishes; then, seeing that the others were determined to remain silent,
and that she would not be able to learn anything, she took herself off.
“No; I rather felt a fancy for a cutlet rolled in bread-crumbs,” she
said as she left the shop, “but the one you have left is too fat. I
must come another time.”
Lisa bent forward to watch her through the sausage-skins hanging in the
shop-front, and saw her cross the road and enter the fruit market.
“The old she-goat!” growled Gavard.
Then, as they were now alone again, he began to tell them of the
situation he had found for Florent. A friend of his, he said, Monsieur
Verlaque, one of the fish market inspectors, was so ill that he was
obliged to take a rest; and that very morning the poor man had told him
that he should be very glad to find a substitute who would keep his
berth open for him in case he should recover.
“Verlaque, you know, won’t last another six months,” added Gavard, “and
Florent will keep the place. It’s a splendid idea, isn’t it? And it
will be such a take-in for the police! The berth is under the
Prefecture, you know. What glorious fun to see Florent getting paid by
the police, eh?”
He burst into a hearty laugh; the idea struck him as so extremely
comical.
“I won’t take the place,” Florent bluntly replied. “I’ve sworn I’ll
never accept anything from the Empire, and I would rather die of
starvation than serve under the Prefecture. It is quite out of the
question, Gavard, quite so!”
Gavard seemed somewhat put out on hearing this. Quenu had lowered his
head, while Lisa, turning round, looked keenly at Florent, her neck
swollen, her bosom straining her bodice almost to bursting point. She
was just going to open her mouth when La Sarriette entered the shop,
and there was another pause in the conversation.
“Dear me!” exclaimed La Sarriette with her soft laugh, “I’d almost
forgotten to get any bacon fat. Please, Madame Quenu, cut me a dozen
thin strips—very thin ones, you know; I want them for larding larks.
Jules has taken it into his head to eat some larks. Ah! how do you do,
uncle?”
She filled the whole shop with her dancing skirts and smiled brightly
at everyone. Her face looked fresh and creamy, and on one side her hair
was coming down, loosened by the wind which blew through the markets.
Gavard grasped her hands, while she with merry impudence resumed: “I’ll
bet that you were talking about me just as I came in. Tell me what you
were saying, uncle.”
However, Lisa now called to her, “Just look and tell me if this is thin
enough.”
She was cutting the strips of bacon fat with great care on a piece of
board in front of her. Then as she wrapped them up she inquired, “Can I
give you anything else?”
“Well, yes,” replied La Sarriette; “since I’m about it, I think I’ll
have a pound of lard. I’m awfully fond of fried potatoes; I can make a
breakfast off a penn’orth of potatoes and a bunch of radishes. Yes,
I’ll have a pound of lard, please, Madame Quenu.”
Lisa placed a sheet of stout paper in the pan of the scales. Then she
took the lard out of a jar under the shelves with a boxwood spatula,
gently adding small quantities to the fatty heap, which began to melt
and run slightly. When the plate of the scale fell, she took up the
paper, folded it, and rapidly twisted the ends with her finger-tips.
“That makes twenty-four sous,” she said; “the bacon is six sous—thirty
sous altogether. There’s nothing else you want, is there?”
“No,” said La Sarriette, “nothing.” She paid her money, still laughing
and showing her teeth, and staring the men in the face. Her grey skirt
was all awry, and her loosely fastened red neckerchief allowed a little
of her white bosom to appear. Before she went away she stepped up to
Gavard again, and pretending to threaten him exclaimed: “So you won’t
tell me what you were talking about as I came in? I could see you
laughing from the street. Oh, you sly fellow! Ah! I sha’n’t love you
any longer!”
Then she left the shop and ran across the road.
“It was Mademoiselle Saget who sent her here,” remarked handsome Lisa
drily.
Then silence fell again for some moments. Gavard was dismayed at
Florent’s reception of his proposal. Lisa was the first to speak. “It
was wrong of you to refuse the post, Florent,” she said in the most
friendly tones. “You know how difficult it is to find any employment,
and you are not in a position to be over-exacting.”
“I have my reasons,” Florent replied.
Lisa shrugged her shoulders. “Come now,” said she, “you really can’t be
serious, I’m sure. I can understand that you are not in love with the
Government, but it would be too absurd to let your opinions prevent you
from earning your living. And, besides, my dear fellow, the Emperor
isn’t at all a bad sort of man. You don’t suppose, do you, that he knew
you were eating mouldy bread and tainted meat? He can’t be everywhere,
you know, and you can see for yourself that he hasn’t prevented us here
from doing pretty well. You are not at all just; indeed you are not.”
Gavard, however, was getting very fidgety. He could not bear to hear
people speak well of the Emperor.
“No, no, Madame Quenu,” he interrupted; “you are going too far. It is a
scoundrelly system altogether.”
“Oh, as for you,” exclaimed Lisa vivaciously, “you’ll never rest until
you’ve got yourself plundered and knocked on the head as the result of
all your wild talk. Don’t let us discuss politics; you would only make
me angry. The question is Florent, isn’t it? Well, for my part, I say
that he ought to accept this inspectorship. Don’t you think so too,
Quenu?”
Quenu, who had not yet said a word, was very much put out by his wife’s
sudden appeal.
“It’s a good berth,” he replied, without compromising himself.
Then, amidst another interval of awkward silence, Florent resumed: “I
beg you, let us drop the subject. My mind is quite made up. I shall
wait.”
“You will wait!” cried Lisa, losing patience.
Two rosy fires had risen to her cheeks. As she stood there, erect, in
her white apron, with rounded, swelling hips, it was with difficulty
that she restrained herself from breaking out into bitter words.
However, the entrance of another person into the shop arrested her
anger. The new arrival was Madame Lecœur.
“Can you let me have half a pound of mixed meats at fifty sous the
pound?” she asked.
She at first pretended not to notice her brother-in-law; but presently
she just nodded her head to him, without speaking. Then she scrutinised
the three men from head to foot, doubtless hoping to divine their
secret by the manner in which they waited for her to go. She could see
that she was putting them out, and the knowledge of this rendered her
yet more sour and angular, as she stood there in her limp skirts, with
her long, spider-like arms bent and her knotted fingers clasped beneath
her apron. Then, as she coughed slightly, Gavard, whom the silence
embarrassed, inquired if she had a cold.
She curtly answered in the negative. Her tightly stretched skin was of
a red-brick colour on those parts of her face where her bones
protruded, and the dull fire burning in her eyes and scorching their
lids testified to some liver complaint nurtured by the querulous
jealousy of her disposition. She turned round again towards the
counter, and watched each movement made by Lisa as she served her with
the distrustful glance of one who is convinced that an attempt will be
made to defraud her.
“Don’t give me any saveloy,” she exclaimed; “I don’t like it.”
Lisa had taken up a slender knife, and was cutting some thin slices of
sausage. She next passed on to the smoked ham and the common ham,
cutting delicate slices from each, and bending forward slightly as she
did so, with her eyes ever fixed on the knife. Her plump rosy hands,
flitting about the viands with light and gentle touches, seemed to have
derived suppleness from contact with all the fat.
“You would like some larded veal, wouldn’t you?” she asked, bringing a
yellow pan towards her.
Madame Lecœur seemed to be thinking the matter over at considerable
length; however, she at last said that she would have some. Lisa had
now begun to cut into the contents of the pans, from which she removed
slices of larded veal and hare _paté_ on the tip of a broad-bladed
knife. And she deposited each successive slice on the middle of a sheet
of paper placed on the scales.
“Aren’t you going to give me some of the boar’s head with pistachio
nuts?” asked Madame Lecœur in her querulous voice.
Lisa was obliged to add some of the boar’s head. But the butter dealer
was getting exacting, and asked for two slices of galantine. She was
very fond of it. Lisa, who was already irritated, played impatiently
with the handles of the knives, and told her that the galantine was
truffled, and that she could only include it in an “assortment” at
three francs the pound. Madame Lecœur, however, continued to pry into
the dishes, trying to find something else to ask for. When the
“assortment” was weighed she made Lisa add some jelly and gherkins to
it. The block of jelly, shaped like a Savoy cake, shook on its white
china dish beneath the angry violence of Lisa’s hand; and as with her
finger-tips she took a couple of gherkins from a jar behind the heater,
she made the vinegar spurt over the sides.
“Twenty-five sous, isn’t it?” Madame Lecœur leisurely inquired.
She fully perceived Lisa’s covert irritation, and greatly enjoyed the
sight of it, producing her money as slowly as possible, as though,
indeed, her silver had got lost amongst the coppers in her pocket. And
she glanced askance at Gavard, relishing the embarrassed silence which
her presence was prolonging, and vowing that she would not go off,
since they were hiding some trickery or other from her. However, Lisa
at last put the parcel in her hands, and she was then obliged to make
her departure. She went away without saying a word, but darting a
searching glance all round the shop.
“It was that Saget who sent her too!” burst out Lisa, as soon as the
old woman was gone. “Is the old wretch going to send the whole market
here to try to find out what we talk about? What a prying, malicious
set they are! Did anyone ever hear before of crumbed cutlets and
‘assortments’ being bought at five o’clock in the afternoon? But then
they’d rack themselves with indigestion rather than not find out! Upon
my word, though, if La Saget sends anyone else here, you’ll see the
reception she’ll get. I would bundle her out of the shop, even if she
were my own sister!”
The three men remained silent in presence of this explosion of anger.
Gavard had gone to lean over the brass rail of the window-front, where,
seemingly lost in thought, he began playing with one of the cut-glass
balusters detached from its wire fastening. Presently, however, he
raised his head. “Well, for my part,” he said, “I looked upon it all as
an excellent joke.”
“Looked upon what as a joke?” asked Lisa, still quivering with
indignation.
“The inspectorship.”
She raised her hands, gave a last glance at Florent, and then sat down
upon the cushioned bench behind the counter and said nothing further.
Gavard, however, began to explain his views at length; the drift of his
argument being that it was the Government which would look foolish in
the matter, since Florent would be taking its money.
“My dear fellow,” he said complacently, “those scoundrels all but
starved you to death, didn’t they? Well, you must make them feed you
now. It’s a splendid idea; it caught my fancy at once!”
Florent smiled, but still persisted in his refusal. Quenu, in the hope
of pleasing his wife, did his best to find some good arguments. Lisa,
however, appeared to pay no further attention to them. For the last
moment or two she had been looking attentively in the direction of the
markets. And all at once she sprang to her feet again, exclaiming, “Ah!
it is La Normande that they are sending to play the spy on us now!
Well, so much the worse for La Normande; she shall pay for the others!”
A tall female pushed the shop door open. It was the handsome fish-girl,
Louise Mehudin, generally known as La Normande. She was a bold-looking
beauty, with a delicate white skin, and was almost as plump as Lisa,
but there was more effrontery in her glance, and her bosom heaved with
warmer life. She came into the shop with a light swinging step, her
gold chain jingling on her apron, her bare hair arranged in the latest
style, and a bow at her throat, a lace bow, which made her one of the
most coquettish-looking queens of the markets. She brought a vague
odour of fish with her, and a herring-scale showed like a tiny patch of
mother-of-pearl near the little finger of one of her hands. She and
Lisa having lived in the same house in the Rue Pirouette, were intimate
friends, linked by a touch of rivalry which kept each of them busy with
thoughts of the other. In the neighbourhood people spoke of “the
beautiful Norman,” just as they spoke of “beautiful Lisa.” This brought
them into opposition and comparison, and compelled each of them to do
her utmost to sustain her reputation for beauty. Lisa from her counter
could, by stooping a little, perceive the fish-girl amidst her salmon
and turbot in the pavilion opposite; and each kept a watch on the
other. Beautiful Lisa laced herself more tightly in her stays; and the
beautiful Norman replied by placing additional rings on her fingers and
additional bows on her shoulders. When they met they were very bland
and unctuous and profuse in compliments; but all the while their eyes
were furtively glancing from under their lowered lids, in the hope of
discovering some flaw. They made a point of always dealing with each
other, and professed great mutual affection.
“I say,” said La Normande, with her smiling air, “it’s to-morrow
evening that you make your black-puddings, isn’t it?”
Lisa maintained a cold demeanour. She seldom showed any anger; but when
she did it was tenacious, and slow to be appeased. “Yes,” she replied
drily, with the tips of her lips.
“I’m so fond of black-puddings, you know, when they come straight out
of the pot,” resumed La Normande. “I’ll come and get some of you
to-morrow.”
She was conscious of her rival’s unfriendly greeting. However, she
glanced at Florent, who seemed to interest her; and then, unwilling to
go off without having the last word, she was imprudent enough to add:
“I bought some black-pudding of you the day before yesterday, you know,
and it wasn’t quite sweet.”
“Not quite sweet!” repeated Lisa, very pale, and her lips quivering.
She might, perhaps, have once more restrained herself, for fear of La
Normande imagining that she was overcome by envious spite at the sight
of the lace bow; but the girl, not content with playing the spy,
proceeded to insult her, and that was beyond endurance. So, leaning
forward, with her hands clenched on the counter, she exclaimed, in a
somewhat hoarse voice: “I say! when you sold me that pair of soles last
week, did I come and tell you, before everybody that they were
stinking?”
“Stinking! My soles stinking!” cried the fish dealer, flushing scarlet.
For a moment they remained silent, choking with anger, but glaring
fiercely at each other over the array of dishes. All their honeyed
friendship had vanished; a word had sufficed to reveal what sharp teeth
there were behind their smiling lips.
“You’re a vulgar, low creature!” cried the beautiful Norman. “You’ll
never catch me setting foot in here again, I can tell you!”
“Get along with you, get along with you,” exclaimed beautiful Lisa. “I
know quite well whom I’ve got to deal with!”
The fish-girl went off, hurling behind her a coarse expression which
left Lisa quivering. The whole scene had passed so quickly that the
three men, overcome with amazement, had not had time to interfere. Lisa
soon recovered herself, and was resuming the conversation, without
making any allusion to what had just occurred, when the shop girl,
Augustine, returned from an errand on which she had been sent. Lisa
thereupon took Gavard aside, and after telling him to say nothing for
the present to Monsieur Verlaque, promised that she would undertake to
convince her brother-in-law in a couple of days’ time at the utmost.
Quenu then returned to his kitchen, while Gavard took Florent off with
him. And as they were just going into Monsieur Lebigre’s to drink a
drop of vermouth together he called his attention to three women
standing in the covered way between the fish and poultry pavilions.
“They’re cackling together!” he said with an envious air.
The markets were growing empty, and Mademoiselle Saget, Madame Lecœur,
and La Sarriette alone lingered on the edge of the footway. The old
maid was holding forth.
“As I told you before, Madame Lecœur,” said she, “they’ve always got
your brother-in-law in their shop. You saw him there yourself just now,
didn’t you?”
“Oh yes, indeed! He was sitting on a table, and seemed quite at home.”
“Well, for my part,” interrupted La Sarriette, “I heard nothing wrong;
and I can’t understand why you’re making such a fuss.”
Mademoiselle Saget shrugged her shoulders. “Ah, you’re very innocent
yet, my dear,” she said. “Can’t you see why the Quenus are always
attracting Monsieur Gavard to their place? Well, I’ll wager that he’ll
leave all he has to their little Pauline.”
“You believe that, do you?” cried Madame Lecœur, white with rage. Then,
in a mournful voice, as though she had just received some heavy blow,
she continued: “I am alone in the world, and have no one to take my
part; he is quite at liberty to do as he pleases. His niece sides with
him too—you heard her just now. She has quite forgotten all that she
cost me, and wouldn’t stir a hand to help me.”
“Indeed, aunt,” exclaimed La Sarriette, “you are quite wrong there!
It’s you who’ve never had anything but unkind words for me.”
They became reconciled on the spot, and kissed one another. The niece
promised that she would play no more pranks, and the aunt swore by all
she held most sacred that she looked upon La Sarriette as her own
daughter. Then Mademoiselle Saget advised them as to the steps they
ought to take to prevent Gavard from squandering his money. And they
all agreed that the Quenu-Gradelles were very disreputable folks, and
required closely watching.
“I don’t know what they’re up to just now,” said the old maid, “but
there’s something suspicious going on, I’m sure. What’s your opinion,
now, of that fellow Florent, that cousin of Madame Quenu’s?”
The three women drew more closely together, and lowered their voices.
“You remember,” said Madame Lecœur, “that we saw him one morning with
his boots all split, and his clothes covered with dust, looking just
like a thief who’s been up to some roguery. That fellow quite frightens
me.”
“Well, he’s certainly very thin,” said La Sarriette, “but he isn’t
ugly.”
Mademoiselle Saget was reflecting, and she expressed her thoughts
aloud. “I’ve been trying to find out something about him for the last
fortnight, but I can make nothing of it. Monsieur Gavard certainly
knows him. I must have met him myself somewhere before, but I can’t
remember where.”
She was still ransacking her memory when La Normande swept up to them
like a whirlwind. She had just left the pork shop.
“That big booby Lisa has got nice manners, I must say!” she cried,
delighted to be able to relieve herself. “Fancy her telling me that I
sold nothing but stinking fish! But I gave her as good as she deserved,
I can tell you! A nice den they keep, with their tainted pig meat which
poisons all their customers!”
“But what had you been saying to her?” asked the old maid, quite frisky
with excitement, and delighted to hear that the two women had
quarrelled.
“I! I’d said just nothing at all—no, not that! I just went into the
shop and told her very civilly that I’d buy some black-pudding
to-morrow evening, and then she overwhelmed me with abuse. A dirty
hypocrite she is, with her saint-like airs! But she’ll pay more dearly
for this than she fancies!”
The three women felt that La Normande was not telling them the truth,
but this did not prevent them from taking her part with a rush of bad
language. They turned towards the Rue Rambuteau with insulting mien,
inventing all sorts of stories about the uncleanliness of the cookery
at the Quenu’s shop, and making the most extraordinary accusations. If
the Quenus had been detected selling human flesh the women could not
have displayed more violent and threatening anger. The fish-girl was
obliged to tell her story three times over.
“And what did the cousin say?” asked Mademoiselle Saget, with wicked
intent.
“The cousin!” repeated La Normande, in a shrill voice. “Do you really
believe that he’s a cousin? He’s some lover or other, I’ll wager, the
great booby!”
The three others protested against this. Lisa’s honourability was an
article of faith in the neighbourhood.
“Stuff and nonsense!” retorted La Normande. “You can never be sure
about those smug, sleek hypocrites.”
Mademoiselle Saget nodded her head as if to say that she was not very
far from sharing La Normande’s opinion. And she softly added:
“Especially as this cousin has sprung from no one knows where; for it’s
a very doubtful sort of account that the Quenus give of him.”
“Oh, he’s the fat woman’s sweetheart, I tell you!” reaffirmed the
fish-girl; “some scamp or vagabond picked up in the streets. It’s easy
enough to see it.”
“She has given him a complete outfit,” remarked Madame Lecœur. “He must
be costing her a pretty penny.”
“Yes, yes,” muttered the old maid; “perhaps you are right. I must
really get to know something about him.”
Then they all promised to keep one another thoroughly informed of
whatever might take place in the Quenu-Gradelle establishment. The
butter dealer pretended that she wished to open her brother-in-law’s
eyes as to the sort of places he frequented. However, La Normande’s
anger had by this time toned down, and, a good sort of girl at heart,
she went off, weary of having talked so much on the matter.
“I’m sure that La Normande said something or other insolent,” remarked
Madame Lecœur knowingly, when the fish-girl had left them. “It is just
her way; and it scarcely becomes a creature like her to talk as she did
of Lisa.”
The three women looked at each other and smiled. Then, when Madame
Lecœur also had gone off, La Sarriette remarked to Mademoiselle Saget:
“It is foolish of my aunt to worry herself so much about all these
affairs. It’s that which makes her so thin. Ah! she’d have willingly
taken Gavard for a husband if she could only have got him. Yet she used
to beat me if ever a young man looked my way.”
Mademoiselle Saget smiled once more. And when she found herself alone,
and went back towards the Rue Pirouette, she reflected that those three
cackling hussies were not worth a rope to hang them. She was, indeed, a
little afraid that she might have been seen with them, and the idea
somewhat troubled her, for she realised that it would be bad policy to
fall out with the Quenu-Gradelles, who, after all, were well-to-do
folks and much esteemed. So she went a little out of her way on purpose
to call at Taboureau the baker’s in the Rue Turbigo—the finest baker’s
shop in the whole neighbourhood. Madame Taboureau was not only an
intimate friend of Lisa’s, but an accepted authority on every subject.
When it was remarked that “Madame Taboureau had said this,” or “Madame
Taboureau had said that,” there was no more to be urged. So the old
maid, calling at the baker’s under pretence of inquiring at what time
the oven would be hot, as she wished to bring a dish of pears to be
baked, took the opportunity to eulogise Lisa, and lavish praise upon
the sweetness and excellence of her black-puddings. Then, well pleased
at having prepared this moral alibi and delighted at having done what
she could to fan the flames of a quarrel without involving herself in
it, she briskly returned home, feeling much easier in her mind, but
still striving to recall where she had previously seen Madame Quenu’s
so-called cousin.
That same evening, after dinner, Florent went out and strolled for some
time in one of the covered ways of the markets. A fine mist was rising,
and a grey sadness, which the gas lights studded as with yellow tears,
hung over the deserted pavilions. For the first time Florent began to
feel that he was in the way, and to recognise the unmannerly fashion in
which he, thin and artless, had tumbled into this world of fat people;
and he frankly admitted to himself that his presence was disturbing the
whole neighbourhood, and that he was a source of discomfort to the
Quenus—a spurious cousin of far too compromising appearance. These
reflections made him very sad; not, indeed, that they had noticed the
slightest harshness on the part of his brother or Lisa: it was their
very kindness, rather, that was troubling him, and he accused himself
of a lack of delicacy in quartering himself upon them. He was beginning
to doubt the propriety of his conduct. The recollection of the
conversation in the shop during the afternoon caused him a vague
disquietude. The odour of the viands on Lisa’s counter seemed to
penetrate him; he felt himself gliding into nerveless, satiated
cowardice. Perhaps he had acted wrongly in refusing the inspectorship
offered him. This reflection gave birth to a stormy struggle in his
mind, and he was obliged to brace and shake himself before he could
recover his wonted rigidity of principles. However, a moist breeze had
risen, and was blowing along the covered way, and he regained some
degree of calmness and resolution on being obliged to button up his
coat. The wind seemingly swept from his clothes all the greasy odour of
the pork shop, which had made him feel so languid.
He was returning home when he met Claude Lantier. The artist, hidden in
the folds of his greenish overcoat, spoke in a hollow voice full of
suppressed anger. He was in a passion with painting, declared that it
was a dog’s trade, and swore that he would not take up a brush again as
long as he lived. That very afternoon he had thrust his foot through a
study which he had been making of the head of that hussy Cadine.
Claude was subject to these outbursts, the fruit of his inability to
execute the lasting, living works which he dreamed of. And at such
times life became an utter blank to him, and he wandered about the
streets, wrapped in the gloomiest thoughts, and waiting for the morning
as for a sort of resurrection. He used to say that he felt bright and
cheerful in the morning, and horribly miserable in the evening.[*] Each
of his days was a long effort ending in disappointment. Florent
scarcely recognised in him the careless night wanderer of the markets.
They had already met again at the pork shop, and Claude, who knew the
fugitive’s story, had grasped his hand and told him that he was a
sterling fellow. It was very seldom, however, that the artist went to
the Quenus’.
[*] Claude Lantier’s struggle for fame is fully described in M. Zola’s
novel, _L’Oeuvre_ (“His Masterpiece”). —Translator.
“Are you still at my aunt’s?” he asked. “I can’t imagine how you manage
to exist amidst all that cookery. The places reeks with the smell of
meat. When I’ve been there for an hour I feel as though I shouldn’t
want anything to eat for another three days. I ought not to have gone
there this morning; it was that which made me make a mess of my work.”
Then, after he and Florent had taken a few steps in silence, he
resumed:
“Ah! the good people! They quite grieve me with their fine health. I
had thought of painting their portraits, but I’ve never been able to
succeed with such round faces, in which there is never a bone. Ah! You
wouldn’t find my aunt Lisa kicking her foot through her pans! I was an
idiot to have destroyed Cadine’s head! Now that I come to think of it,
it wasn’t so very bad, perhaps, after all.”
Then they began to talk about Aunt Lisa. Claude said that his mother[*]
had not seen anything of her for a long time, and he hinted that the
pork butcher’s wife was somewhat ashamed of her sister having married a
common working man; moreover, she wasn’t at all fond of unfortunate
folks. Speaking of himself, he told Florent that a benevolent gentleman
had sent him to college, being very pleased with the donkeys and old
women that he had managed to draw when only eight years old; but the
good soul had died, leaving him an income of a thousand francs, which
just saved him from perishing of hunger.
[*] Gervaise, the heroine of the _Assommoir_.
“All the same, I would rather have been a working man,” continued
Claude. “Look at the carpenters, for instance. They are very happy
folks, the carpenters. They have a table to make, say; well, they make
it, and then go off to bed, happy at having finished the table, and
perfectly satisfied with themselves. Now I, on the other hand, scarcely
get any sleep at nights. All those confounded pictures which I can’t
finish go flying about my brain. I never get anything finished and done
with—never, never!”
His voice almost broke into a sob. Then he attempted to laugh; and
afterwards began to swear and pour forth coarse expressions, with the
cold rage of one who, endowed with a delicate, sensitive mind, doubts
his own powers, and dreams of wallowing in the mire. He ended by
squatting down before one of the gratings which admit air into the
cellars beneath the markets—cellars where the gas is continually kept
burning. And in the depths below he pointed out Marjolin and Cadine
tranquilly eating their supper, whilst seated on one of the stone
blocks used for killing the poultry. The two young vagabonds had
discovered a means of hiding themselves and making themselves at home
in the cellars after the doors had been closed.
“What a magnificent animal he is, eh!” exclaimed Claude, with envious
admiration, speaking of Marjolin. “He and Cadine are happy, at all
events! All they care for is eating and kissing. They haven’t a care in
the world. Ah, you do quite right, after all, to remain at the pork
shop; perhaps you’ll grow sleek and plump there.”
Then he suddenly went off. Florent climbed up to his garret, disturbed
by Claude’s nervous restlessness, which revived his own uncertainty. On
the morrow, he avoided the pork shop all the morning, and went for a
long walk on the quays. When he returned to lunch, however, he was
struck by Lisa’s kindliness. Without any undue insistence she again
spoke to him about the inspectorship, as of something which was well
worth his consideration. As he listened to her, with a full plate in
front of him, he was affected, in spite of himself, by the prim comfort
of his surroundings. The matting beneath his feet seemed very soft; the
gleams of the brass hanging lamp, the soft, yellow tint of the
wallpaper, and the bright oak of the furniture filled him with
appreciation of a life spent in comfort, which disturbed his notions of
right and wrong. He still, however, had sufficient strength to persist
in his refusal, and repeated his reasons; albeit conscious of the bad
taste he was showing in thus ostentatiously parading his animosity and
obstinacy in such a place. Lisa showed no signs of vexation; on the
contrary, she smiled, and the sweetness of her smile embarrassed
Florent far more than her suppressed irritation of the previous
evening. At dinner the subject was not renewed; they talked solely of
the great winter saltings, which would keep the whole staff of the
establishment busily employed.
The evenings were growing cold, and as soon as they had dined they
retired into the kitchen, where it was very warm. The room was so
large, too, that several people could sit comfortably at the square
central table, without in any way impeding the work that was going on.
Lighted by gas, the walls were coated with white and blue tiles to a
height of some five or six feet from the floor. On the left was a great
iron stove, in the three apertures of which were set three large round
pots, their bottoms black with soot. At the end was a small range,
which, fitted with an oven and a smoking-place, served for the
broiling; and up above, over the skimming-spoons, ladles, and
long-handled forks, were several numbered drawers, containing rasped
bread, both fine and coarse, toasted crumbs, spices, cloves, nutmegs,
and pepper. On the right, leaning heavily against the wall, was the
chopping-block, a huge mass of oak, slashed and scored all over.
Attached to it were several appliances, an injecting pump, a
forcing-machine, and a mechanical mincer, which, with their wheels and
cranks, imparted to the place an uncanny and mysterious aspect,
suggesting some kitchen of the infernal regions.
Then, all round the walls upon shelves, and even under the tables, were
iron pots, earthenware pans, dishes, pails, various kinds of tin
utensils, a perfect battery of deep copper saucepans, and swelling
funnels, racks of knives and choppers, rows of larding-pins and
needles—a perfect world of greasy things. In spite of the extreme
cleanliness, grease was paramount; it oozed forth from between the blue
and white tiles on the wall, glistened on the red tiles of the
flooring, gave a greyish glitter to the stove, and polished the edges
of the chopping-block with the transparent sheen of varnished oak. And,
indeed, amidst the ever-rising steam, the continuous evaporation from
the three big pots, in which pork was boiling and melting, there was
not a single nail from ceiling to floor from which grease did not
exude.
The Quenu-Gradelles prepared nearly all their stock themselves. All
that they procured from outside were the potted meats of celebrated
firms, with jars of pickles and preserves, sardines, cheese, and edible
snails. They consequently became very busy after September in filling
the cellars which had been emptied during the summer. They continued
working even after the shop had been closed for the night. Assisted by
Auguste and Leon, Quenu would stuff sausages-skins, prepare hams, melt
down lard, and salt the different sorts of bacon. There was a
tremendous noise of cauldrons and cleavers, and the odour of cooking
spread through the whole house. All this was quite independent of the
daily business in fresh pork, _paté de fois gras_, hare patty,
galantine, saveloys and black-puddings.
That evening, at about eleven o’clock, Quenu, after placing a couple of
pots on the fire in order to melt down some lard, began to prepare the
black-puddings. Auguste assisted him. At one corner of the square table
Lisa and Augustine sat mending linen, whilst opposite to them, on the
other side, with his face turned towards the fireplace, was Florent.
Leon was mincing some sausage-meat on the oak block in a slow,
rhythmical fashion.
Auguste first of all went out into the yard to fetch a couple of
jug-like cans full of pigs’ blood. It was he who stuck the animals in
the slaughter house. He himself would carry away the blood and interior
portions of the pigs, leaving the men who scalded the carcasses to
bring them home completely dressed in their carts. Quenu asserted that
no assistant in all Paris was Auguste’ equal as a pig-sticker. The
truth was that Auguste was a wonderfully keen judge of the quality of
the blood; and the black-pudding proved good every time that he said
such would be the case.
“Well, will the black-pudding be good this time?” asked Lisa.
August put down the two cans and slowly answered: “I believe so, Madame
Quenu; yes, I believe so. I tell it at first by the way the blood
flows. If it spurts out very gently when I pull out the knife, that’s a
bad sign, and shows that the blood is poor.”
“But doesn’t that depend on how far the knife has been stuck in?” asked
Quenu.
A smile came over Auguste’s pale face. “No,” he replied; “I always let
four digits of the blade go in; that’s the right way to measure. But
the best sign of all is when the blood runs out and I beat it with my
hand when it pours into the pail; it ought to be of a good warmth, and
creamy, without being too thick.”
Augustine had put down her needle, and with her eyes raised was now
gazing at Auguste. On her ruddy face, crowned by wiry chestnut hair,
there was an expression of profound attention. Lisa and even little
Pauline were also listening with deep interest.
“Well, I beat it, and beat it, and beat it,” continued the young man,
whisking his hand about as though he were whipping cream. “And then,
when I take my hand out and look at it, it ought to be greased, as it
were, by the blood and equally coated all over. And if that’s the case,
anyone can say without fear of mistake that the black-puddings will be
good.”
He remained for a moment in an easy attitude, complacently holding his
hand in the air. This hand, which spent so much of its time in pails of
blood, had brightly gleaming nails, and looked very rosy above his
white sleeve. Quenu had nodded his head in approbation, and an interval
of silence followed. Leon was still mincing. Pauline, however, after
remaining thoughtful for a little while, mounted upon Florent’s feet
again, and in her clear voice exclaimed: “I say, cousin, tell me the
story of the gentleman who was eaten by the wild beasts!”
It was probably the mention of the pig’s blood which had aroused in the
child’s mind the recollection of “the gentleman who had been eaten by
the wild beasts.” Florent did not at first understand what she referred
to, and asked her what gentleman she meant. Lisa began to smile.
“She wants you to tell her,” she said, “the story of that unfortunate
man—you know whom I mean—which you told to Gavard one evening. She must
have heard you.”
At this Florent grew very grave. The little girl got up, and taking the
big cat in her arms, placed it on his knees, saying that Mouton also
would like to hear the story. Mouton, however, leapt on to the table,
where, with rounded back, he remained contemplating the tall, scraggy
individual who for the last fortnight had apparently afforded him
matter for deep reflection. Pauline meantime began to grow impatient,
stamping her feet and insisting on hearing the story.
“Oh, tell her what she wants,” said Lisa, as the child persisted and
became quite unbearable; “she’ll leave us in peace then.”
Florent remained silent for a moment longer, with his eyes turned
towards the floor. Then slowly raising his head he let his gaze rest
first on the two women who were plying their needles, and next on Quenu
and Auguste, who were preparing the pot for the black-puddings. The gas
was burning quietly, the stove diffused a gentle warmth, and all the
grease of the kitchen glistened in an atmosphere of comfort such as
attends good digestion
Then, taking little Pauline upon his knee, and smiling a sad smile,
Florent addressed himself to the child as follows[*]:—
[*] Florent’s narrative is not romance, but is based on the statements
of several of the innocent victims whom the third Napoleon transported
to Cayenne when wading through blood to the power which he so
misused.—Translator.
“Once upon a time there was a poor man who was sent away, a long, long
way off, right across the sea. On the ship which carried him were four
hundred convicts, and he was thrown among them. He was forced to live
for five weeks amidst all those scoundrels, dressed like them in coarse
canvas, and feeding at their mess. Foul insects preyed on him, and
terrible sweats robbed him of all his strength. The kitchen, the
bakehouse, and the engine-room made the orlop deck so terribly hot that
ten of the convicts died from it. In the daytime they were sent up in
batches of fifty to get a little fresh air from the sea; and as the
crew of the ship feared them, a couple of cannons were pointed at the
little bit of deck where they took exercise. The poor fellow was very
glad indeed when his turn to go up came. His terrible perspiration then
abated somewhat; still, he could not eat, and felt very ill. During the
night, when he was manacled again, and the rolling of the ship in the
rough sea kept knocking him against his companions, he quite broke
down, and began to cry, glad to be able to do so without being seen.”
Pauline was listening with dilated eyes, and her little hands crossed
primly in front of her.
“But this isn’t the story of the gentleman who was eaten by the wild
beasts,” she interrupted. “This is quite a different story; isn’t it
now, cousin?”
“Wait a bit, and you’ll see,” replied Florent gently. “I shall come to
the gentleman presently. I’m telling you the whole story from the
beginning.”
“Oh, thank you,” murmured the child, with a delighted expression.
However, she remained thoughtful, evidently struggling with some great
difficulty to which she could find no explanation. At last she spoke.
“But what had the poor man done,” she asked, “that he was sent away and
put in the ship?”
Lisa and Augustine smiled. They were quite charmed with the child’s
intelligence; and Lisa, without giving the little one a direct reply,
took advantage of the opportunity to teach her a lesson by telling her
that naughty children were also sent away in boats like that.
“Oh, then,” remarked Pauline judiciously, “perhaps it served my
cousin’s poor man quite right if he cried all night long.”
Lisa resumed her sewing, bending over her work. Quenu had not listened.
He had been cutting some little rounds of onion over a pot placed on
the fire; and almost at once the onions began to crackle, raising a
clear shrill chirrup like that of grasshoppers basking in the heat.
They gave out a pleasant odour too, and when Quenu plunged his great
wooden spoon into the pot the chirruping became yet louder, and the
whole kitchen was filled with the penetrating perfume of the onions.
Auguste meantime was preparing some bacon fat in a dish, and Leon’s
chopper fell faster and faster, and every now and then scraped the
block so as to gather together the sausage-meat, now almost a paste.
“When they got across the sea,” Florent continued, “they took the man
to an island called the Devil’s Island,[*] where he found himself
amongst others who had been carried away from their own country. They
were all very unhappy. At first they were kept to hard labour, just
like convicts. The gendarme who had charge of them counted them three
times every day, so as to be sure that none were missing. Later on,
they were left free to do as they liked, being merely locked up at
night in a big wooden hut, where they slept in hammocks stretched
between two bars. At the end of the year they went about barefooted, as
their boots were quite worn out, and their clothes had become so ragged
that their flesh showed through them. They had built themselves some
huts with trunks of trees as a shelter against the sun, which is
terribly hot in those parts; but these huts did not shield them against
the mosquitoes, which covered them with pimples and swellings during
the night. Many of them died, and the others turned quite yellow, so
shrunken and wretched, with their long, unkempt beards, that one could
not behold them without pity.”
[*] The Île du Diable. This spot was selected as the place of detention
of Captain Dreyfus, the French officer convicted in 1894 of having
divulged important military documents to foreign powers.—Translator.
“Auguste, give me the fat,” cried Quenu; and when the apprentice had
handed him the dish he let the pieces of bacon-fat slide gently into
the pot, and then stirred them with his spoon. A yet denser steam now
rose from the fireplace.
“What did they give them to eat?” asked little Pauline, who seemed
deeply interested.
“They gave them maggoty rice and foul meat,” answered Florent, whose
voice grew lower as he spoke. “The rice could scarcely be eaten. When
the meat was roasted and very well done it was just possible to swallow
it; but if it was boiled, it smelt so dreadfully that the men had
nausea and stomach ache.”
“I’d rather have lived upon dry bread,” said the child, after thinking
the matter carefully over.
Leon, having finished the mincing, now placed the sausage-meat upon the
square table in a dish. Mouton, who had remained seated with his eyes
fixed upon Florent, as though filled with amazement by his story, was
obliged to retreat a few steps, which he did with a very bad grace.
Then he rolled himself up, with his nose close to the sausage-meat, and
began to purr.
Lisa was unable to conceal her disgust and amazement. That foul rice,
that evil-smelling meat, seemed to her to be scarcely credible
abominations, which disgraced those who had eaten them as much as it
did those who had provided them; and her calm, handsome face and round
neck quivered with vague fear of the man who had lived upon such horrid
food.
“No, indeed, it was not a land of delights,” Florent resumed,
forgetting all about little Pauline, and fixing his dreamy eyes upon
the steaming pot. “Every day brought fresh annoyances—perpetual
grinding tyranny, the violation of every principle of justice, contempt
for all human charity, which exasperated the prisoners, and slowly
consumed them with a fever of sickly rancour. They lived like wild
beasts, with the lash ceaselessly raised over their backs. Those
torturers would have liked to kill the poor man—Oh, no; it can never be
forgotten; it is impossible! Such sufferings will some day claim
vengeance.”
His voice had fallen, and the pieces of fat hissing merrily in the pot
drowned it with the sound of their boiling. Lisa, however, heard him,
and was frightened by the implacable expression which had suddenly come
over his face; and, recollecting the gentle look which he habitually
wore, she judged him to be a hypocrite.
Florent’s hollow voice had brought Pauline’s interest and delight to
the highest pitch, and she fidgeted with pleasure on his knee.
“But the man?” she exclaimed. “Go on about the man!”
Florent looked at her, and then appeared to remember, and smiled his
sad smile again.
“The man,” he continued, “was weary of remaining on the island, and had
but one thought—that of making his escape by crossing the sea and
reaching the mainland, whose white coast line could be seen on the
horizon in clear weather. But it was no easy matter to escape. It was
necessary that a raft should be built, and as several of the prisoners
had already made their escape, all the trees on the island had been
felled to prevent the others from obtaining timber. The island was,
indeed, so bare and naked, so scorched by the blazing sun, that life in
it had become yet more perilous and terrible. However, it occurred to
the man and two of his companions to employ the timbers of which their
huts were built; and one evening they put out to sea on some rotten
beams, which they had fastened together with dry branches. The wind
carried them towards the coast. Just as daylight was about to appear,
the raft struck on a sandbank with such violence that the beams were
severed from their lashings and carried out to sea. The three poor
fellows were almost engulfed in the sand. Two of them sank in it to
their waists, while the third disappeared up to his chin, and his
companions were obliged to pull him out. At last they reached a rock,
so small that there was scarcely room for them to sit down upon it.
When the sun rose they could see the coast in front of them, a bar of
grey cliffs stretching all along the horizon. Two, who knew how to
swim, determined to reach those cliffs. They preferred to run the risk
of being drowned at once to that of slowly starving on the rock. But
they promised their companion that they would return for him when they
had reached land and had been able to procure a boat.”
“Ah, I know now!” cried little Pauline, clapping her hands with glee.
“It’s the story of the gentleman who was eaten by the crabs!”
“They succeeded in reaching the coast,” continued Florent, “but it was
quite deserted; and it was only at the end of four days that they were
able to get a boat. When they returned to the rock, they found their
companion lying on his back, dead, and half-eaten by crabs, which were
still swarming over what remained of his body.”[*]
[*] In deference to the easily shocked feelings of the average English
reader I have somewhat modified this passage. In the original M. Zola
fully describes the awful appearance of the body.—Translator.
A murmur of disgust escaped Lisa and Augustine, and a horrified grimace
passed over the face of Leon, who was preparing the skins for the
black-puddings. Quenu stopped in the midst of his work and looked at
Auguste, who seemed to have turned faint. Only little Pauline was
smiling. In imagination the others could picture those swarming,
ravenous crabs crawling all over the kitchen, and mingling gruesome
odours with the aroma of the bacon-fat and onions.
“Give me the blood,” cried Quenu, who had not been following the story.
Auguste came up to him with the two cans, from which he slowly poured
the blood, while Quenu, as it fell, vigorously stirred the now
thickening contents of the pot. When the cans were emptied, Quenu
reached up to one of the drawers above the range, and took out some
pinches of spice. Then he added a plentiful seasoning of pepper.
“They left him there, didn’t they,” Lisa now asked of Florent, “and
returned themselves in safety?”
“As they were going back,” continued Florent, “the wind changed, and
they were driven out into the open sea. A wave carried away one of
their oars, and the water swept so furiously into the boat that their
whole time was taken up in baling it out with their hands. They tossed
about in this way in sight of the coast, carried away by squalls and
then brought back again by the tide, without a mouthful of bread to
eat, for their scanty stock of provisions had been consumed. This went
on for three days.”
“Three days!” cried Lisa in stupefaction; “three days without food!”
“Yes, three days without food. When the east wind at last brought them
to shore, one of them was so weak that he lay on the beach the whole
day. In the evening he died. His companion had vainly attempted to get
him to chew some leaves which he gathered from the trees.”
At this point Augustine broke into a slight laugh. Then, ashamed at
having done so and not wishing to be considered heartless, she
stammered out in confusion: “Oh! I wasn’t laughing at that. It was
Mouton. Do just look at Mouton, madame.”
Then Lisa in her turn began to smile. Mouton, who had been lying all
this time with his nose close to the dish of sausage-meat, had probably
begun to feel distressed and disgusted by the presence of all this
food, for he had risen and was rapidly scratching the table with his
paws as though he wanted to bury the dish and its contents. At last,
however, turning his back to it and lying down on his side, he
stretched himself out, half closing his eyes and rubbing his head
against the table with languid pleasure. Then they all began to
compliment Mouton. He never stole anything, they said, and could be
safely left with the meat. Pauline related that he licked her fingers
and washed her face after dinner without trying to bite her.
However, Lisa now came back to the question as to whether it were
possible to live for three days without food. In her opinion it was
not. “No,” she said, “I can’t believe it. No one ever goes three days
without food. When people talk of a person dying of hunger, it is a
mere expression. They always get something to eat, more or less. It is
only the most abandoned wretches, people who are utterly lost——”
She was doubtless going to add, “vagrant rogues,” but she stopped short
and looked at Florent. The scornful pout of her lips and the expression
of her bright eyes plainly signified that in her belief only villains
made such prolonged fasts. It seemed to her that a man able to remain
without food for three days must necessarily be a very dangerous
character. For, indeed, honest folks never placed themselves in such a
position.
Florent was now almost stifling. In front of him the stove, into which
Leon had just thrown several shovelfuls of coal, was snoring like a lay
clerk asleep in the sun; and the heat was very great. Auguste, who had
taken charge of the lard melting in the pots, was watching over it in a
state of perspiration, and Quenu wiped his brow with his sleeve whilst
waiting for the blood to mix. A drowsiness such as follows gross
feeding, an atmosphere heavy with indigestion, pervaded the kitchen.
“When the man had buried his comrade in the sand,” Florent continued
slowly, “he walked off alone straight in front of him. Dutch Guiana, in
which country he now was, is a land of forests intermingled with rivers
and swamps. The man walked on for more than a week without coming
across a single human dwelling-place. All around, death seemed to be
lurking and lying in wait for him. Though his stomach was racked by
hunger, he often did not dare to eat the bright-coloured fruits which
hung from the trees; he was afraid to touch the glittering berries,
fearing lest they should be poisonous. For whole days he did not see a
patch of sky, but tramped on beneath a canopy of branches, amidst a
greenish gloom that swarmed with horrible living creatures. Great birds
flew over his head with a terrible flapping of wings and sudden strange
calls resembling death groans; apes sprang, wild animals rushed through
the thickets around him, bending the saplings and bringing down a rain
of leaves, as though a gale were passing. But it was particularly the
serpents that turned his blood cold when, stepping upon a matting of
moving, withered leaves, he caught sight of their slim heads gliding
amidst a horrid maze of roots. In certain nooks, nooks of dank shadow,
swarming colonies of reptiles—some black, some yellow, some purple,
some striped, some spotted, and some resembling withered reeds—suddenly
awakened into life and wriggled away. At such times the man would stop
and look about for a stone on which he might take refuge from the soft
yielding ground into which his feet sank; and there he would remain for
hours, terror-stricken on espying in some open space near by a boa,
who, with tail coiled and head erect, swayed like the trunk of a big
tree splotched with gold.
“At night he used to sleep in the trees, alarmed by the slightest
rustling of the branches, and fancying that he could hear endless
swarms of serpents gliding through the gloom. He almost stifled beneath
the interminable expanse of foliage. The gloomy shade reeked with
close, oppressive heat, a clammy dankness and pestilential sweat,
impregnated with the coarse aroma of scented wood and malodorous
flowers.
“And when at last, after a long weary tramp, the man made his way out
of the forest and beheld the sky again, he found himself confronted by
wide rivers which barred his way. He skirted their banks, keeping a
watchful eye on the grey backs of the alligators and the masses of
drifting vegetation, and then, when he came to a less
suspicious-looking spot, he swam across. And beyond the rivers the
forests began again. At other times there were vast prairie lands,
leagues of thick vegetation, in which, at distant intervals, small
lakes gleamed bluely. The man then made a wide detour, and sounded the
ground beneath him before advancing, having but narrowly escaped from
being swallowed up and buried beneath one of those smiling plains which
he could hear cracking at each step he took. The giant grass, nourished
by all the collected humus, concealed pestiferous marshes, depths of
liquid mud; and amongst the expanses of verdure spread over the
glaucous immensity to the very horizon there were only narrow stretches
of firm ground with which the traveller must be acquainted if he would
avoid disappearing for ever. One night the man sank down as far as his
waist. At each effort he made to extricate himself the mud threatened
to rise to his mouth. Then he remained quite still for nearly a couple
of hours; and when the moon rose he was fortunately able to catch hold
of a branch of a tree above his head. By the time he reached a human
dwelling his hands and feet were bruised and bleeding, swollen with
poisonous stings. He presented such a pitiable, famished appearance
that those who saw him were afraid of him. They tossed him some food
fifty yards away from the house, and the master of it kept guard over
his door with a loaded gun.”
Florent stopped, his voice choked by emotion, and his eyes gazing
blankly before him. For some minutes he had seemed to be speaking to
himself alone. Little Pauline, who had grown drowsy, was lying in his
arms with her head thrown back, though striving to keep her wondering
eyes open. And Quenu, for his part, appeared to be getting impatient.
“Why, you stupid!” he shouted to Leon, “don’t you know how to hold a
skin yet? What do you stand staring at me for? It’s the skin you should
look at, not me! There, hold it like that, and don’t move again!”
With his right hand Leon was raising a long string of sausage-skin, at
one end of which a very wide funnel was inserted; while with his left
hand he coiled the black-pudding round a metal bowl as fast as Quenu
filled the funnel with big spoonfuls of the meat. The latter, black and
steaming, flowed through the funnel, gradually inflating the skin,
which fell down again, gorged to repletion and curving languidly. As
Quenu had removed the pot from the range both he and Leon stood out
prominently, he broad visaged, and the lad slender of profile, in the
burning glow which cast over their pale faces and white garments a
flood of rosy light.
Lisa and Augustine watched the filling of the skin with great interest,
Lisa especially; and she in her turn found fault with Leon because he
nipped the skin too tightly with his fingers, which caused knots to
form, she said. When the skin was quite full, Quenu let it slip gently
into a pot of boiling water; and seemed quite easy in his mind again,
for now nothing remained but to leave it to boil.
“And the man—go on about the man!” murmured Pauline, opening her eyes,
and surprised at no longer hearing the narrative.
Florent rocked her on his knee, and resumed his story in a slow,
murmuring voice, suggestive of that of a nurse singing an infant to
sleep.
“The man,” he said, “arrived at a large town. There he was at first
taken for an escaped convict, and was kept in prison for several
months. Then he was released, and turned his hand to all sorts of work.
He kept accounts and taught children to read, and at one time he was
even employed as a navvy in making an embankment. He was continually
hoping to return to his own country. He had saved the necessary amount
of money when he was attacked by yellow fever. Then, believing him to
be dead, those about him divided his clothes amongst themselves; so
that when he at last recovered he had not even a shirt left. He had to
begin all over again. The man was very weak, and was afraid he might
have to remain where he was. But at last he was able to get away, and
he returned.”
His voice had sunk lower and lower, and now died away altogether in a
final quivering of his lips. The close of the story had lulled little
Pauline to sleep, and she was now slumbering with her head on Florent’s
shoulder. He held her with one arm, and still gently rocked her on his
knee. No one seemed to pay any further attention to him, so he remained
still and quiet where he was, holding the sleeping child.
Now came the tug of war, as Quenu said. He had to remove the
black-puddings from the pot. In order to avoid breaking them or getting
them entangled, he coiled them round a thick wooden pin as he drew them
out, and then carried them into the yard and hung them on screens,
where they quickly dried. Leon helped him, holding up the drooping
ends. And as these reeking festoons of black-pudding crossed the
kitchen they left behind them a trail of odorous steam, which still
further thickened the dense atmosphere.
Auguste, on his side, after giving a hasty glance at the lard moulds,
now took the covers off the two pots in which the fat was simmering,
and each bursting bubble discharged an acrid vapour into the kitchen.
The greasy haze had been gradually rising ever since the beginning of
the evening, and now it shrouded the gas and pervaded the whole room,
streaming everywhere, and veiling the ruddy whiteness of Quenu and his
two assistants. Lisa and Augustine had risen from their seats; and all
were panting as though they had eaten too much.
Augustine carried the sleeping Pauline upstairs; and Quenu, who liked
to fasten up the kitchen himself, gave Auguste and Leon leave to go to
bed, saying that he would fetch the black-pudding himself. The younger
apprentice stole off with a very red face, having managed to secrete
under his shirt nearly a yard of the pudding, which must have almost
scalded him. Then the Quenus and Florent remained alone, in silence.
Lisa stood nibbling a little piece of the hot pudding, keeping her
pretty lips well apart all the while, for fear of burning them, and
gradually the black compound vanished in her rosy mouth.
“Well,” said she, “La Normande was foolish in behaving so rudely; the
black-pudding’s excellent to-day.”
However, there was a knock at the passage door, and Gavard, who stayed
at Monsieur Lebigre’s every evening until midnight, came in. He had
called for a definite answer about the fish inspectorship.
“You must understand,” he said, “that Monsieur Verlaque cannot wait any
longer; he is too ill. So Florent must make up his mind. I have
promised to give a positive answer early to-morrow.”
“Well, Florent accepts,” Lisa quietly remarked, taking another nibble
at some black-pudding.
Florent, who had remained in his chair, overcome by a strange feeling
of prostration, vainly endeavoured to rise and protest.
“No, no, say nothing,” continued Lisa; “the matter is quite settled.
You have suffered quite enough already, my dear Florent. What you have
just been telling us is enough to make one shudder. It is time now for
you to settle down. You belong to a respectable family, you received a
good education, and it is really not fitting that you should go
wandering about the highways like a vagrant. At your age childishness
is no longer excusable. You have been foolish; well, all that will be
forgotten and forgiven. You will take your place again among those of
your own class—the class of respectable folks—and live in future like
other people.”
Florent listened in astonishment, quite unable to say a word. Lisa was,
doubtless, right. She looked so healthy, so serene, that it was
impossible to imagine that she desired anything but what was proper. It
was he, with his fleshless body and dark, equivocal-looking
countenance, who must be in the wrong, and indulging in unrighteous
dreams. He could, indeed, no longer understand why he had hitherto
resisted.
Lisa, however, continued to talk to him with an abundant flow of words,
as though he were a little boy found in fault and threatened with the
police. She assumed, indeed, a most maternal manner, and plied him with
the most convincing reasons. And at last, as a final argument, she
said:
“Do it for us, Florent. We occupy a fair position in the neighbourhood
which obliges us to use a certain amount of circumspection; and, to
tell you the truth, between ourselves, I’m afraid that people will
begin to talk. This inspectorship will set everything right; you will
be somebody; you will even be an honour to us.”
Her manner had become caressingly persuasive, and Florent was
penetrated by all the surrounding plenteousness, all the aroma filling
the kitchen, where he fed, as it were, on the nourishment floating in
the atmosphere. He sank into blissful meanness, born of all the copious
feeding that went on in the sphere of plenty in which he had been
living during the last fortnight. He felt, as it were, the titillation
of forming fat which spread slowly all over his body. He experienced
the languid beatitude of shopkeepers, whose chief concern is to fill
their bellies. At this late hour of night, in the warm atmosphere of
the kitchen, all his acerbity and determination melted away. That
peaceable evening, with the odour of the black-pudding and the lard,
and the sight of plump little Pauline slumbering on his knee, had so
enervated him that he found himself wishing for a succession of such
evenings—endless ones which would make him fat.
However, it was the sight of Mouton that chiefly decided him. Mouton
was sound asleep, with his stomach turned upwards, one of his paws
resting on his nose, and his tail twisted over this side, as though to
keep him warm; and he was slumbering with such an expression of feline
happiness that Florent, as he gazed at him, murmured: “No, it would be
too foolish! I accept the berth. Say that I accept it, Gavard.”
Then Lisa finished eating her black-pudding, and wiped her fingers on
the edge of her apron. And next she got her brother-in-law’s candle
ready for him, while Gavard and Quenu congratulated him on his
decision. It was always necessary for a man to settle down, said they;
the breakneck freaks of politics did not provide one with food. And,
meantime, Lisa, standing there with the lighted candle in her hand,
looked at him with an expression of satisfaction resting on her
handsome face, placid like that of some sacred cow.