The first thing I did was to look at the clock as I entered the
waiting-room of the station at Loubain, and I found that I had to wait
two hours and ten minutes for the Paris express.
I had walked twenty miles and felt suddenly tired. Not seeing anything
on the station walls to amuse me, I went outside and stood there
racking my brains to think of something to do. The street was a kind of
boulevard, planted with acacias, and on either side a row of houses of
varying shape and different styles of architecture, houses such as one
only sees in a small town, and ascended a slight hill, at the extreme
end of which there were some trees, as though it ended in a park.
From time to time a cat crossed the street and jumped over the gutters
carefully. A cur sniffed at every tree and hunted for scraps from the
kitchens, but I did not see a single human being, and I felt listless
and disheartened. What could I do with myself? I was already thinking of
the inevitable and interminable visit to the small cafe at the railway
station, where I should have to sit over a glass of undrinkable beer and
the illegible newspaper, when I saw a funeral procession coming out of a
side street into the one in which I was, and the sight of the hearse was
a relief to me. It would, at any rate, give me something to do for ten
minutes.
Suddenly, however, my curiosity was aroused. The hearse was followed by
eight gentlemen, one of whom was weeping, while the others were chatting
together, but there was no priest, and I thought to myself:
“This is a non-religious funeral,” and then I reflected that a town like
Loubain must contain at least a hundred freethinkers, who would have
made a point of making a manifestation. What could it be, then? The
rapid pace of the procession clearly proved that the body was to be
buried without ceremony, and, consequently, without the intervention of
the Church.
My idle curiosity framed the most complicated surmises, and as the
hearse passed me, a strange idea struck me, which was to follow it, with
the eight gentlemen. That would take up my time for an hour, at least,
and I accordingly walked with the others, with a sad look on my face,
and, on seeing this, the two last turned round in surprise, and then
spoke to each other in a low voice.
No doubt they were asking each other whether I belonged to the town, and
then they consulted the two in front of them, who stared at me in turn.
This close scrutiny annoyed me, and to put an end to it I went up to
them, and, after bowing, I said:
“I beg your pardon, gentlemen, for interrupting your conversation, but,
seeing a civil funeral, I have followed it, although I did not know the
deceased gentleman whom you are accompanying.”
“It was a woman,” one of them said.