A death-like silence gradually spread through the tavern. No one

laughed now. The anxious faces of the peasants were turned towards this

tall ruffian, who, in his cups, poured out the muddled contents of his

brain--the confused ideas that he had formed as an Algerian campaigner,

as a hanger-about-town, and tavern politician. What was paramount in

him was the old leaven of '48, the humanitarian communistic views of

one who still worshipped at the shrine of '89.

"Liberty, equality, fraternity!" he shouted. "We must hark back to

the Revolution. We were swindled in the division of property; the

gentlefolks have taken everything, and, by God, they shall be forced

to give it back. Isn't one man as good as another? Is it fair, for

instance, such a lot of land held by that ass at La Borderie, while

I've got none? I want my rights; I want my share; everybody shall have

his share."

Bécu, who was too drunk to uphold the principle of authority, approved

without understanding. Still, he had a gleam of sense left, and imposed

certain limitations.

"That's so, that's so," said he; "but the king's the king, and what is

mine isn't yours."

A murmur of approbation ran round, and Buteau took his revenge.

"Don't listen to him; he's only fit to kill!"

There was a fresh burst of laughter, and Hyacinthe, losing all control,

stood up, wildly shaking his fists in the air.

"Just you wait a bit. I'll talk to you, you cursed coward! You're in

fine feather now, because you've got the mayor, the assessor, and that

twopenny-halfpenny deputy on your side! You lick his boots, and you

are fool enough to think that he's a power and will help you to sell

your corn. Well, I, who have nothing to sell, I don't care a fig for

you or your mayor, assessor, deputy, or gendarmes! To-morrow, it'll be

our turn to be the stronger; and it won't be me alone, it'll be all the

poor devils who are starving to death. Ay, and it'll be you, too; you,

I say! when you've got tired of keeping the gentlefolks, without having

so much as a crust of bread to eat yourselves. A pretty plight they'll

be in, the landowners. They'll have their jaws broken, and the land'll

be free for any one to take. D'ye hear, young 'un? I'll take that land

of yours and ---- on it!"

"You just try it on, and I'll shoot you down like a dog!" shouted

Buteau, so wild with rage that he went out, slamming the door after him.

Lequeu, having listened with a reserved air, had already left,

unwilling, as an official, to compromise himself any further. Fouan

and Delhomme, with their faces over their liquor, breathed not a word;

feeling ashamed, and knowing that if they interposed the sot would

only shout the louder. The peasants at the surrounding tables were

eventually getting angry. What! Their property wasn't their own? It

would be taken from them? And, growling, they were about to pummel

the communist soundly and turn him out, when Jean rose up. He had not

taken his eyes off the speaker, or missed one of his words, as he sat

there listening with a serious face, as if seeking what justice might

underlie these things that shocked him.

"Hyacinthe," said he quietly, "you'd better hold your tongue. It's not

the sort of thing to say; and if by any chance you are right, you're

not very clever to put yourself so in the wrong."

So wise a remark from so cool a speaker calmed Hyacinthe

instantaneously. He fell back in his chair, declaring that, after all,

he didn't care a fig. He then began larking again: kissed Madame Bécu,

whose husband was asleep with his head on the table, and finished

up the punch, drinking out of the salad-bowl. The laughter had

recommenced, amid the dense smoke, and he was voted a funny fellow, all

the same.

At the far end of the barn, the dancing was still going on. Clou was

still smothering the squeaky notes of the little fiddle with his

thunderous blasts of trombone accompaniment. Sweat drained off the

bodies of the dancers, and exhaled amid the ruddy smoke of the lamps.

La Trouille, whirling about in turn in the arms of Nénesse and Delphin,

was conspicuous by her red bow. Berthe, too, was still there, faithful

to her gallant and dancing with no one else. In a corner, some young

men whom she had cast off were tittering together. Oh, well; if that

great gawky was willing, she did right to stick to him; there were

plenty of others who, for all her money, would have certainly thought

twice before marrying her.

"Let's go home to bed," said Fouan at last to Jean and Delhomme.

Outside, when Jean had left them, the old man walked on in silence,

apparently pondering over all he had just heard. Then, abruptly, as if

that had decided him, he turned to his son-in-law.

"I'll sell the shanty and come and live with you. That's settled.

Good-bye!"

He went slowly home. His heart was heavy; as his boots stumbled over

the dark road, a terrible sadness made him stagger like a drunken

man. As it was, he had no land, and he would soon have no house. It

seemed to him that people were already sawing down the old rafters and

pulling off the slates from over his head. He now had not the shelter

of a single stone left him; he was like a beggar wandering along the

roads, by day and night, unceasingly; and when it rained, the chill,

never-ending downpour would fall upon his head.

CHAPTER IV.

The bright August sun had been climbing the horizon since five o'clock,

and La Beauce displayed its ripe grain under the glowing sky. Since

the last summer showers, the green, ever-growing expanse had little by

little turned yellow. It was now a tawny sea of fire, that seemed to

reflect the flaming atmosphere: a sea that gleamed and swelled at the

least breath of wind. Nothing but corn; corn to infinity, without a

glimpse of house or tree! Now and then in the heat of the day, a leaden

calm enwrapped the ears, while a fruitful odour rose smoking from the

soil. The period of gestation was finishing; it could be realised that

the swelling seed was bursting from the womb in warm, heavy grain. At

sight of this mighty plain, this giant harvest, one felt uneasy as to

whether man, with his insect-like form, so small amid such immensity,

would ever be able to get through it.

During the last week, at La Borderie, Hourdequin, having finished his

barley, had been engaged upon his wheat. During the previous year his

reaping-machine had got out of order; and, discouraged by his servants'

hostility, and having himself grown doubtful as to the efficacy of

machinery, he had had to provide himself with a staff of reapers since

Ascension Day. According to custom, he had hired them at Mondoubleau,

in Le Perche. There was the foreman, a tall, lean fellow, five other

reapers, and six pickers-up, four of them women and two of them girls.

A cart had brought them to Cloyes, where a conveyance from the farm had

gone to fetch them. Everybody slept in the sheep-cot--empty at that

time of year--the girls, women, and men being all huddled together

pell-mell in the straw, half-undressed on account of the great heat.

This was the season when Jacqueline had the most trouble. The sunrise

and sunset decided the work of the day or the morrow. They shook off

their fleas at three in the morning, and returned to their straw at

about ten at night. She always had to be up the first, for the four

o'clock soup; just as she went to bed the last, after serving the heavy

nine o'clock meal of bacon, beef, and cabbage. Between these two meals

there were three others; bread and cheese at eight, soup again at

twelve, a sop of milk by way of a snack in the afternoon. In all, five

meals, copiously washed down with cider and wine, for the harvesters,

who work hard, are exacting as regards their food. However, she merely

laughed, as if stimulated by her duties. She was lithe like a cat,

with sinews of iron, and her resistance to fatigue was all the more

surprising, on account of her amours with that big lubber Tron, whose

soft flesh whetted her appetites. She had made him her creature, and

she took him into the barns, the hay-loft, and even the sheep-cot,

now that the shepherd, whose espionage she feared, passed the night

out-of-doors with his sheep. And withal she became more supple and

active. Hourdequin neither saw nor heard anything. He was in his

harvest fever, something out of the common, the great annual crisis

of his passion for the soil. His brain became on fire, his heart beat

fast, and his flesh quivered at sight of the ripe, falling grain.

The nights were so sultry that year, that sometimes Jean could not

stay in the loft, where he slept, near the stable. He preferred to

stretch himself, with all his clothes on, on the pavement of the

yard. It was not merely the intolerable living heat of the horses,

and the exhalations from their litter, that drove him outside; but

sleeplessness, the ever-present image of Françoise, the constant

idea of her coming, of his seizing her, and devouring her with his

embraces. Now that Jacqueline, being busy elsewhere, left him to

himself, his affection for the young girl turned into a madness of

longing. Scores of times, while he suffered at night-time, in a state

of semi-somnolence, he swore that he would go the next day and win her;

but, on rising up, as soon as he had dipped his head into a bucket of

cold water, he thought it disgusting: he was too old for her. And then

the next night the torture began again. When the harvesters arrived,

he recognised among them a woman, now married to one of the reapers,

with whom he had been familiar two years before, while she was yet a

girl. One evening he slipped into the sheep-cot, and pulled her by the

feet as she lay between her husband and her brother, who were both

snoring open-mouthed. She got up and came to him, and they lay silently

together in the sultry darkness on the trodden soil which, although it

had been raked over, still retained, from the winter sojourn of the

sheep, so keen an ammoniacal odour as to bring tears into one's eyes.

During the three weeks that the reapers were there, he came back to the

sheep-cot every night.

After the second week in August, the work made progress. The reapers

had started with the northern fields, and were working down towards

those which bordered the valley of the Aigre. The immense stretch of

corn fell sheaf by sheaf. Every cut of the scythe told, leaving a

circular incision. The puny insects, seemingly lost amid their gigantic

task, came forth from it in triumph. Behind them, as they slowly

marched onward in line, the razed ground re-appeared, bristling with

stubble, over which trampled the pickers-up, bending down It was the

season when there was the most gaiety about the vast sad solitude of

La Beauce, now full of people and animated by the constant motion of

labourers, carts, and horses. As far as the eye could reach, there were

parties advancing with the same slant progress, with the same swinging

of their arms; some so near that the swish of the steel was audible,

others extending in black streaks, like ants, as far as the edge of

the sky. On all sides gaps were appearing, as though the plain were a

piece of cloth wearing into holes all over. Shred by shred, amid the

ant-like activity, La Beauce was stripped of her court mantle formed

of cloth-of-gold, her sole summer adornment, the loss of which left

her desolate and naked. During the last days of the harvest, the heat

was overpowering, especially one day when Jean near the Buteaus' land,

and, with his cart and pair, was removing some sheaves to a field of

the farm where a large stack, six and twenty feet high, was to be built

with some three thousand trusses. The stubble was splitting atwain with

the drought, and the heat scorched the motionless wheat which was still

standing. The latter seemed as if it were itself flaming with visible

fire, in the quivering of the sun-rays. Not the shelter of a leaf; no

shadow on the ground save the scanty ones of the toilers. Perspiring

since the morning under this blazing sky, Jean had been loading and

unloading his cart, without saying a word, simply glancing at each

journey towards the field where Françoise, bending double, was slowly

gathering behind the reaping Buteau.

Buteau had had to take Palmyre to help him; for Françoise did not

suffice, and he could not rely on Lise, who had been in the family way

for the last eight months. This had exasperated him. After all the

precautions he had taken, how could it possibly have happened? He used

to jostle his wife about, accusing her of having done it on purpose,

and complaining lugubriously for hours together, as if some destitute

wretch or stray animal were coming to eat him out of house and home.

Although eight months had gone by, he never noticed Lise's condition

without abusing it. Curse the thing! A goose was not so stupid! It was

the ruin of the household!

That morning she had come to help in the gathering; but he had sent

her back, furious with her heavy, clumsy movements. She was to return,

however, with the four o'clock snack.

"Good God!" said Buteau, who was bent on finishing a bit of ground; "My

back's baked, and my tongue's a perfect chip."

Then he straightened himself; his sockless feet were thrust into thick

shoes, and he wore nothing but a shirt and canvas smock, the former

hanging half out of the open smock and showing the hair of his sweating

chest down to the navel.

"I must have another drink!" said he.

Then he took from under his jacket on the ground a quart bottle of

cider, which he had sheltered there. At last, having swallowed two

mouthfuls of the tepid drink, he thought of the girl.

"Aren't you thirsty?"

"Yes."

Françoise took a deep draught from the bottle without repugnance.

While she bent backward, with her loins curved, and her rounded bust

straining the thin material of her dress, he looked at her askance. She

also was dripping with moisture, in a print dress half undone, the body

being unhooked at the top and showing her white flesh. Under the blue

handkerchief with which she had covered her head and neck, her eyes

seemed very large in her quiet face, glowing with the heat.

Without another word Buteau, with his hips swinging, resumed his work,

felling a swath with every stroke of his scythe, the swish of which

kept time to his tread. Stooping down again, she followed him, carrying

in her right hand her sickle, which she made use of to gather up each

armful of corn from among the thistles. At every three steps she laid

the wheat regularly in bundles. Whenever he straightened himself,

just long enough to pass the back of his hand over his brow, and saw

Françoise too far in the rear, stooping, with her head quite close to

the ground, in the position of an expectant animal, he called out to

her in a husky voice, his tongue seemingly getting drier than ever:

"Now, then, lazybones! You ought to know better than to fool away your

time like that!"

In the adjacent field, where for three days the straw of the bundles

had been drying, Palmyre was engaged in binding the sheaves. He did

not watch _her_; for, contrary to the usual practice, he had arranged

to pay her per hundred sheaves, on the pretext that she was old and

worn out, and had lost her strength, so that he should lose if he paid

her by time--at the rate of a franc and a-half per day, which was what

the younger women earned. Even to secure this piecework she had had

to implore him; and he had taken advantage of her position, assuming

the resigned air of a Christian performing a work of charity. The poor

creature collected three or four bundles--as many as her shrivelled

arms could hold--and then tightly tied the sheaf with a band she had

prepared. This work, so fatiguing that it is usually reserved for the

men, was exhausting her. Her breast was crushed by the constant loads

it had to sustain; her arms were strained by dint of embracing such

massive bundles, and tugging at the bands of straw. She had brought

with her in the morning a bottle, which she went and filled every

hour or so at a neighbouring stagnant, poisonous pool; and she drank

greedily of the water, in spite of the diarrhœa, which had torn her to

pieces since the beginning of the hot weather, her health being already

ruined by over-work.

The azure of the sky had grown pale, as if it were whitened by the

heat; and burning coals seemed to fall from the sun, now glowing

more fiercely than ever. It was the oppressive noontide hour of the

siesta. Delhomme and his party, who had been stacking some sheaves

near by--four below, and one to roof the others in with--had already

disappeared, and were all lying down in some hollow. For an instant

longer old Fouan could be seen, still standing up. He had sold his

house a fortnight previously, since when he had been living with his

son-in-law, following the harvest-work with all the feverishness

of yore. In his turn, he soon felt obliged to lie down, and also

disappeared from view. There was nothing remaining against the blank

horizon, or the blazing background of the stubble, save the withered

figure of La Grande, who was examining a tall stack which her people

had begun to erect among a little tribe of smaller ones already

partially pulled to pieces. She seemed like a tree hardened by age,

with nothing to fear from the sun, as, without a drop of perspiration

on her, she stood there bolt upright, feeling sternly indignant with

the sleepers.

"Pish! My skin's absolutely crackling," said Buteau at last.

And, turning to Françoise:

"Let's sleep a bit!"

He looked round him for a little shade, but found none. The sun was

beating down perpendicularly, and there was not so much as a bush to

shelter them. At last he noticed that at the end of the field, in a

sort of little ditch, some wheat which was still standing threw a brown

streak of shadow.

"Hullo there, Palmyre!" cried he. "Don't you follow our example?"

She was fifty paces off, and replied in a stifled voice, which reached

them like a whisper:

"No, no! I haven't time."

She was now the only worker left in all the glowing plain. If she

didn't take her franc-and-a-half home with her at night-time, Hilarion

would beat her; for he no longer confined himself to his accustomed

ill-usage, but robbed her as well, that he might have money to buy

brandy with. However, her strength was now forsaking her. Her flat

figure, planed straight like a plank by sheer hard work, creaked as if

it were about to snap at every fresh sheaf she picked up and bound.

With ashen face, worn like some old copper coin, seemingly sixty years

of age though actually but thirty-five, she let the burning sun drink

up her life-blood in the despairing efforts she made, like a beast of

burden about to fall and perish.

Buteau and Françoise had stretched themselves side by side. They

were steaming with sweat, now that they had ceased to move about,

and they lay in silence with closed eyes. A leaden slumber instantly

weighed them down; they slept for an hour; and the perspiration poured

unceasingly from their limbs in the motionless, heavy, furnace-like

atmosphere. When Françoise opened her eyes again, she saw Buteau lying

on his side, watching her with the jaundiced look that had disturbed

her for some time past. She re-closed her eyelids, and pretended to go

to sleep again. Without his having yet spoken to her, she knew well

enough that he desired her, now that she had grown up, and was quite

a woman. The idea maddened her. Would he dare, the swine! he whom

she heard rioting with her sister every night? Never before had his

lustful manner so exasperated her. Would he dare? And she awaited his

addresses, unconsciously wishing for them, but resolved, if he touched

her, to strangle him.

As she closed her eyes Buteau suddenly seized hold of her.

"You swine! you swine!" she stammered, repulsing him.

He chuckled with a wild look, and whispered:

"Stupid! Keep still! I tell you they're asleep; no one is looking."

At that moment, Palmyre's wan and agonised face appeared above the

corn. She had turned round at the noise. But she didn't count, any more

than if a cow had lifted up its muzzle. And, indeed, she returned, with

indifference, to her sheaves. The cracking of her loins was again heard

at each effort she made.

"Stupid," said Buteau. "Lise won't know."

At the mention of her sister, Françoise, who was on the eve of giving

way, nerved herself for renewed resistance. From that moment she

remained firm, beating him with her fists and kicking him with her bare

legs. Was he hers, this fellow? Did he think she wanted some one else's

leavings?

"Go and find my sister, you pig!" she exclaimed. And then she gave him

such a kick in a tender part that he was forced to let her go, pushing

her away so brutally that she had to stifle a cry of pain.

It was high time that the scene should finish, for Buteau, when he got

up, perceived Lise returning with the snack. He walked on to meet her,

and engaged her in talk, so as to allow Françoise the time to tidy her

dress. The idea that she was going to tell everything made him regret

not having stunned her with a kick. However, she said nothing, but sat

down amid the bundles of wheat with a stubborn and insolent air. He had

resumed his reaping, but she still stayed there idly, like a princess.

"What is it?" asked Lise, tired with her journey, and sitting down as

well: "you're not working?"

"No, it bores me," replied Françoise, savagely.

Then Buteau, afraid to storm at her, fell foul of his wife. What was

she up to, stretched out there like a sow, warming her belly in the

sun? And a sweet thing, indeed, it was. A fine pumpkin to set out

to ripen. At that phrase she began to laugh with all her old buxom

gaiety. Maybe it was true that the warmth ripened the little one and

brought it on; and so, under the flaming heavens, she rounded her huge

figure, which seemed like the protuberance of some germ rising from

the fruitful soil. But he did not laugh. He brutally made her get up,

and insisted on her helping him. Inconvenienced by her condition, she

was fain to kneel down, picking up the ears of corn with a side-long

movement, and panting as she laboured on.

"As you're doing nothing," she said to her sister, "you might at least

go back home and make the soup."

Françoise went off without a word. Although the heat was still

stifling La Beauce had again assumed an aspect of activity. The little

black specks of harvesters re-appeared, swarming to infinity. Delhomme

was once more reaping with his two men, while La Grande, watching

the growth of her stack, was leaning on her stick, quite prepared to

bring it across the face of any idler. Fouan also went to have a look

at the stack; next he again became absorbed in his son-in-law's work;

and then he wandered retrospectively and regretfully to and fro, with

heavy gait. Françoise, with her head still dizzy from the shock she had

experienced, was going along the new road, when a voice called to her:

"Come along. This way!"

It was Jean, half hidden behind the sheaves which he had been carting

from the neighbouring fields since the morning. He had just unloaded

his waggon once more; and the two horses were waiting motionless in

the sunshine. The erection of the large stack would not be begun till

the morrow, and he had merely piled up some heaps, three walls which

enclosed, as it were, a room; a deep snug nest of straw.

"Come along!" he said. "It's me!"

Françoise mechanically complied with the request. She did not even

think of glancing back. Had she turned round, she would have noticed

Buteau craning forward, surprised to see her leaving the road.

Jean now began jestingly:

"It's proud you're getting, to go by without giving a good-day to your

friends!"

"Why, you're so hidden," she replied, "that you can't be seen."

Then he complained of the cold shoulder that the Buteaus now always

turned upon him. But she was not composed enough to talk of that; she

remained silent, or only let a brief word fall now and then. She had

spontaneously dropped upon the straw, at the far end of the nook, as

though she were thoroughly tired out. Her head was full of one thing,

the attack of that man over yonder at the edge of the field; his

hot hands, of which she still felt the powerful grip; his masculine

approach, that she still seemed to expect, breathing short, in an

anguish of desire, against which she struggled. She closed her eyes,

choking.

Then Jean spoke no more. Seeing her thus, supine and yielding, the

blood pulsed strongly through his veins. He had not calculated on

this encounter, and he still held back, thinking that it would be a

shame to take advantage of such a child. But the loud beating of his

heart upset him. He had so long desired her! A vision of possession

drove him frantic, as during his feverish nights. He lay down near

her, contenting himself first with one of her hands, and then with

both hands; which he crushed between his own, without so much as

venturing to raise them to his lips. She did not draw them away, but

re-opened her dreamy, heavy-lidded eyes, and looked at him without a

smile, without any sign of shame, her face nervously strained. It was

this mute, almost painful look of hers that all at once urged him to

brutality. He made a dash, and seized her like the other.

"No, no," she faltered; "I entreat you."

But she made no defence. She only gave a cry of pain. It seemed as

if the ground were giving way beneath her, and in her dizziness

consciousness failed her.

When she re-opened her eyes, without saying a word, without making

a movement, after remaining for a moment in a state of stupor, the

thought of the other one came back to her. Jean, on his side, was

displeased. Why had she yielded? She could not love a veteran like him!

And he also remained motionless, aghast. Finally, with a discontented

gesture, he tried to think of something to say, and failed. Embarrassed

still further, he resolved to kiss her; but she at once recoiled,

unwilling that he should touch her again.

"I must go," he muttered. "You stay here."

She made no answer, but stared vaguely up at the sky.

"Won't you? Come, wait five minutes, so that you mayn't be seen coming

away at the same time as me."

Then she decided to open her lips.

"All right, be off!"

That was all. He smacked his whip, swore at his horses, and with his

head bent trudged away by the side of his cart.

Meanwhile, Buteau's astonishment at Françoise's disappearance behind

the sheaves continued; and when he saw Jean make off, he had a

suspicion of the truth. Without confiding in Lise, he crept off like

a wary hunter, and finally leapt full into the midst of the nook of

straw. Françoise had not stirred, in the torpor that benumbed her; she

was still gazing vaguely upwards.

"Oh, you strumpet! So that vagabond's your lover, and I'm only good to

be kicked! Great God! We'll soon see about that."

He had already got hold of her; and she plainly realised by his heated

look that he intended to take advantage of the opportunity. As soon

as she again felt his burning hands, she once more resisted. Now that

he was there, she no longer regretted or wanted him. Her whole nature

revolted rancorously and jealously against him, albeit she was herself

unconscious of the freaks of her will.

"Will you let me go, you swine!" she said. "I'll bite you!"

For the second time he had to leave go of her. He spluttered with fury,

enraged at the thought that she yielded to another.

"Oh, I had a notion that there was something between you two," he said.

"I ought to have kicked him out a long time ago, you hussy!"

Then he gave vent to a flood of filth. She, although maddened on her

own side, remained stiff and pale, affecting perfect calmness, and

replying curtly to all his dirty speeches:

"What's it got to do with you? Can't I do what I like?"

"Very well. Then I shall turn you out of the house immediately we get

back! I shall tell Lise how I found you, and you may go and do as you

like elsewhere."

He was now pushing her in front of him towards the field where his wife

was waiting.

"Tell Lise!" said Françoise. "What do I care? I shall go away if I

choose."

"If you choose! Oh, indeed! We shall see about that. You'll be kicked

out, neck and crop!"

By way of taking a short cut, he was driving her across the field

which had hitherto belonged in common to her sister and herself, and

the partition of which he had always postponed. Suddenly he was seized

with consternation. A new idea had just flashed like lightning through

his mind. It had occurred to him that if he turned her away this field

would be cut in two, and that she would take half of it, and perhaps

give it to her gallant. The thought froze him, and both nipped his

lust and wrath. No; that would be folly. He must not let everything go

because a girl had baulked him for once. There was plenty of sport to

be had any day; but if a fellow once got hold of some land, the thing

was to stick to it.

He said nothing more, but slackened his pace, feeling puzzled as to how

he might recall his violent words before he reached his wife. At length

he made up his mind.

"Well, I'm not fond of making mischief," he said; "it's your seeming

disgust of me that annoys me so. Otherwise, I hardly care to vex Lise,

situated as she is."

She fancied that he, too, was afraid of being exposed.

"You may be sure of one thing," she answered; "if you speak, I shall do

the same."

"Oh, I'm not afraid of that," he resumed, coolly and quietly. "I shall

say you are lying, in revenge, because I caught you." Then, as they

were getting near, he concluded, quickly: "So it shan't go any further.

We must both of us talk it over some other time."

Lise, however, was beginning to feel surprised, unable to understand

why Françoise was coming back with Buteau like that. He was explaining

that the lazy thing had been sulking behind a hay-stack, down yonder,

when suddenly a harsh cry interrupted him, and the matter was forgotten.

"What's that? Who screamed?"

It was a weird cry, a long screaming sigh, like the death-gasp of

an animal having its throat cut. It rose up and died away amid the

pitiless glare of the sun.

"Eh? What is it? A horse surely, with its bones broken!"

They turned round, and saw Palmyre still standing in the next field,

amid the bundles of wheat. With her failing arms, she was pressing

against her shrivelled bosom one last sheaf, which she was striving

to bind. But, raising a fresh cry of agony, and letting the whole lot

fall, she spun round and fell prone among the corn, struck down by the

sun that had been scorching her for the last twelve hours.

Lise and Françoise ran up, Buteau following at a more careless

pace; while everybody from the surrounding fields came forward: the

Delhommes, Fouan, who was strolling about there, and La Grande, who was

scattering the stones with the ferule of her stick.

"What's the matter?"

"Palmyre in a fit."

"I saw her fall from over there."

"Good Heavens!"

All of them stood round and watched her, not venturing too near,

however, for they were struck with that mysterious awe which disease

always inspires in the peasantry. She was stretched, face upwards, on

the ground, with her arms extended as if she had been crucified on

that earth, which, by the hard toil it exacted, had worn her out so

soon, and was now killing her. Some vessel must have broken, for a

streamlet of blood flowed from her mouth. Still, she was dying more

from exhaustion, brought on by toil such as would have over-tasked a

beast. A withered, shrunken thing she looked among the stubble, a mere

fleshless, sexless bit of frippery, exhaling a last faint gasp amid the

rich, fertile harvest.

La Grande, the grandmother who had renounced her and never spoke to

her, at last came forward, saying:

"I really think she's dead." Then she prodded her with her stick. The

body, with its eyes glaring vacantly in the brilliant light, and its

mouth gaping as if to inhale boundless breezes, did not stir. On the

chin the thread of blood was clotting. Then the grandmother added:

"Sure enough she's dead; better so, than to live at the expense of

others."

They all stood motionless and aghast. Could anybody venture to touch

her, without summoning the mayor? At first they spoke in whispers; then

they began to shout again, to make themselves heard.

"I'll go and fetch my ladder from over yonder against the stack," said

Delhomme eventually. "It'll serve as a stretcher. It's a bad thing to

leave a corpse on the ground."

When he came back with the ladder, and they wanted to take some sheaves

to make a bed for the body, Buteau grumbled.

"You shall have your corn back," they said.

"I should just hope so, indeed!" he answered.

Lise, a little ashamed of this meanness, added two bundles as a pillow,

and Palmyre was laid upon the ladder, while Françoise, in a sort of

dream, bewildered by this death, which had occurred so soon after her

own adventure, could not take her eyes off the corpse. At sight of it

she felt saddened, and, above all, she was astonished that that thing

could ever have been a woman. She remained on guard with Fouan, pending

the removal; and the old man said nothing either, though he seemed to

think that those who died were very fortunate.

At sunset, when they all went home, two men came and took the stretcher

away. The burden was not a heavy one, and there was hardly need of a

relay. However, some others were in attendance, and quite a procession

was formed. They cut across the field, to avoid a bend in the road. The

corpse was stiffening on the sheaves, and some ears fell down behind

the head, and swayed to and fro at each jolt of the bearers' measured

tread.

In the sky above there now only remained the heat that had accumulated

during the day, a ruddy heat that weighed heavily in the blue air. On

the horizon, on the other side of the Loir valley, the sun, steeped in

vapour, now cast over La Beauce a sheet of yellow rays on a level with

the ground. Everything seemed tinged with the fine golden glow of the

fair harvest evening. Such corn as was still standing displayed egrets

of rosy flame, the stubble ends bristled with a ruddy gleam, and afar,

projecting in all directions above the level, tawny sea, the stacks

rose up one behind the other, apparently growing preposterously large.

On the one side they seemed to be in flames, while on the other they

were already black, casting shadows that stretched from end to end of

the vast plain.

A solemn stillness fell, broken only by the song of a lark far aloft.

None of the worn-out toilers spoke; they followed the corpse with bent

heads, as resignedly as a flock of sheep. And there was no sound save

a slight creaking of the ladder as the dead woman rocked to and fro on

the way back through the ripe corn.

That night, Hourdequin paid off his harvesters, who had finished the

work they had bargained to do. The men went away with a hundred and

twenty francs a-piece, the women with sixty, for their month's work.

It had been a good season; not too much corn blown down, to jag the

scythe, nor a single storm during the cutting. Accordingly, it was

amid loud acclamations that the foreman, at the head of his party of

men, presented the harvest-home sheaf, with its ears woven cross-wise,

to Jacqueline, who was looked upon as mistress of the household. The

"Ripane," the traditional farewell meal, was very merry. Three legs

of mutton and five rabbits were eaten, and the liquor circulated till

so late into the night that they all went to bed more or less tipsy.

Jacqueline, herself intoxicated, all but let herself be caught by

Hourdequin while she was hanging round Tron's neck. Jean, quite dazed,

had flung himself on the straw in his garret. Despite his fatigue, he

could not sleep, for the image of Françoise had returned and tormented

him. This surprised--in fact, it almost angered--him. He had had such

little pleasure with the girl, after spending so many nights longing

for her! He had subsequently felt so forlorn, that he had been inclined

to vow that he would have nothing more to do with her. And yet now,

scarcely was he lying down, when, evoked by carnal lust, she again

uprose before his mind, and he again yearned for her as before. What

had transpired had only whetted his fleshly appetite. How could he

manage to see her again? Where could he clasp her on the morrow, during

the following days, for ever? Suddenly a rustling made him start. A

woman was nestling near him; it was the picker-up from Le Perche, who

was astonished that he had not joined her on this last night. At first

he repulsed her; but, finally, he stifled her with his embraces; and it

seemed to him that she was that other one whom he would have crushed

likewise, clinging, clinging, till they swooned.

At the same moment, Françoise, starting from her slumber, got up, and,

longing for air, opened the dormer-window of her room. She had just

dreamed of fellows fighting, and of dogs tearing down the door below.

When the air had cooled her a little, her mind again ran upon the two

men--the one who wanted her, and the other who had taken her. This was

the limit of her reflections: the thought simply revolved in her mind,

without her giving it any consideration or coming to any decision.

Something at last caught her ear. It had not been a dream, then? A dog

was howling, afar off, on the banks of the Aigre. Then she remembered:

it was Hilarion, who, since night-fall, had been howling over Palmyre's

corpse. They had tried to drive him away, but he had clung and bitten,

refusing to leave the remains of his sister, his wife, his all in all;

and he howled endlessly, with a howling that filled the night.

For a long time Françoise listened, shuddering.

CHAPTER V.

"I only hope La Coliche won't calve at the same time as me!" repeated

Lise every morning.

Lost in thought she stood in the cow-house, gazing at the cow, whose

belly was distended beyond measure. Never had any animal swollen to

such an extent. She looked round as a barrel on her shrunken shanks.

The nine months fell exactly on Saint-Fiacre's Day, for Françoise had

been careful to note the date on which she had taken her to the bull.

Lise, on her side, was unfortunately by no means certain, that is

within a few days. Still the child would certainly be born somewhere

about Saint-Fiacre's Day, perhaps on the day before, perhaps on the day

after. So she repeated, forlornly:

"I only hope La Coliche won't calve at the same time as me! A pretty

job that'd be! Yes, good gracious! We should be in a nice pickle!"

La Coliche, who had been ten years in the house, was greatly spoilt.

She had come to be considered as one of the family. The Buteaus

nestled near her in winter time, having no other firing than the warm

exhalation from her flanks. She in return, displayed great affection,

particularly towards Françoise, whom she could never see without a

tender feeling moistening her large eyes. She would lick her with

her rough tongue till the blood came; or seizing her skirt between

her teeth she would pull her near, so as to have her all to herself.

Accordingly she was taken great care of, now that her calving time drew

near: warm mashes, excursions out at the best times of the day,--in

fact, she met with hourly attention. All this was not merely due to

their fondness for her; they remembered the five hundred francs she

represented, as well as the milk, butter, and cheese she gave; quite a

fortune, which would be lost in losing her.

A fortnight had elapsed since the harvest. Françoise had resumed her

every-day life in the household, as though nothing had occurred between

her and Buteau. He seemed to have forgotten; and she herself was glad

to avoid thinking of these matters, which disturbed her. Jean, whom

she had met and warned, had not called again. He used to watch for her

beside the hedges, and implore her to slip out and meet him in the

evening in ditches which he particularised. But she refused, in alarm,

concealing her coldness under an assumption of great prudence. Later

on, she said, when she wouldn't be so much wanted at home. One evening

when he surprised her going down to Macqueron's to buy some sugar, she

obstinately refused to accompany him behind the church; and talked to

him the whole time about La Coliche, about her bones which were giving

way, and her hind-quarters which were opening: sure signs, which made

him remark that the time could not now be far off.

And now, just on Saint-Fiacre's Eve, Lise was seized with severe pains,

as she went into the cow-house after dinner with her sister to look at

the cow, who, with her thighs drawn apart by the swelling of her womb,

was also in pain, lowing softly.

"What did I say?" cried Lise, furiously. "A nice mess we're in now."

Towards ten o'clock, Buteau, annoyed at nothing having happened,

decided to go to bed, leaving Lise and Françoise obstinately

remaining in the cow-house beside La Coliche, whose pains seemed to

be increasing. They both began to feel uneasy. No progress was made,

although, as far as the bones were concerned, the labour seemed at an

end. There was the passage, so why did not the calf come out? They

stroked the animal, encouraged her, and brought her dainties--sugar,

which she refused, with her head bent and her croup profoundly

agitated. At midnight, Lise, who had hitherto been writhing and

groaning, found herself suddenly relieved. In her case it had only been

a false alarm; some wandering pains. But she was convinced that she

had driven it back, just as she would have repressed a need of nature.

The whole night through she and her sister sat up with La Coliche,

nursing her carefully, and even applying fomentations of hot rags;

while Rougette, the other cow, the one last bought at Cloyes market,

astonished by the lighted candles, watched their movements with her

large, bluish, drowsy eyes.

At dawn of day, Françoise, seeing that nothing had yet come off,

decided to run over and fetch their neighbour La Frimat, who was

renowned for her knowledge, having assisted so many cows that people

readily had recourse to her in ticklish cases, so as to avoid sending

for the veterinary. On her arrival she made a grimace.

"She don't look well," she muttered. "How long has it been like this?"

"Why, for twelve hours."

She kept on walking round the animal, poking her nose everywhere, and

alarming the other two with her dissatisfied grimaces and the way she

jerked her chin.

When Buteau came in from the fields to breakfast, he also took fright,

and talked of sending for Patoir, albeit shuddering at the idea of the

expense.

"A veterinary!" said La Frimat tartly, "to kill her, hey? Old

Saucisse's animal died before his very eyes. No! See here. I'll open

the bladder, and _I'll_ look after your calf for you!"

"Why," remarked Françoise, "Monsieur Patoir says the bladder shouldn't

be opened. He says that the water inside is a help."

La Frimat shrugged her shoulders in exasperation. Patoir was an ass!

Then she slit open the pocket with a pair of scissors. For a moment La

Coliche breathed more easily, and the old woman triumphed. Lise and

Françoise watched her with anxiously quivering eyelids, as she tried

to ascertain the posture of the calf. Buteau himself, who had not gone

back into the fields, waited breathless and still.

"I can feel the feet," she muttered, "but not the head. It's a bad sign

when you can't feel the head."

"Better not bustle her," said La Frimat, sagely; "it'll come all right

by-and-bye."

* * * * *

It was now three o'clock. They waited till seven. Nothing happened,

however, and the house was a perfect hell. On the one hand, Lise,

obstinately remaining on an old chair, was writhing and groaning;

on the other, La Coliche was lowing incessantly amid shiverings and

sweatings, which grew more and more serious. Rougette, the second cow,

also began to low with fright. Françoise was at her wits' end, and

Buteau kept swearing and bawling alternately. At last La Coliche, her

strength failing her, fell on to her side, and lay stretched out upon

the straw panting pitiably.

"We sha'n't get the brute!" declared Buteau; "and the mother will die

as well!"

Françoise clasped her hands entreatingly.

"Do go and fetch Monsieur Patoir! Cost what it may, go and fetch

Monsieur Patoir!"

Buteau had grown gloomy. Then, after a final struggle with himself, he

got out the cart without saying a word.

La Frimat, who affected to pay no further heed to the cow since

the veterinary had again been mentioned, was now getting anxious

about Lise. The old woman was also good at accouchements; all the

neighbourhood had passed through her hands. She seemed uneasy, and did

not conceal her apprehensions from La Bécu, who called Buteau back as

he was putting the horse to.

"Look here! Your wife's not well. Suppose you bring back a doctor at

the same time?"

He stood mute and staring. What? Another of 'em to be coddled! Not

likely that he was going to pay for everybody!

"No, no!" cried Lise, in an interval between two throes. "I shall be

all right. We can't be throwing money into the gutter like that!"

Buteau hastily whipped up his horse, and the cart on its way to Cloyes

vanished amid the falling shades of night.

When Patoir at last arrived, two hours later, everything was in the

same state: La Coliche lay groaning on her side, and Lise, writhing

like a worm, was half falling off her chair. Things had lasted thus for

twenty-four hours.

"Which is my patient, hey?" asked the veterinary, who was of a jovial

disposition.

And addressing Lise familiarly:

"Then, if it's not you, my fat beauty, please put yourself to bed. You

want it badly."

She made no answer, nor did she go. He was already examining the cow.

"Heavens! she's in a wretched state, this beast of yours. You always

come for me too late, you clumsy wretches!"

They all listened to him with a respectful, despondent, hang-dog look;

that is, all of them excepting La Frimat, who screwed up her lips in

high disdain. Patoir, taking off his coat and turning up his shirt

sleeves, proceeded to make an elaborate examination.

"Of course," he resumed, after an instant's pause, "it's exactly as I

thought. Let me tell you, my children, it's all up with this calf of

yours. I've no wish to cut my fingers against his teeth, in turning him

round. Besides, I shouldn't get him out any the more if I did so, and I

should certainly damage the mother."

Françoise burst into sobs.

"Monsieur Patoir," said she, "I implore you, save our cow. Poor

Coliche! she's so fond of me!"

Both Lise, sallow with a fit of griping, and Buteau, in rude health, so

unfeeling as they were regarding the woes of others, now lamented and

softened, making the same supplication.

"Save our cow, our old cow that has given us such good milk for years

and years," they begged in chorus. "Pray save her, Monsieur Patoir."

"Well, one thing must be clearly understood: I shall be forced to cut

up the calf."

"Who cares a curse for the calf? Save our cow, Monsieur Patoir, save

her!"

Then the veterinary, who had brought a large blue apron with him,

borrowed a pair of canvas trousers. Stripping himself quite naked in

a corner, behind Rougette, he slipped on the trousers, and then tied

the apron round his loins. When he re-appeared in this scanty costume,

with his genial bull-dog face and his fat and dumpy figure, La Coliche

lifted her head and, no doubt from astonishment, ceased to complain.

However, no one even smiled, so wrung with anxiety was every heart.

"Light some candles!" said Patoir.

He set four on the ground, and then lay down flat on his stomach in the

straw, behind the cow, who was now unable to get up. For a moment he

remained flat, examining her. Near by he had placed a little box, and,

having raised himself on his elbow, he was taking a bistoury out of

it, when a husky groan startled him, and he at once assumed a sitting

posture.

"What, still there, my stout matron? Well, I thought that couldn't be

the cow!"

It was Lise, seized with the final pangs.

"For goodness sake go and get your business over in your own room, and

leave me to do mine here! It disturbs me; it acts on my nerves, 'pon my

honour it does, to hear you straining behind me. Come, come! It's not

common sense! Take her away, the rest of you!"

La Frimat and La Bécu decided to take her each by an arm and lead her

to her room. She surrendered herself, no longer having the strength

to resist. But on crossing the kitchen, where a solitary candle was

burning, she asked to have all the doors left open, with the idea that

she would thus not be so far off. La Frimat had already prepared the

bed of anguish according to rural custom--a simple sheet spread out in

the middle of the room over a truss of straw, and three chairs turned

down. Lise squatted down and stretched herself, with her back against

one chair and one leg against each of the others. She was not even

undressed.

Buteau and Françoise had remained in the cow-house to light Patoir;

they squatted on their heels, each holding a candle, while the

veterinary, again stretched out on his stomach, cut a section round

the left ham with his bistoury. He loosened the skin, and then pulled

at the calf's shoulder, which came away. Françoise, pale and faint,

dropped her candle and fled with a shriek.

"My poor old Coliche," she exclaimed; "I won't see it! I won't see it!"

Thereupon Patoir lost his temper, the more so as he had to rise up

and extinguish an incipient conflagration, caused by the fall of

Françoise's candle among the straw.

"Drat the wench! She might be a princess, with her nerves. She'd smoke

us like so many hams," he remarked in a peevish tone.

Françoise had run and flung herself on a chair in the room where her

sister was being confined. The latter's exposure did not disturb her.

It seemed a mere matter of course, after what she had just seen. She

waved from her memory that vision of living severed flesh, and gave a

stammering account of what was being done to the cow.

"It's sure to go wrong; I must go back," said Lise suddenly; and

despite her sufferings, she made an effort to get up from among the

three chairs. But La Frimat and La Bécu grew angry, and held her down.

"Good heavens! will you keep still! What on earth possesses you?"

exclaimed La Frimat.

"So as to keep you quiet," said La Bécu, "I'll go myself and bring you

the news."

From that moment La Bécu did nothing but run to and fro between the

room and the cow-house. To save continually making the journey, she at

last shouted out her report from the kitchen. The veterinary was still

busily occupied with his nasty, troublesome job, and he emerged from it

disgustingly filthy from head to foot.

"It's all right, Lise," exclaimed La Bécu; "don't be uneasy. We've got

the other shoulder, and it will soon be all over now."

Lise saluted each phase of the operation with a heartrending sigh; and

no one knew whether the lament was for herself or for the calf. There

was not the slightest cessation of her travail, and she seemed to be

seized with inconsolable despair.

"Oh, dear, how unlucky! Oh, dear, how unlucky to lose such a fine calf!"

Françoise likewise lamented, and the regrets they all expressed grew

so aggressive, so full of implied hostility, that Patoir felt hurt. He

hurried to them, stopping, however, outside the door, for decency's

sake.

"I say! I give you warning. Just remember that you implored me to save

your cow. I know you so well, you beggars. Now, don't you go about

telling everybody that I killed your calf."

"That's right enough, right enough," muttered Buteau, going back with

him into the cow-house. "All the same, it was you that cut it up."

As Lise lay prostrate among the three chairs, a kind of billow passed

over her. Françoise, who in her desolation had so far seen nothing,

became quite thunderstruck.

"A little more patience," said La Frimat. "It'll soon be all right."

Françoise, on her part, shook herself free from the fascination of the

sight, and feeling embarrassed, went and took her sister's hand.

"My poor Lise," she said affectionately, "what great trouble you're in!"

"Oh, yes, yes! And no one pities me. If I only had some pity! Oh, dear!

It's beginning again. Won't it _ever_ be born?"

This kind of talk might have gone on for a considerable time, but

some exclamations were heard in the cow-house. They came from Patoir,

who, astonished to find La Coliche still quivering and moaning, had

suspected the presence of a second calf. And, indeed, there was one.

Buteau ran into his wife's room carrying the little animal, which hung

its astonished head in a tipsy-like way.

Amid the general acclamations at the sight, Lise broke into an endless,

irresistible peal of mad laughter, stuttering:

"Oh, how funny it looks! Oh! it's too bad to make me laugh like this!

Oh, dear! Oh! oh! how I am suffering! No, no! don't make me laugh any

more: I've had enough!"

The climax was at length reached.

"It's a girl," declared La Frimat.

"No, no!" said Lise, who felt disappointed, "I don't want one: I want a

boy."

* * * * *

Patoir went away, after two quarts of sweetened wine had been given

to La Coliche. La Frimat undressed Lise and put her to bed, while La

Bécu, assisted by Françoise, cleared away the straw and swept up the

room. In ten minutes' time all was in order. No one would have had any

idea that a confinement had just taken place, except for the constant

mewling of the baby, who was being washed in warm water. However, after

being swathed, the infant gradually became quiet; while the mother,

now utterly prostrate, fell into a leaden sleep, and lay with her face

congested, almost black, between the thick brownish sheets.

Towards midnight, when the two neighbours had left, Françoise told

Buteau that he had better go up into the hay-loft to sleep. She had

laid a mattress on the floor, and meant to stay there for the night,

so as not to leave her sister alone. He made no answer, but finished

his pipe in silence. All was quiet, save for the heavy breathing of the

sleeping Lise.

As Françoise was kneeling on her mattress, at the very foot of the bed,

in a darkened corner, Buteau, still silent, suddenly came up behind

her and laid her flat. She turned her head, and instantly grasped

the situation, from the look of his drawn, flushed face. He was at

it again; he had not relinquished his purpose, and, presumably, the

longing was a violent one, since he attacked her thus beside his wife,

and just after occurrences which were scarcely of an engaging kind.

Françoise repulsed and overturned him, however, and then there was a

suppressed, panting struggle.

With a snigger, and in a choking voice, he said:

"Come, come! Why should you mind? I'm equal to taking on the two of

you."

He knew her well, and felt sure she would not scream. Nor did she. She

resisted without a word, too proud to call to her sister, unwilling to

acquaint any one, even Lise, with her business. He was stifling her,

however, and seemed on the point of succeeding.

"It'll be so convenient, as we're living together, and shall be always

with each other," he said.

But suddenly he gave a cry of pain. She had silently dug her nails into

his neck. Then he grew mad, and spoke of Jean, saying:

"Don't think you'll marry him, that blackguard fellow of yours. Never,

so long as you're under age."

As he was now doing her brutal violence, she kicked him so vigorously

that he howled aloud. Then he bounded up in alarm, looking anxiously

towards the bed. His wife was sleeping so soundly, however, that she

had not stirred. Nevertheless, he went off, with a terrible threatening

gesture.

When Françoise had stretched herself on the mattress, amid the deep

stillness of the room, she lay there with her eyes open. She would

never let him have his way, that she wouldn't, even although she

herself were perchance desirous. And she felt astonished at it all; for

the idea that she might marry Jean had never yet occurred to her.

CHAPTER VI.

Jean had been engaged for a couple of days in some fields which

Hourdequin owned near Rognes, and where he had set up a steam

threshing-machine, hired from a Châteaudun engine-builder, who sent it

about from Bonneval to Cloyes. With his cart and his two horses, the

young man brought the sheaves from the surrounding ricks, and then took

the grain to the farm; while the machine, puffing away from morning

till night, scattered golden dust in the sunlight, and filled the

country-side with a terrific, incessant snorting.

Jean was not well, and was ransacking his brains as to how he might

best recover possession of Françoise. A month had already gone by since

he had clasped her, on that very spot, among the wheat which they

were now threshing; and since then she had always escaped from him,

apprehensively. He began to despair of renewing the intercourse; and

yet his desire was increasing, becoming an all-absorbing, maddening

passion. As he drove his horses, he wondered why he should not go to

the Buteaus and roundly ask for Françoise's hand. There had been no

open definitive rupture between them. He still bade them good-day as

he passed, and, if he did not call on them, it was solely because he

was influenced by the disquietude of guilt. As soon as this idea of

marriage occurred to him, as the only means of getting the girl back,

he persuaded himself that it was the path of duty, and that he should

be acting dishonourably if he did not marry her. The next morning,

however, when he returned to the machine, he was seized with fear; and

he would never have dared to risk the step had he not seen Buteau and

Françoise set off together for the fields. He then bethought himself

that Lise had always been favourable to him, and that, with her, he

would possess more confidence. So he slipped away for a few moments,

leaving his horses in charge of a fellow-servant.

"Why, Jean!" cried Lise, sturdily up and about again after her

confinement; "no one ever sees you now. What's up?"

He made some excuses, and then, with the brusqueness of shy people,

he hurriedly broached the subject, in such an awkward way, however,

that at first it was open for her to think that he was making her a

declaration. For he reminded her that he had loved her, and that he

would willingly have taken her to wife. However, he at once added:

"And that's why I'd all the same marry Françoise if she were given me."

Lise stared at him in such astonishment that he began to stammer:

"Oh, I'm well aware that it can't be settled straight off. I only

wanted to talk to you about it!"

"Well, it takes me by surprise," she replied at length, "because I

hardly expected such a thing, on account of your ages. First of all, we

must know what Françoise thinks."

He had come formally resolved to tell the whole tale, thus hoping

to make the marriage inevitable. But at the last moment a scruple

restrained him. If Françoise had not confessed to her sister, if no one

knew anything about it, had he the right to speak? He was discouraged,

and felt ridiculous, on account of his thirty-three years of age.

"Most certainly," he muttered, "she should be consulted. Nobody would

force her."

Lise, however, having once got over her astonishment, looked at him as

genially as ever. Evidently the idea did not displease her. She was

even quite gracious.

"It shall be as she chooses, Jean. I'm not like Buteau, who thinks her

too young. She's getting on for eighteen, and she has the build for two

men, let alone one. And, besides, love is all very well between sister

and sister, of course; but now that she's a woman, I'd rather have a

servant under orders in her place. If she says yes, take her! You're a

good sort, and the old cocks are often the best."

She had been unable to restrain these words of complaint anent the

gradual estrangement which was irresistibly increasing between herself

and her younger sister: that hostility, aggravated by little daily

jars, a secret leaven of jealousy and hatred which had been doing its

stealthy work ever since a man had come into the house with his will

and his lust.

Jean, in his delight, kissed Lise warmly on both cheeks.

"It happens that we're just christening the baby," she added, "and we

shall have the family to dinner this evening. I invite you, and you

shall make your proposal to old Fouan, who's the guardian, that is if

Françoise will have you."

"Agreed!" cried he. "I'll see you to-night!"

He rapidly strode back to his horses, and drove them all day long,

making his whip resound with clacks which rang out like gun-shots on

the morning of a fête.

The Buteaus were, indeed, having their child baptised after a deal

of delay. First of all, Lise had insisted on waiting till she was

quite strong and well again, wishing to join in the feast. Next--on

ambitious thoughts intent--she had obstinately resolved to have

Monsieur and Madame Charles for godfather and godmother, and they

having condescendingly consented, it had been necessary to wait for

Madame Charles, who had just started for Chartres to lend a helping

hand in her daughter's establishment, for as it was now the time of

the September fair, the house in the Rue aux Juifs was always full.

However, as Lise had told Jean, the christening was to be simply

a family gathering, with Fouan, La Grande, the Delhommes, and the

godparents.

At the last moment there had been serious difficulties with the Abbé

Godard, who was now incessantly at loggerheads with Rognes. So long

as he had cherished the hope that the Municipal Council would indulge

in the luxury of a priest of its own, he had been content to bear

his troubles patiently: such as the four miles or so which he had to

walk for each mass, and the vexatious demands which this irreligious

village made upon him. But he could now no longer deceive himself

with false hopes. Every year the council regularly refused to repair

the parsonage. Hourdequin, the mayor, declared that the expenses were

already too heavy; and Macqueron, the assessor, alone paid court to

the priesthood, in furtherance of certain hidden ambitious designs.

So the Abbé Godard, no longer having any reason to keep on good terms

with Rognes, became severe in his treatment of the village, and only

vouchsafed it the strictest minimum of worship. He did not treat the

inhabitants to any extra prayers, or any display of tapers and incense

for amusement's sake. He was always quarrelling with the women of the

village. In June there had been quite a pitched battle on the subject

of the first communion. Five children--two little girls and three

boys--had been attending his catechism class on Sundays after mass, and

to avoid having to return to confess them, he insisted on their coming

to him at Bazoches-le-Doyen. Thereupon a first sedition arose among the

women. A pretty thing, indeed! Three-quarters of a league to go there,

and the same distance back! Who was to know what might happen, with

boys and girls running about together? Next, there was a terrible storm

when he refused point-blank to celebrate the full ceremony at Rognes:

high mass, with singing, and so forth. He intended to hold this

celebration in his own parish, whither the five children were free to

repair, if they wished to do so. For a whole fortnight the women raved

with fury round the fountain. What! He christened them, married them,

and buried them in their own village, and now he wouldn't give them a

decent communion! He was obstinate, however, and merely officiated at

low mass, dismissing the five communicants without even a blossom or

an oremus by way of consolation. When the women, vexed even to tears

at seeing such a paltry ceremony, entreated him to have vespers sung

in the afternoon, he flew into a passion! Nothing of the kind! He gave

them their due. They would have had high mass, vespers, and everything

else at Bazoches if their obstinacy had not made them rebel even

against the blessed God Himself! After this quarrel a rupture seemed

imminent between the Abbé Godard and Rognes, and the least jar would

certainly bring about a catastrophe.

When Lise went to see the priest about the christening of her baby,

he talked of fixing it for the Sunday, after mass. But she begged

of him to return on the Tuesday at two o'clock, for the godmother

would not return from Chartres till the morning of that day; and he

eventually consented, recommending the party to be punctual, for he was

determined, he cried, that he would not wait a second.

On the Tuesday, at two o'clock precisely, the Abbé Godard reached the

church, panting from his journey, and damp owing to a sudden shower.

No one had yet arrived. There was only Hilarion, who, at the entrance

of the nave, was engaged in clearing up a corner of the baptistery,

encumbered with fragments of old flag-stones, which had always been

seen there. Since the death of his sister, the cripple had lived on

public charity, and it had occurred to the priest, who used to slip

odd francs into the poor fellow's hand from time to time, to employ

him on this work of clearance, which had been resolved upon scores of

times but always deferred. For a few moments he interested himself in

watching Hilarion's task. Then he was taken with a first fit of anger.

"Good gracious! are they making a fool of me? It's already ten minutes

past two," he exclaimed.

Then, as he looked at the Buteaus' silent, sleepy-looking house across

the square, he noticed the rural constable waiting under the porch, and

smoking his pipe.

"Ring the bell, Bécu!" he cried; "that'll bring the sluggards along."

So Bécu, who was very drunk, as usual, hung on to the bell-rope, while

the priest went to put on his surplice. He had drawn up the entry

in the register on the previous Sunday, and he intended to perform

the ceremony by himself, without the help of the choir-children, who

brought him to the verge of distraction. When all was ready, he again

became impatient. Ten minutes more had elapsed, and the bell still

rang out, with exasperating persistence, amid the deep silence of the

deserted village.

"What on earth are they about? They ought to have some one at their

backs with a stick!" said the priest.

At last he saw La Grande come forth from the Buteaus' house, walking

along in her spiteful, old-queen-like way, dry and upright, like a

thistle, despite her eighty-five years.

A great worry was distracting the family. All the guests were there,

excepting the godmother, who had been vainly awaited since the morning.

Monsieur Charles, quite dumbfounded, declared over and over again that

it was most surprising, that he had received a letter only the night

before, and that Madame Charles, who was detained perhaps at Cloyes,

would certainly arrive in a minute or two. Lise, anxious, and knowing

that the priest was not over-fond of waiting, finally took it into her

head to despatch La Grande to him, so as to keep him patient.

"What's the meaning of this?" he asked her, from a distance. "Are we

going to begin to-day or to-morrow? Perhaps you think that God Almighty

is at your beck and call?"

"In a moment, your reverence; in a moment," replied the old woman, with

her impassive calmness.

Hilarion was just then bringing out the last fragments of the

flag-stones, and he went by carrying an immense block against his

stomach. He swayed from side to side on his crooked shanks, but he did

not bend, being as firmly set as a rock, with muscles strong enough to

have carried an ox. His hare-lip was dribbling, but not a drop of sweat

moistened his hardened skin.

The Abbé Godard, provoked by La Grande's equanimity, fell upon her at

once.

"Look here, La Grande," said he, "now that I've got hold of _you_, is

it charitable of you, who are so well off, to let your only grandson

beg his bread along the roads?"

"The mother disobeyed me; the child is nothing to me," she answered

harshly.

"Well, I've given you fair warning, and I tell you again that if

you're so hard-hearted as that you'll go to Hell. He would have starved

to death the other day but for what I gave him, and now I'm obliged to

invent a job for him."

On hearing the word "Hell" La Grande slightly smiled. As she herself

said, she knew too much about it: the poor folks' Hell was on this

earth. The sight of Hilarion carrying paving-stones set her thinking,

however, far more than the priest's threats did. She was surprised; she

would never have imagined that he was so strong, with his jacket-sleeve

shanks.

"If it's work he wants," she replied at last, "I daresay he can be

found some."

"His proper place is with you. Take him, La Grande," said the priest.

"We'll see. Let him come to-morrow."

Hilarion, who had understood, began to tremble to such a degree that he

all but crushed his feet as he dropped his last slab. As he went off he

cast a furtive glance on his grandmother, like a whipped, terrified,

submissive animal.

Another half-hour went by. Bécu, tired of ringing, was smoking his

pipe once more in the sunshine. La Grande remained there, silent and

imperturbable, as if her mere presence sufficed as a mark of respect to

the priest; while the latter, whose exasperation was on the increase,

kept running every instant to the church door to cast a fiery look

across the empty square towards the Buteaus' house.

"Ring, Bécu, why don't you!" he shouted all at once. "If they're not

here in three minutes' time, I'm off!"

Then as the bell pealed out madly once more, and set the aged ravens

a-fluttering and a-cawing, the Buteaus and their party were seen

to leave the house one by one and cross the square. Lise was in

consternation; the godmother had still not arrived, and so they settled

to stroll quietly over to the church, in hopes that perhaps that would

bring her a little quicker. But they were only a hundred yards away,

and the Abbé Godard at once began to hurry them up.

"I say, you know, are you trying to make a fool of me?" he called. "I

consult your convenience, and in return I'm kept waiting an hour! Make

haste! Make haste!"

Then he pushed them all towards the baptistery: the mother carrying her

newly-born child, the father, grandfather Fouan, uncle Delhomme, aunt

Fanny, and even Monsieur Charles, who, in his black frock-coat, looked

very dignified as a godparent.

"Your reverence," said Buteau, with an exaggerated air of humility, in

which a sniggering slyness lurked, "if you would only be so good as to

wait a tiny bit longer----"

"Wait! What for?"

"Why, for the godmother, your reverence!"

The Abbé Godard became so red that apoplexy seemed imminent. Half

suffocating, he stuttered out:

"Get somebody else!"

They all looked at each other. Delhomme and Fanny shook their heads;

and Fouan declared:

"Impossible. It would be bad breeding."

"A thousand pardons, your reverence," said Monsieur Charles, who

thought that it devolved upon him as a person of good breeding to

explain matters; "it's partly our fault, but not quite. My wife had

expressly written me that she would be back this morning. She's at

Chartres."

The Abbé Godard started, and, losing all control, breaking all bounds,

he shouted:

"At _Chartres_! At Chartres, indeed! I regret for your sake that you

have a finger in this pie, Monsieur Charles. But the thing sha'n't go

on. No, no! I won't put up with it any longer!"

Then he burst forth:

"No one here cares what outrage he offers God in my person; I get a

fresh buffet every time I come to Rognes. I've threatened long enough,

and now I'll do it. I leave to-day, and I will never return. Tell your

mayor that, and find a priest and pay him, if you want one. I'll speak

to the bishop, and tell him who you are; I'm sure he will approve of

my course. We'll soon see who'll get the worst of it. You shall live

priestless, like brute beasts."

They were all staring at him curiously, with the inward indifference of

practical folk who no longer feared the God of wrath and chastisement.

What was the use of quaking and prostrating themselves, and purchasing

forgiveness, when the very idea of the devil now made them smile,

and when they had ceased to believe that the wind, the hail, and

the thunder were controlled by an avenging Master? It was certainly

waste of time. It was better for them to keep their respect for the

Government gendarmes, who held the reins of power.

Despite their assumed air of deferential gravity, the Abbé Godard

saw that Buteau was sniggering, that La Grande was disdainful, and

that even Delhomme and Fouan were perfectly unmoved; and this loss of

influence completed the rupture.

"I'm perfectly aware that your cows have more religion than you have,"

said he. "Well, good-bye! Dip your barbarian child into the pond, and

christen it like that!"

Then he ran away and tore off his surplice, crossed the church again,

and bolted in such a whirl of wrath that the christening party, thus

left in the lurch, could not even get in a word, but stood open-mouthed

and open-eyed.

The worst of it was that at that very moment, as the Abbé Godard was

going down Macqueron's new street, they saw a covered cart coming up

the high-road--a cart containing Madame Charles and Elodie. The former

explained that she had stopped at Châteaudun to kiss the child, who had

been granted a two days' holiday. She seemed extremely sorry for the

delay, and declared that she had not even gone on to Roseblanche with

her trunk.

"Some one must run after the priest," said Lise; "it's only dogs that

are left unchristened."

Buteau ran off, and was heard trotting down Macqueron's street. But the

Abbé Godard had got a good start; and Buteau crossed the bridge and

mounted the slope, only catching sight of the priest when he reached

the crest of it, just where the road turned.

"Your reverence, your reverence!"

At last the priest turned round and waited.

"What is it?" he asked.

"The godmother's there. Christening isn't a thing to refuse one."

For an instant the Abbé stood motionless. Then he came back down the

hill behind the peasant, at the same furious pace; and thus they

re-entered the church without exchanging another word. The ceremony was

hurried through. The priest mangled the godparents' _Credo_, anointed

the child, applied the salt, and poured out the water, all with the

same violence. He had soon got to the signing of the register.

"Your reverence," now said Madame Charles, "I've a box of sweetmeats

for you, but it's in my trunk."

He thanked her in dumb-show and went off, after turning to them all

once more and repeating:

"Good-bye, again!"

The Buteaus and their party, breathless at having been carried along at

such a pace, watched him as he disappeared at the corner of the square,

with his black cassock flying behind him. All the villagers were in

the fields; there were merely a few urchins about, on the chance of

obtaining some plaster-of-Paris sweetmeats. Amid the deep silence one

only heard the distant snorting of the steam thrasher, which never

rested.

On re-entering the Buteaus' house, at the door of which the cart with

the trunk was waiting, they all agreed to have a little something to

drink, and then to separate until dinner in the evening. It was now

only four o'clock, so what would they have done in each other's company

till seven? Then, when the glasses and the two quarts of wine were set

out on the kitchen table, Madame Charles absolutely insisted on having

her trunk got down, so as to make her presents there and then. Opening

the trunk, she first took out the baby's dress and cap--which came

somewhat behind time--and next six boxes of sweetmeats, which she gave

to the mother.

"Do these come from mamma's confectionery shop?" asked Elodie, who was

looking at them.

For a second Madame Charles felt embarrassed. Then she calmly replied:

"No, my darling; your mother does not keep this kind."

And, turning towards Lise, she added: "I thought of you, too, in the

matter of linen. There is nothing so useful in a house as old linen; so

I asked my daughter for some, and ransacked all her drawers."

Hearing linen mentioned, everybody had drawn near--La Grande, the

Delhommes, and Fouan himself. Gathering in a ring round the trunk, they

watched the old lady unpack a whole lot of rags, all clean and white,

and exhaling, despite the washing, a persistent odour of musk. First

came some fine linen sheets, in tatters; then a quantity of chemises,

all slit down, with the lace palpably torn off.

Madame Charles unfolded the things, shook them out, and explained:

"The sheets are not new. They've been quite five years in use; and in

time, what with friction and so on, they wear out. You see that they've

all a large hole in the middle, but the edges are still good, and a

host of things may be cut out of them."

They all stuck their noses into the sheets, and felt them, with

approving nods, particularly the women--La Grande and Fanny, whose

pinched-up lips were expressive of suppressed envy. Buteau was

indulging in silent laughter, tickled by certain jocular ideas which

he kept to himself, for propriety's sake; while Fouan and Delhomme

testified by their extreme gravity to the respect they felt for linen,

which was the only wealth, worth calling so, next to land.

"As for the chemises," resumed Madame Charles, unfolding them in their

turn, "see for yourselves. They're not worn at all. Lots of slits in

them, no doubt! They're torn to ruination! And as they can't always be

sewn up again, because that would make thick seams, and look a little

paltry, why, they're thrown away for old linen. But they'll come in

handy for you, Lise--"

"Why, I'll wear them," cried the peasant woman. "It makes no odds to me

to wear a mended chemise."

"As for me," declared Buteau, with a sly wink, "I shall be glad enough

if you'll make me some handkerchiefs out of them."

This set them laughing undisguisedly. Little Elodie, who had not taken

her eyes off a single sheet or chemise, now cried out:

"Oh, what a funny smell! How strong! Was all that linen mamma's?"

Madame Charles did not hesitate a moment.

"Why, certainly, darling. That is, it's the linen of her shop-girls. A

lot of girls are wanted in business, I can tell you!"

As soon as Lise had put the whole lot away in her wardrobe, with

Françoise's help, they clinked glasses and drank the health of the

baby, whom the godmother had christened Laure, after herself. Then

they tarried for a moment, lost in conversation; and Monsieur Charles,

sitting on the trunk, was heard questioning Madame Charles, without

waiting to get her alone, so great, indeed, was his impatience to hear

how things were going on over yonder. It was still a passion with him;

his head was always running upon the house so energetically established

in days gone by, and so deeply regretted since! The news was not good.

True enough, their daughter Estelle had a hand and a head; but their

son-in-law Vaucogne, that milksop Achilles, did not give her proper

support. He spent the whole day smoking his pipe, and let everything

go to rack and ruin. The curtains of No. 3 were stained, the mirror in

the small red drawing-room was cracked, the water-jugs and basins were

chipped all over the house; and he never so much as raised a finger.

And a man's arm was so necessary to ensure due respect for one's goods

and chattels! At every fresh piece of damage thus brought under his

notice, Monsieur Charles fetched a sigh, and became paler. One last

grievance, communicated in a whisper, finished him off.

"Lastly, he himself goes upstairs with that stout woman of No. 5--"

"What's that you say?"

"Oh, I'm sure of it; I've seen them."

Monsieur Charles, who was quivering, clenched his fists in a burst of

exasperated indignation.

"The wretch! Disgracing himself in that way! That beats everything!"

With a gesture, Madame Charles silenced him, for Elodie was coming back

from the yard, where she had been to see the hens. Another quart bottle

was drained, and the trunk was again placed in the cart, which Monsieur

and Madame Charles followed on foot as far as their house. All the

others also went off to give a glance indoors while awaiting the feast.

As soon as Buteau was alone, feeling dissatisfied with this waste of

an afternoon, he took off his jacket and set to work threshing in the

paved corner of the yard; he wanted a sack of corn for the morrow.

However, he soon got tired of threshing alone. To warm him to his work

he needed the cadence of two flails, keeping time together. So he

called to Françoise, who frequently helped him in this work, as her

loins were strong, and her arms as hard-set as a young man's. In spite

of the slowness and the fatigue of this primitive method of threshing,

Buteau had always refused to buy a machine, saying, like all petty

landowners, that he preferred to thresh at a time just the quantity he

needed.

"Hallo, Françoise! Are you coming?" he called.

Lise, who was leaning over some veal stewing with carrots, after

commissioning her sister to look after a loin of roast-pork, wanted

to prevent the girl obeying. But Buteau, who was not in the best of

temper, threatened them both with a hiding.

"You cursed females! I'll smack your saucepans across your heads for

you! One may well sweat for one's bread when you'd go and fry the whole

house, to gobble it down with other people!"

Françoise, who had already slipped on a working dress for fear of

getting her best clothes stained, was obliged to follow him. She took

a flail with handle and flap of cornel wood, secured together with

leather buckles. It was her own, polished by friction, and closely

bound with string to prevent its slipping. Swinging it round over

her head with both hands she brought it down on the wheat, striking

the latter smartly with the whole length of the flap. She went on

without stopping, raising the flail very high, turning it as upon a

hinge, and then banging it down again with the mechanical, rhythmical

movement of a blacksmith; while Buteau, opposite her, swung his flail

in alternation. They soon became hot. The rhythm was accelerated, and

nothing could now be seen but the flying flaps, rebounding every time

and whirling behind their necks like birds tied by the feet.

After ten minutes or so, Buteau gave a slight cry. The flails stopped,

and he turned the sheaf round, whereupon the flails started again. At

the end of another ten minutes he ordered a new pause, and laid the

sheaf open. It had to pass thus six times under the flaps before the

grain was fully separated from the ears, and the straw could be tied

up. Sheaf succeeded sheaf, and for two hours the regular noise of the

flails pervaded the house, though above it, in the distance, there

arose the prolonged snorting of the steam-thresher.

Françoise's cheeks were now flushed and her wrists swollen, and from

all her glowing skin there emanated a kind of flame that quivered

visibly in the air. Her open lips were panting. Bits of straw had

become entangled in the loose locks of her hair. At every stroke, as

she raised the flail, her right knee stretched her petticoat, her hip

and bosom expanded, straining her dress, while the contour of her

well-set frame showed roughly through the fabric. A button flew off her

bodice, and Buteau saw her white skin beneath the sun-burnt line of her

neck--an eminence of flesh that kept rising with the swing of her arms

in the powerful play of the shoulder-muscles. This seemed to excite him

still more; and the flails still fell, while the grain leapt and fell

like hail under the panting strokes of the coupled threshers.

At a quarter to seven, at close of day, Fouan and the Delhommes

presented themselves.

"We must finish this," shouted Buteau to them, without stopping. "Keep

it up, Françoise!"

She stuck to it, striking still harder in the enthusiasm prompted by

the labour and noise. And thus it was that Jean found them when he in

his turn arrived. He felt a spasm of jealousy, and looked at them as if

he had surprised them together. Busy with this warm work, each striking

true in turn, both perspiring, so heated and so disarranged, they

seemed to be engaged in some other more private business than that of

threshing wheat. Perhaps Françoise, who was going at it so zealously,

had the same idea, for she suddenly stopped short in embarrassment.

Then Buteau, turning round, remained motionless for an instant, with

surprise and wrath.

"What do _you_ want here?" he cried.

Lise was just then coming out to meet Fouan and the Delhommes. She drew

near in their company, and cried in her sprightly way:

"Ah, yes! I forgot to tell you. I saw Jean this morning and asked him

to come in to-night."

Her husband's face was so terribly inflamed that she added, by way of

apology:

"I've a notion, Fouan, that he has a request to make of you."

"What about?" said the old man. Jean flushed and stammered, feeling

very vexed that the matter should be broached so abruptly and publicly.

However, Buteau violently cut him short, the smiling look which his

wife cast upon Françoise having sufficed to enlighten him.

"Do you come here to make a laughing-stock of us? She's not for the

likes of you, you ugly bird!"

This brutal reception gave Jean back his courage. He turned his back

and addressed the old man.

"This is the matter, Fouan. It's a very simple thing. As you are

Françoise's guardian, I ought to apply to you for her, oughtn't I?

Well, if she will have me, I'll have her. I ask her in marriage."

Françoise, who was still holding her flail, dropped it in amazement,

She ought to have expected this; but she had not imagined that Jean

would venture to propose for her in such a fashion all at once. Why had

he not spoken to her about it first? It flurried her; she could not

have told whether she was trembling with hope or fear. Vibrating from

her recent toil, her bosom heaving under her unfastened bodice, she

remained there between the two men, glowing with such a rush of blood

that they felt the heat radiate even to where they stood.

Buteau did not allow Fouan time to answer. He went on in growing fury:

"What? You dare ask that. An old man of thirty-three marry a child of

eighteen. Merely fifteen years difference! Isn't it monstrous? Fancy

giving young chickens to a fellow with a dirty hide like yours!"

Jean was beginning to lose his temper.

"What's it got to do with you," he replied, "if she likes me and I like

her?"

And he turned towards Françoise for her to pronounce. But she stood

there startled and rigid, without seeming to understand. She could not

say no, but she did not say yes. Buteau, moreover, was glaring at her

so murderously as to make the yes stick in her throat. If she married,

he would lose her and the land as well. The sudden thought of this

result put a finishing touch to his wrath.

"Come, papa; come, Delhomme. Doesn't it revolt you; this child to that

old brute, who doesn't even belong to our part of the country, and who

comes from God knows where, after traipsing about here, there, and

everywhere? A carpenter who failed in his calling and turned peasant,

because he had some disgraceful affair to keep secret, of course."

All his hatred of the town artisan burst forth.

"And what then? If I like her and she likes me!" repeated Jean,

restraining himself, and resolving, out of courtesy, to let her be the

first to relate their story. "Come, Françoise, say something."

"Why, that's true!" cried Lise, carried away by the desire to see her

sister married, and thus get rid of her: "what have you to do with

it, Buteau, if they agree? She doesn't need your consent, and it's

very good of her not to send you about your business. You're getting a

perfect nuisance!"

Buteau clearly realised that the matter would be arranged, if the

girl were to speak. He especially dreaded that the marriage would be

considered reasonable if the past connection were made public. Just

then La Grande came into the yard, followed by Monsieur and Madame

Charles, who were returning with Elodie. Buteau beckoned them to

approach without yet knowing what he would say. Then an idea struck

him, and with his face swollen and shaking his fist at his wife and

sister-in-law, he yelled out:

"You cursed cows! Yes, cows, trolls, both of you! If you want to

know the truth, I sleep with the pair of them! and that's why they

think they can make a fool of me! With the pair of them, I tell you!

Strumpets that they are!"

These words came in a volley full in the faces of Monsieur and Madame

Charles, who both stood there open-mouthed. Madame Charles made a rush

as if to shield the listening Elodie. Then, pushing her towards the

kitchen garden, she cried in a very loud voice:

"Come and see the salads, come and see the cabbages! Oh, such fine

cabbages!"

Buteau invented fresh details as he went on, relating that when one had

had her share it was the other one's turn; using the coarsest terms,

and venting a flood of sewerage in unutterably beastly words. Lise, in

sheer astonishment at this sudden fit, simply shrugged her shoulders,

repeating:

"He's mad! It isn't possible otherwise. He's mad!"

"Tell him he lies!" cried Jean to Françoise.

"Most certainly he lies!" said the girl, composedly.

"Oh, I lie?" resumed Buteau. "Oh! And it isn't true what happened

between us at harvest-time? I'll pretty soon bring you under, the two

of you, strumpets that you are!"

This rabid audacity paralysed and astounded Jean. Could he now explain

what had happened between himself and Françoise? It seemed to him that

it would be foul to do so, particularly as she did not give him any

assistance. The others--the Delhommes, Fouan, and La Grande--remained

reserved. They had not seemed surprised; and they evidently thought

that, if the fellow did sleep with the two of them, he could dispose of

them as he chose. When a man has his rights, he asserts them.

From that moment, Buteau felt himself victorious in the might of his

undisputed possession. He turned towards Jean and cried:

"And you, just you come here again worrying me in my household. To

begin with, you'll be off pretty sharp. Eh? you won't? Wait, wait a

bit."

He picked up his flail, and whirled the flap round. Jean only just had

time to catch up the other one--Françoise's--to defend himself with.

There were shrieks, and some attempt to interpose; but the antagonists

were so terrible, that everyone recoiled. With the long handles of the

flails, blows could be dealt at several yards; so that the yard was

soon left clear. Jean and Buteau remained alone in the middle, at a

distance from one another, enlarging the circle of their twirls. They

no longer spoke but kept their teeth clenched. No sound was heard but

the sharp smack of the pieces of wood at each exchange of blows.

Buteau had launched the first one, and Jean, still stooping, would

have had his head split open, had he not leapt backwards. By a quick

contraction of his muscles, he at once raised his flail, and brought it

down in the same style as a thresher crushing grain. But the other was

also striking; and the two flaps met, and swung back upon their straps

like wounded birds swooping wildly. Thrice there was the same shock.

Each time the flaps whirled and whizzed through the air, and they all

but fell and split the skulls they threatened. The contest could not

be of long duration, for the first blow must be a mortal one.

Delhomme and Fouan, however, were rushing forward, when the

women shrieked. Jean had rolled over in the straw, Buteau having

treacherously aimed a whip-like blow, which swept along the ground,

and, although fortunately deadened, reached his opponent's legs. Jean

got up again without letting go of his flail, which he brandished with

a fury increased tenfold by pain. The flap made a wide sweep and fell

on the right, while the other was expecting it on the left. A fraction

of an inch nearer and Buteau's brains would have been dashed out. As

it was, his ear was grazed, and the blow coming down obliquely fell

full on his arm, which was sharply broken atwain. The bone was heard to

snap as if it had been breaking glass. Buteau's hand fell limply down,

dropping the flail it was holding.

"The murderer!" yelled Buteau, "he's killed me!"

Jean, with a haggard face and blood-shot eyes, also dropped his weapon.

He glanced round at them all for a moment, as if stupefied by the

sudden turn that things had taken, and then limped away with a wild

gesture of despair.

When he had turned the corner of the house, going towards the plain, he

espied La Trouille, who had witnessed the fight over the garden hedge.

She was still chuckling over it, having come there to prowl around

the christening party, to which neither she nor her father had been

invited. What fun it would all be for Hyacinthe--this little family

fête and his brother's broken arm! She was wriggling as if she were

being tickled, and nearly fell over backwards, so highly was she amused.

"Oh, Corporal, what a whack!" she cried. "The bone gave such a crack!

It _was_ fun!"

He made no answer, but slackened his pace with a dejected air. She

followed him, whistling to her geese, which she had taken with her, so

as to have a pretext for eavesdropping behind the walls. Jean returned

mechanically to the threshing-machine, which was still in action,

though the day was waning. He thought to himself that it was all over;

that he could never go back to the Buteaus, that they would never give

him Françoise. What folly it was! Ten minutes had sufficed: an unsought

quarrel, and so unlucky a blow, just when everything was in such trim!

And now, never, never more! The snorting of the machine amid the

twilight was prolonged like a great cry of distress.

Another encounter just then occurred. At the corner of a cross road La

Trouille's geese, which she was taking back home, found themselves face

to face with old Saucisse's geese on their way down to the village,

unaccompanied. The two ganders, in the van, pulled up short, resting on

one leg, with their large yellow beaks turned towards each other. All

the beaks of each flock turned simultaneously in the same direction as

the leaders', and the geese's bodies were inclined to the same side.

For an instant perfect immobility was preserved. It was like an armed

reconnaissance; two patrols exchanging watch-words. Then one of the

ganders, with round, contented eyes, went straight on, while the other

bore to the left; and each troop filed off behind its own leader, going

about its business with the same uniform waddling gait.

PART IV.

CHAPTER I.

After the shearing and the sale of the lambs in May, Soulas, the

shepherd, had removed the sheep from La Borderie. Nearly four hundred

head there were, which he led away without any other assistance than

that of the little swine-herd Firmin, and his two formidable dogs,

Emperor and Massacre. Until August the flocks grazed in the fallows

amongst the clover and lucern, or in the waste-lands along the roads;

and barely three weeks had now elapsed since he had turned them out

into the stubble, immediately after the harvest, in the last blazing

days of September.

This was the terrible season of the year. The fields of La Beauce lay

stripped and desolate and bare, without a single fleck of green about

them. The torrid summer, and the complete absence of all moisture, had

dried up the splitting soil, and almost all signs of vegetation had

disappeared. There was nothing left save a tangle of dead grass, and

the hard bristles of the stubble-fields, which stretched out their

mournful, bare nudity as far as the eye could reach, making all the

plain look as though some giant conflagration had swept from horizon

to horizon. The soil still seemed to be giving out a yellowish glow, a

weird, threatening light, livid like that of a storm. Everything looked

yellow, a frightfully mournful yellow; the baked earth, the stubble,

and the high-roads and by-paths, rutted and torn up by passing wheels.

The slightest breeze set clouds of dust flying, and covering the banks

and hedges as with cinders. The blue sky and the blazing sun only

seemed to render the scene of desolation still more mournful.

Upon that particular day there was a high wind, blowing in quick, warm

puffs, which brought along heavy, scudding clouds; and when the sun

shone fully out, his rays seemed to burn the skin like red-hot iron.

Ever since early morning, Soulas had been expecting a supply of water

for himself and his flock--water which was to be brought to him from

the farm--for the stubble lands where he found himself lay to the

north of Rognes, far away from any pond. In the grazing ground, between

the light, movable hurdles secured with staves the sheep were lying

on their bellies, panting and breathing only with difficulty; while

the two dogs, stretched at full length outside the hurdles, were also

panting, with their tongues lolling out of their mouths. The shepherd,

to protect himself from the wind and to procure a little shade, was

seated, leaning against a little hut raised on two wheels--a narrow box

which served him for bed, and wardrobe, and pantry--and which he pushed

along at every change of the grazing ground.

At noon, however, when the sun shone down perpendicularly, Soulas rose

to his feet again, and scanned the distance to ascertain if he could

see Firmin returning from the farm, where he had sent him to find out

why the water did not come.

At last the little swine-herd made his appearance.

"They'll be here soon," he cried. "They had no horses this morning."

"You silly little fool, haven't you brought a bottle of water for us to

drink ourselves?"

"Oh, dear, I never thought about it."

Soulas struck out a swinging blow with his closed fist, which the lad

avoided by jumping aside. Then the shepherd began to swear, but he

decided that he would eat without drinking, although he was almost

choked with thirst. By his orders, Firmin warily took out of the hut

some bread a week old, some shrivelled walnuts, and some dry cheese.

Then they both sat down to eat, intently watched by the two dogs, who

came and sat down in front of them, getting a crust tossed to them

now and then, so hard that it cracked between their teeth as if it

had been a bone. In spite of his seventy years, the old man got as

quickly through his food with his gums as the youngster did with his

teeth. Soulas was still straight and upright, flexible and tough like a

thornwood stick. Time seemed merely to have scored furrows in his face,

which was gnarled like a tree trunk beneath a tangle of faded hair, now

the colour of earth.

The little swine-herd did not manage to escape his cuffing, for just

as he was about to stow the remains of the bread and cheese inside the

hut, and was no longer suspecting an attack, Soulas gave him a thumping

whack which sent him rolling into the shelter-place.

"There, you silly little fool," cried the old man; "take and drink

that, till the water comes!"

Two o'clock arrived without there being a sign of anybody coming. The

heat had gone on increasing, and was well-nigh intolerable amid the

complete calms which suddenly set in. Then, every now and again the

breeze would rise and sweep up the powdery soil in little wheeling

whirlwinds which seemed composed of blinding, suffocating smoke, and

terribly enhanced the pangs of thirst.

At last the shepherd, who bore his sufferings with stoical,

uncomplaining patience, gave a grunt of satisfaction.

"Thank heaven!" he exclaimed; "they've come none too soon."

Two carts, which in the distance looked scarcely bigger than a man's

fist, had now at length made their appearance on the line where the

plain intersected the horizon. In the first one, which was driven by

Jean, Soulas had distinctly recognised the barrel of water. The second

one, which Tron was in charge of, was loaded with sacks of corn, which

were being taken to the mill, whose lofty wooden carcass could be seen

some five hundred yards away. This second cart came to a standstill on

the road, and Tron accompanied Jean through the stubble-fields up to

the sheep-fold, under pretence of lending him a hand with the water,

but really for the sake of idling and indulging in a few minutes'

gossip.

"Do they want us all to die of thirst?" cried the shepherd.

The sheep, also having sniffed the water, had sprung up in eager

tumult, and were now pressing against the hurdles, craning out their

heads, and bleating plaintively.

"Patience! patience!" replied Jean; "there's something here to make you

tipsy."

The men now quickly put the trough into position, and filled it by the

aid of a wooden spout. Some of the water ran over, and the two dogs

lapped it up eagerly, while the shepherd and the little swine-herd, too

thirsty to wait any longer, drank greedily out of the trough. Then the

whole flock swarmed up to it, and the air was filled with the flowing

murmur of refreshing water, and the gurgling sound of animals and

men swallowing it, and splashing and drenching themselves with it in

delight.