The Fat and the Thin

(LE VENTRE DE PARIS)

by Émile Zola

Translated, With An Introduction, By Ernest Alfred Vizetelly


Contents

 INTRODUCTION
 CHAPTER I
 CHAPTER II
 CHAPTER III
 CHAPTER IV
 CHAPTER V
 CHAPTER VI




Let me have men about me that are fat: Sleek-headed men, and such as
sleep o’ nights: Yond’ Cassius has a lean and hungry look; He thinks
too much: such men are dangerous. SHAKESPEARE: _Julius Caesar_, act i,
sc. 2.




INTRODUCTION


“THE FAT AND THE THIN,” or, to use the French title, “Le Ventre de
Paris,” is a story of life in and around those vast Central Markets
which form a distinctive feature of modern Paris. Even the reader who
has never crossed the Channel must have heard of the Parisian _Halles_,
for much has been written about them, not only in English books on the
French metropolis, but also in English newspapers, magazines, and
reviews; so that few, I fancy, will commence the perusal of the present
volume without having, at all events, some knowledge of its subject
matter.

The Paris markets form such a world of their own, and teem at certain
hours of the day and night with such exuberance of life, that it was
only natural they should attract the attention of a novelist like M.
Zola, who, to use his own words, delights “in any subject in which vast
masses of people can be shown in motion.” Mr. Sherard tells us[*] that
the idea of “Le Ventre de Paris” first occurred to M. Zola in 1872,
when he used continually to take his friend Paul Alexis for a ramble
through the Halles. I have in my possession, however, an article
written by M. Zola some five or six years before that time, and in this
one can already detect the germ of the present work; just as the motif
of another of M. Zola’s novels, “La Joie de Vivre,” can be traced to a
short story written for a Russian review.

[*] _Emile Zola: a Biographical and Critical Study_, by Robert
Harborough Sherard, pp. 103, 104. London, Chatto & Windus, 1893.


Similar instances are frequently to be found in the writings of English
as well as French novelists, and are, of course, easily explained. A
young man unknown to fame, and unable to procure the publication of a
long novel, often contents himself with embodying some particular idea
in a short sketch or story, which finds its way into one or another
periodical, where it lies buried and forgotten by everybody—excepting
its author. Time goes by, however, the writer achieves some measure of
success, and one day it occurs to him to elaborate and perfect that old
idea of his, only a faint _apercu_ of which, for lack of opportunity,
he had been able to give in the past. With a little research, no doubt,
an interesting essay might be written on these literary resuscitations;
but if one except certain novelists who are so deficient in ideas that
they continue writing and rewriting the same story throughout their
lives, it will, I think, be generally found that the revivals in
question are due to some such reason as that given above.

It should be mentioned that the article of M. Zola’s young days to
which I have referred is not one on market life in particular, but one
on violets. It contains, however, a vigorous, if brief, picture of the
Halles in the small hours of the morning, and is instinct with that
realistic descriptive power of which M. Zola has since given so many
proofs. We hear the rumbling and clattering of the market carts, we see
the piles of red meat, the baskets of silvery fish, the mountains of
vegetables, green and white; in a few paragraphs the whole market world
passes in kaleidoscopic fashion before our eyes by the pale, dancing
light of the gas lamps and the lanterns. Several years after the paper
I speak of was published, when M. Zola began to issue “Le Ventre de
Paris,” M. Tournachon, better known as Nadar, the aeronaut and
photographer, rushed into print to proclaim that the realistic novelist
had simply pilfered his ideas from an account of the Halles which he
(Tournachon) had but lately written. M. Zola, as is so often his wont,
scorned to reply to this charge of plagiarism; but, had he chosen, he
could have promptly settled the matter by producing his own forgotten
article.

At the risk of passing for a literary ghoul, I propose to exhume some
portion of the paper in question, as, so far as translation can avail,
it will show how M. Zola wrote and what he thought in 1867. After the
description of the markets to which I have alluded, there comes the
following passage:—

I was gazing at the preparations for the great daily orgy of Paris when
I espied a throng of people bustling suspiciously in a corner. A few
lanterns threw a yellow light upon this crowd. Children, women, and men
with outstretched hands were fumbling in dark piles which extended
along the footway. I thought that those piles must be remnants of meat
sold for a trifling price, and that all those wretched people were
rushing upon them to feed. I drew near, and discovered my mistake. The
heaps were not heaps of meat, but heaps of violets. All the flowery
poesy of the streets of Paris lay there, on that muddy pavement, amidst
mountains of food. The gardeners of the suburbs had brought their
sweet-scented harvests to the markets and were disposing of them to the
hawkers. From the rough fingers of their peasant growers the violets
were passing to the dirty hands of those who would cry them in the
streets. At winter time it is between four and six o’clock in the
morning that the flowers of Paris are thus sold at the Halles. Whilst
the city sleeps and its butchers are getting all ready for its daily
attack of indigestion, a trade in poetry is plied in dark, dank
corners. When the sun rises the bright red meat will be displayed in
trim, carefully dressed joints, and the violets, mounted on bits of
osier, will gleam softly within their elegant collars of green leaves.
But when they arrive, in the dark night, the bullocks, already ripped
open, discharge black blood, and the trodden flowers lie prone upon the
footways. . . . I noticed just in front of me one large bunch which had
slipped off a neighbouring mound and was almost bathing in the gutter.
I picked it up. Underneath, it was soiled with mud; the greasy, fetid
sewer water had left black stains upon the flowers. And then, gazing at
these exquisite daughters of our gardens and our woods, astray amidst
all the filth of the city, I began to ponder. On what woman’s bosom
would those wretched flowerets open and bloom? Some hawker would dip
them in a pail of water, and of all the bitter odours of the Paris mud
they would retain but a slight pungency, which would remain mingled
with their own sweet perfume. The water would remove their stains, they
would pale somewhat, and become a joy both for the smell and for the
sight. Nevertheless, in the depths of each corolla there would still
remain some particle of mud suggestive of impurity. And I asked myself
how much love and passion was represented by all those heaps of flowers
shivering in the bleak wind. To how many loving ones, and how many
indifferent ones, and how many egotistical ones, would all those
thousands and thousands of violets go! In a few hours’ time they would
be scattered to the four corners of Paris, and for a paltry copper the
passers-by would purchase a glimpse and a whiff of springtide in the
muddy streets.

Imperfect as the rendering may be, I think that the above passage will
show that M. Zola was already possessed of a large amount of his
acknowledged realistic power at the early date I have mentioned. I
should also have liked to quote a rather amusing story of a priggish
Philistine who ate violets with oil and vinegar, strongly peppered, but
considerations of space forbid; so I will pass to another passage,
which is of more interest and importance. Both French and English
critics have often contended that although M. Zola is a married man, he
knows very little of women, as there has virtually never been any
_feminine romance_ in his life. There are those who are aware of the
contrary, but whose tongues are stayed by considerations of delicacy
and respect. Still, as the passage I am now about to reproduce is
signed and acknowledged as fact by M. Zola himself, I see no harm in
slightly raising the veil from a long-past episode in the master’s
life:—

The light was rising, and as I stood there before that footway
transformed into a bed of flowers my strange night-fancies gave place
to recollections at once sweet and sad. I thought of my last excursion
to Fontenay-aux-Roses, with the loved one, the good fairy of my
twentieth year. Springtime was budding into birth, the tender foliage
gleamed in the pale April sunshine. The little pathway skirting the
hill was bordered by large fields of violets. As one passed along, a
strong perfume seemed to penetrate one and make one languid. _She_ was
leaning on my arm, faint with love from the sweet odour of the flowers.
A whiteness hovered over the country-side, little insects buzzed in the
sunshine, deep silence fell from the heavens, and so low was the sound
of our kisses that not a bird in all the hedges showed sign of fear. At
a turn of the path we perceived some old bent women, who with dry,
withered hands were hurriedly gathering violets and throwing them into
large baskets. She who was with me glanced longingly at the flowers,
and I called one of the women. “You want some violets?” said she. “How
much? A pound?”

God of Heaven! She sold her flowers by the pound! We fled in deep
distress. It seemed as though the country-side had been transformed
into a huge grocer’s shop. . . . Then we ascended to the woods of
Verrieres, and there, in the grass, under the soft, fresh foliage, we
found some tiny violets which seemed to be dreadfully afraid, and
contrived to hide themselves with all sorts of artful ruses. During two
long hours I scoured the grass and peered into every nook, and as soon
as ever I found a fresh violet I carried it to her. She bought it of
me, and the price that I exacted was a kiss. . . . And I thought of all
those things, of all that happiness, amidst the hubbub of the markets
of Paris, before those poor dead flowers whose graveyard the footway
had become. I remembered my good fairy, who is now dead and gone, and
the little bouquet of dry violets which I still preserve in a drawer.
When I returned home I counted their withered stems: there were twenty
of them, and over my lips there passed the gentle warmth of my loved
one’s twenty kisses.

And now from violets I must, with a brutality akin to that which M.
Zola himself displays in some of his transitions, pass to very
different things, for some time back a well-known English poet and
essayist wrote of the present work that it was redolent of pork,
onions, and cheese. To one of his sensitive temperament, with a muse
strictly nourished on sugar and water, such gross edibles as pork and
cheese and onions were peculiarly offensive. That humble plant the
onion, employed to flavour wellnigh every savoury dish, can assuredly
need no defence; in most European countries, too, cheese has long been
known as the poor man’s friend; whilst as for pork, apart from all
other considerations, I can claim for it a distinct place in English
literature. A greater essayist by far than the critic to whom I am
referring, a certain Mr. Charles Lamb, of the India House, has left us
an immortal page on the origin of roast pig and crackling. And, when
everything is considered, I should much like to know why novels should
be confined to the aspirations of the soul, and why they should not
also treat of the requirements of our physical nature? From the days of
antiquity we have all known what befell the members when, guided by the
brain, they were foolish enough to revolt against the stomach. The
latter plays a considerable part not only in each individual organism,
but also in the life of the world. Over and over again—I could adduce a
score of historical examples—it has thwarted the mightiest designs of
the human mind. We mortals are much addicted to talking of our minds
and our souls and treating our bodies as mere dross. But I hold—it is a
personal opinion—that in the vast majority of cases the former are
largely governed by the last. I conceive, therefore, that a novel which
takes our daily sustenance as one of its themes has the best of all
_raisons d’être_. A foreign writer of far more consequence and ability
than myself—Signor Edmondo de Amicis—has proclaimed the present book to
be “one of the most original and happiest inventions of French genius,”
and I am strongly inclined to share his opinion.

It should be observed that the work does not merely treat of the
provisioning of a great city. That provisioning is its _scenario_; but
it also embraces a powerful allegory, the prose song of “the eternal
battle between the lean of this world and the fat—a battle in which, as
the author shows, the latter always come off successful. It is, too, in
its way an allegory of the triumph of the fat bourgeois, who lives well
and beds softly, over the gaunt and Ishmael artist—an allegory which M.
Zola has more than once introduced into his pages, another notable
instance thereof being found in ‘Germinal,’ with the fat, well-fed
Gregoires on the one hand, and the starving Maheus on the other.”

From this quotation from Mr. Sherard’s pages it will be gathered that
M. Zola had a distinct social aim in writing this book. Wellnigh the
whole social question may, indeed, be summed up in the words “food and
comfort”; and in a series of novels like “Les Rougon-Macquart,” dealing
firstly with different conditions and grades of society, and, secondly,
with the influence which the Second Empire exercised on France, the
present volume necessarily had its place marked out from the very
first.

Mr. Sherard has told us of all the labour which M. Zola expended on the
preparation of the work, of his multitudinous visits to the Paris
markets, his patient investigation of their organism, and his keen
artistic interest in their manifold phases of life. And bred as I was
in Paris, a partaker as I have been of her exultations and her woes
they have always had for me a strong attraction. My memory goes back to
the earlier years of their existence, and I can well remember many of
the old surroundings which have now disappeared. I can recollect the
last vestiges of the antique _piliers_, built by Francis I, facing the
Rue de la Tonnellerie. Paul Niquet’s, with its “bowel-twisting brandy”
and its crew of drunken ragpickers, was certainly before my time; but I
can readily recall Baratte’s and Bordier’s and all the folly and
prodigality which raged there; I knew, too, several of the noted
thieves’ haunts which took the place of Niquet’s, and which one was
careful never to enter without due precaution. And then, when the
German armies were beleaguering Paris, and two millions of people were
shut off from the world, I often strolled to the Halles to view their
strangely altered aspect. The fish pavilion, of which M. Zola has so
much to say, was bare and deserted. The railway drays, laden with the
comestible treasures of the ocean, no longer thundered through the
covered ways. At the most one found an auction going on in one or
another corner, and a few Seine eels or gudgeons fetching wellnigh
their weight in gold. Then, in the butter and cheese pavilions, one
could only procure some nauseous melted fat, while in the meat
department horse and mule and donkey took the place of beef and veal
and mutton. Mule and donkey were very scarce, and commanded high
prices, but both were of better flavour than horse; mule, indeed, being
quite a delicacy. I also well remember a stall at which dog was sold,
and, hunger knowing no law, I once purchased, cooked, and ate a couple
of canine cutlets which cost me two francs apiece. The flesh was pinky
and very tender, yet I would not willingly make such a repast again.
However, peace and plenty at last came round once more, the Halles
regained their old-time aspect, and in the years which followed I more
than once saw the dawn rise slowly over the mounds of cabbages,
carrots, leeks, and pumpkins, even as M. Zola describes in the
following pages. He has, I think, depicted with remarkable accuracy and
artistic skill the many varying effects of colour that are produced as
the climbing sun casts its early beams on the giant larder and its
masses of food—effects of colour which, to quote a famous saying of the
first Napoleon, show that “the markets of Paris are the Louvre of the
people” in more senses than one.

The reader will bear in mind that the period dealt with by the author
in this work is that of 1857-60, when the new Halles Centrales were yet
young, and indeed not altogether complete. Still, although many old
landmarks have long since been swept away, the picture of life in all
essential particulars remained the same. Prior to 1860 the limits of
Paris were the so-called _boulevards exterieurs_, from which a girdle
of suburbs, such as Montmartre, Belleville, Passy, and Montrouge,
extended to the fortifications; and the population of the city was then
only 1,400,000 souls. Some of the figures which will be found scattered
through M. Zola’s work must therefore be taken as applying entirely to
the past.

Nowadays the amount of business transacted at the Halles has very
largely increased, in spite of the multiplication of district markets.
Paris seems to have an insatiable appetite, though, on the other hand,
its cuisine is fast becoming all simplicity. To my thinking, few more
remarkable changes have come over the Parisians of recent years than
this change of diet. One by one great restaurants, formerly renowned
for particular dishes and special wines, have been compelled through
lack of custom to close their doors; and this has not been caused so
much by inability to defray the cost of high feeding as by inability to
indulge in it with impunity in a physical sense. In fact, Paris has
become a city of impaired digestions, which nowadays seek the
simplicity without the heaviness of the old English cuisine; and,
should things continue in their present course, I fancy that Parisians
anxious for high feeding will ultimately have to cross over to our side
of the Channel.

These remarks, I trust, will not be considered out of place in an
introduction to a work which to no small extent treats of the appetite
of Paris. The reader will find that the characters portrayed by M. Zola
are all types of humble life, but I fail to see that their
circumstances should render them any the less interesting. A faithful
portrait of a shopkeeper, a workman, or a workgirl is artistically of
far more value than all the imaginary sketches of impossible dukes and
good and wicked baronets in which so many English novels abound.
Several of M. Zola’s personages seem to me extremely lifelike—Gavard,
indeed, is a _chef-d’oeuvre_ of portraiture: I have known many men like
him; and no one who lived in Paris under the Empire can deny the
accuracy with which the author has delineated his hero Florent, the
dreamy and hapless revolutionary caught in the toils of others. In
those days, too, there was many such a plot as M. Zola describes,
instigated by agents like Logre and Lebigre, and allowed to mature till
the eve of an election or some other important event which rendered its
exposure desirable for the purpose of influencing public opinion. In
fact, in all that relates to the so-called “conspiracy of the markets,”
M. Zola, whilst changing time and place to suit the requirements of his
story, has simply followed historical lines. As for the Quenus, who
play such prominent parts in the narrative, the husband is a weakling
with no soul above his stewpans, whilst his wife, the beautiful Lisa,
in reality wears the breeches and rules the roast. The manner in which
she cures Quenu of his political proclivities, though savouring of
persuasiveness rather than violence, is worthy of the immortal Mrs.
Caudle: Douglas Jerrold might have signed a certain lecture which she
administers to her astounded helpmate. Of Pauline, the Quenus’
daughter, we see but little in the story, but she becomes the heroine
of another of M. Zola’s novels, “La Joie de Vivre,” and instead of
inheriting the egotism of her parents, develops a passionate love and
devotion for others. In a like way Claude Lantier, Florent’s artist
friend and son of Gervaise of the “Assommoir,” figures more
particularly in “L’Oeuvre,” which tells how his painful struggle for
fame resulted in madness and suicide. With reference to the beautiful
Norman and the other fishwives and gossips scattered through the
present volume, and those genuine types of Parisian _gaminerie_, Muche,
Marjolin, and Cadine, I may mention that I have frequently chastened
their language in deference to English susceptibilities, so that the
story, whilst retaining every essential feature, contains nothing to
which exception can reasonably be taken.

E. A. V.




THE FAT AND THE THIN




CHAPTER I


Amidst the deep silence and solitude prevailing in the avenue several
market gardeners’ carts were climbing the slope which led towards
Paris, and the fronts of the houses, asleep behind the dim lines of
elms on either side of the road, echoed back the rhythmical jolting of
the wheels. At the Neuilly bridge a cart full of cabbages and another
full of peas had joined the eight waggons of carrots and turnips coming
down from Nanterre; and the horses, left to themselves, had continued
plodding along with lowered heads, at a regular though lazy pace, which
the ascent of the slope now slackened. The sleeping waggoners, wrapped
in woollen cloaks, striped black and grey, and grasping the reins
slackly in their closed hands, were stretched at full length on their
stomachs atop of the piles of vegetables. Every now and then, a gas
lamp, following some patch of gloom, would light up the hobnails of a
boot, the blue sleeve of a blouse, or the peak of a cap peering out of
the huge florescence of vegetables—red bouquets of carrots, white
bouquets of turnips, and the overflowing greenery of peas and cabbages.

And all along the road, and along the neighbouring roads, in front and
behind, the distant rumbling of vehicles told of the presence of
similar contingents of the great caravan which was travelling onward
through the gloom and deep slumber of that matutinal hour, lulling the
dark city to continued repose with its echoes of passing food.

Madame Francois’s horse, Balthazar, an animal that was far too fat, led
the van. He was plodding on, half asleep and wagging his ears, when
suddenly, on reaching the Rue de Longchamp, he quivered with fear and
came to a dead stop. The horses behind, thus unexpectedly checked, ran
their heads against the backs of the carts in front of them, and the
procession halted amidst a clattering of bolts and chains and the oaths
of the awakened waggoners. Madame Francois, who sat in front of her
vehicle, with her back to a board which kept her vegetables in
position, looked down; but, in the dim light thrown to the left by a
small square lantern, which illuminated little beyond one of
Balthazar’s sheeny flanks, she could distinguish nothing.

“Come, old woman, let’s get on!” cried one of the men, who had raised
himself to a kneeling position amongst his turnips; “it’s only some
drunken sot.”

Madame Francois, however, had bent forward and on her right hand had
caught sight of a black mass, lying almost under the horse’s hoofs, and
blocking the road.

“You wouldn’t have us drive over a man, would you?” said she, jumping
to the ground.

It was indeed a man lying at full length upon the road, with his arms
stretched out and his face in the dust. He seemed to be remarkably
tall, but as withered as a dry branch, and the wonder was that
Balthazar had not broken him in half with a blow from his hoof. Madame
Francois thought that he was dead; but on stooping and taking hold of
one of his hands, she found that it was quite warm.

“Poor fellow!” she murmured softly.

The waggoners, however, were getting impatient.

“Hurry up, there!” said the man kneeling amongst the turnips, in a
hoarse voice. “He’s drunk till he can hold no more, the hog! Shove him
into the gutter.”

Meantime, the man on the road had opened his eyes. He looked at Madame
Francois with a startled air, but did not move. She herself now thought
that he must indeed be drunk.

“You mustn’t stop here,” she said to him, “or you’ll get run over and
killed. Where were you going?”

“I don’t know,” replied the man in a faint voice.

Then, with an effort and an anxious expression, he added: “I was going
to Paris; I fell down, and don’t remember any more.”

Madame Francois could now see him more distinctly, and he was truly a
pitiable object, with his ragged black coat and trousers, through the
rents in which you could espy his scraggy limbs. Underneath a black
cloth cap, which was drawn low over his brows, as though he were afraid
of being recognised, could be seen two large brown eyes, gleaming with
peculiar softness in his otherwise stern and harassed countenance. It
seemed to Madame Francois that he was in far too famished a condition
to have got drunk.

“And what part of Paris were you going to?” she continued.

The man did not reply immediately. This questioning seemed to distress
him. He appeared to be thinking the matter over, but at last said
hesitatingly, “Over yonder, towards the markets.”

He had now, with great difficulty, got to his feet again, and seemed
anxious to resume his journey. But Madame Francois noticed that he
tottered, and clung for support to one of the shafts of her waggon.

“Are you tired?” she asked him.

“Yes, very tired,” he replied.

Then she suddenly assumed a grumpy tone, as though displeased, and,
giving him a push, exclaimed: “Look sharp, then, and climb into my
cart. You’ve made us lose a lot of time. I’m going to the markets, and
I’ll turn you out there with my vegetables.”

Then, as the man seemed inclined to refuse her offer, she pushed him up
with her stout arms, and bundled him down upon the turnips and carrots.

“Come, now, don’t give us any more trouble,” she cried angrily. “You
are quite enough to provoke one, my good fellow. Don’t I tell you that
I’m going to the markets? Sleep away up there. I’ll wake you when we
arrive.”

She herself then clambered into the cart again, and settled herself
with her back against the board, grasping the reins of Balthazar, who
started off drowsily, swaying his ears once more. The other waggons
followed, and the procession resumed its lazy march through the
darkness, whilst the rhythmical jolting of the wheels again awoke the
echoes of the sleepy house fronts, and the waggoners, wrapped in their
cloaks, dozed off afresh. The one who had called to Madame Francois
growled out as he lay down: “As if we’d nothing better to do than pick
up every drunken sot we come across! You’re a scorcher, old woman!”

The waggons rumbled on, and the horses picked their own way, with
drooping heads. The stranger whom Madame Francois had befriended was
lying on his stomach, with his long legs lost amongst the turnips which
filled the back part of the cart, whilst his face was buried amidst the
spreading piles of carrot bunches. With weary, extended arms he
clutched hold of his vegetable couch in fear of being thrown to the
ground by one of the waggon’s jolts, and his eyes were fixed on the two
long lines of gas lamps which stretched away in front of him till they
mingled with a swarm of other lights in the distance atop of the slope.
Far away on the horizon floated a spreading, whitish vapour, showing
where Paris slept amidst the luminous haze of all those flamelets.

“I come from Nanterre, and my name’s Madame Francois,” said the market
gardener presently. “Since my poor man died I go to the markets every
morning myself. It’s a hard life, as you may guess. And who are you?”

“My name’s Florent, I come from a distance,” replied the stranger, with
embarrassment. “Please excuse me, but I’m really so tired that it is
painful to me to talk.”

He was evidently unwilling to say anything more, and so Madame Francois
relapsed into silence, and allowed the reins to fall loosely on the
back of Balthazar, who went his way like an animal acquainted with
every stone of the road.

Meantime, with his eyes still fixed upon the far-spreading glare of
Paris, Florent was pondering over the story which he had refused to
communicate to Madame Francois. After making his escape from Cayenne,
whither he had been transported for his participation in the resistance
to Louis Napoleon’s Coup d’Etat, he had wandered about Dutch Guiana for
a couple of years, burning to return to France, yet dreading the
Imperial police. At last, however, he once more saw before him the
beloved and mighty city which he had so keenly regretted and so
ardently longed for. He would hide himself there, he told himself, and
again lead the quiet, peaceable life that he had lived years ago. The
police would never be any the wiser; and everyone would imagine,
indeed, that he had died over yonder, across the sea. Then he thought
of his arrival at Havre, where he had landed with only some fifteen
francs tied up in a corner of his handkerchief. He had been able to pay
for a seat in the coach as far as Rouen, but from that point he had
been forced to continue his journey on foot, as he had scarcely thirty
sous left of his little store. At Vernon his last copper had gone in
bread. After that he had no clear recollection of anything. He fancied
that he could remember having slept for several hours in a ditch, and
having shown the papers with which he had provided himself to a
gendarme; however, he had only a very confused idea of what had
happened. He had left Vernon without any breakfast, seized every now
and then with hopeless despair and raging pangs which had driven him to
munch the leaves of the hedges as he tramped along. A prey to cramp and
fright, his body bent, his sight dimmed, and his feet sore, he had
continued his weary march, ever drawn onwards in a semi-unconscious
state by a vision of Paris, which, far, far away, beyond the horizon,
seemed to be summoning him and waiting for him.

When he at length reached Courbevoie, the night was very dark. Paris,
looking like a patch of star-sprent sky that had fallen upon the black
earth, seemed to him to wear a forbidding aspect, as though angry at
his return. Then he felt very faint, and his legs almost gave way
beneath him as he descended the hill. As he crossed the Neuilly bridge
he sustained himself by clinging to the parapet, and bent over and
looked at the Seine rolling inky waves between its dense, massy banks.
A red lamp on the water seemed to be watching him with a sanguineous
eye. And then he had to climb the hill if he would reach Paris on its
summit yonder. The hundreds of leagues which he had already travelled
were as nothing to it. That bit of a road filled him with despair. He
would never be able, he thought, to reach yonder light crowned summit.
The spacious avenue lay before him with its silence and its darkness,
its lines of tall trees and low houses, its broad grey footwalks,
speckled with the shadows of overhanging branches, and parted
occasionally by the gloomy gaps of side streets. The squat yellow
flames of the gas lamps, standing erect at regular intervals, alone
imparted a little life to the lonely wilderness. And Florent seemed to
make no progress; the avenue appeared to grow ever longer and longer,
to be carrying Paris away into the far depths of the night. At last he
fancied that the gas lamps, with their single eyes, were running off on
either hand, whisking the road away with them; and then, overcome by
vertigo, he stumbled and fell on the roadway like a log.

Now he was lying at ease on his couch of greenery, which seemed to him
soft as a feather bed. He had slightly raised his head so as to keep
his eyes on the luminous haze which was spreading above the dark roofs
which he could divine on the horizon. He was nearing his goal, carried
along towards it, with nothing to do but to yield to the leisurely
jolts of the waggon; and, free from all further fatigue, he now only
suffered from hunger. Hunger, indeed, had once more awoke within him
with frightful and wellnigh intolerable pangs. His limbs seemed to have
fallen asleep; he was only conscious of the existence of his stomach,
horribly cramped and twisted as by a red-hot iron. The fresh odour of
the vegetables, amongst which he was lying, affected him so keenly that
he almost fainted away. He strained himself against that piled-up mass
of food with all his remaining strength, in order to compress his
stomach and silence its groans. And the nine other waggons behind him,
with their mountains of cabbages and peas, their piles of artichokes,
lettuces, celery, and leeks, seemed to him to be slowly overtaking him,
as though to bury him whilst he was thus tortured by hunger beneath an
avalanche of food. Presently the procession halted, and there was a
sound of deep voices. They had reached the barriers, and the municipal
customs officers were examining the waggons. A moment later Florent
entered Paris, in a swoon, lying atop of the carrots, with clenched
teeth.

“Hallow! You up there!” Madame Francois called out sharply.

And as the stranger made no attempt to move, she clambered up and shook
him. Florent rose to a sitting posture. He had slept and no longer felt
the pangs of hunger, but was dizzy and confused.

“You’ll help me to unload, won’t you?” Madame Francois said to him, as
she made him get down.

He helped her. A stout man with a felt hat on his head and a badge in
the top buttonhole of his coat was striking the ground with a stick and
grumbling loudly:

“Come, come, now, make haste! You must get on faster than that! Bring
the waggon a little more forward. How many yards’ standing have you?
Four, isn’t it?”

Then he gave a ticket to Madame Francois, who took some coppers out of
a little canvas bag and handed them to him; whereupon he went off to
vent his impatience and tap the ground with his stick a little further
away. Madame Francois took hold of Balthazar’s bridle and backed him so
as to bring the wheels of the waggon close to the footway. Then, having
marked out her four yards with some wisps of straw, after removing the
back of the cart, she asked Florent to hand her the vegetables bunch by
bunch. She arranged them sort by sort on her standing, setting them out
artistically, the “tops” forming a band of greenery around each pile;
and it was with remarkable rapidity that she completed her show, which,
in the gloom of early morning, looked like some piece of symmetrically
coloured tapestry. When Florent had handed her a huge bunch of parsley,
which he had found at the bottom of the cart, she asked him for still
another service.

“It would be very kind of you,” said she, “if you would look after my
goods while I put the horse and cart up. I’m only going a couple of
yards, to the Golden Compasses, in the Rue Montorgueil.”

Florent told her that she might make herself easy. He preferred to
remain still, for his hunger had revived since he had begun to move
about. He sat down and leaned against a heap of cabbages beside Madame
Francois’s stock. He was all right there, he told himself, and would
not go further afield, but wait. His head felt empty, and he had no
very clear notion as to where he was. At the beginning of September it
is quite dark in the early morning. Around him lighted lanterns were
flitting or standing stationary in the depths of the gloom. He was
sitting on one side of a broad street which he did not recognise; it
stretched far away into the blackness of the night. He could make out
nothing plainly, excepting the stock of which he had been left in
charge. All around him along the market footways rose similar piles of
goods. The middle of the roadway was blocked by huge grey tumbrels, and
from one end of the street to the other a sound of heavy breathing
passed, betokening the presence of horses which the eye could not
distinguish.

Shouts and calls, the noise of falling wood, or of iron chains slipping
to the ground, the heavy thud of loads of vegetables discharged from
the waggons, and the grating of wheels as the carts were backed against
the footways, filled the yet sonorous awakening, whose near approach
could be felt and heard in the throbbing gloom. Glancing over the pile
of cabbages behind him. Florent caught sight of a man wrapped like a
parcel in his cloak, and snoring away with his head upon some baskets
of plums. Nearer to him, on his left, he could distinguish a lad, some
ten years old, slumbering between two heaps of endive, with an angelic
smile on his face. And as yet there seemed to be nothing on that
pavement that was really awake except the lanterns waving from
invisible arms, and flitting and skipping over the sleep of the
vegetables and human beings spread out there in heaps pending the dawn.
However, what surprised Florent was the sight of some huge pavilions on
either side of the street, pavilions with lofty roofs that seemed to
expand and soar out of sight amidst a swarm of gleams. In his weakened
state of mind he fancied he beheld a series of enormous, symmetrically
built palaces, light and airy as crystal, whose fronts sparkled with
countless streaks of light filtering through endless Venetian shutters.
Gleaming between the slender pillar shafts these narrow golden bars
seemed like ladders of light mounting to the gloomy line of the lower
roofs, and then soaring aloft till they reached the jumble of higher
ones, thus describing the open framework of immense square halls, where
in the yellow flare of the gas lights a multitude of vague, grey,
slumbering things was gathered together.

At last Florent turned his head to look about him, distressed at not
knowing where he was, and filled with vague uneasiness by the sight of
that huge and seemingly fragile vision. And now, as he raised his eyes,
he caught sight of the luminous dial and the grey massive pile of Saint
Eustache’s Church. At this he was much astonished. He was close to
Saint Eustache, yet all was novel to him.

However, Madame Francois had come back again, and was engaged in a
heated discussion with a man who carried a sack over his shoulder and
offered to buy her carrots for a sou a bunch.

“Really, now, you are unreasonable, Lacaille!” said she. “You know
quite well that you will sell them again to the Parisians at four and
five sous the bunch. Don’t tell me that you won’t! You may have them
for two sous the bunch, if you like.”

Then, as the man went off, she continued: “Upon my word, I believe some
people think that things grow of their own accord! Let him go and find
carrots at a sou the bunch elsewhere, tipsy scoundrel that he is! He’ll
come back again presently, you’ll see.”

These last remarks were addressed to Florent. And, seating herself by
his side, Madame Francois resumed: “If you’ve been a long time away
from Paris, you perhaps don’t know the new markets. They haven’t been
built for more than five years at the most. That pavilion you see there
beside us is the flower and fruit market. The fish and poultry markets
are farther away, and over there behind us come the vegetables and the
butter and cheese. There are six pavilions on this side, and on the
other side, across the road, there are four more, with the meat and the
tripe stalls. It’s an enormous place, but it’s horribly cold in the
winter. They talk about pulling down the houses near the corn market to
make room for two more pavilions. But perhaps you know all this?”

“No, indeed,” replied Florent; “I’ve been abroad. And what’s the name
of that big street in front of us?”

“Oh, that’s a new street. It’s called the Rue du Pont Neuf. It leads
from the Seine through here to the Rue Montmartre and the Rue
Montorgueil. You would soon have recognized where you were if it had
been daylight.”

Madame Francois paused and rose, for she saw a woman heading down to
examine her turnips. “Ah, is that you, Mother Chantemesse?” she said in
a friendly way.

Florent meanwhile glanced towards the Rue Montorgueil. It was there
that a body of police officers had arrested him on the night of
December 4.[*] He had been walking along the Boulevard Montmartre at
about two o’clock, quietly making his way through the crowd, and
smiling at the number of soldiers that the Elysee had sent into the
streets to awe the people, when the military suddenly began making a
clean sweep of the thoroughfare, shooting folks down at close range
during a quarter of an hour. Jostled and knocked to the ground, Florent
fell at the corner of the Rue Vivienne and knew nothing further of what
happened, for the panic-stricken crowd, in their wild terror of being
shot, trampled over his body. Presently, hearing everything quiet, he
made an attempt to rise; but across him there lay a young woman in a
pink bonnet, whose shawl had slipped aside, allowing her chemisette,
pleated in little tucks, to be seen. Two bullets had pierced the upper
part of her bosom; and when Florent gently removed the poor creature to
free his legs, two streamlets of blood oozed from her wounds on to his
hands. Then he sprang up with a sudden bound, and rushed madly away,
hatless and with his hands still wet with blood. Until evening he
wandered about the streets, with his head swimming, ever seeing the
young woman lying across his legs with her pale face, her blue staring
eyes, her distorted lips, and her expression of astonishment at thus
meeting death so suddenly. He was a shy, timid fellow. Albeit thirty
years old he had never dared to stare women in the face; and now, for
the rest of his life, he was to have that one fixed in his heart and
memory. He felt as though he had lost some loved one of his own.

[*] 1851. Two days after the Coup d’Etat.—Translator.


In the evening, without knowing how he had got there, still dazed and
horrified as he was by the terrible scenes of the afternoon, he had
found himself at a wine shop in the Rue Montorgueil, where several men
were drinking and talking of throwing up barricades. He went away with
them, helped them to tear up a few paving-stones, and seated himself on
the barricade, weary with his long wandering through the streets, and
reflecting that he would fight when the soldiers came up. However, he
had not even a knife with him, and was still bareheaded. Towards eleven
o’clock he dozed off, and in his sleep could see the two holes in the
dead woman’s white chemisette glaring at him like eyes reddened by
tears and blood. When he awoke he found himself in the grasp of four
police officers, who were pummelling him with their fists. The men who
had built the barricade had fled. The police officers treated him with
still greater violence, and indeed almost strangled him when they
noticed that his hands were stained with blood. It was the blood of the
young woman.

Florent raised his eyes to the luminous dial of Saint Eustache with his
mind so full of these recollections that he did not notice the position
of the pointers. It was, however, nearly four o’clock. The markets were
as yet wrapped in sleep. Madame Francois was still talking to old
Madame Chantemesse, both standing and arguing about the price of
turnips, and Florent now called to mind how narrowly he had escaped
being shot over yonder by the wall of Saint Eustache. A detachment of
gendarmes had just blown out the brains of five unhappy fellows caught
at a barricade in the Rue Greneta. The five corpses were lying on the
footway, at a spot where he thought he could now distinguish a heap of
rosy radishes. He himself had escaped being shot merely because the
policemen only carried swords. They took him to a neighbouring police
station and gave the officer in charge a scrap of paper, on which were
these words written in pencil: “Taken with blood-stained hands. Very
dangerous.” Then he had been dragged from station to station till the
morning came. The scrap of paper accompanied him wherever he went. He
was manacled and guarded as though he were a raving madman. At the
station in the Rue de la Lingerie some tipsy soldiers wanted to shoot
him; and they had already lighted a lantern with that object when the
order arrived for the prisoners to be taken to the depot of the
Prefecture of Police. Two days afterwards he found himself in a
casemate of the fort of Bicêtre. Ever since then he had been suffering
from hunger. He had felt hungry in the casemate, and the pangs of
hunger had never since left him. A hundred men were pent in the depths
of that cellar-like dungeon, where, scarce able to breathe, they
devoured the few mouthfuls of bread that were thrown to them, like so
many captive wild beasts.

When Florent was brought before an investigating magistrate, without
anyone to defend him, and without any evidence being adduced, he was
accused of belonging to a secret society; and when he swore that this
was untrue, the magistrate produced the scrap of paper from amongst the
documents before him: “Taken with blood-stained hands. Very dangerous.”
That was quite sufficient. He was condemned to transportation. Six
weeks afterwards, one January night, a gaoler awoke him and locked him
up in a courtyard with more than four hundred other prisoners. An hour
later this first detachment started for the pontoons and exile,
handcuffed and guarded by a double file of gendarmes with loaded
muskets. They crossed the Austerlitz bridge, followed the line of the
boulevards, and so reached the terminus of the Western Railway line. It
was a joyous carnival night. The windows of the restaurants on the
boulevards glittered with lights. At the top of the Rue Vivienne, just
at the spot where he ever saw the young woman lying dead—that unknown
young woman whose image he always bore with him—he now beheld a large
carriage in which a party of masked women, with bare shoulders and
laughing voices, were venting their impatience at being detained, and
expressing their horror of that endless procession of convicts. The
whole of the way from Paris to Havre the prisoners never received a
mouthful of bread or a drink of water. The officials had forgotten to
give them their rations before starting, and it was not till thirty-six
hours afterwards, when they had been stowed away in the hold of the
frigate _Canada_, that they at last broke their fast.

No, Florent had never again been free from hunger. He recalled all the
past to mind, but could not recollect a single hour of satiety. He had
become dry and withered; his stomach seemed to have shrunk; his skin
clung to his bones. And now that he was back in Paris once more, he
found it fat and sleek and flourishing, teeming with food in the midst
of the darkness. He had returned to it on a couch of vegetables; he
lingered in its midst encompassed by unknown masses of food which still
and ever increased and disquieted him. Had that happy carnival night
continued throughout those seven years, then? Once again he saw the
glittering windows on the boulevards, the laughing women, the
luxurious, greedy city which he had quitted on that far-away January
night; and it seemed to him that everything had expanded and increased
in harmony with those huge markets, whose gigantic breathing, still
heavy from the indigestion of the previous day, he now began to hear.

Old Mother Chantemesse had by this time made up her mind to buy a dozen
bunches of turnips. She put them in her apron, which she held closely
pressed to her person, thus making herself look yet more corpulent than
she was; and for some time longer she lingered there, still gossiping
in a drawling voice. When at last she went away, Madame Francois again
sat down by the side of Florent.

“Poor old Mother Chantemesse!” she said; “she must be at least
seventy-two. I can remember her buying turnips of my father when I was
a mere chit. And she hasn’t a relation in the world; no one but a young
hussy whom she picked up I don’t know where and who does nothing but
bring her trouble. Still, she manages to live, selling things by the
ha’p’orth and clearing her couple of francs profit a day. For my own
part, I’m sure that I could never spend my days on the foot-pavement in
this horrid Paris! And she hasn’t even any relations here!”

“You have some relations in Paris, I suppose?” she asked presently,
seeing that Florent seemed disinclined to talk.

Florent did not appear to hear her. A feeling of distrust came back to
him. His head was teeming with old stories of the police, stories of
spies prowling about at every street corner, and of women selling the
secrets which they managed to worm out of the unhappy fellows they
deluded. Madame Francois was sitting close beside him and certainly
looked perfectly straightforward and honest, with her big calm face,
above which was bound a black and yellow handkerchief. She seemed about
five and thirty years of age, and was somewhat stoutly built, with a
certain hardy beauty due to her life in the fresh air. A pair of black
eyes, which beamed with kindly tenderness, softened the more masculine
characteristics of her person. She certainly was inquisitive, but her
curiosity was probably well meant.

“I’ve a nephew in Paris,” she continued, without seeming at all
offended by Florent’s silence. “He’s turned out badly though, and has
enlisted. It’s a pleasant thing to have somewhere to go to and stay at,
isn’t it? I dare say there’s a big surprise in store for your relations
when they see you. But it’s always a pleasure to welcome one of one’s
own people back again, isn’t it?”

She kept her eyes fixed upon him while she spoke, doubtless
compassionating his extreme scragginess; fancying, too, that there was
a “gentleman” inside those old black rags, and so not daring to slip a
piece of silver into his hand. At last, however, she timidly murmured:
“All the same, if you should happen just at present to be in want of
anything——”

But Florent checked her with uneasy pride. He told her that he had
everything he required, and had a place to go to. She seemed quite
pleased to hear this, and, as though to tranquillise herself concerning
him, repeated several times: “Well, well, in that case you’ve only got
to wait till daylight.”

A large bell at the corner of the fruit market, just over Florent’s
head, now began to ring. The slow regular peals seemed to gradually
dissipate the slumber that yet lingered all around. Carts were still
arriving, and the shouts of the waggoners, the cracking of their whips,
and the grinding of the paving-stones beneath the iron-bound wheels and
the horses’ shoes sounded with an increasing din. The carts could now
only advance by a series of spasmodic jolts, and stretched in a long
line, one behind the other, till they were lost to sight in the distant
darkness, whence a confused roar ascended.

Unloading was in progress all along the Rue du Pont Neuf, the vehicles
being drawn up close to the edge of the footways, while their teams
stood motionless in close order as at a horse fair. Florent felt
interested in one enormous tumbrel which was piled up with magnificent
cabbages, and had only been backed to the kerb with the greatest
difficulty. Its load towered above the lofty gas lamp whose bright
light fell full upon the broad leaves which looked like pieces of dark
green velvet, scalloped and goffered. A young peasant girl, some
sixteen years old, in a blue linen jacket and cap, had climbed on to
the tumbrel, where, buried in the cabbages to her shoulders, she took
them one by one and threw them to somebody concealed in the shade
below. Every now and then the girl would slip and vanish, overwhelmed
by an avalanche of the vegetables, but her rosy nose soon reappeared
amidst the teeming greenery, and she broke into a laugh while the
cabbages again flew down between Florent and the gas lamp. He counted
them mechanically as they fell. When the cart was emptied he felt
worried.

The piles of vegetables on the pavement now extended to the verge of
the roadway. Between the heaps, the market gardeners left narrow paths
to enable people to pass along. The whole of the wide footway was
covered from end to end with dark mounds. As yet, in the sudden dancing
gleams of light from the lanterns, you only just espied the luxuriant
fulness of the bundles of artichokes, the delicate green of the
lettuces, the rosy coral of the carrots, and dull ivory of the turnips.
And these gleams of rich colour flitted along the heaps, according as
the lanterns came and went. The footway was now becoming populated: a
crowd of people had awakened, and was moving hither and thither amidst
the vegetables, stopping at times, and chattering and shouting. In the
distance a loud voice could be heard crying, “Endive! who’s got
endive?” The gates of the pavilion devoted to the sale of ordinary
vegetables had just been opened; and the retail dealers who had stalls
there, with white caps on their heads, fichus knotted over their black
jackets, and skirts pinned up to keep them from getting soiled, now
began to secure their stock for the day, depositing their purchases in
some huge porters’ baskets placed upon the ground. Between the roadway
and the pavilion these baskets were to be seen coming and going on all
sides, knocking against the crowded heads of the bystanders, who
resented the pushing with coarse expressions, whilst all around was a
clamour of voices growing hoarse by prolonged wrangling over a sou or
two. Florent was astonished by the calmness of the female market
gardeners, with bandanas and bronzed faces, displayed amidst all this
garrulous bargaining of the markets.

Behind him, on the footway of the Rue Rambuteau, fruit was being sold.
Hampers and low baskets covered with canvas or straw stood there in
long lines, a strong odour of over-ripe mirabelle plums was wafted
hither and thither. At last a subdued and gentle voice, which he had
heard for some time past, induced him to turn his head, and he saw a
charming darksome little woman sitting on the ground and bargaining.

“Come now, Marcel,” said she, “you’ll take a hundred sous, won’t you?”

The man to whom she was speaking was closely wrapped in his cloak and
made no reply; however, after a silence of five minutes or more, the
young woman returned to the charge.

“Come now, Marcel; a hundred sous for that basket there, and four
francs for the other one; that’ll make nine francs altogether.”

Then came another interval.

“Well, tell me what you will take.”

“Ten francs. You know that well enough already; I told you so before.
But what have you done with your Jules this morning, La Sarriette?”

The young woman began to laugh as she took a handful of small change
out of her pocket.

“Oh,” she replied, “Jules is still in bed. He says that men were not
intended to work.”

She paid for the two baskets, and carried them into the fruit pavilion,
which had just been opened. The market buildings still retained their
gloom-wrapped aspect of airy fragility, streaked with the thousand
lines of light that gleamed from the venetian shutters. People were
beginning to pass along the broad covered streets intersecting the
pavilions, but the more distant buildings still remained deserted
amidst the increasing buzz of life on the footways. By Saint Eustache
the bakers and wine sellers were taking down their shutters, and the
ruddy shops, with their gas lights flaring, showed like gaps of fire in
the gloom in which the grey house-fronts were yet steeped. Florent
noticed a baker’s shop on the left-hand side of the Rue Montorgueil,
replete and golden with its last baking, and fancied he could scent the
pleasant smell of the hot bread. It was now half past four.

Madame Francois by this time had disposed of nearly all her stock. She
had only a few bunches of carrots left when Lacaille once more made his
appearance with his sack.

“Well,” said he, “will you take a sou now?”

“I knew I should see you again,” the good woman quietly answered.
“You’d better take all I have left. There are seventeen bunches.”

“That makes seventeen sous.”

“No; thirty-four.”

At last they agreed to fix the price at twenty-five sous. Madame
Francois was anxious to be off.

“He’d been keeping his eye upon me all the time,” she said to Florent,
when Lacaille had gone off with the carrots in his sack. “That old
rogue runs things down all over the markets, and he often waits till
the last peal of the bell before spending four sous in purchase. Oh,
these Paris folk! They’ll wrangle and argue for an hour to save half a
sou, and then go off and empty their purses at the wine shop.”

Whenever Madame Francois talked of Paris she always spoke in a tone of
disdain, and referred to the city as though it were some ridiculous,
contemptible, far-away place, in which she only condescended to set
foot at nighttime.

“There!” she continued, sitting down again, beside Florent, on some
vegetables belonging to a neighbour, “I can get away now.”

Florent bent his head. He had just committed a theft. When Lacaille
went off he had caught sight of a carrot lying on the ground, and
having picked it up he was holding it tightly in his right hand. Behind
him were some bundles of celery and bunches of parsley were diffusing
pungent odours which painfully affected him.

“Well, I’m off now!” said Madame Francois.

However, she felt interested in this stranger, and could divine that he
was suffering there on that foot-pavement, from which he had never
stirred. She made him fresh offers of assistance, but he again refused
them, with a still more bitter show of pride. He even got up and
remained standing to prove that he was quite strong again. Then, as
Madame Francois turned her head away, he put the carrot to his mouth.
But he had to remove it for a moment, in spite of the terrible longing
which he felt to dig his teeth into it; for Madame Francois turned
round again and looking him full in the face, began to question him
with her good-natured womanly curiosity. Florent, to avoid speaking,
merely answered by nods and shakes of the head. Then, slowly and
gently, he began to eat the carrot.

The worthy woman was at last on the point of going off, when a powerful
voice exclaimed close beside her, “Good morning, Madame Francois.”

The speaker was a slim young man, with big bones and a big head. His
face was bearded, and he had a very delicate nose and narrow sparkling
eyes. He wore on his head a rusty, battered, black felt hat, and was
buttoned up in an immense overcoat, which had once been of a soft
chestnut hue, but which rain had discoloured and streaked with long
greenish stains. Somewhat bent, and quivering with a nervous
restlessness which was doubtless habitual with him, he stood there in a
pair of heavy laced shoes, and the shortness of his trousers allowed a
glimpse of his coarse blue hose.

“Good morning, Monsieur Claude,” the market gardener replied
cheerfully. “I expected you, you know, last Monday, and, as you didn’t
come, I’ve taken care of your canvas for you. I’ve hung it up on a nail
in my room.”

“You are really very kind, Madame Francois. I’ll go to finish that
study of mine one of these days. I wasn’t able to go on Monday. Has
your big plum tree still got all its leaves?”

“Yes, indeed.”

“I wanted to know, because I mean to put it in a corner of the picture.
It will come in nicely by the side of the fowl house. I have been
thinking about it all the week. What lovely vegetables are in the
market this morning! I came down very early, expecting a fine sunrise
effect upon all these heaps of cabbages.”

With a wave of the arm he indicated the footway.

“Well, well, I must be off now,” said Madame Francois. “Good-bye for
the present. We shall meet again soon, I hope, Monsieur Claude.”

However, as she turned to go, she introduced Florent to the young
artist.

“This gentleman, it seems, has just come from a distance,” said she.
“He feels quite lost in your scampish Paris. I dare say you might be of
service to him.”

Then she at last took her departure, feeling pleased at having left the
two men together. Claude looked at Florent with a feeling of interest.
That tall, slight, wavy figure seemed to him original. Madame
Francois’s hasty presentation was in his eyes quite sufficient, and he
addressed Florent with the easy familiarity of a lounger accustomed to
all sorts of chance encounters.

“I’ll accompany you,” he said; “which way are you going?”

Florent felt ill at ease; he was not wont to unbosom himself so
readily. However, ever since his arrival in Paris, a question had been
trembling on his lips, and now he ventured to ask it, with the evident
fear of receiving an unfavourable reply.

“Is the Rue Pirouette still in existence?”

“Oh, yes,” answered the artist. “A very curious corner of old Paris is
the Rue Pirouette. It twists and turns like a dancing girl, and the
houses bulge out like pot-bellied gluttons. I’ve made an etching of it
that isn’t half bad. I’ll show it to you when you come to see me. Is it
to the Rue Pirouette that you want to go?”

Florent, who felt easier and more cheerful now that he knew the street
still existed, declared that he did not want to go there; in fact, he
did not want to go anywhere in particular. All his distrust awoke into
fresh life at Claude’s insistence.

“Oh! never mind,” said the artist, “let’s go to the Rue Pirouette all
the same. It has such a fine colour at night time. Come along; it’s
only a couple of yards away.”

Florent felt constrained to follow him, and the two men walked off,
side by side, stepping over the hampers and vegetables like a couple of
old friends. On the footway of the Rue Rambuteau there were some
immense heaps of cauliflowers, symmetrically piled up like so many
cannonballs. The soft-white flowers spread out like huge roses in the
midst of their thick green leaves, and the piles had something of the
appearance of bridal bouquets ranged in a row in colossal flower
stands. Claude stopped in front of them, venting cries of admiration.

Then, on turning into the Rue Pirouette, which was just opposite, he
pointed out each house to his companion, and explained his views
concerning it. There was only a single gas lamp, burning in a corner.
The buildings, which had settled down and swollen, threw their
pent-houses forward in such wise as to justify Claude’s allusion to
pot-bellied gluttons, whilst their gables receded, and on either side
they clung to their neighbours for support. Three or four, however,
standing in gloomy recesses, appeared to be on the point of toppling
forward. The solitary gas lamp illumined one which was snowy with a
fresh coat of whitewash, suggesting some flabby broken-down old
dowager, powdered and bedaubed in the hope of appearing young. Then the
others stretched away into the darkness, bruised, dented, and cracked,
greeny with the fall of water from their roofs, and displaying such an
extraordinary variety of attitudes and tints that Claude could not
refrain from laughing as he contemplated them.

Florent, however, came to stand at the corner of the rue de Mondetour,
in front of the last house but one on the left. Here the three floors,
each with two shutterless windows, having little white curtains closely
drawn, seemed wrapped in sleep; but, up above, a light could be seen
flitting behind the curtains of a tiny gable casement. However, the
sight of the shop beneath the pent-house seemed to fill Florent with
the deepest emotion. It was kept by a dealer in cooked vegetables, and
was just being opened. At its far end some metal pans were glittering,
while on several earthen ones in the window there was a display of
cooked spinach and endive, reduced to a paste and arranged in conical
mounds from which customers were served with shovel-like carvers of
white metal, only the handles of which were visible. This sight seemed
to rivet Florent to the ground with surprise. He evidently could not
recognize the place. He read the name of the shopkeeper, Godeboeuf,
which was painted on a red sign board up above, and remained quite
overcome by consternation. His arms dangling beside him, he began to
examine the cooked spinach, with the despairing air of one on whom some
supreme misfortune falls.

However, the gable casement was now opened, and a little old woman
leaned out of it, and looked first at the sky and then at the markets
in the distance.

“Ah, Mademoiselle Saget is an early riser,” exclaimed Claude, who had
just raised his head. And, turning to his companion, he added: “I once
had an aunt living in that house. It’s a regular hive of tittle-tattle!
Ah, the Mehudins are stirring now, I see. There’s a light on the second
floor.”

Florent would have liked to question his companion, but the latter’s
long discoloured overcoat give him a disquieting appearance. So without
a word Florent followed him, whilst he went on talking about the
Mehudins. These Mehudins were fish-girls, it seemed; the older one was
a magnificent creature, while the younger one, who sold fresh-water
fish, reminded Claude of one of Murillo’s virgins, whenever he saw her
standing with her fair face amidst her carps and eels.

From this Claude went on to remark with asperity that Murillo painted
like an ignoramus. But all at once he stopped short in the middle of
the street.

“Come!” he exclaimed, “tell me where it is that you want to go.”

“I don’t want to go anywhere just at present,” replied Florent in
confusion. “Let’s go wherever you like.”

Just as they were leaving the Rue Pirouette, some one called to Claude
from a wine shop at the corner of the street. The young man went in,
dragging Florent with him. The shutters had been taken down on one side
only, and the gas was still burning in the sleepy atmosphere of the
shop. A forgotten napkin and some cards that had been used in the
previous evening’s play were still lying on the tables; and the fresh
breeze that streamed in through the open doorway freshened the close,
warm vinous air. The landlord, Monsieur Lebigre, was serving his
customers. He wore a sleeved waistcoat, and his fat regular features,
fringed by an untidy beard, were still pale with sleep. Standing in
front of the counter, groups of men, with heavy, tired eyes, were
drinking, coughing, and spitting, whilst trying to rouse themselves by
the aid of white wine and brandy. Amongst them Florent recognised
Lacaille, whose sack now overflowed with various sorts of vegetables.
He was taking his third dram with a friend, who was telling him a long
story about the purchase of a hamper of potatoes.[*] When he had
emptied his glass, he went to chat with Monsieur Lebigre in a little
glazed compartment at the end of the room, where the gas had not yet
been lighted.

[*] At the Paris central markets potatoes are sold by the hamper, not
by the sack as in England.—Translator.


“What will you take?” Claude asked of Florent.

He had on entering grasped the hand of the person who had called out to
him. This was a market porter,[*] a well-built young man of two and
twenty at the most. His cheeks and chin were clean-shaven, but he wore
a small moustache, and looked a sprightly, strapping fellow with his
broad-brimmed hat covered with chalk, and his wool-worked neck-piece,
the straps falling from which tightened his short blue blouse. Claude,
who called him Alexandre, patted his arms, and asked him when they were
going to Charentonneau again. Then they talked about a grand excursion
they had made together in a boat on the Marne, when they had eaten a
rabbit for supper in the evening.

[*] _Fort_ is the French term, literally “a strong man,” as every
market porter needs to be.—Translator.


“Well, what will you take?” Claude again asked Florent.

The latter looked at the counter in great embarrassment. At one end of
it some stoneware pots, encircled with brass bands and containing punch
and hot wine, were standing over the short blue flames of a gas stove.
Florent at last confessed that a glass of something warm would be
welcome. Monsieur Lebigre thereupon served them with three glasses of
punch. In a basket near the pots were some smoking hot rolls which had
only just arrived. However, as neither of the others took one, Florent
likewise refrained, and drank his punch. He felt it slipping down into
his empty stomach, like a steam of molten lead. It was Alexandre who
paid for the “shout.”

“He’s a fine fellow, that Alexandre!” said Claude, when he and Florent
found themselves alone again on the footway of the Rue Rambuteau. “He’s
a very amusing companion to take into the country. He’s fond of showing
his strength. And then he’s so magnificently built! I have seen him
stripped. Ah, if I could only get him to pose for me in the nude out in
the open air! Well, we’ll go and take a turn through the markets now,
if you like.”

Florent followed, yielding entirely to his new friend’s guidance. A
bright glow at the far end of the Rue Rambuteau announced the break of
day. The far-spreading voice of the markets was become more sonorous,
and every now and then the peals of a bell ringing in some distant
pavilion mingled with the swelling, rising clamour. Claude and Florent
entered one of the covered streets between the fish and poultry
pavilions. Florent raised his eyes and looked at the lofty vault
overhead, the inner timbers of which glistened amidst a black lacework
of iron supports. As he turned into the great central thoroughfare he
pictured himself in some strange town, with its various districts and
suburbs, promenades and streets, squares and cross-roads, all suddenly
placed under shelter on a rainy day by the whim of some gigantic power.
The deep gloom brooding in the hollows of the roofs multiplied, as it
were, the forest of pillars, and infinitely increased the number of the
delicate ribs, railed galleries, and transparent shutters. And over the
phantom city and far away into the depths of the shade, a teeming,
flowering vegetation of luxuriant metal-work, with spindle-shaped stems
and twining knotted branches, covered the vast expanse as with the
foliage of some ancient forest. Several departments of the markets
still slumbered behind their closed iron gates. The butter and poultry
pavilions displayed rows of little trellised stalls and long alleys,
which lines of gas lights showed to be deserted. The fish market,
however, had just been opened, and women were flitting to and fro
amongst the white slabs littered with shadowy hampers and cloths. Among
the vegetables and fruit and flowers the noise and bustle were
gradually increasing. The whole place was by degree waking up, from the
popular quarter where the cabbages are piled at four o’clock in the
morning, to the lazy and wealthy district which only hangs up its
pullets and pheasants when the hands of the clock point to eight.

The great covered alleys were now teeming with life. All along the
footways on both sides of the road there were still many market
gardeners, with other small growers from the environs of Paris, who
displayed baskets containing their “gatherings” of the previous
evening—bundles of vegetables and clusters of fruit. Whilst the crowd
incessantly paced hither and thither, vehicles barred the road; and
Florent, in order to pass them, had to press against some dingy sacks,
like coal-sacks in appearance, and so numerous and heavy that the
axle-trees of the vans bent beneath them. They were quite damp, and
exhaled a fresh odour of seaweed. From a rent low down in the side of
one of them a black stream of big mussels was trickling.

Florent and Claude had now to pause at every step. The fish was
arriving and one after another the drays of the railway companies drove
up laden with wooden cages full of the hampers and baskets that had
come by train from the sea coast. And to get out of the way of the fish
drays, which became more and more numerous and disquieting, the artist
and Florent rushed amongst the wheels of the drays laden with butter
and eggs and cheese, huge yellow vehicles bearing coloured lanterns,
and drawn by four horses. The market porters carried the cases of eggs,
and baskets of cheese and butter, into the auction pavilion, where
clerks were making entries in note books by the light of the gas.

Claude was quite charmed with all this uproar, and forgot everything to
gaze at some effect of light, some group of blouses, or the picturesque
unloading of a cart. At last they extricated themselves from the crowd,
and as they continued on their way along the main artery they presently
found themselves amidst an exquisite perfume which seemed to be
following them. They were in the cut-flower market. All over the
footways, to the right and left, women were seated in front of large
rectangular baskets full of bunches of roses, violets, dahlias, and
marguerites. At times the clumps darkened and looked like splotches of
blood, at others they brightened into silvery greys of the softest
tones. A lighted candle, standing near one basket, set amidst the
general blackness quite a melody of colour—the bright variegations of
marguerites, the blood-red crimson of dahlias, the bluey purple of
violets, and the warm flesh tints of roses. And nothing could have been
sweeter or more suggestive of springtide than this soft breath of
perfume encountered on the footway, on emerging from the sharp odours
of the fish market and the pestilential smell of the butter and the
cheese.

Claude and Florent turned round and strolled about, loitering among the
flowers. They halted with some curiosity before several women who were
selling bunches of fern and bundles of vine-leaves, neatly tied up in
packets of five and twenty. Then they turned down another covered
alley, which was almost deserted, and where their footsteps echoed as
though they had been walking through a church. Here they found a little
cart, scarcely larger than a wheelbarrow, to which was harnessed a
diminutive donkey, who, no doubt, felt bored, for at sight of them he
began braying with such prolonged and sonorous force that the vast
roofing of the markets fairly trembled. Then the horses began to neigh
in reply, there was a sound of pawing and tramping, a distant uproar,
which swelled, rolled along, then died away.

Meantime, in the Rue Berger in front of them, Claude and Florent
perceived a number of bare, frontless, salesmen’s shops, where, by the
light of flaring gas jets, they could distinguish piles of hampers and
fruit, enclosed by three dirty walls which were covered with addition
sums in pencil. And the two wanderers were still standing there,
contemplating this scene, when they noticed a well-dressed woman
huddled up in a cab which looked quite lost and forlorn in the block of
carts as it stealthily made its way onwards.

“There’s Cinderella coming back without her slippers,” remarked Claude
with a smile.

They began chatting together as they went back towards the markets.
Claude whistled as he strolled along with his hands in his pockets, and
expatiated on his love for this mountain of food which rises every
morning in the very centre of Paris. He prowled about the footways
night after night, dreaming of colossal still-life subjects, paintings
of an extraordinary character. He had even started on one, having his
friend Marjolin and that jade Cadine to pose for him; but it was hard
work to paint those confounded vegetables and fruit and fish and
meat—they were all so beautiful! Florent listened to the artist’s
enthusiastic talk with a void and hunger-aching stomach. It did not
seem to occur to Claude that all those things were intended to be
eaten. Their charm for him lay in their colour. Suddenly, however, he
ceased speaking and, with a gesture that was habitual to him, tightened
the long red sash which he wore under his green-stained coat.

And then with a sly expression he resumed:

“Besides, I breakfast here, through my eyes, at any rate, and that’s
better than getting nothing at all. Sometimes, when I’ve forgotten to
dine on the previous day, I treat myself to a perfect fit of
indigestion in the morning by watching the carts arrive here laden with
all sorts of good things. On such mornings as those I love my
vegetables more than ever. Ah! the exasperating part, the rank
injustice of it all, is that those rascally Philistines really eat
these things!”

Then he went on to tell Florent of a supper to which a friend had
treated him at Baratte’s on a day of affluence. They had partaken of
oysters, fish, and game. But Baratte’s had sadly fallen, and all the
carnival life of the old Marché des Innocents was now buried. In place
thereof they had those huge central markets, that colossus of ironwork,
that new and wonderful town. Fools might say what they liked; it was
the embodiment of the spirit of the times. Florent, however, could not
at first make out whether he was condemning the picturesqueness of
Baratte’s or its good cheer.

But Claude next began to inveigh against romanticism. He preferred his
piles of vegetables, he said, to the rags of the middle ages; and he
ended by reproaching himself with guilty weakness in making an etching
of the Rue Pirouette. All those grimy old places ought to be levelled
to the ground, he declared, and modern houses ought to be built in
their stead.

“There!” he exclaimed, coming to a halt, “look at the corner of the
footway yonder! Isn’t that a picture readymade, ever so much more human
and natural than all their confounded consumptive daubs?”

Along the covered way women were now selling hot soup and coffee. At
one corner of the foot-pavement a large circle of customers clustered
round a vendor of cabbage soup. The bright tin caldron, full of broth,
was steaming over a little low stove, through the holes of which came
the pale glow of the embers. From a napkin-lined basket the woman took
some thin slices of bread and dropped them into yellow cups; then with
a ladle she filled the cups with liquor. Around her were saleswomen
neatly dressed, market gardeners in blouses, porters with coats soiled
by the loads they had carried, poor ragged vagabonds—in fact, all the
early hungry ones of the markets, eating, and scalding their mouths,
and drawing back their chins to avoid soiling them with the drippings
from their spoons. The delighted artist blinked, and sought a point of
view so as to get a good ensemble of the picture. That cabbage soup,
however, exhaled a very strong odour. Florent, for his part, turned his
head away, distressed by the sight of the full cups which the customers
emptied in silence, glancing around them the while like suspicious
animals. As the woman began serving a fresh customer, Claude himself
was affected by the odorous steam of the soup, which was wafted full in
his face.

He again tightened his sash, half amused and half annoyed. Then
resuming his walk, and alluding to the punch paid for by Alexandre, he
said to Florent in a low voice:

“It’s very odd, but have you ever noticed that although a man can
always find somebody to treat him to something to drink, he can never
find a soul who will stand him anything to eat?”

The dawn was now rising. The houses on the Boulevard de Sebastopol at
the end of the Rue de la Cossonnerie were still black; but above the
sharp line of their slate roofs a patch of pale blue sky, circumscribed
by the arch-pieces of the covered way, showed like a gleaming
half-moon. Claude, who had been bending over some grated openings on a
level with the ground, through which a glimpse could be obtained of
deep cellars where gas lights glimmered, now glanced up into the air
between the lofty pillars, as though scanning the dark roofs which
fringed the clear sky. Then he halted again, with his eyes fixed on one
of the light iron ladders which connect the superposed market roofs and
give access from one to the other. Florent asked him what he was
seeking there.

“I’m looking for that scamp of a Marjolin,” replied the artist. “He’s
sure to be in some guttering up there, unless, indeed, he’s been
spending the night in the poultry cellars. I want him to give me a
sitting.”

Then he went on to relate how a market saleswoman had found his friend
Marjolin one morning in a pile of cabbages, and how Marjolin had grown
up in all liberty on the surrounding footways. When an attempt had been
made to send him to school he had fallen ill, and it had been necessary
to bring him back to the markets. He knew every nook and corner of
them, and loved them with a filial affection, leading the agile life of
a squirrel in that forest of ironwork. He and Cadine, the hussy whom
Mother Chantemesse had picked up one night in the old Market of the
Innocents, made a pretty couple—he, a splendid foolish fellow, as
glowing as a Rubens, with a ruddy down on his skin which attracted the
sunlight; and she, slight and sly, with a comical phiz under her tangle
of black curly hair.

Whilst talking Claude quickened his steps, and soon brought his
companion back to Saint Eustache again. Florent, whose legs were once
more giving way, dropped upon a bench near the omnibus office. The
morning air was freshening. At the far end of the Rue Rambuteau rosy
gleams were streaking the milky sky, which higher up was slashed by
broad grey rifts. Such was the sweet balsamic scent of this dawn, that
Florent for a moment fancied himself in the open country, on the brow
of a hill. But behind the bench Claude pointed out to him the many
aromatic herbs and bulbs on sale. All along the footway skirting the
tripe market there were, so to say, fields of thyme and lavender,
garlic and shallots; and round the young plane-trees on the pavement
the vendors had twined long branches of laurel, forming trophies of
greenery. The strong scent of the laurel leaves prevailed over every
other odour.

At present the luminous dial of Saint Eustache was paling as a
night-light does when surprised by the dawn. The gas jets in the wine
shops in the neighbouring streets went out one by one, like stars
extinguished by the brightness. And Florent gazed at the vast markets
now gradually emerging from the gloom, from the dreamland in which he
had beheld them, stretching out their ranges of open palaces.
Greenish-grey in hue, they looked more solid now, and even more
colossal with their prodigious masting of columns upholding an endless
expanse of roofs. They rose up in geometrically shaped masses; and when
all the inner lights had been extinguished and the square uniform
buildings were steeped in the rising dawn, they seemed typical of some
gigantic modern machine, some engine, some caldron for the supply of a
whole people, some colossal belly, bolted and riveted, built up of wood
and glass and iron, and endowed with all the elegance and power of some
mechanical motive appliance working there with flaring furnaces, and
wild, bewildering revolutions of wheels.

Claude, however, had enthusiastically sprung on to the bench, and stood
upon it. He compelled his companion to admire the effect of the dawn
rising over the vegetables. There was a perfect sea of these extending
between the two clusters of pavilions from Saint Eustache to the Rue
des Halles. And in the two open spaces at either end the flood of
greenery rose to even greater height, and quite submerged the
pavements. The dawn appeared slowly, softly grey in hue, and spreading
a light water-colour tint over everything. These surging piles akin to
hurrying waves, this river of verdure rushing along the roadway like an
autumn torrent, assumed delicate shadowy tints—tender violet,
blush-rose, and greeny yellow, all the soft, light hues which at
sunrise make the sky look like a canopy of shot silk. And by degrees,
as the fires of dawn rose higher and higher at the far end of the Rue
Rambuteau, the mass of vegetation grew brighter and brighter, emerging
more and more distinctly from the bluey gloom that clung to the ground.
Salad herbs, cabbage-lettuce, endive, and succory, with rich soil still
clinging to their roots, exposed their swelling hearts; bundles of
spinach, bundles of sorrel, clusters of artichokes, piles of peas and
beans, mounds of cos-lettuce, tied round with straws, sounded every
note in the whole gamut of greenery, from the sheeny lacquer-like green
of the pods to the deep-toned green of the foliage; a continuous gamut
with ascending and descending scales which died away in the variegated
tones of the heads of celery and bundles of leeks. But the highest and
most sonorous notes still came from the patches of bright carrots and
snowy turnips, strewn in prodigious quantities all along the markets
and lighting them up with the medley of their two colours.

At the crossway in the Rue des Halles cabbages were piled up in
mountains; there were white ones, hard and compact as metal balls,
curly savoys, whose great leaves made them look like basins of green
bronze, and red cabbages, which the dawn seemed to transform into
superb masses of bloom with the hue of wine-lees, splotched with dark
purple and carmine. At the other side of the markets, at the crossway
near Saint Eustache, the end of the Rue Rambuteau was blocked by a
barricade of orange-hued pumpkins, sprawling with swelling bellies in
two superposed rows. And here and there gleamed the glistening ruddy
brown of a hamper of onions, the blood-red crimson of a heap of
tomatoes, the quiet yellow of a display of marrows, and the sombre
violet of the fruit of the eggplant; while numerous fat black radishes
still left patches of gloom amidst the quivering brilliance of the
general awakening.

Claude clapped his hands at the sight. He declared that those
“blackguard vegetables” were wild, mad, sublime! He stoutly maintained
that they were not yet dead, but, gathered in the previous evening,
waited for the morning sun to bid him good-bye from the flag-stones of
the market. He could observe their vitality, he declared, see their
leaves stir and open as though their roots were yet firmly and warmly
embedded in well-manured soil. And here, in the markets, he added, he
heard the death-rattle of all the kitchen gardens of the environs of
Paris.

A crowd of white caps, loose black jackets, and blue blouses was
swarming in the narrow paths between the various piles. The big baskets
of the market porters passed along slowly, above the heads of the
throng. Retail dealers, costermongers, and greengrocers were making
their purchases in haste. Corporals and nuns clustered round the
mountains of cabbages, and college cooks prowled about inquisitively,
on the look-out for good bargains. The unloading was still going on;
heavy tumbrels, discharging their contents as though these were so many
paving-stones, added more and more waves to the sea of greenery which
was now beating against the opposite footways. And from the far end of
the Rue du Pont Neuf fresh rows of carts were still and ever arriving.

“What a fine sight it is!” exclaimed Claude in an ecstasy of
enthusiasm.

Florent was suffering keenly. He fancied that all this was some
supernatural temptation, and, unwilling to look at the markets any
longer, turned towards Saint Eustache, a side view of which he obtained
from the spot where he now stood. With its roses, and broad arched
windows, its bell-turret, and roofs of slate, it looked as though
painted in sepia against the blue of the sky. He fixed his eyes at last
on the sombre depths of the Rue Montorgueil, where fragments of gaudy
sign boards showed conspicuously, and on the corner of the Rue
Montmartre, where there were balconies gleaming with letters of gold.
And when he again glanced at the cross-roads, his gaze was solicited by
other sign boards, on which such inscriptions as “Druggist and
Chemist,” “Flour and Grain” appeared in big red and black capital
letters upon faded backgrounds. Near these corners, houses with narrow
windows were now awakening, setting amidst the newness and airiness of
the Rue du Pont Neuf a few of the yellow ancient facades of olden
Paris. Standing at the empty windows of the great drapery shop at the
corner of the Rue Rambuteau a number of spruce-looking counter-jumpers
in their shirt sleeves, with snowy-white wristbands and tight-fitting
pantaloons, were “dressing” their goods. Farther away, in the windows
of the severe looking, barrack-like Guillot establishment, biscuits in
gilt wrappers and fancy cakes on glass stands were tastefully set out.
All the shops were now open; and workmen in white blouses, with tools
under their arms, were hurrying along the road.

Claude had not yet got down from the bench. He was standing on tiptoe
in order to see the farther down the streets. Suddenly, in the midst of
the crowd which he overlooked, he caught sight of a fair head with long
wavy locks, followed by a little black one covered with curly tumbled
hair.

“Hallo, Marjolin! Hallo, Cadine!” he shouted; and then, as his voice
was drowned by the general uproar, he jumped to the ground and started
off. But all at once, recollecting that he had left Florent behind him,
he hastily came back. “I live at the end of the Impasse des
Bourdonnais,” he said rapidly. “My name’s written in chalk on the door,
Claude Lantier. Come and see the etching of the Rue Pirouette.”

Then he vanished. He was quite ignorant of Florent’s name, and, after
favouring him with his views on art, parted from him as he had met him,
at the roadside.

Florent was now alone, and at first this pleased him. Ever since Madame
Francoise had picked him up in the Avenue de Neuilly he had been coming
and going in a state of pain fraught somnolence which had quite
prevented him from forming any definite ideas of his surroundings. Now
at last he was at liberty to do what he liked, and he tried to shake
himself free from that intolerable vision of teeming food by which he
was pursued. But his head still felt empty and dizzy, and all that he
could find within him was a kind of vague fear. The day was now growing
quite bright, and he could be distinctly seen. He looked down at his
wretched shabby coat and trousers. He buttoned the first, dusted the
latter, and strove to make a bit of a toilet, fearing lest those black
rags of his should proclaim aloud whence he had come. He was seated in
the middle of the bench, by the side of some wandering vagabonds who
had settled themselves there while waiting for the sunrise. The
neighbourhood of the markets is a favourite spot with vagrants in the
small hours of the morning. However, two constables, still in night
uniform, with cloaks and _kepis_, paced up and down the footway side by
side, their hands resting behind their backs; and every time they
passed the bench they glanced at the game which they scented there.
Florent felt sure that they recognised him, and were consulting
together about arresting him. At this thought his anguish of mind
became extreme. He felt a wild desire to get up and run away; but he
did not dare to do so, and was quite at a loss as to how he might take
himself off. The repeated glances of the constables, their cold,
deliberate scrutiny caused him the keenest torture. At length he rose
from the bench, making a great effort to restrain himself from rushing
off as quickly as his long legs could carry him; and succeeded in
walking quietly away, though his shoulders quivered in the fear he felt
of suddenly feeling the rough hands of the constables clutching at his
collar from behind.

He had now only one thought, one desire, which was to get away from the
markets as quickly as possible. He would wait and make his
investigations later on, when the footways should be clear. The three
streets which met here—the Rue Montmartre, Rue Montorgueil, and Rue
Turbigo—filled him with uneasiness. They were blocked by vehicles of
all kinds, and their footways were crowded with vegetables. Florent
went straight along as far as the Rue Pierre Lescot, but there the
cress and the potato markets seemed to him insuperable obstacles. So he
resolved to take the Rue Rambuteau. On reaching the Boulevard de
Sebastopol, however, he came across such a block of vans and carts and
waggonettes that he turned back and proceeded along the Rue Saint
Denis. Then he got amongst the vegetables once more. Retail dealers had
just set up their stalls, formed of planks resting on tall hampers; and
the deluge of cabbages and carrots and turnips began all over again.
The markets were overflowing. Florent tried to make his escape from
this pursuing flood which ever overtook him in his flight. He tried the
Rue de la Cossonnerie, the Rue Berger, the Square des Innocents, the
Rue de la Ferronnerie, and the Rue des Halles. And at last he came to a
standstill, quite discouraged and scared at finding himself unable to
escape from the infernal circle of vegetables, which now seemed to
dance around him, twining clinging verdure about his legs.

The everlasting stream of carts and horses stretched away as far as the
Rue de Rivoli and the Place de l’Hôtel de Ville. Huge vans were
carrying away supplies for all the greengrocers and fruiterers of an
entire district; _chars-a-bancs_ were starting for the suburbs with
straining, groaning sides. In the Rue de Pont Neuf Florent got
completely bewildered. He stumbled upon a crowd of hand-carts, in which
numerous costermongers were arranging their purchases. Amongst them he
recognised Lacaille, who went off along the Rue Saint Honoré, pushing a
barrow of carrots and cauliflowers before him. Florent followed him, in
the hope that he would guide him out of the mob. The pavement was now
quite slippery, although the weather was dry, and the litter of
artichoke stalks, turnip tops, and leaves of all kinds made walking
somewhat dangerous. Florent stumbled at almost every step. He lost
sight of Lacaille in the Rue Vauvilliers, and on approaching the corn
market he again found the streets barricaded with vehicles. Then he
made no further attempt to struggle; he was once more in the clutch of
the markets, and their stream of life bore him back. Slowly retracing
his steps, he presently found himself by Saint Eustache again.

He now heard the loud continuous rumbling of the waggons that were
setting out from the markets. Paris was doling out the daily food of
its two million inhabitants. These markets were like some huge central
organ beating with giant force, and sending the blood of life through
every vein of the city. The uproar was akin to that of colossal jaws—a
mighty sound to which each phase of the provisioning contributed, from
the whip-cracking of the larger retail dealers as they started off for
the district markets to the dragging pit-a-pat of the old shoes worn by
the poor women who hawked their lettuces in baskets from door to door.

Florent turned into a covered way on the left, intersecting the group
of four pavilions whose deep silent gloom he had remarked during the
night. He hoped that he might there find a refuge, discover some corner
in which he could hide himself. But these pavilions were now as busy,
as lively as the others. Florent walked on to the end of the street.
Drays were driving up at a quick trot, crowding the market with cages
full of live poultry, and square hampers in which dead birds were
stowed in deep layers. On the other side of the way were other drays
from which porters were removing freshly killed calves, wrapped in
canvas, and laid at full length in baskets, whence only the four
bleeding stumps of their legs protruded. There were also whole sheep,
and sides and quarters of beef. Butchers in long white aprons marked
the meat with a stamp, carried it off, weighted it, and hung it up on
hooks in the auction room. Florent, with his face close to the grating,
stood gazing at the rows of hanging carcasses, at the ruddy sheep and
oxen and paler calves, all streaked with yellow fat and sinews, and
with bellies yawning open. Then he passed along the sidewalk where the
tripe market was held, amidst the pallid calves’ feet and heads, the
rolled tripe neatly packed in boxes, the brains delicately set out in
flat baskets, the sanguineous livers, and purplish kidneys. He checked
his steps in front of some long two-wheeled carts, covered with round
awnings, and containing sides of pork hung on each side of the vehicle
over a bed of straw. Seen from the back end, the interiors of the carts
looked like recesses of some tabernacle, like some taper-lighted
chapel, such was the glow of all the bare flesh they contained. And on
the beds of straw were lines of tin cans, full of the blood that had
trickled from the pigs. Thereupon Florent was attacked by a sort of
rage. The insipid odour of the meat, the pungent smell of the tripe
exasperated him. He made his way out of the covered road, preferring to
return once more to the footwalk of the Rue de Pont Neuf.

He was enduring perfect agony. The shiver of early morning came upon
him; his teeth chattered, and he was afraid of falling to the ground
and finding himself unable to rise again. He looked about, but could
see no vacant place on any bench. Had he found one he would have
dropped asleep there, even at the risk of being awakened by the police.
Then, as giddiness nearly blinded him, he leaned for support against a
tree, with his eyes closed and his ears ringing. The raw carrot, which
he had swallowed almost without chewing, was torturing his stomach, and
the glass of punch which he had drunk seemed to have intoxicated him.
He was indeed intoxicated with misery, weariness, and hunger. Again he
felt a burning fire in the pit of the stomach, to which he every now
and then carried his hands, as though he were trying to stop up a hole
through which all his life was oozing away. As he stood there he
fancied that the foot-pavement rocked beneath him; and thinking that he
might perhaps lessen his sufferings by walking, he went straight on
through the vegetables again. He lost himself among them. He went along
a narrow footway, turned down another, was forced to retrace his steps,
bungled in doing so, and once more found himself amidst piles of
greenery. Some heaps were so high that people seemed to be walking
between walls of bundles and bunches. Only their heads slightly
overtopped these ramparts, and passed along showing whitely or blackly
according to the colour of their hats or caps; whilst the huge swinging
baskets, carried aloft on a level with the greenery, looked like osier
boats floating on a stagnant, mossy lake.

Florent stumbled against a thousand obstacles—against porters taking up
their burdens, and saleswomen disputing in rough tones. He slipped over
the thick bed of waste leaves and stumps which covered the footway, and
was almost suffocated by the powerful odour of crushed verdure. At last
he halted in a sort of confused stupor, and surrendered to the pushing
of some and the insults of others; and then he became a mere waif, a
piece of wreckage tossed about on the surface of that surging sea.

He was fast losing all self-respect, and would willingly have begged.
The recollection of his foolish pride during the night exasperated him.
If he had accepted Madame Francois’s charity, if he had not felt such
idiotic fear of Claude, he would not now have been stranded there
groaning in the midst of these cabbages. And he was especially angry
with himself for not having questioned the artist when they were in the
Rue Pirouette. Now, alas! he was alone and deserted, liable to die in
the streets like a homeless dog.

For the last time he raised his eyes and looked at the markets. At
present they were glittering in the sun. A broad ray was pouring
through the covered road from the far end, cleaving the massy pavilions
with an arcade of light, whilst fiery beams rained down upon the far
expanse of roofs. The huge iron framework grew less distinct, assumed a
bluey hue, became nothing but a shadowy silhouette outlined against the
flaming flare of the sunrise. But up above a pane of glass took fire,
drops of light trickled down the broad sloping zinc plates to the
gutterings; and then, below, a tumultuous city appeared amidst a haze
of dancing golden dust. The general awakening had spread, from the
first start of the market gardeners snoring in their cloaks, to the
brisk rolling of the food-laden railway drays. And the whole city was
opening its iron gates, the footways were humming, the pavilions
roaring with life. Shouts and cries of all kinds rent the air; it was
as though the strain, which Florent had heard gathering force in the
gloom ever since four in the morning, had now attained its fullest
volume. To the right and left, on all sides indeed, the sharp cries
accompanying the auction sales sounded shrilly like flutes amidst the
sonorous bass roar of the crowd. It was the fish, the butter, the
poultry, and the meat being sold.

The pealing of bells passed through the air, imparting a quiver to the
buzzing of the opening markets. Around Florent the sun was setting the
vegetables aflame. He no longer perceived any of those soft
water-colour tints which had predominated in the pale light of early
morning. The swelling hearts of the lettuces were now gleaming
brightly, the scales of greenery showed forth with wondrous vigour, the
carrots glowed blood-red, the turnips shone as if incandescent in the
triumphant radiance of the sun.

On Florent’s left some waggons were discharging fresh loads of
cabbages. He turned his eyes, and away in the distance saw carts yet
streaming out of the Rue Turbigo. The tide was still and ever rising.
He had felt it about his ankles, then on a level with his stomach, and
now it was threatening to drown him altogether. Blinded and submerged,
his ears buzzing, his stomach overpowered by all that he had seen, he
asked for mercy; and wild grief took possession of him at the thought
of dying there of starvation in the very heart of glutted Paris, amidst
the effulgent awakening of her markets. Big hot tears started from his
eyes.

Walking on, he had now reached one of the larger alleys. Two women, one
short and old, the other tall and withered, passed him, talking
together as they made their way towards the pavilions.

“So you’ve come to do your marketing, Mademoiselle Saget?” said the
tall withered woman.

“Well, yes, Madame Lecœur, if you can give it such a name as marketing.
I’m a lone woman, you know, and live on next to nothing. I should have
liked a small cauliflower, but everything is so dear. How is butter
selling to-day?”

“At thirty-four sous. I have some which is first rate. Will you come
and look at it?”

“Well, I don’t know if I shall want any to-day; I’ve still a little
lard left.”

Making a supreme effort, Florent followed these two women. He
recollected having heard Claude name the old one—Mademoiselle
Saget—when they were in the Rue Pirouette; and he made up his mind to
question her when she should have parted from her tall withered
acquaintance.

“And how’s your niece?” Mademoiselle Saget now asked.

“Oh, La Sarriette does as she likes,” Madame Lecœur replied in a bitter
tone. “She’s chosen to set up for herself and her affairs no longer
concern me. When her lovers have beggared her, she needn’t come to me
for any bread.”

“And you were so good to her, too! She ought to do well this year;
fruit is yielding big profits. And your brother-in-law, how is he?”

“Oh, he——”

Madame Lecœur bit her lips, and seemed disinclined to say anything
more.

“Still the same as ever, I suppose?” continued Mademoiselle Saget.
“He’s a very worthy man. Still, I once heard it said that he spent his
money in such a way that—”

“But does anyone know how he spends his money?” interrupted Madame
Lecœur, with much asperity. “He’s a miserly niggard, a scurvy fellow,
that’s what I say! Do you know, mademoiselle, he’d see me die of
starvation rather than lend me five francs! He knows quite well that
there’s nothing to be made out of butter this season, any more than out
of cheese and eggs; whereas he can sell as much poultry as ever he
chooses. But not once, I assure you, not once has he offered to help
me. I am too proud, as you know, to accept any assistance from him;
still it would have pleased me to have had it offered.”

“Ah, by the way, there he is, your brother-in-law!” suddenly exclaimed
Mademoiselle Saget, lowering her voice.

The two women turned and gazed at a man who was crossing the road to
enter the covered way close by.

“I’m in a hurry,” murmured Madame Lecœur. “I left my stall without
anyone to look after it; and, besides, I don’t want to speak to him.”

However, Florent also had mechanically turned round and glanced at the
individual referred to. This was a short, squarely-built man, with a
cheery look and grey, close-cut brush-like hair. Under each arm he was
carrying a fat goose, whose head hung down and flapped against his
legs. And then all at once Florent made a gesture of delight.
Forgetting his fatigue, he ran after the man, and, overtaking him,
tapped him on the shoulder.

“Gavard!” he exclaimed.

The other raised his head and stared with surprise at Florent’s tall
black figure, which he did not at first recognise. Then all at once:
“What! is it you?” he cried, as if overcome with amazement. “Is it
really you?”

He all but let his geese fall, and seemed unable to master his
surprise. On catching sight, however, of his sister-in-law and
Mademoiselle Saget, who were watching the meeting at a distance, he
began to walk on again.

“Come along; don’t let us stop here,” he said. “There are too many eyes
and tongues about.”

When they were in the covered way they began to chat. Florent related
how he had gone to the Rue Pirouette, at which Gavard seemed much
amused and laughed heartily. Then he told Florent that his brother
Quenu had moved from that street and had reopened his pork shop close
by, in the Rue Rambuteau, just in front of the markets. And afterwards
he was again highly amused to hear that Florent had been wandering
about all that morning with Claude Lantier, an odd kind of fish, who,
strangely enough, said he, was Madame Quenu’s nephew. Thus chatting,
Gavard was on the point of taking Florent straight to the pork shop,
but, on hearing that he had returned to France with false papers, he
suddenly assumed all sorts of solemn and mysterious airs, and insisted
upon walking some fifteen paces in front of him, to avoid attracting
attention. After passing through the poultry pavilion, where he hung
his geese up in his stall, he began to cross the Rue Rambuteau, still
followed by Florent; and then, halting in the middle of the road, he
glanced significantly towards a large and well-appointed pork shop.

The sun was obliquely enfilading the Rue Rambuteau, lighting up the
fronts of the houses, in the midst of which the Rue Pirouette formed a
dark gap. At the other end the great pile of Saint Eustache glittered
brightly in the sunlight like some huge reliquary. And right through
the crowd, from the distant crossway, an army of street-sweepers was
advancing in file down the road, the brooms swishing rhythmically,
while scavengers provided with forks pitched the collected refuse into
tumbrels, which at intervals of a score of paces halted with a noise
like the chattering of broken pots. However, all Florent’s attention
was concentrated on the pork shop, open and radiant in the rising sun.

It stood very near the corner of the Rue Pirouette and provided quite a
feast for the eyes. Its aspect was bright and smiling, touches of
brilliant colour showing conspicuously amidst all the snowy marble. The
sign board, on which the name of QUENU-GRADELLE glittered in fat gilt
letters encircled by leaves and branches painted on a soft-hued
background, was protected by a sheet of glass. On two panels, one on
each side of the shop-front, and both, like the board above, covered
with glass, were paintings representing various chubby little cupids
playing amidst boars’ heads, pork chops and strings of sausages; and
these latter still-life subjects, embellished with scrolls and bows,
had been painted in such soft tones that the uncooked pork which they
represented had the pinkiness of raspberry jam. Within this pleasing
framework arose the window display, arranged upon a bed of fine
blue-paper shavings. Here and there fern-leaves, tastefully disposed,
changed the plates which they encircled into bouquets fringed with
foliage. There was a wealth of rich, luscious, melting things. Down
below, quite close to the window, jars of preserved sausage-meat were
interspersed with pots of mustard. Above these were some small, plump,
boned hams. Golden with their dressings of toasted bread-crumbs, and
adorned at the knuckles with green rosettes. Next came the larger
dishes, some containing preserved Strasburg tongues, enclosed in
bladders coloured a bright red and varnished, so that they looked quite
sanguineous beside the pale sausages and trotters; then there were
black-puddings coiled like harmless snakes, healthy looking
chitterlings piled up two by two; Lyons sausages in little silver copes
that made them look like choristers; hot pies, with little banner-like
tickets stuck in them; big hams, and great glazed joints of veal and
pork, whose jelly was as limpid as sugar-candy. In the rear were other
dishes and earthen pans in which meat, minced and sliced, slumbered
beneath lakes of melted fat. And betwixt the various plates and dishes,
jars and bottle of sauce, cullis, stock and preserved truffles, pans of
_foie gras_ and boxes of sardines and tunny-fish were strewn over the
bed of paper shavings. A box of creamy cheeses, and one of edible
snails, the apertures of whose shells were dressed with butter and
parsley, had been placed carelessly at either corner. Finally, from a
bar overhead strings of sausages and saveloys of various sizes hung
down symmetrically like cords and tassels; while in the rear fragments
of intestinal membranes showed like lacework, like some _guipure_ of
white flesh. And on the highest tier in this sanctuary of gluttony,
amidst the membranes and between two bouquets of purple gladioli, the
window stand was crowned by a small square aquarium, ornamented with
rock-work, and containing a couple of gold-fish, which were continually
swimming round it.

Florent’s whole body thrilled at the sight. Then he perceived a woman
standing in the sunlight at the door of the shop. With her prosperous,
happy look in the midst of all those inviting things she added to the
cherry aspect of the place. She was a fine woman and quite blocked the
doorway. Still, she was not over stout, but simply buxom, with the full
ripeness of her thirty years. She had only just risen, yet her glossy
hair was already brushed smooth and arranged in little flat bands over
her temples, giving her an appearance of extreme neatness. She had the
fine skin, the pinky-white complexion common to those whose life is
spent in an atmosphere of raw meat and fat. There was a touch of
gravity about her demeanour, her movements were calm and slow; what
mirth or pleasure she felt she expressed by her eyes, her lips
retaining all their seriousness. A collar of starched linen encircled
her neck, white sleevelets reached to her elbows, and a white apron
fell even over the tips of her shoes, so that you saw but little of her
black cashmere dress, which clung tightly to her well-rounded shoulders
and swelling bosom. The sun rays poured hotly upon all the whiteness
she displayed. However, although her bluish-black hair, her rosy face,
and bright sleeves and apron were steeped in the glow of light, she
never once blinked, but enjoyed her morning bath of sunshine with
blissful tranquillity, her soft eyes smiling the while at the flow and
riot of the markets. She had the appearance of a very worthy woman.

“That is your brother’s wife, your sister-in-law, Lisa,” Gavard said to
Florent.

He had saluted her with a slight inclination of the head. Then he
darted along the house passage, continuing to take the most minute
precautions, and unwilling to let Florent enter the premises through
the shop, though there was no one there. It was evident that he felt
great pleasure in dabbling in what he considered to be a compromising
business.

“Wait here,” he said, “while I go to see whether your brother is alone.
You can come in when I clap my hands.”

Thereupon he opened a door at the end of the passage. But as soon as
Florent heard his brother’s voice behind it, he sprang inside at a
bound. Quenu, who was much attached to him, threw his arms round his
neck, and they kissed each other like children.

“Ah! dash it all! Is it really you, my dear fellow?” stammered the pork
butcher. “I never expected to see you again. I felt sure you were dead!
Why, only yesterday I was saying to Lisa, ‘That poor fellow, Florent!’”

However, he stopped short, and popping his head into the shop, called
out, “Lisa! Lisa!” Then turning towards a little girl who had crept
into a corner, he added, “Pauline, go and find your mother.”

The little one did not stir, however. She was an extremely fine child,
five years of age, with a plump chubby face, bearing a strong
resemblance to that of the pork butcher’s wife. In her arms she was
holding a huge yellow cat, which had cheerfully surrendered itself to
her embrace, with its legs dangling downwards; and she now squeezed it
tightly with her little arms, as if she were afraid that yonder
shabby-looking gentleman might rob her of it.

Lisa, however, leisurely made her appearance.

“Here is my brother Florent!” exclaimed Quenu.

Lisa addressed him as “Monsieur,” and gave him a kindly welcome. She
scanned him quietly from head to foot, without evincing any
disagreeable surprise. Merely a faint pout appeared for a moment on her
lips. Then, standing by, she began to smile at her husband’s
demonstrations of affection. Quenu, however, at last recovered his
calmness, and noticing Florent’s fleshless, poverty-stricken
appearance, exclaimed: “Ah, my poor fellow, you haven’t improved in
your looks since you were over yonder. For my part, I’ve grown fat; but
what would you have!”

He had indeed grown fat, too fat for his thirty years. He seemed to be
bursting through his shirt and apron, through all the snowy-white linen
in which he was swathed like a huge doll. With advancing years his
clean-shaven face had become elongated, assuming a faint resemblance to
the snout of one of those pigs amidst whose flesh his hands worked and
lived the whole day through. Florent scarcely recognised him. He had
now seated himself, and his glance turned from his brother to handsome
Lisa and little Pauline. They were all brimful of health, squarely
built, sleek, in prime condition; and in their turn they looked at
Florent with the uneasy astonishment which corpulent people feel at the
sight of a scraggy person. The very cat, whose skin was distended by
fat, dilated its yellow eyes and scrutinised him with an air of
distrust.

“You’ll wait till we have breakfast, won’t you?” asked Quenu. “We have
it early, at ten o’clock.”

A penetrating odour of cookery pervaded the place; and Florent looked
back upon the terrible night which he had just spent, his arrival
amongst the vegetables, his agony in the midst of the markets, the
endless avalanches of food from which he had just escaped. And then in
a low tone and with a gentle smile he responded:

“No; I’m really very hungry, you see.”




CHAPTER II


Florent had just begun to study law in Paris when his mother died. She
lived at Le Vigan, in the department of the Gard, and had taken for her
second husband one Quenu, a native of Yvetot in Normandy, whom some
sub-prefect had transplanted to the south and then forgotten there. He
had remained in employment at the sub-prefecture, finding the country
charming, the wine good, and the women very amiable. Three years after
his marriage he had been carried off by a bad attack of indigestion,
leaving as sole legacy to his wife a sturdy boy who resembled him. It
was only with very great difficulty that the widow could pay the
college fees of Florent, her elder son, the issue of her first
marriage. He was a very gentle youth, devoted to his studies, and
constantly won the chief prizes at school. It was upon him that his
mother lavished all her affection and based all her hopes. Perhaps, in
bestowing so much love on this slim pale youth, she was giving evidence
of her preference for her first husband, a tender-hearted, caressing
Provençal, who had loved her devotedly. Quenu, whose good humour and
amiability had at first attracted her, had perhaps displayed too much
self-satisfaction, and shown too plainly that he looked upon himself as
the main source of happiness. At all events she formed the opinion that
her younger son—and in southern families younger sons are still often
sacrificed—would never do any good; so she contented herself with
sending him to a school kept by a neighbouring old maid, where the lad
learned nothing but how to idle his time away. The two brothers grew up
far apart from each other, as though they were strangers.

When Florent arrived at Le Vigan his mother was already buried. She had
insisted upon having her illness concealed from him till the very last
moment, for fear of disturbing his studies. Thus he found little Quenu,
who was then twelve years old, sitting and sobbing alone on a table in
the middle of the kitchen. A furniture dealer, a neighbour, gave him
particulars of his mother’s last hours. She had reached the end of her
resources, had killed herself by the hard work which she had undertaken
to earn sufficient money that her elder son might continue his legal
studies. To her modest trade in ribbons, the profits of which were but
small, she had been obliged to add other occupations, which kept her up
very late at night. Her one idea of seeing Florent established as an
advocate, holding a good position in the town, had gradually caused her
to become hard and miserly, without pity for either herself or others.
Little Quenu was allowed to wander about in ragged breeches, and in
blouses from which the sleeves were falling away. He never dared to
serve himself at table, but waited till he received his allowance of
bread from his mother’s hands. She gave herself equally thin slices,
and it was to the effects of this regimen that she had succumbed, in
deep despair at having failed to accomplish her self-allotted task.

This story made a most painful impression upon Florent’s tender nature,
and his sobs wellnigh choked him. He took his little half brother in
his arms, held him to his breast, and kissed him as though to restore
to him the love of which he had unwittingly deprived him. Then he
looked at the lad’s gaping shoes, torn sleeves, and dirty hands, at all
the manifest signs of wretchedness and neglect. And he told him that he
would take him away, and that they would both live happily together.
The next day, when he began to inquire into affairs, he felt afraid
that he would not be able to keep sufficient money to pay for the
journey back to Paris. However, he was determined to leave Le Vigan at
any cost. He was fortunately able to sell the little ribbon business,
and this enabled him to discharge his mother’s debts, for despite her
strictness in money matters she had gradually run up bills. Then, as
there was nothing left, his mother’s neighbour, the furniture dealer,
offered him five hundred francs for her chattels and stock of linen. It
was a very good bargain for the dealer, but the young man thanked him
with tears in his eyes. He bought his brother some new clothes, and
took him away that same evening.

On his return to Paris he gave up all thought of continuing to attend
the Law School, and postponed every ambitious project. He obtained a
few pupils, and established himself with little Quenu in the Rue Royer
Collard, at the corner of the Rue Saint Jacques, in a big room which he
furnished with two iron bedsteads, a wardrobe, a table, and four
chairs. He now had a child to look after, and this assumed paternity
was very pleasing to him. During the earlier days he attempted to give
the lad some lessons when he returned home in the evening, but Quenu
was an unwilling pupil. He was dull of understanding, and refused to
learn, bursting into tears and regretfully recalling the time when his
mother had allowed him to run wild in the streets. Florent thereupon
stopped his lessons in despair, and to console the lad promised him a
holiday of indefinite length. As an excuse for his own weakness he
repeated that he had not brought his brother to Paris to distress him.
To see him grow up in happiness became his chief desire. He quite
worshipped the boy, was charmed with his merry laughter, and felt
infinite joy in seeing him about him, healthy and vigorous, and without
a care. Florent for his part remained very slim and lean in his
threadbare coat, and his face began to turn yellow amidst all the
drudgery and worry of teaching; but Quenu grew up plump and merry, a
little dense, indeed, and scarce able to read or write, but endowed
with high spirits which nothing could ruffle, and which filled the big
gloomy room in the Rue Royer Collard with gaiety.

Years, meantime, passed by. Florent, who had inherited all his mother’s
spirit of devotion, kept Quenu at home as though he were a big, idle
girl. He did not even suffer him to perform any petty domestic duties,
but always went to buy the provisions himself, and attended to the
cooking and other necessary matters. This kept him, he said, from
indulging in his own bad thoughts. He was given to gloominess, and
fancied that he was disposed to evil. When he returned home in the
evening, splashed with mud, and his head bowed by the annoyances to
which other people’s children had subjected him, his heart melted
beneath the embrace of the sturdy lad whom he found spinning his top on
the tiled flooring of the big room. Quenu laughed at his brother’s
clumsiness in making omelettes, and at the serious fashion in which he
prepared the soup-beef and vegetables. When the lamp was extinguished,
and Florent lay in bed, he sometimes gave way to feelings of sadness.
He longed to resume his legal studies, and strove to map out his duties
in such wise as to secure time to follow the programme of the faculty.
He succeeded in doing this, and was then perfectly happy. But a slight
attack of fever, which confined him to his room for a week, made such a
hole in his purse, and caused him so much alarm, that he abandoned all
idea of completing his studies. The boy was now getting a big fellow,
and Florent took a post as teacher in a school in the Rue de
l’Estrapade, at a salary of eighteen hundred francs per annum. This
seemed like a fortune to him. By dint of economy he hoped to be able to
amass a sum of money which would set Quenu going in the world. When the
lad reached his eighteenth year Florent still treated him as though he
were a daughter for whom a dowry must be provided.

However, during his brother’s brief illness Quenu himself had made
certain reflections. One morning he proclaimed his desire to work,
saying that he was now old enough to earn his own living. Florent was
deeply touched at this. Just opposite, on the other side of the street,
lived a working watchmaker whom Quenu, through the curtainless window,
could see leaning over a little table, manipulating all sorts of
delicate things, and patiently gazing at them through a magnifying
glass all day long. The lad was much attracted by the sight, and
declared that he had a taste for watchmaking. At the end of a
fortnight, however, he became restless, and began to cry like a child
of ten, complaining that the work was too complicated, and that he
would never be able to understand all the silly little things that
enter into the construction of a watch.

His next whim was to be a locksmith; but this calling he found too
fatiguing. In a couple of years he tried more than ten different
trades. Florent opined that he acted rightly, that it was wrong to take
up a calling one did not like. However, Quenu’s fine eagerness to work
for his living strained the resources of the little establishment very
seriously. Since he had begun flitting from one workshop to another
there had been a constant succession of fresh expenses; money had gone
in new clothes, in meals taken away from home, and in the payment of
footings among fellow workmen. Florent’s salary of eighteen hundred
francs was no longer sufficient, and he was obliged to take a couple of
pupils in the evenings. For eight years he had continued to wear the
same old coat.

However, the two brothers had made a friend. One side of the house in
which they lived overlooked the Rue Saint Jacques, where there was a
large poultry-roasting establishment[*] kept by a worthy man called
Gavard, whose wife was dying from consumption amidst an atmosphere
redolent of plump fowls. When Florent returned home too late to cook a
scrap of meat, he was in the habit of laying out a dozen sous or so on
a small portion of turkey or goose at this shop. Such days were feast
days. Gavard in time grew interested in this tall, scraggy customer,
learned his history, and invited Quenu into his shop. Before long the
young fellow was constantly to be found there. As soon as his brother
left the house he came downstairs and installed himself at the rear of
the roasting shop, quite enraptured with the four huge spits which
turned with a gentle sound in front of the tall bright flames.

[*] These rotisseries, now all but extinct, were at one time a
particular feature of the Parisian provision trade. I can myself
recollect several akin to the one described by M. Zola. I suspect that
they largely owed their origin to the form and dimensions of the
ordinary Parisian kitchen stove, which did not enable people to roast
poultry at home in a convenient way. In the old French cuisine,
moreover, roast joints of meat were virtually unknown; roasting was
almost entirely confined to chickens, geese, turkeys, pheasants, etc.;
and among the middle classes people largely bought their poultry
already cooked of the _rotisseur_, or else confided it to him for the
purpose of roasting, in the same way as our poorer classes still send
their joints to the baker’s. Roasting was also long looked upon in
France as a very delicate art. Brillat-Savarin, in his famous
_Physiologie du Gout_, lays down the dictum that “A man may become a
cook, but is born a _rotisseur_.”—Translator.


The broad copper bands of the fireplace glistened brightly, the poultry
steamed, the fat bubbled melodiously in the dripping-pan, and the spits
seemed to talk amongst themselves and to address kindly words to Quenu,
who, with a long ladle, devoutly basted the golden breasts of the fat
geese and turkeys. He would stay there for hours, quite crimson in the
dancing glow of the flames, and laughing vaguely, with a somewhat
stupid expression, at the birds roasting in front of him. Indeed, he
did not awake from this kind of trance until the geese and turkeys were
unspitted. They were placed on dishes, the spits emerged from their
carcasses smoking hot, and a rich gravy flowed from either end and
filled the shop with a penetrating odour. Then the lad, who, standing
up, had eagerly followed every phase of the dishing, would clap his
hands and begin to talk to the birds, telling them that they were very
nice, and would be eaten up, and that the cats would have nothing but
their bones. And he would give a start of delight whenever Gavard
handed him a slice of bread, which he forthwith put into the
dripping-pan that it might soak and toast there for half an hour.

It was in this shop, no doubt, that Quenu’s love of cookery took its
birth. Later on, when he had tried all sorts of crafts, he returned, as
though driven by fate, to the spits and the poultry and the savoury
gravy which induces one to lick one’s fingers. At first he was afraid
of vexing his brother, who was a small eater and spoke of good fare
with the disdain of a man who is ignorant of it; but afterwards, on
seeing that Florent listened to him when he explained the preparation
of some very elaborate dish, he confessed his desires and presently
found a situation at a large restaurant. From that time forward the
life of the two brothers was settled. They continued to live in the
room in the Rue Royer Collard, whither they returned every evening; the
one glowing and radiant from his hot fire, the other with the depressed
countenance of a shabby, impecunious teacher. Florent still wore his
old black coat, as he sat absorbed in correcting his pupils’ exercises;
while Quenu, to put himself more at ease, donned his white apron, cap,
and jacket, and, flitting about in front of the stove, amused himself
by baking some dainty in the oven. Sometimes they smiled at seeing
themselves thus attired, the one all in black, the other all in white.
These different garbs, one bright and the other sombre, seemed to make
the big room half gay and half mournful. Never, however, was there so
much harmony in a household marked by such dissimilarity. Though the
elder brother grew thinner and thinner, consumed by the ardent
temperament which he had inherited from his Provençal father, and the
younger one waxed fatter and fatter like a true son of Normandy, they
loved each other in the brotherhood they derived from their mother—a
mother who had been all devotion.

They had a relation in Paris, a brother of their mother’s, one
Gradelle, who was in business as a pork butcher in the Rue Pirouette,
near the central markets. He was a fat, hard-hearted, miserly fellow,
and received his nephews as though they were starving paupers the first
time they paid him a visit. They seldom went to see him afterwards. On
his nameday Quenu would take him a bunch of flowers, and receive a
half-franc piece in return for it. Florent’s proud and sensitive nature
suffered keenly when Gradelle scrutinised his shabby clothes with the
anxious, suspicious glance of a miser apprehending a request for a
dinner, or the loan of a five-franc piece. One day, however, it
occurred to Florent in all artlessness to ask his uncle to change a
hundred-franc note for him, and after this the pork butcher showed less
alarm at sight of the lads, as he called them. Still, their friendship
got no further than these infrequent visits.

These years were like a long, sweet, sad dream to Florent. As they
passed he tasted to the full all the bitter joys of self-sacrifice. At
home, in the big room, life was all love and tenderness; but out in the
world, amidst the humiliations inflicted on him by his pupils, and the
rough jostling of the streets, he felt himself yielding to wicked
thoughts. His slain ambitions embittered him. It was long before he
could bring himself to bow to his fate, and accept with equanimity the
painful lot of a poor, plain, commonplace man. At last, to guard
against the temptations of wickedness, he plunged into ideal goodness,
and sought refuge in a self-created sphere of absolute truth and
justice. It was then that he became a republican, entering into the
republican idea even as heart-broken girls enter a convent. And not
finding a republic where sufficient peace and kindliness prevailed to
lull his troubles to sleep, he created one for himself. He took no
pleasure in books. All the blackened paper amidst which he lived spoke
of evil-smelling class-rooms, of pellets of paper chewed by unruly
schoolboys, of long, profitless hours of torture. Besides, books only
suggested to him a spirit of mutiny and pride, whereas it was of peace
and oblivion that he felt most need. To lull and soothe himself with
the ideal imaginings, to dream that he was perfectly happy, and that
all the world would likewise become so, to erect in his brain the
republican city in which he would fain have lived, such now became his
recreation, the task, again and again renewed, of all his leisure
hours. He no longer read any books beyond those which his duties
compelled him to peruse; he preferred to tramp along the Rue Saint
Jacques as far as the outer boulevards, occasionally going yet a
greater distance and returning by the Barriere d’Italie; and all along
the road, with his eyes on the Quartier Mouffetard spread out at his
feet, he would devise reforms of great moral and humanitarian scope,
such as he thought would change that city of suffering into an abode of
bliss. During the turmoil of February 1848, when Paris was stained with
blood he became quite heartbroken, and rushed from one to another of
the public clubs demanding that the blood which had been shed should
find atonement in “the fraternal embrace of all republicans throughout
the world.” He became one of those enthusiastic orators who preached
revolution as a new religion, full of gentleness and salvation. The
terrible days of December 1851, the days of the Coup d’Etat, were
required to wean him from his doctrines of universal love. He was then
without arms; allowed himself to be captured like a sheep, and was
treated as though he were a wolf. He awoke from his sermon on universal
brotherhood to find himself starving on the cold stones of a casemate
at Bicêtre.

Quenu, when two and twenty, was distressed with anguish when his
brother did not return home. On the following day he went to seek his
corpse at the cemetery of Montmartre, where the bodies of those shot
down on the boulevards had been laid out in a line and covered with
straw, from beneath which only their ghastly heads projected. However,
Quenu’s courage failed him, he was blinded by his tears, and had to
pass twice along the line of corpses before acquiring the certainty
that Florent’s was not among them. At last, at the end of a long and
wretched week, he learned at the Prefecture of Police that his brother
was a prisoner. He was not allowed to see him, and when he pressed the
matter the police threatened to arrest him also. Then he hastened off
to his uncle Gradelle, whom he looked upon as a person of importance,
hoping that he might be able to enlist his influence in Florent’s
behalf. But Gradelle waxed wrathful, declared that Florent deserved his
fate, that he ought to have known better than to have mixed himself up
with those rascally republicans. And he even added that Florent was
destined to turn out badly, that it was written on his face.

Quenu wept copiously and remained there, almost choked by his sobs. His
uncle, a little ashamed of his harshness, and feeling that he ought to
do something for him, offered to receive him into his house. He wanted
an assistant, and knew that his nephew was a good cook. Quenu was so
much alarmed by the mere thought of going back to live alone in the big
room in the Rue Royer Collard, that then and there he accepted
Gradelle’s offer. That same night he slept in his uncle’s house, in a
dark hole of a garret just under the room, where there was scarcely
space for him to lie at full length. However, he was less wretched
there than he would have been opposite his brother’s empty couch.

He succeeded at length in obtaining permission to see Florent; but on
his return from Bicêtre he was obliged to take to his bed. For nearly
three weeks he lay fever-stricken, in a stupefied, comatose state.
Gradelle meantime called down all sorts of maledictions on his
republican nephew; and one morning, when he heard of Florent’s
departure for Cayenne, he went upstairs, tapped Quenu on the hands,
awoke him, and bluntly told him the news, thereby bringing about such a
reaction that on the following day the young man was up and about
again. His grief wore itself out, and his soft flabby flesh seemed to
absorb his tears. A month later he laughed again, and then grew vexed
and unhappy with himself for having been merry; but his natural
light-heartedness soon gained the mastery, and he laughed afresh in
unconscious happiness.

He now learned his uncle’s business, from which he derived even more
enjoyment than from cookery. Gradelle told him, however, that he must
not neglect his pots and pans, that it was rare to find a pork butcher
who was also a good cook, and that he had been lucky in serving in a
restaurant before coming to the shop. Gradelle, moreover, made full use
of his nephew’s acquirements, employed him to cook the dinners sent out
to certain customers, and placed all the broiling, and the preparation
of pork chops garnished with gherkins in his special charge. As the
young man was of real service to him, he grew fond of him after his own
fashion, and would nip his plump arms when he was in a good humour.
Gradelle had sold the scanty furniture of the room in the Rue Royer
Collard and retained possession of the proceeds—some forty francs or
so—in order, said he, to prevent the foolish lad, Quenu, from making
ducks and drakes of the cash. After a time, however, he allowed his
nephew six francs a month a pocket-money.

Quenu now became quite happy, in spite of the emptiness of his purse
and the harshness with which he was occasionally treated. He liked to
have life doled out to him; Florent had treated him too much like an
indolent girl. Moreover, he had made a friend at his uncle’s. Gradelle,
when his wife died, had been obliged to engage a girl to attend to the
shop, and had taken care to choose a healthy and attractive one,
knowing that a good-looking girl would set off his viands and help to
tempt custom. Amongst his acquaintances was a widow, living in the Rue
Cuvier, near the Jardin des Plantes, whose deceased husband had been
postmaster at Plassans, the seat of a sub-prefecture in the south of
France. This lady, who lived in a very modest fashion on a small
annuity, had brought with her from Plassans a plump, pretty child, whom
she treated as her own daughter. Lisa, as the young one was called,
attended upon her with much placidity and serenity of disposition.
Somewhat seriously inclined, she looked quite beautiful when she
smiled. Indeed, her great charm came from the exquisite manner in which
she allowed this infrequent smile of hers to escape her. Her eyes then
became most caressing, and her habitual gravity imparted inestimable
value to these sudden, seductive flashes. The old lady had often said
that one of Lisa’s smiles would suffice to lure her to perdition.

When the widow died she left all her savings, amounting to some ten
thousand francs, to her adopted daughter. For a week Lisa lived alone
in the Rue Cuvier; it was there that Gradelle came in search of her. He
had become acquainted with her by often seeing her with her mistress
when the latter called on him in the Rue Pirouette; and at the funeral
she had struck him as having grown so handsome and sturdy that he had
followed the hearse all the way to the cemetery, though he had not
intended to do so. As the coffin was being lowered into the grave, he
reflected what a splendid girl she would be for the counter of a pork
butcher’s shop. He thought the matter over, and finally resolved to
offer her thirty francs a month, with board and lodging. When he made
this proposal, Lisa asked for twenty-four hours to consider it. Then
she arrived one morning with a little bundle of clothes, and her ten
thousand francs concealed in the bosom of her dress. A month later the
whole place belonged to her; she enslaved Gradelle, Quenu, and even the
smallest kitchen-boy. For his part, Quenu would have cut off his
fingers to please her. When she happened to smile, he remained rooted
to the floor, laughing with delight as he gazed at her.

Lisa was the eldest daughter of the Macquarts of Plassans, and her
father was still alive.[*] But she said that he was abroad, and never
wrote to him. Sometimes she just dropped a hint that her mother, now
deceased, had been a hard worker, and that she took after her. She
worked, indeed, very assiduously. However, she sometimes added that the
worthy woman had slaved herself to death in striving to support her
family. Then she would speak of the respective duties of husband and
wife in such a practical though modest fashion as to enchant Quenu. He
assured her that he fully shared her ideas. These were that everyone,
man or woman, ought to work for his or her living, that everyone was
charged with the duty of achieving personal happiness, that great harm
was done by encouraging habits of idleness, and that the presence of so
much misery in the world was greatly due to sloth. This theory of hers
was a sweeping condemnation of drunkenness, of all the legendary
loafing ways of her father Macquart. But, though she did not know it,
there was much of Macquart’s nature in herself. She was merely a
steady, sensible Macquart with a logical desire for comfort, having
grasped the truth of the proverb that as you make your bed so you lie
on it. To sleep in blissful warmth there is no better plan than to
prepare oneself a soft and downy couch; and to the preparation of such
a couch she gave all her time and all her thoughts. When no more than
six years old she had consented to remain quietly on her chair the
whole day through on condition that she should be rewarded with a cake
in the evening.

[*] See M. Zola’s novel, _The Fortune of the Rougons_.—Translator


At Gradelle’s establishment Lisa went on leading the calm, methodical
life which her exquisite smiles illumined. She had not accepted the
pork butcher’s offer at random. She reckoned upon finding a guardian in
him; with the keen scent of those who are born lucky she perhaps
foresaw that the gloomy shop in the Rue Pirouette would bring her the
comfortable future she dreamed of—a life of healthy enjoyment, and work
without fatigue, each hour of which would bring its own reward. She
attended to her counter with the quiet earnestness with which she had
waited upon the postmaster’s widow; and the cleanliness of her aprons
soon became proverbial in the neighbourhood. Uncle Gradelle was so
charmed with this pretty girl that sometimes, as he was stringing his
sausages, he would say to Quenu: “Upon my word, if I weren’t turned
sixty, I think I should be foolish enough to marry her. A wife like
she’d make is worth her weight in gold to a shopkeeper, my lad.”

Quenu himself was growing still fonder of her, though he laughed
merrily one day when a neighbour accused him of being in love with
Lisa. He was not worried with love-sickness. The two were very good
friends, however. In the evening they went up to their bedrooms
together. Lisa slept in a little chamber adjoining the dark hole which
the young man occupied. She had made this room of hers quite bright by
hanging it with muslin curtains. The pair would stand together for a
moment on the landing, holding their candles in their hands, and
chatting as they unlocked their doors. Then, as they closed them, they
said in friendly tones:

“Good night, Mademoiselle Lisa.”

“Good night, Monsieur Quenu.”

As Quenu undressed himself he listened to Lisa making her own
preparations. The partition between the two rooms was very thin.
“There, she is drawing her curtains now,” he would say to himself;
“what can she be doing, I wonder, in front of her chest of drawers? Ah!
she’s sitting down now and taking off her shoes. Now she’s blown her
candle out. Well, good night. I must get to sleep”; and at times, when
he heard her bed creak as she got into it, he would say to himself with
a smile, “Dash it all! Mademoiselle Lisa is no feather.” This idea
seemed to amuse him, and presently he would fall asleep thinking about
the hams and salt pork that he had to prepare the next morning.

This state of affairs went on for a year without causing Lisa a single
blush or Quenu a moment’s embarrassment. When the girl came into the
kitchen in the morning at the busiest moment of the day’s work, they
grasped hands over the dishes of sausage-meat. Sometimes she helped
him, holding the skins with her plump fingers while he filled them with
meat and fat. Sometimes, too, with the tips of their tongues they just
tasted the raw sausage-meat, to see if it was properly seasoned. She
was able to give Quenu some useful hints, for she knew of many
favourite southern recipes, with which he experimented with much
success. He was often aware that she was standing behind his shoulder,
prying into the pans. If he wanted a spoon or a dish, she would hand it
to him. The heat of the fire would bring their blood to their skins;
still, nothing in the world would have induced the young man to cease
stirring the fatty _bouillis_ which were thickening over the fire while
the girl stood gravely by him, discussing the amount of boiling that
was necessary. In the afternoon, when the shop lacked customers, they
quietly chatted together for hours at a time. Lisa sat behind the
counter, leaning back, and knitting in an easy, regular fashion; while
Quenu installed himself on a big oak block, dangling his legs and
tapping his heels against the wood. They got on wonderfully well
together, discussing all sorts of subjects, generally cookery, and then
Uncle Gradelle and the neighbours. Lisa also amused the young man with
stories, just as though he were a child. She knew some very pretty
ones—some miraculous legends, full of lambs and little angels, which
she narrated in a piping voice, with all her wonted seriousness. If a
customer happened to come in, she saved herself the trouble of moving
by asking Quenu to get the required pot of lard or box of snails. And
at eleven o’clock they went slowly up to bed as on the previous night.
As they closed their doors, they calmly repeated the words:

“Good night, Mademoiselle Lisa.”

“Good night, Monsieur Quenu.”

One morning Uncle Gradelle was struck dead by apoplexy while preparing
a galantine. He fell forward, with his face against the chopping-block.
Lisa did not lose her self-possession. She remarked that the dead man
could not be left lying in the middle of the kitchen, and had the body
removed into a little back room where Gradelle had slept. Then she
arranged with the assistants what should be said. It must be given out
that the master had died in his bed; otherwise the whole district would
be disgusted, and the shop would lose its customers. Quenu helped to
carry the dead man away, feeling quite confused, and astonished at
being unable to shed any tears. Presently, however, he and Lisa cried
together. Quenu and his brother Florent were the sole heirs. The
gossips of the neighbourhood credited old Gradelle with the possession
of a considerable fortune. However, not a single crown could be
discovered. Lisa seemed very restless and uneasy. Quenu noticed how
pensive she became, how she kept on looking around her from morning
till night, as though she had lost something. At last she decided to
have a thorough cleaning of the premises, declaring that people were
beginning to talk, that the story of the old man’s death had got about,
and that it was necessary they should make a great show of cleanliness.
One afternoon, after remaining in the cellar for a couple of hours,
whither she herself had gone to wash the salting-tubs, she came up
again, carrying something in her apron. Quenu was just then cutting up
a pig’s fry. She waited till he had finished, talking awhile in an
easy, indifferent fashion. But there was an unusual glitter in her
eyes, and she smiled her most charming smile as she told him that she
wanted to speak to him. She led the way upstairs with seeming
difficulty, impeded by what she had in her apron, which was strained
almost to bursting.

By the time she reached the third floor she found herself short of
breath, and for a moment was obliged to lean against the balustrade.
Quenu, much astonished, followed her into her bedroom without saying a
word. It was the first time she had ever invited him to enter it. She
closed the door, and letting go the corners of her apron, which her
stiffened fingers could no longer hold up, she allowed a stream of gold
and silver coins to flow gently upon her bed. She had discovered Uncle
Gradelle’s treasure at the bottom of a salting-tub. The heap of money
made a deep impression in the softy downy bed.

Lisa and Quenu evinced a quiet delight. They sat down on the edge of
the bed, Lisa at the head and Quenu at the foot, on either side of the
heap of coins, and they counted the money out upon the counterpane, so
as to avoid making any noise. There were forty thousand francs in gold,
and three thousand francs in silver, whilst in a tin box they found
bank notes to the value of forty-two thousand francs. It took them two
hours to count up the treasure. Quenu’s hands trembled slightly, and it
was Lisa who did most of the work.

They arranged the gold on the pillow in little heaps, leaving the
silver in the hollow depression of the counterpane. When they had
ascertained the total amount—eighty-five thousand francs, to them an
enormous sum—they began to chat. And their conversation naturally
turned upon their future, and they spoke of their marriage, although
there had never been any previous mention of love between them. But
this heap of money seemed to loosen their tongues. They had gradually
seated themselves further back on the bed, leaning against the wall,
beneath the white muslin curtains; and as they talked together, their
hands, playing with the heap of silver between them, met, and remained
linked amidst the pile of five-franc pieces. Twilight surprised them
still sitting together. Then, for the first time, Lisa blushed at
finding the young man by her side. For a few moments, indeed, although
not a thought of evil had come to them, they felt much embarrassed.
Then Lisa went to get her own ten thousand francs. Quenu wanted her to
put them with his uncle’s savings. He mixed the two sums together,
saying with a laugh that the money must be married also. Then it was
agreed that Lisa should keep the hoard in her chest of drawers. When
she had locked it up they both quietly went downstairs. They were now
practically husband and wife.

The wedding took place during the following month. The neighbours
considered the match a very natural one, and in every way suitable.
They had vaguely heard the story of the treasure, and Lisa’s honesty
was the subject of endless eulogy. After all, said the gossips, she
might well have kept the money herself, and not have spoken a word to
Quenu about it; if she had spoken, it was out of pure honesty, for no
one had seen her find the hoard. She well deserved, they added, that
Quenu should make her his wife. That Quenu, by the way, was a lucky
fellow; he wasn’t a beauty himself, yet he had secured a beautiful
wife, who had disinterred a fortune for him. Some even went so far as
to whisper that Lisa was a simpleton for having acted as she had done;
but the young woman only smiled when people speaking to her vaguely
alluded to all these things. She and her husband lived on as
previously, in happy placidity and quiet affection. She still assisted
him as before, their hands still met amidst the sausage-meat, she still
glanced over his shoulder into the pots and pans, and still nothing but
the great fire in the kitchen brought the blood to their cheeks.

However, Lisa was a woman of practical common sense, and speedily saw
the folly of allowing eighty-five thousand francs to lie idle in a
chest of drawers. Quenu would have willingly stowed them away again at
the bottom of the salting-tub until he had gained as much more, when
they could have retired from business and have gone to live at
Suresnes, a suburb to which both were partial. Lisa, however, had other
ambitions. The Rue Pirouette did not accord with her ideas of
cleanliness, her craving for fresh air, light, and healthy life. The
shop where Uncle Gradelle had accumulated his fortune, sou by sou, was
a long, dark place, one of those suspicious looking pork butchers’
shops of the old quarters of the city, where the well-worn flagstones
retain a strong odour of meat in spite of constant washings. Now the
young woman longed for one of those bright modern shops, ornamented
like a drawing-room, and fringing the footway of some broad street with
windows of crystalline transparence. She was not actuated by any petty
ambition to play the fine lady behind a stylish counter, but clearly
realised that commerce in its latest development needed elegant
surroundings. Quenu showed much alarm the first time his wife suggested
that they ought to move and spend some of their money in decorating a
new shop. However, Lisa only shrugged her shoulders and smiled at
finding him so timorous.

One evening, when night was falling and the shop had grown dark, Quenu
and Lisa overheard a woman of the neighbourhood talking to a friend
outside their door.

“No, indeed! I’ve given up dealing with them,” said she. “I wouldn’t
buy a bit of black-pudding from them now on any account. They had a
dead man in their kitchen, you know.”

Quenu wept with vexation. The story of Gradelle’s death in the kitchen
was clearly getting about; and his nephew began to blush before his
customers when he saw them sniffing his wares too closely. So, of his
own accord, he spoke to his wife of her proposal to take a new shop.
Lisa, without saying anything, had already been looking out for other
premises, and had found some, admirably situated, only a few yards
away, in the Rue Rambuteau. The immediate neighbourhood of the central
markets, which were being opened just opposite, would triple their
business, and make their shop known all over Paris.

Quenu allowed himself to be drawn into a lavish expenditure of money;
he laid out over thirty thousand francs in marble, glass, and gilding.
Lisa spent hours with the workmen, giving her views about the slightest
details. When she was at last installed behind the counter, customers
arrived in a perfect procession, merely for the sake of examining the
shop. The inside walls were lined from top to bottom with white marble.
The ceiling was covered with a huge square mirror, framed by a broad
gilded cornice, richly ornamented, whilst from the centre hung a
crystal chandelier with four branches. And behind the counter, and on
the left, and at the far end of the shop were other mirrors, fitted
between the marble panels and looking like doors opening into an
infinite series of brightly lighted halls, where all sorts of
appetising edibles were displayed. The huge counter on the right hand
was considered a very fine piece of work. At intervals along the front
were lozenge-shaped panels of pinky marble. The flooring was of tiles,
alternately white and pink, with a deep red fretting as border. The
whole neighbourhood was proud of the shop, and no one again thought of
referring to the kitchen in the Rue Pirouette, where a man had died.
For quite a month women stopped short on the footway to look at Lisa
between the saveloys and bladders in the window. Her white and pink
flesh excited as much admiration as the marbles. She seemed to be the
soul, the living light, the healthy, sturdy idol of the pork trade; and
thenceforth one and all baptised her “Lisa the beauty.”

To the right of the shop was the dining-room, a neat looking apartment
containing a sideboard, a table, and several cane-seated chairs of
light oak. The matting on the floor, the wallpaper of a soft yellow
tint, the oil-cloth table-cover, coloured to imitate oak, gave the room
a somewhat cold appearance, which was relieved only by the glitter of a
brass hanging lamp, suspended from the ceiling, and spreading its big
shade of transparent porcelain over the table. One of the dining-room
doors opened into the huge square kitchen, at the end of which was a
small paved courtyard, serving for the storage of lumber—tubs, barrels
and pans, and all kinds of utensils not in use. To the left of the
water-tap, alongside the gutter which carried off the greasy water,
stood pots of faded flowers, removed from the shop window, and slowly
dying.

Business was excellent. Quenu, who had been much alarmed by the initial
outlay, now regarded his wife with something like respect, and told his
friends that she had “a wonderful head.” At the end of five years they
had nearly eighty thousand francs invested in the State funds. Lisa
would say that they were not ambitious, that they had no desire to pile
up money too quickly, or else she would have enabled her husband to
gain hundreds and thousands of francs by prompting him to embark in the
wholesale pig trade. But they were still young, and had plenty of time
before them; besides, they didn’t care about a rough, scrambling
business, but preferred to work at their ease, and enjoy life, instead
of wearing themselves out with endless anxieties.

“For instance,” Lisa would add in her expansive moments, “I have, you
know, a cousin in Paris. I never see him, as the two families have
fallen out. He has taken the name of Saccard,[*] on account of certain
matters which he wants to be forgotten. Well, this cousin of mine, I’m
told, makes millions and millions of francs; but he gets no enjoyment
out of life. He’s always in a state of feverish excitement, always
rushing hither and thither, up to his neck in all sorts of worrying
business. Well, it’s impossible, isn’t it, for such a man to eat his
dinner peaceably in the evening? We, at any rate, can take our meals
comfortably, and make sure of what we eat, and we are not harassed by
worries as he is. The only reason why people should care for money is
that money’s wanted for one to live. People like comfort; that’s
natural. But as for making money simply for the sake of making it, and
giving yourself far more trouble and anxiety to gain it than you can
ever get pleasure from it when it’s gained, why, as for me, I’d rather
sit still and cross my arms. And besides, I should like to see all
those millions of my cousin’s. I can’t say that I altogether believe in
them. I caught sight of him the other day in his carriage. He was quite
yellow, and looked ever so sly. A man who’s making money doesn’t have
that kind of expression. But it’s his business, and not mine. For our
part, we prefer to make merely a hundred sous at a time, and to get a
hundred sous’ worth of enjoyment out of them.”

[*] See M. Zola’s novel, _Money_.


The household was undoubtedly thriving. A daughter had been born to the
young couple during their first year of wedlock, and all three of them
looked blooming. The business went on prosperously, without any
laborious fatigue, just as Lisa desired. She had carefully kept free of
any possible source of trouble or anxiety, and the days went by in an
atmosphere of peaceful, unctuous prosperity. Their home was a nook of
sensible happiness—a comfortable manger, so to speak, where father,
mother, and daughter could grow sleek and fat. It was only Quenu who
occasionally felt sad, through thinking of his brother Florent. Up to
the year 1856 he had received letters from him at long intervals. Then
no more came, and he had learned from a newspaper that three convicts
having attempted to escape from the Île du Diable, had been drowned
before they were able to reach the mainland. He had made inquiries at
the Prefecture of Police, but had not learnt anything definite; it
seemed probable that his brother was dead. However, he did not lose all
hope, though months passed without any tidings. Florent, in the
meantime, was wandering about Dutch Guiana, and refrained from writing
home as he was ever in hope of being able to return to France. Quenu at
last began to mourn for him as one mourns for those whom one has been
unable to bid farewell. Lisa had never known Florent, but she spoke
very kindly whenever she saw her husband give way to his sorrow; and
she evinced no impatience when for the hundredth time or so he began to
relate stories of his early days, of his life in the big room in the
Rue Royer Collard, the thirty-six trades which he had taken up one
after another, and the dainties which he had cooked at the stove,
dressed all in white, while Florent was dressed all in black. To such
talk as this, indeed, she listened placidly, with a complacency which
never wearied.

It was into the midst of all this happiness, ripening after careful
culture, that Florent dropped one September morning just as Lisa was
taking her matutinal bath of sunshine, and Quenu, with his eyes still
heavy with sleep, was lazily applying his fingers to the congealed fat
left in the pans from the previous evening. Florent’s arrival caused a
great commotion. Gavard advised them to conceal the “outlaw,” as he
somewhat pompously called Florent. Lisa, who looked pale, and more
serious than was her wont, at last took him to the fifth floor, where
she gave him the room belonging to the girl who assisted her in the
shop. Quenu had cut some slices of bread and ham, but Florent was
scarcely able to eat. He was overcome by dizziness and nausea, and went
to bed, where he remained for five days in a state of delirium, the
outcome of an attack of brain-fever, which fortunately received
energetic treatment. When he recovered consciousness he perceived Lisa
sitting by his bedside, silently stirring some cooling drink in a cup.
As he tried to thank her, she told him that he must keep perfectly
quiet, and that they could talk together later on. At the end of
another three days Florent was on his feet again. Then one morning
Quenu went up to tell him that Lisa awaited them in her room on the
first floor.

Quenu and his wife there occupied a suite of three rooms and a
dressing-room. You first passed through an antechamber, containing
nothing but chairs, and then a small sitting-room, whose furniture,
shrouded in white covers, slumbered in the gloom cast by the Venetian
shutters, which were always kept closed so as to prevent the light blue
of the upholstery from fading. Then came the bedroom, the only one of
the three which was really used. It was very comfortably furnished in
mahogany. The bed, bulky and drowsy of aspect in the depths of the damp
alcove, was really wonderful, with its four mattresses, its four
pillows, its layers of blankets, and its corpulent _édredon_. It was
evidently a bed intended for slumber. A mirrored wardrobe, a washstand
with drawers, a small central table with a worked cover, and several
chairs whose seats were protected by squares of lace, gave the room an
aspect of plain but substantial middle-class luxury. On the left-hand
wall, on either side of the mantelpiece, which was ornamented with some
landscape-painted vases mounted on bronze stands, and a gilt timepiece
on which a figure of Gutenberg, also gilt, stood in an attitude of deep
thought, hung portraits in oils of Quenu and Lisa, in ornate oval
frames. Quenu had a smiling face, while Lisa wore an air of grave
propriety; and both were dressed in black and depicted in flattering
fashion, their features idealised, their skins wondrously smooth, their
complexions soft and pinky. A carpet, in the Wilton style, with a
complicated pattern of roses mingling with stars, concealed the
flooring; while in front of the bed was a fluffy mat, made out of long
pieces of curly wool, a work of patience at which Lisa herself had
toiled while seated behind her counter. But the most striking object of
all in the midst of this array of new furniture was a great square,
thick-set secrétaire, which had been re-polished in vain, for the
cracks and notches in the marble top and the scratches on the old
mahogany front, quite black with age, still showed plainly. Lisa had
desired to retain this piece of furniture, however, as Uncle Gradelle
had used it for more than forty years. It would bring them good luck,
she said. It’s metal fastenings were truly something terrible, it’s
lock was like that of a prison gate, and it was so heavy that it could
scarcely be moved.

When Florent and Quenu entered the room they found Lisa seated at the
lowered desk of the secrétaire, writing and putting down figures in a
big, round, and very legible hand. She signed to them not to disturb
her, and the two men sat down. Florent looked round the room, and
notably at the two portraits, the bed and the timepiece, with an air of
surprise.

“There!” at last exclaimed Lisa, after having carefully verified a
whole page of calculations. “Listen to me now; we have an account to
render to you, my dear Florent.”

It was the first time that she had so addressed him. However, taking up
the page of figures, she continued: “Your Uncle Gradelle died without
leaving a will. Consequently you and your brother are his sole heirs.
We now have to hand your share over to you.”

“But I do not ask you for anything!” exclaimed Florent, “I don’t wish
for anything!”

Quenu had apparently been in ignorance of his wife’s intentions. He
turned rather pale and looked at her with an expression of displeasure.
Of course, he certainly loved his brother dearly; but there was no
occasion to hurl his uncle’s money at him in this way. There would have
been plenty of time to go into the matter later on.

“I know very well, my dear Florent,” continued Lisa, “that you did not
come back with the intention of claiming from us what belongs to you;
but business is business, you know, and we had better get things
settled at once. Your uncle’s savings amounted to eighty-five thousand
francs. I have therefore put down forty-two thousand five hundred to
your credit. See!”

She showed him the figures on the sheet of paper.

“It is unfortunately not so easy to value the shop, plant,
stock-in-trade, and goodwill. I have only been able to put down
approximate amounts, but I don’t think I have underestimated anything.
Well, the total valuation which I have made comes to fifteen thousand
three hundred and ten francs; your half of which is seven thousand six
hundred and fifty-five francs, so that your share amounts, in all, to
fifty thousand one hundred and fifty-five francs. Please verify it for
yourself, will you?”

She had called out the figures in a clear, distinct voice, and she now
handed the paper to Florent, who was obliged to take it.

“But the old man’s business was certainly never worth fifteen thousand
francs!” cried Quenu. “Why, I wouldn’t have given ten thousand for it!”

He had ended by getting quite angry with his wife. Really, it was
absurd to carry honesty to such a point as that! Had Florent said one
word about the business? No, indeed, he had declared that he didn’t
wish for anything.

“The business was worth fifteen thousand three hundred and ten francs,”
Lisa re-asserted, calmly. “You will agree with me, my dear Florent,
that it is quite unnecessary to bring a lawyer into our affairs. It is
for us to arrange the division between ourselves, since you have now
turned up again. I naturally thought of this as soon as you arrived;
and, while you were in bed with the fever, I did my best to draw up
this little inventory. It contains, as you see, a fairly complete
statement of everything. I have been through our old books, and have
called up my memory to help me. Read it aloud, and I will give you any
additional information you may want.”

Florent ended by smiling. He was touched by this easy and, as it were,
natural display of probity. Placing the sheet of figures on the young
woman’s knee, he took hold of her hand and said, “I am very glad, my
dear Lisa, to hear that you are prosperous, but I will not take your
money. The heritage belongs to you and my brother, who took care of my
uncle up to the last. I don’t require anything, and I don’t intend to
hamper you in carrying on your business.”

Lisa insisted, and even showed some vexation, while Quenu gnawed his
thumbs in silence to restrain himself.

“Ah!” resumed Florent with a laugh, “if Uncle Gradelle could hear you,
I think he’d come back and take the money away again. I was never a
favourite of his, you know.”

“Well, no,” muttered Quenu, no longer able to keep still, “he certainly
wasn’t over fond of you.”

Lisa, however, still pressed the matter. She did not like to have money
in her secrétaire that did not belong to her; it would worry her, said
she; the thought of it would disturb her peace. Thereupon Florent,
still in a joking way, proposed to invest his share in the business.
Moreover, said he, he did not intend to refuse their help; he would, no
doubt, be unable to find employment all at once; and then, too, he
would need a complete outfit, for he was scarcely presentable.

“Of course,” cried Quenu, “you will board and lodge with us, and we
will buy you all that you want. That’s understood. You know very well
that we are not likely to leave you in the streets, I hope!”

He was quite moved now, and even felt a trifle ashamed of the alarm he
had experienced at the thought of having to hand over a large amount of
money all at once. He began to joke, and told his brother that he would
undertake to fatten him. Florent gently shook his hand; while Lisa
folded up the sheet of figures and put it away in a drawer of the
secrétaire.

“You are wrong,” she said by way of conclusion. “I have done what I was
bound to do. Now it shall be as you wish. But, for my part, I should
never have had a moment’s peace if I had not put things before you. Bad
thoughts would quite upset me.”

They then began to speak of another matter. It would be necessary to
give some reason for Florent’s presence, and at the same time avoid
exciting the suspicion of the police. He told them that in order to
return to France he had availed himself of the papers of a poor fellow
who had died in his arms at Surinam from yellow fever. By a singular
coincidence this young fellow’s Christian name was Florent.

Florent Laquerriere, to give him his name in full, had left but one
relation in Paris, a female cousin, and had been informed of her death
while in America. Nothing could therefore be easier than for Quenu’s
half brother to pass himself off as the man who had died at Surinam.
Lisa offered to take upon herself the part of the female cousin. They
then agreed to relate that their cousin Florent had returned from
abroad, where he had failed in his attempts to make a fortune, and that
they, the Quenu-Gradelles, as they were called in the neighbourhood,
had received him into their house until he could find suitable
employment. When this was all settled, Quenu insisted upon his brother
making a thorough inspection of the rooms, and would not spare him the
examination of a single stool. Whilst they were in the bare looking
chamber containing nothing but chairs, Lisa pushed open a door, and
showing Florent a small dressing room, told him that the shop girl
should sleep in it, so that he could retain the bedroom on the fifth
floor.

In the evening Florent was arrayed in new clothes from head to foot. He
had insisted upon again having a black coat and black trousers, much
against the advice of Quenu, upon whom black had a depressing effect.
No further attempts were made to conceal his presence in the house, and
Lisa told the story which had been planned to everyone who cared to
hear it. Henceforth Florent spent almost all his time on the premises,
lingering on a chair in the kitchen or leaning against the marble-work
in the shop. At meal times Quenu plied him with food, and evinced
considerable vexation when he proved such a small eater and left half
the contents of his liberally filled plate untouched. Lisa had resumed
her old life, evincing a kindly tolerance of her brother-in-law’s
presence, even in the morning, when he somewhat interfered with the
work. Then she would momentarily forget him, and on suddenly perceiving
his black form in front of her give a slight start of surprise,
followed, however, by one of her sweet smiles, lest he might feel at
all hurt. This skinny man’s disinterestedness had impressed her, and
she regarded him with a feeling akin to respect, mingled with vague
fear. Florent had for his part only felt that there was great affection
around him.

When bedtime came he went upstairs, a little wearied by his lazy day,
with the two young men whom Quenu employed as assistants, and who slept
in attics adjoining his own. Leon, the apprentice, was barely fifteen
years of age. He was a slight, gentle looking lad, addicted to stealing
stray slices of ham and bits of sausages. These he would conceal under
his pillow, eating them during the night without any bread. Several
times at about one o’clock in the morning Florent almost fancied that
Leon was giving a supper-party; for he heard low whispering followed by
a sound of munching jaws and rustling paper. And then a rippling
girlish laugh would break faintly on the deep silence of the sleeping
house like the soft trilling of a flageolet.

The other assistant, Auguste Landois, came from Troyes. Bloated with
unhealthy fat, he had too large a head, and was already bald, although
only twenty-eight years of age. As he went upstairs with Florent on the
first evening, he told him his story in a confused, garrulous way. He
had at first come to Paris merely for the purpose of perfecting himself
in the business, intending to return to Troyes, where his cousin,
Augustine Landois, was waiting for him, and there setting up for
himself as a pork butcher. He and she had had the same godfather and
bore virtually the same Christian name. However, he had grown
ambitious; and now hoped to establish himself in business in Paris by
the aid of the money left him by his mother, which he had deposited
with a notary before leaving Champagne.

Auguste had got so far in his narrative when the fifth floor was
reached; however, he still detained Florent, in order to sound the
praises of Madame Quenu, who had consented to send for Augustine
Landois to replace an assistant who had turned out badly. He himself
was now thoroughly acquainted with his part of the business, and his
cousin was perfecting herself in shop management. In a year or eighteen
months they would be married, and then they would set up on their own
account in some populous corner of Paris, at Plaisance most likely.
They were in no great hurry, he added, for the bacon trade was very bad
that year. Then he proceeded to tell Florent that he and his cousin had
been photographed together at the fair of St. Ouen, and he entered the
attic to have another look at the photograph, which Augustine had left
on the mantelpiece, in her desire that Madame Quenu’s cousin should
have a pretty room. Auguste lingered there for a moment, looking quite
livid in the dim yellow light of his candle, and casting his eyes
around the little chamber which was still full of memorials of the
young girl. Next, stepping up to the bed, he asked Florent if it was
comfortable. His cousin slept below now, said he, and would be better
there in the winter, for the attics were very cold. Then at last he
went off, leaving Florent alone with the bed, and standing in front of
the photograph. As shown on the latter Auguste looked like a sort of
pale Quenu, and Augustine like an immature Lisa.

Florent, although on friendly terms with the assistants, petted by his
brother, and cordially treated by Lisa, presently began to feel very
bored. He had tried, but without success, to obtain some pupils;
moreover, he purposely avoided the students’ quarter for fear of being
recognised. Lisa gently suggested to him that he had better try to
obtain a situation in some commercial house, where he could take charge
of the correspondence and keep the books. She returned to this subject
again and again, and at last offered to find a berth for him herself.
She was gradually becoming impatient at finding him so often in her
way, idle, and not knowing what to do with himself. At first this
impatience was merely due to the dislike she felt of people who do
nothing but cross their arms and eat, and she had no thought of
reproaching him for consuming her substance.

“For my own part,” she would say to him, “I could never spend the whole
day in dreamy lounging. You can’t have any appetite for your meals. You
ought to tire yourself.”

Gavard, also, was seeking a situation for Florent, but in a very
extraordinary and most mysterious fashion. He would have liked to find
some employment of a dramatic character, or in which there should be a
touch of bitter irony, as was suitable for an outlaw. Gavard was a man
who was always in opposition. He had just completed his fiftieth year,
and he boasted that he had already passed judgment on four Governments.
He still contemptuously shrugged his shoulders at the thought of
Charles X, the priests and nobles and other attendant rabble, whom he
had helped to sweep away. Louis Philippe, with his bourgeois following,
had been an imbecile, and he could tell how the citizen-king had
hoarded his coppers in a woollen stocking. As for the Republic of ‘48,
that had been a mere farce, the working classes had deceived him;
however, he no longer acknowledged that he had applauded the Coup
d’Etat, for he now looked upon Napoleon III as his personal enemy, a
scoundrel who shut himself up with Morny and others to indulge in
gluttonous orgies. He was never weary of holding forth upon this
subject. Lowering his voice a little, he would declare that women were
brought to the Tuileries in closed carriages every evening, and that
he, who was speaking, had one night heard the echoes of the orgies
while crossing the Place du Carrousel. It was Gavard’s religion to make
himself as disagreeable as possible to any existing Government. He
would seek to spite it in all sorts of ways, and laugh in secret for
several months at the pranks he played. To begin with, he voted for
candidates who would worry the Ministers at the Corps Législatif. Then,
if he could rob the revenue, or baffle the police, and bring about a
row of some kind or other, he strove to give the affair as much of an
insurrectionary character as possible. He told a great many lies, too;
set himself up as being a very dangerous man; talked as though “the
satellites of the Tuileries” were well acquainted with him and trembled
at the sight of him; and asserted that one half of them must be
guillotined, and the other half transported, the next time there was “a
flare-up.” His violent political creed found food in boastful, bragging
talk of this sort; he displayed all the partiality for a lark and a
rumpus which prompts a Parisian shopkeeper to take down his shutters on
a day of barricade-fighting to get a good view of the corpses of the
slain. When Florent returned from Cayenne, Gavard opined that he had
got hold of a splendid chance for some abominable trick, and bestowed
much thought upon the question of how he might best vent his spleen on
the Emperor and Ministers and everyone in office, down to the very
lowest police constable.

Gavard’s manners with Florent were altogether those of a man tasting
some forbidden pleasure. He contemplated him with blinking eyes,
lowered his voice even when making the most trifling remark, and
grasped his hand with all sorts of masonic flummery. He had at last
lighted upon something in the way of an adventure; he had a friend who
was really compromised, and could, without falsehood speak of the
dangers he incurred. He undoubtedly experienced a secret alarm at the
sight of this man who had returned from transportation, and whose
fleshlessness testified to the long sufferings he had endured; however,
this touch of alarm was delightful, for it increased his notion of his
own importance, and convinced him that he was really doing something
wonderful in treating a dangerous character as a friend. Florent became
a sort of sacred being in his eyes: he swore by him alone, and had
recourse to his name whenever arguments failed him and he wanted to
crush the Government once and for all.

Gavard had lost his wife in the Rue Saint Jacques some months after the
Coup d’Etat; however, he had kept on his roasting shop till 1856. At
that time it was reported that he had made large sums of money by going
into partnership with a neighbouring grocer who had obtained a contract
for supplying dried vegetables to the Crimean expeditionary corps. The
truth was, however, that, having sold his shop, he lived on his income
for a year without doing anything. He himself did not care to talk
about the real origin of his fortune, for to have revealed it would
have prevented him from plainly expressing his opinion of the Crimean
War, which he referred to as a mere adventurous expedition, “undertaken
simply to consolidate the throne and to fill certain persons’ pockets.”
At the end of a year he had grown utterly weary of life in his bachelor
quarters. As he was in the habit of visiting the Quenu-Gradelles almost
daily, he determined to take up his residence nearer to them, and came
to live in the Rue de la Cossonnerie. The neighbouring markets, with
their noisy uproar and endless chatter, quite fascinated him; and he
decided to hire a stall in the poultry pavilion, just for the purpose
of amusing himself and occupying his idle hours with all the gossip.
Thenceforth he lived amidst ceaseless tittle-tattle, acquainted with
every little scandal in the neighbourhood, his head buzzing with the
incessant yelping around him. He blissfully tasted a thousand
titillating delights, having at last found his true element, and
bathing in it, with the voluptuous pleasure of a carp swimming in the
sunshine. Florent would sometimes go to see him at his stall. The
afternoons were still very warm. All along the narrow alleys sat women
plucking poultry. Rays of light streamed in between the awnings, and in
the warm atmosphere, in the golden dust of the sunbeams, feathers
fluttered hither and thither like dancing snowflakes. A trail of
coaxing calls and offers followed Florent as he passed along. “Can I
sell you a fine duck, monsieur?” “I’ve some very fine fat chickens
here, monsieur; come and see!” “Monsieur! monsieur, do just buy this
pair of pigeons!” Deafened and embarrassed he freed himself from the
women, who still went on plucking as they fought for possession of him;
and the fine down flew about and wellnigh choked him, like hot smoke
reeking with the strong odour of the poultry. At last, in the middle of
the alley, near the water-taps, he found Gavard ranting away in his
shirt-sleeves, in front of his stall, with his arms crossed over the
bib of his blue apron. He reigned there, in a gracious, condescending
way, over a group of ten or twelve women. He was the only male dealer
in that part of the market. He was so fond of wagging his tongue that
he had quarrelled with five or six girls whom he had successively
engaged to attend to his stall, and had now made up his mind to sell
his goods himself, naively explaining that the silly women spent the
whole blessed day in gossiping, and that it was beyond his power to
manage them. As someone, however, was still necessary to supply his
place whenever he absented himself he took in Marjolin, who was
prowling about, after attempting in turn all the petty market callings.

Florent sometimes remained for an hour with Gavard, amazed by his
ceaseless flow of chatter, and his calm serenity and assurance amid the
crowd of petticoats. He would interrupt one woman, pick a quarrel with
another ten stalls away, snatch a customer from a third, and make as
much noise himself as his hundred and odd garrulous neighbours, whose
incessant clamour kept the iron plates of the pavilion vibrating
sonorously like so many gongs.

The poultry dealer’s only relations were a sister-in-law and a niece.
When his wife died, her eldest sister, Madame Lecœur, who had become a
widow about a year previously, had mourned for her in an exaggerated
fashion, and gone almost every evening to tender consolation to the
bereaved husband. She had doubtless cherished the hope that she might
win his affection and fill the yet warm place of the deceased. Gavard,
however, abominated lean women; and would, indeed, only stroke such
cats and dogs as were very fat; so that Madame Lecœur, who was long and
withered, failed in her designs.

With her feelings greatly hurt, furious at the ex-roaster’s five-franc
pieces eluding her grasp, she nurtured great spite against him. He
became the enemy to whom she devoted all her time. When she saw him set
up in the markets only a few yards away from the pavilion where she
herself sold butter and eggs and cheese, she accused him of doing so
simply for the sake of annoying her and bringing her bad luck. From
that moment she began to lament, and turned so yellow and melancholy
that she indeed ended by losing her customers and getting into
difficulties. She had for a long time kept with her the daughter of one
of her sisters, a peasant woman who had sent her the child and then
taken no further trouble about it.

This child grew up in the markets. Her surname was Sarriet, and so she
soon became generally known as La Sarriette. At sixteen years of age
she had developed into such a charming sly-looking puss that gentlemen
came to buy cheeses at her aunt’s stall simply for the purpose of
ogling her. She did not care for the gentlemen, however; with her dark
hair, pale face, and eyes glistening like live embers, her sympathies
were with the lower ranks of the people. At last she chose as her lover
a young man from Menilmontant who was employed by her aunt as a porter.
At twenty she set up in business as a fruit dealer with the help of
some funds procured no one knew how; and thenceforth Monsieur Jules, as
her lover was called, displayed spotless hands, a clean blouse, and a
velvet cap; and only came down to the market in the afternoon, in his
slippers. They lived together on the third storey of a large house in
the Rue Vauvilliers, on the ground floor of which was a disreputable
café.

Madame Lecœur’s acerbity of temper was brought to a pitch by what she
called La Sarriette’s ingratitude, and she spoke of the girl in the
most violent and abusive language. They broke off all intercourse, the
aunt fairly exasperated, and the niece and Monsieur Jules concocting
stories about the aunt, which the young man would repeat to the other
dealers in the butter pavilion. Gavard found La Sarriette very
entertaining, and treated her with great indulgence. Whenever they met
he would good-naturedly pat her cheeks.

One afternoon, whilst Florent was sitting in his brother’s shop, tired
out with the fruitless pilgrimages he had made during the morning in
search of work, Marjolin made his appearance there. This big lad, who
had the massiveness and gentleness of a Fleming, was a protege of
Lisa’s. She would say that there was no evil in him; that he was indeed
a little bit stupid, but as strong as a horse, and particularly
interesting from the fact that nobody knew anything of his parentage.
It was she who had got Gavard to employ him.

Lisa was sitting behind the counter, feeling annoyed by the sight of
Florent’s muddy boots which were soiling the pink and white tiles of
the flooring. Twice already had she risen to scatter sawdust about the
shop. However, she smiled at Marjolin as he entered.

“Monsieur Gavard,” began the young man, “has sent me to ask—”

But all at once he stopped and glanced round; then in a lower voice he
resumed: “He told me to wait till there was no one with you, and then
to repeat these words, which he made me learn by heart: ‘Ask them if
there is no danger, and if I can come and talk to them of the matter
they know about.’”

“Tell Monsieur Gavard that we are expecting him,” replied Lisa, who was
quite accustomed to the poultry dealer’s mysterious ways.

Marjolin, however, did not go away; but remained in ecstasy before the
handsome mistress of the shop, contemplating her with an expression of
fawning humility.

Touched, as it were, by this mute adoration, Lisa spoke to him again.

“Are you comfortable with Monsieur Gavard?” she asked. “He’s not an
unkind man, and you ought to try to please him.”

“Yes, Madame Lisa.”

“But you don’t behave as you should, you know. Only yesterday I saw you
clambering about the roofs of the market again; and, besides, you are
constantly with a lot of disreputable lads and lasses. You ought to
remember that you are a man now, and begin to think of the future.”

“Yes, Madame Lisa.”

However, Lisa had to get up to wait upon a lady who came in and wanted
a pound of pork chops. She left the counter and went to the block at
the far end of the shop. Here, with a long, slender knife, she cut
three chops in a loin of pork; and then, raising a small cleaver with
her strong hand, dealt three sharp blows which separated the chops from
the loin. At each blow she dealt, her black merino dress rose slightly
behind her, and the ribs of her stays showed beneath her tightly
stretched bodice. She slowly took up the chops and weighed them with an
air of gravity, her eyes gleaming and her lips tightly closed.

When the lady had gone, and Lisa perceived Marjolin still full of
delight at having seen her deal those three clean, forcible blows with
the cleaver, she at once called out to him, “What! haven’t you gone
yet?”

He thereupon turned to go, but she detained him for a moment longer.

“Now, don’t let me see you again with that hussy Cadine,” she said.
“Oh, it’s no use to deny it! I saw you together this morning in the
tripe market, watching men breaking the sheep’s heads. I can’t
understand what attraction a good-looking young fellow like you can
find in such a slipshod slattern as Cadine. Now then, go and tell
Monsieur Gavard that he had better come at once, while there’s no one
about.”

Marjolin thereupon went off in confusion, without saying a word.

Handsome Lisa remained standing behind her counter, with her head
turned slightly in the direction of her markets, and Florent gazed at
her in silence, surprised to see her looking so beautiful. He had never
looked at her properly before; indeed, he did not know the right way to
look at a woman. He now saw her rising above the viands on the counter.
In front of her was an array of white china dishes, containing long
Arles and Lyons sausages, slices of which had already been cut off,
with tongues and pieces of boiled pork; then a pig’s head in a mass of
jelly; an open pot of preserved sausage-meat, and a large box of
sardines disclosing a pool of oil. On the right and left, upon wooden
platters, were mounds of French and Italian brawn, a common French ham,
of a pinky hue, and a Yorkshire ham, whose deep red lean showed beneath
a broad band of fat. There were other dishes too, round ones and oval
ones, containing spiced tongue, truffled galantine, and a boar’s head
stuffed with pistachio nuts; while close to her, in reach of her hand,
stood some yellow earthen pans containing larded veal, _paté de foie
gras_, and hare-pie.

As there were no signs of Gavard’s coming, she arranged some fore-end
bacon upon a little marble shelf at the end of the counter, put the
jars of lard and dripping back into their places, wiped the plates of
each pair of scales, and saw to the fire of the heater, which was
getting low. Then she turned her head again, and gazed in silence
towards the markets. The smell of all the viands ascended around her,
she was enveloped, as it were, by the aroma of truffles. She looked
beautifully fresh that afternoon. The whiteness of all the dishes was
supplemented by that of her sleevelets and apron, above which appeared
her plump neck and rosy cheeks, which recalled the soft tones of the
hams and the pallor of all the transparent fat.

As Florent continued to gaze at her he began to feel intimidated,
disquieted by her prim, sedate demeanour; and in lieu of openly looking
at her he ended by glancing surreptitiously in the mirrors around the
shop, in which her back and face and profile could be seen. The mirror
on the ceiling, too, reflected the top of her head, with its tightly
rolled chignon and the little bands lowered over her temples. There
seemed, indeed, to be a perfect crowd of Lisas, with broad shoulders,
powerful arms, and round, full bosoms. At last Florent checked his
roving eyes, and let them rest on a particularly pleasing side view of
the young woman as mirrored between two pieces of pork. From the hooks
running along the whole line of mirrors and marbles hung sides of pork
and bands of larding fat; and Lisa, with her massive neck, rounded
hips, and swelling bosom seen in profile, looked like some waxwork
queen in the midst of the dangling fat and meat. However, she bent
forward and smiled in a friendly way at the two gold-fish which were
ever and ever swimming round the aquarium in the window.

Gavard entered the shop. With an air of great importance he went to
fetch Quenu from the kitchen. Then he seated himself upon a small
marble-topped table, while Florent remained on his chair and Lisa
behind the counter; Quenu meantime leaning his back against a side of
pork. And thereupon Gavard announced that he had at last found a
situation for Florent. They would be vastly amused when they heard what
it was, and the Government would be nicely caught.

But all at once he stopped short, for a passing neighbour, Mademoiselle
Saget, having seen such a large party gossiping together at the
Quenu-Gradelles’, had opened the door and entered the shop. Carrying
her everlasting black ribbonless straw hat, which appropriately cast a
shadow over her prying white face, she saluted the men with a slight
bow and Lisa with a sharp smile.

She was an acquaintance of the family, and still lived in the house in
the Rue Pirouette where she had resided for the last forty years,
probably on a small private income; but of that she never spoke. She
had, however, one day talked of Cherbourg, mentioning that she had been
born there. Nothing further was ever known of her antecedents. All her
conversation was about other people; she could tell the whole story of
their daily lives, even to the number of things they sent to be washed
each month; and she carried her prying curiosity concerning her
neighbours’ affairs so far as to listen behind their doors and open
their letters. Her tongue was feared from the Rue Saint Denis to the
Rue Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and from the Rue Saint Honoré to the Rue
Mauconseil. All day long she went ferreting about with her empty bag,
pretending that she was marketing, but in reality buying nothing, as
her sole purpose was to retail scandal and gossip, and keep herself
fully informed of every trifling incident that happened. Indeed, she
had turned her brain into an encyclopaedia brimful of every possible
particular concerning the people of the neighbourhood and their homes.

Quenu had always accused her of having spread the story of his Uncle
Gradelle’s death on the chopping-block, and had borne her a grudge ever
since. She was extremely well posted in the history of Uncle Gradelle
and the Quenus, and knew them, she would say, by heart. For the last
fortnight, however, Florent’s arrival had greatly perplexed her, filled
her, indeed, with a perfect fever of curiosity. She became quite ill
when she discovered any unforeseen gap in her information. And yet she
could have sworn that she had seen that tall lanky fellow somewhere or
other before.

She remained standing in front of the counter, examining the dishes one
after another, and saying in a shrill voice:

“I hardly know what to have. When the afternoon comes I feel quite
famished for my dinner, and then, later on, I don’t seem able to fancy
anything at all. Have you got a cutlet rolled in bread-crumbs left,
Madame Quenu?”

Without waiting for a reply, she removed one of the covers of the
heater. It was that of the compartment reserved for the chitterlings,
sausages, and black-puddings. However, the chafing-dish was quite cold,
and there was nothing left but one stray forgotten sausage.

“Look under the other cover, Mademoiselle Saget,” said Lisa. “I believe
there’s a cutlet there.”

“No, it doesn’t tempt me,” muttered the little old woman, poking her
nose under the other cover, however, all the same. “I felt rather a
fancy for one, but I’m afraid a cutlet would be rather too heavy in the
evening. I’d rather have something, too, that I need not warm.”

While speaking she had turned towards Florent and looked at him; then
she looked at Gavard, who was beating a tattoo with his finger-tips on
the marble table. She smiled at them, as though inviting them to
continue their conversation.

“Wouldn’t a little piece of salt pork suit you?” asked Lisa.

“A piece of salt pork? Yes, that might do.”

Thereupon she took up the fork with plated handle, which was lying at
the edge of the dish, and began to turn all the pieces of pork about,
prodding them, lightly tapping the bones to judge of their thickness,
and minutely scrutinising the shreds of pinky meat. And as she turned
them over she repeated, “No, no; it doesn’t tempt me.”

“Well, then, have a sheep’s tongue, or a bit of brawn, or a slice of
larded veal,” suggested Lisa patiently.

Mademoiselle Saget, however, shook her head. She remained there for a
few minutes longer, pulling dissatisfied faces over the different
dishes; then, seeing that the others were determined to remain silent,
and that she would not be able to learn anything, she took herself off.

“No; I rather felt a fancy for a cutlet rolled in bread-crumbs,” she
said as she left the shop, “but the one you have left is too fat. I
must come another time.”

Lisa bent forward to watch her through the sausage-skins hanging in the
shop-front, and saw her cross the road and enter the fruit market.

“The old she-goat!” growled Gavard.

Then, as they were now alone again, he began to tell them of the
situation he had found for Florent. A friend of his, he said, Monsieur
Verlaque, one of the fish market inspectors, was so ill that he was
obliged to take a rest; and that very morning the poor man had told him
that he should be very glad to find a substitute who would keep his
berth open for him in case he should recover.

“Verlaque, you know, won’t last another six months,” added Gavard, “and
Florent will keep the place. It’s a splendid idea, isn’t it? And it
will be such a take-in for the police! The berth is under the
Prefecture, you know. What glorious fun to see Florent getting paid by
the police, eh?”

He burst into a hearty laugh; the idea struck him as so extremely
comical.

“I won’t take the place,” Florent bluntly replied. “I’ve sworn I’ll
never accept anything from the Empire, and I would rather die of
starvation than serve under the Prefecture. It is quite out of the
question, Gavard, quite so!”

Gavard seemed somewhat put out on hearing this. Quenu had lowered his
head, while Lisa, turning round, looked keenly at Florent, her neck
swollen, her bosom straining her bodice almost to bursting point. She
was just going to open her mouth when La Sarriette entered the shop,
and there was another pause in the conversation.

“Dear me!” exclaimed La Sarriette with her soft laugh, “I’d almost
forgotten to get any bacon fat. Please, Madame Quenu, cut me a dozen
thin strips—very thin ones, you know; I want them for larding larks.
Jules has taken it into his head to eat some larks. Ah! how do you do,
uncle?”

She filled the whole shop with her dancing skirts and smiled brightly
at everyone. Her face looked fresh and creamy, and on one side her hair
was coming down, loosened by the wind which blew through the markets.
Gavard grasped her hands, while she with merry impudence resumed: “I’ll
bet that you were talking about me just as I came in. Tell me what you
were saying, uncle.”

However, Lisa now called to her, “Just look and tell me if this is thin
enough.”

She was cutting the strips of bacon fat with great care on a piece of
board in front of her. Then as she wrapped them up she inquired, “Can I
give you anything else?”

“Well, yes,” replied La Sarriette; “since I’m about it, I think I’ll
have a pound of lard. I’m awfully fond of fried potatoes; I can make a
breakfast off a penn’orth of potatoes and a bunch of radishes. Yes,
I’ll have a pound of lard, please, Madame Quenu.”

Lisa placed a sheet of stout paper in the pan of the scales. Then she
took the lard out of a jar under the shelves with a boxwood spatula,
gently adding small quantities to the fatty heap, which began to melt
and run slightly. When the plate of the scale fell, she took up the
paper, folded it, and rapidly twisted the ends with her finger-tips.

“That makes twenty-four sous,” she said; “the bacon is six sous—thirty
sous altogether. There’s nothing else you want, is there?”

“No,” said La Sarriette, “nothing.” She paid her money, still laughing
and showing her teeth, and staring the men in the face. Her grey skirt
was all awry, and her loosely fastened red neckerchief allowed a little
of her white bosom to appear. Before she went away she stepped up to
Gavard again, and pretending to threaten him exclaimed: “So you won’t
tell me what you were talking about as I came in? I could see you
laughing from the street. Oh, you sly fellow! Ah! I sha’n’t love you
any longer!”

Then she left the shop and ran across the road.

“It was Mademoiselle Saget who sent her here,” remarked handsome Lisa
drily.

Then silence fell again for some moments. Gavard was dismayed at
Florent’s reception of his proposal. Lisa was the first to speak. “It
was wrong of you to refuse the post, Florent,” she said in the most
friendly tones. “You know how difficult it is to find any employment,
and you are not in a position to be over-exacting.”

“I have my reasons,” Florent replied.

Lisa shrugged her shoulders. “Come now,” said she, “you really can’t be
serious, I’m sure. I can understand that you are not in love with the
Government, but it would be too absurd to let your opinions prevent you
from earning your living. And, besides, my dear fellow, the Emperor
isn’t at all a bad sort of man. You don’t suppose, do you, that he knew
you were eating mouldy bread and tainted meat? He can’t be everywhere,
you know, and you can see for yourself that he hasn’t prevented us here
from doing pretty well. You are not at all just; indeed you are not.”

Gavard, however, was getting very fidgety. He could not bear to hear
people speak well of the Emperor.

“No, no, Madame Quenu,” he interrupted; “you are going too far. It is a
scoundrelly system altogether.”

“Oh, as for you,” exclaimed Lisa vivaciously, “you’ll never rest until
you’ve got yourself plundered and knocked on the head as the result of
all your wild talk. Don’t let us discuss politics; you would only make
me angry. The question is Florent, isn’t it? Well, for my part, I say
that he ought to accept this inspectorship. Don’t you think so too,
Quenu?”

Quenu, who had not yet said a word, was very much put out by his wife’s
sudden appeal.

“It’s a good berth,” he replied, without compromising himself.

Then, amidst another interval of awkward silence, Florent resumed: “I
beg you, let us drop the subject. My mind is quite made up. I shall
wait.”

“You will wait!” cried Lisa, losing patience.

Two rosy fires had risen to her cheeks. As she stood there, erect, in
her white apron, with rounded, swelling hips, it was with difficulty
that she restrained herself from breaking out into bitter words.
However, the entrance of another person into the shop arrested her
anger. The new arrival was Madame Lecœur.

“Can you let me have half a pound of mixed meats at fifty sous the
pound?” she asked.

She at first pretended not to notice her brother-in-law; but presently
she just nodded her head to him, without speaking. Then she scrutinised
the three men from head to foot, doubtless hoping to divine their
secret by the manner in which they waited for her to go. She could see
that she was putting them out, and the knowledge of this rendered her
yet more sour and angular, as she stood there in her limp skirts, with
her long, spider-like arms bent and her knotted fingers clasped beneath
her apron. Then, as she coughed slightly, Gavard, whom the silence
embarrassed, inquired if she had a cold.

She curtly answered in the negative. Her tightly stretched skin was of
a red-brick colour on those parts of her face where her bones
protruded, and the dull fire burning in her eyes and scorching their
lids testified to some liver complaint nurtured by the querulous
jealousy of her disposition. She turned round again towards the
counter, and watched each movement made by Lisa as she served her with
the distrustful glance of one who is convinced that an attempt will be
made to defraud her.

“Don’t give me any saveloy,” she exclaimed; “I don’t like it.”

Lisa had taken up a slender knife, and was cutting some thin slices of
sausage. She next passed on to the smoked ham and the common ham,
cutting delicate slices from each, and bending forward slightly as she
did so, with her eyes ever fixed on the knife. Her plump rosy hands,
flitting about the viands with light and gentle touches, seemed to have
derived suppleness from contact with all the fat.

“You would like some larded veal, wouldn’t you?” she asked, bringing a
yellow pan towards her.

Madame Lecœur seemed to be thinking the matter over at considerable
length; however, she at last said that she would have some. Lisa had
now begun to cut into the contents of the pans, from which she removed
slices of larded veal and hare _paté_ on the tip of a broad-bladed
knife. And she deposited each successive slice on the middle of a sheet
of paper placed on the scales.

“Aren’t you going to give me some of the boar’s head with pistachio
nuts?” asked Madame Lecœur in her querulous voice.

Lisa was obliged to add some of the boar’s head. But the butter dealer
was getting exacting, and asked for two slices of galantine. She was
very fond of it. Lisa, who was already irritated, played impatiently
with the handles of the knives, and told her that the galantine was
truffled, and that she could only include it in an “assortment” at
three francs the pound. Madame Lecœur, however, continued to pry into
the dishes, trying to find something else to ask for. When the
“assortment” was weighed she made Lisa add some jelly and gherkins to
it. The block of jelly, shaped like a Savoy cake, shook on its white
china dish beneath the angry violence of Lisa’s hand; and as with her
finger-tips she took a couple of gherkins from a jar behind the heater,
she made the vinegar spurt over the sides.

“Twenty-five sous, isn’t it?” Madame Lecœur leisurely inquired.

She fully perceived Lisa’s covert irritation, and greatly enjoyed the
sight of it, producing her money as slowly as possible, as though,
indeed, her silver had got lost amongst the coppers in her pocket. And
she glanced askance at Gavard, relishing the embarrassed silence which
her presence was prolonging, and vowing that she would not go off,
since they were hiding some trickery or other from her. However, Lisa
at last put the parcel in her hands, and she was then obliged to make
her departure. She went away without saying a word, but darting a
searching glance all round the shop.

“It was that Saget who sent her too!” burst out Lisa, as soon as the
old woman was gone. “Is the old wretch going to send the whole market
here to try to find out what we talk about? What a prying, malicious
set they are! Did anyone ever hear before of crumbed cutlets and
‘assortments’ being bought at five o’clock in the afternoon? But then
they’d rack themselves with indigestion rather than not find out! Upon
my word, though, if La Saget sends anyone else here, you’ll see the
reception she’ll get. I would bundle her out of the shop, even if she
were my own sister!”

The three men remained silent in presence of this explosion of anger.
Gavard had gone to lean over the brass rail of the window-front, where,
seemingly lost in thought, he began playing with one of the cut-glass
balusters detached from its wire fastening. Presently, however, he
raised his head. “Well, for my part,” he said, “I looked upon it all as
an excellent joke.”

“Looked upon what as a joke?” asked Lisa, still quivering with
indignation.

“The inspectorship.”

She raised her hands, gave a last glance at Florent, and then sat down
upon the cushioned bench behind the counter and said nothing further.
Gavard, however, began to explain his views at length; the drift of his
argument being that it was the Government which would look foolish in
the matter, since Florent would be taking its money.

“My dear fellow,” he said complacently, “those scoundrels all but
starved you to death, didn’t they? Well, you must make them feed you
now. It’s a splendid idea; it caught my fancy at once!”

Florent smiled, but still persisted in his refusal. Quenu, in the hope
of pleasing his wife, did his best to find some good arguments. Lisa,
however, appeared to pay no further attention to them. For the last
moment or two she had been looking attentively in the direction of the
markets. And all at once she sprang to her feet again, exclaiming, “Ah!
it is La Normande that they are sending to play the spy on us now!
Well, so much the worse for La Normande; she shall pay for the others!”

A tall female pushed the shop door open. It was the handsome fish-girl,
Louise Mehudin, generally known as La Normande. She was a bold-looking
beauty, with a delicate white skin, and was almost as plump as Lisa,
but there was more effrontery in her glance, and her bosom heaved with
warmer life. She came into the shop with a light swinging step, her
gold chain jingling on her apron, her bare hair arranged in the latest
style, and a bow at her throat, a lace bow, which made her one of the
most coquettish-looking queens of the markets. She brought a vague
odour of fish with her, and a herring-scale showed like a tiny patch of
mother-of-pearl near the little finger of one of her hands. She and
Lisa having lived in the same house in the Rue Pirouette, were intimate
friends, linked by a touch of rivalry which kept each of them busy with
thoughts of the other. In the neighbourhood people spoke of “the
beautiful Norman,” just as they spoke of “beautiful Lisa.” This brought
them into opposition and comparison, and compelled each of them to do
her utmost to sustain her reputation for beauty. Lisa from her counter
could, by stooping a little, perceive the fish-girl amidst her salmon
and turbot in the pavilion opposite; and each kept a watch on the
other. Beautiful Lisa laced herself more tightly in her stays; and the
beautiful Norman replied by placing additional rings on her fingers and
additional bows on her shoulders. When they met they were very bland
and unctuous and profuse in compliments; but all the while their eyes
were furtively glancing from under their lowered lids, in the hope of
discovering some flaw. They made a point of always dealing with each
other, and professed great mutual affection.

“I say,” said La Normande, with her smiling air, “it’s to-morrow
evening that you make your black-puddings, isn’t it?”

Lisa maintained a cold demeanour. She seldom showed any anger; but when
she did it was tenacious, and slow to be appeased. “Yes,” she replied
drily, with the tips of her lips.

“I’m so fond of black-puddings, you know, when they come straight out
of the pot,” resumed La Normande. “I’ll come and get some of you
to-morrow.”

She was conscious of her rival’s unfriendly greeting. However, she
glanced at Florent, who seemed to interest her; and then, unwilling to
go off without having the last word, she was imprudent enough to add:
“I bought some black-pudding of you the day before yesterday, you know,
and it wasn’t quite sweet.”

“Not quite sweet!” repeated Lisa, very pale, and her lips quivering.

She might, perhaps, have once more restrained herself, for fear of La
Normande imagining that she was overcome by envious spite at the sight
of the lace bow; but the girl, not content with playing the spy,
proceeded to insult her, and that was beyond endurance. So, leaning
forward, with her hands clenched on the counter, she exclaimed, in a
somewhat hoarse voice: “I say! when you sold me that pair of soles last
week, did I come and tell you, before everybody that they were
stinking?”

“Stinking! My soles stinking!” cried the fish dealer, flushing scarlet.

For a moment they remained silent, choking with anger, but glaring
fiercely at each other over the array of dishes. All their honeyed
friendship had vanished; a word had sufficed to reveal what sharp teeth
there were behind their smiling lips.

“You’re a vulgar, low creature!” cried the beautiful Norman. “You’ll
never catch me setting foot in here again, I can tell you!”

“Get along with you, get along with you,” exclaimed beautiful Lisa. “I
know quite well whom I’ve got to deal with!”

The fish-girl went off, hurling behind her a coarse expression which
left Lisa quivering. The whole scene had passed so quickly that the
three men, overcome with amazement, had not had time to interfere. Lisa
soon recovered herself, and was resuming the conversation, without
making any allusion to what had just occurred, when the shop girl,
Augustine, returned from an errand on which she had been sent. Lisa
thereupon took Gavard aside, and after telling him to say nothing for
the present to Monsieur Verlaque, promised that she would undertake to
convince her brother-in-law in a couple of days’ time at the utmost.
Quenu then returned to his kitchen, while Gavard took Florent off with
him. And as they were just going into Monsieur Lebigre’s to drink a
drop of vermouth together he called his attention to three women
standing in the covered way between the fish and poultry pavilions.

“They’re cackling together!” he said with an envious air.

The markets were growing empty, and Mademoiselle Saget, Madame Lecœur,
and La Sarriette alone lingered on the edge of the footway. The old
maid was holding forth.

“As I told you before, Madame Lecœur,” said she, “they’ve always got
your brother-in-law in their shop. You saw him there yourself just now,
didn’t you?”

“Oh yes, indeed! He was sitting on a table, and seemed quite at home.”

“Well, for my part,” interrupted La Sarriette, “I heard nothing wrong;
and I can’t understand why you’re making such a fuss.”

Mademoiselle Saget shrugged her shoulders. “Ah, you’re very innocent
yet, my dear,” she said. “Can’t you see why the Quenus are always
attracting Monsieur Gavard to their place? Well, I’ll wager that he’ll
leave all he has to their little Pauline.”

“You believe that, do you?” cried Madame Lecœur, white with rage. Then,
in a mournful voice, as though she had just received some heavy blow,
she continued: “I am alone in the world, and have no one to take my
part; he is quite at liberty to do as he pleases. His niece sides with
him too—you heard her just now. She has quite forgotten all that she
cost me, and wouldn’t stir a hand to help me.”

“Indeed, aunt,” exclaimed La Sarriette, “you are quite wrong there!
It’s you who’ve never had anything but unkind words for me.”

They became reconciled on the spot, and kissed one another. The niece
promised that she would play no more pranks, and the aunt swore by all
she held most sacred that she looked upon La Sarriette as her own
daughter. Then Mademoiselle Saget advised them as to the steps they
ought to take to prevent Gavard from squandering his money. And they
all agreed that the Quenu-Gradelles were very disreputable folks, and
required closely watching.

“I don’t know what they’re up to just now,” said the old maid, “but
there’s something suspicious going on, I’m sure. What’s your opinion,
now, of that fellow Florent, that cousin of Madame Quenu’s?”

The three women drew more closely together, and lowered their voices.

“You remember,” said Madame Lecœur, “that we saw him one morning with
his boots all split, and his clothes covered with dust, looking just
like a thief who’s been up to some roguery. That fellow quite frightens
me.”

“Well, he’s certainly very thin,” said La Sarriette, “but he isn’t
ugly.”

Mademoiselle Saget was reflecting, and she expressed her thoughts
aloud. “I’ve been trying to find out something about him for the last
fortnight, but I can make nothing of it. Monsieur Gavard certainly
knows him. I must have met him myself somewhere before, but I can’t
remember where.”

She was still ransacking her memory when La Normande swept up to them
like a whirlwind. She had just left the pork shop.

“That big booby Lisa has got nice manners, I must say!” she cried,
delighted to be able to relieve herself. “Fancy her telling me that I
sold nothing but stinking fish! But I gave her as good as she deserved,
I can tell you! A nice den they keep, with their tainted pig meat which
poisons all their customers!”

“But what had you been saying to her?” asked the old maid, quite frisky
with excitement, and delighted to hear that the two women had
quarrelled.

“I! I’d said just nothing at all—no, not that! I just went into the
shop and told her very civilly that I’d buy some black-pudding
to-morrow evening, and then she overwhelmed me with abuse. A dirty
hypocrite she is, with her saint-like airs! But she’ll pay more dearly
for this than she fancies!”

The three women felt that La Normande was not telling them the truth,
but this did not prevent them from taking her part with a rush of bad
language. They turned towards the Rue Rambuteau with insulting mien,
inventing all sorts of stories about the uncleanliness of the cookery
at the Quenu’s shop, and making the most extraordinary accusations. If
the Quenus had been detected selling human flesh the women could not
have displayed more violent and threatening anger. The fish-girl was
obliged to tell her story three times over.

“And what did the cousin say?” asked Mademoiselle Saget, with wicked
intent.

“The cousin!” repeated La Normande, in a shrill voice. “Do you really
believe that he’s a cousin? He’s some lover or other, I’ll wager, the
great booby!”

The three others protested against this. Lisa’s honourability was an
article of faith in the neighbourhood.

“Stuff and nonsense!” retorted La Normande. “You can never be sure
about those smug, sleek hypocrites.”

Mademoiselle Saget nodded her head as if to say that she was not very
far from sharing La Normande’s opinion. And she softly added:
“Especially as this cousin has sprung from no one knows where; for it’s
a very doubtful sort of account that the Quenus give of him.”

“Oh, he’s the fat woman’s sweetheart, I tell you!” reaffirmed the
fish-girl; “some scamp or vagabond picked up in the streets. It’s easy
enough to see it.”

“She has given him a complete outfit,” remarked Madame Lecœur. “He must
be costing her a pretty penny.”

“Yes, yes,” muttered the old maid; “perhaps you are right. I must
really get to know something about him.”

Then they all promised to keep one another thoroughly informed of
whatever might take place in the Quenu-Gradelle establishment. The
butter dealer pretended that she wished to open her brother-in-law’s
eyes as to the sort of places he frequented. However, La Normande’s
anger had by this time toned down, and, a good sort of girl at heart,
she went off, weary of having talked so much on the matter.

“I’m sure that La Normande said something or other insolent,” remarked
Madame Lecœur knowingly, when the fish-girl had left them. “It is just
her way; and it scarcely becomes a creature like her to talk as she did
of Lisa.”

The three women looked at each other and smiled. Then, when Madame
Lecœur also had gone off, La Sarriette remarked to Mademoiselle Saget:
“It is foolish of my aunt to worry herself so much about all these
affairs. It’s that which makes her so thin. Ah! she’d have willingly
taken Gavard for a husband if she could only have got him. Yet she used
to beat me if ever a young man looked my way.”

Mademoiselle Saget smiled once more. And when she found herself alone,
and went back towards the Rue Pirouette, she reflected that those three
cackling hussies were not worth a rope to hang them. She was, indeed, a
little afraid that she might have been seen with them, and the idea
somewhat troubled her, for she realised that it would be bad policy to
fall out with the Quenu-Gradelles, who, after all, were well-to-do
folks and much esteemed. So she went a little out of her way on purpose
to call at Taboureau the baker’s in the Rue Turbigo—the finest baker’s
shop in the whole neighbourhood. Madame Taboureau was not only an
intimate friend of Lisa’s, but an accepted authority on every subject.
When it was remarked that “Madame Taboureau had said this,” or “Madame
Taboureau had said that,” there was no more to be urged. So the old
maid, calling at the baker’s under pretence of inquiring at what time
the oven would be hot, as she wished to bring a dish of pears to be
baked, took the opportunity to eulogise Lisa, and lavish praise upon
the sweetness and excellence of her black-puddings. Then, well pleased
at having prepared this moral alibi and delighted at having done what
she could to fan the flames of a quarrel without involving herself in
it, she briskly returned home, feeling much easier in her mind, but
still striving to recall where she had previously seen Madame Quenu’s
so-called cousin.

That same evening, after dinner, Florent went out and strolled for some
time in one of the covered ways of the markets. A fine mist was rising,
and a grey sadness, which the gas lights studded as with yellow tears,
hung over the deserted pavilions. For the first time Florent began to
feel that he was in the way, and to recognise the unmannerly fashion in
which he, thin and artless, had tumbled into this world of fat people;
and he frankly admitted to himself that his presence was disturbing the
whole neighbourhood, and that he was a source of discomfort to the
Quenus—a spurious cousin of far too compromising appearance. These
reflections made him very sad; not, indeed, that they had noticed the
slightest harshness on the part of his brother or Lisa: it was their
very kindness, rather, that was troubling him, and he accused himself
of a lack of delicacy in quartering himself upon them. He was beginning
to doubt the propriety of his conduct. The recollection of the
conversation in the shop during the afternoon caused him a vague
disquietude. The odour of the viands on Lisa’s counter seemed to
penetrate him; he felt himself gliding into nerveless, satiated
cowardice. Perhaps he had acted wrongly in refusing the inspectorship
offered him. This reflection gave birth to a stormy struggle in his
mind, and he was obliged to brace and shake himself before he could
recover his wonted rigidity of principles. However, a moist breeze had
risen, and was blowing along the covered way, and he regained some
degree of calmness and resolution on being obliged to button up his
coat. The wind seemingly swept from his clothes all the greasy odour of
the pork shop, which had made him feel so languid.

He was returning home when he met Claude Lantier. The artist, hidden in
the folds of his greenish overcoat, spoke in a hollow voice full of
suppressed anger. He was in a passion with painting, declared that it
was a dog’s trade, and swore that he would not take up a brush again as
long as he lived. That very afternoon he had thrust his foot through a
study which he had been making of the head of that hussy Cadine.

Claude was subject to these outbursts, the fruit of his inability to
execute the lasting, living works which he dreamed of. And at such
times life became an utter blank to him, and he wandered about the
streets, wrapped in the gloomiest thoughts, and waiting for the morning
as for a sort of resurrection. He used to say that he felt bright and
cheerful in the morning, and horribly miserable in the evening.[*] Each
of his days was a long effort ending in disappointment. Florent
scarcely recognised in him the careless night wanderer of the markets.
They had already met again at the pork shop, and Claude, who knew the
fugitive’s story, had grasped his hand and told him that he was a
sterling fellow. It was very seldom, however, that the artist went to
the Quenus’.

[*] Claude Lantier’s struggle for fame is fully described in M. Zola’s
novel, _L’Oeuvre_ (“His Masterpiece”). —Translator.


“Are you still at my aunt’s?” he asked. “I can’t imagine how you manage
to exist amidst all that cookery. The places reeks with the smell of
meat. When I’ve been there for an hour I feel as though I shouldn’t
want anything to eat for another three days. I ought not to have gone
there this morning; it was that which made me make a mess of my work.”

Then, after he and Florent had taken a few steps in silence, he
resumed:

“Ah! the good people! They quite grieve me with their fine health. I
had thought of painting their portraits, but I’ve never been able to
succeed with such round faces, in which there is never a bone. Ah! You
wouldn’t find my aunt Lisa kicking her foot through her pans! I was an
idiot to have destroyed Cadine’s head! Now that I come to think of it,
it wasn’t so very bad, perhaps, after all.”

Then they began to talk about Aunt Lisa. Claude said that his mother[*]
had not seen anything of her for a long time, and he hinted that the
pork butcher’s wife was somewhat ashamed of her sister having married a
common working man; moreover, she wasn’t at all fond of unfortunate
folks. Speaking of himself, he told Florent that a benevolent gentleman
had sent him to college, being very pleased with the donkeys and old
women that he had managed to draw when only eight years old; but the
good soul had died, leaving him an income of a thousand francs, which
just saved him from perishing of hunger.

[*] Gervaise, the heroine of the _Assommoir_.


“All the same, I would rather have been a working man,” continued
Claude. “Look at the carpenters, for instance. They are very happy
folks, the carpenters. They have a table to make, say; well, they make
it, and then go off to bed, happy at having finished the table, and
perfectly satisfied with themselves. Now I, on the other hand, scarcely
get any sleep at nights. All those confounded pictures which I can’t
finish go flying about my brain. I never get anything finished and done
with—never, never!”

His voice almost broke into a sob. Then he attempted to laugh; and
afterwards began to swear and pour forth coarse expressions, with the
cold rage of one who, endowed with a delicate, sensitive mind, doubts
his own powers, and dreams of wallowing in the mire. He ended by
squatting down before one of the gratings which admit air into the
cellars beneath the markets—cellars where the gas is continually kept
burning. And in the depths below he pointed out Marjolin and Cadine
tranquilly eating their supper, whilst seated on one of the stone
blocks used for killing the poultry. The two young vagabonds had
discovered a means of hiding themselves and making themselves at home
in the cellars after the doors had been closed.

“What a magnificent animal he is, eh!” exclaimed Claude, with envious
admiration, speaking of Marjolin. “He and Cadine are happy, at all
events! All they care for is eating and kissing. They haven’t a care in
the world. Ah, you do quite right, after all, to remain at the pork
shop; perhaps you’ll grow sleek and plump there.”

Then he suddenly went off. Florent climbed up to his garret, disturbed
by Claude’s nervous restlessness, which revived his own uncertainty. On
the morrow, he avoided the pork shop all the morning, and went for a
long walk on the quays. When he returned to lunch, however, he was
struck by Lisa’s kindliness. Without any undue insistence she again
spoke to him about the inspectorship, as of something which was well
worth his consideration. As he listened to her, with a full plate in
front of him, he was affected, in spite of himself, by the prim comfort
of his surroundings. The matting beneath his feet seemed very soft; the
gleams of the brass hanging lamp, the soft, yellow tint of the
wallpaper, and the bright oak of the furniture filled him with
appreciation of a life spent in comfort, which disturbed his notions of
right and wrong. He still, however, had sufficient strength to persist
in his refusal, and repeated his reasons; albeit conscious of the bad
taste he was showing in thus ostentatiously parading his animosity and
obstinacy in such a place. Lisa showed no signs of vexation; on the
contrary, she smiled, and the sweetness of her smile embarrassed
Florent far more than her suppressed irritation of the previous
evening. At dinner the subject was not renewed; they talked solely of
the great winter saltings, which would keep the whole staff of the
establishment busily employed.

The evenings were growing cold, and as soon as they had dined they
retired into the kitchen, where it was very warm. The room was so
large, too, that several people could sit comfortably at the square
central table, without in any way impeding the work that was going on.
Lighted by gas, the walls were coated with white and blue tiles to a
height of some five or six feet from the floor. On the left was a great
iron stove, in the three apertures of which were set three large round
pots, their bottoms black with soot. At the end was a small range,
which, fitted with an oven and a smoking-place, served for the
broiling; and up above, over the skimming-spoons, ladles, and
long-handled forks, were several numbered drawers, containing rasped
bread, both fine and coarse, toasted crumbs, spices, cloves, nutmegs,
and pepper. On the right, leaning heavily against the wall, was the
chopping-block, a huge mass of oak, slashed and scored all over.
Attached to it were several appliances, an injecting pump, a
forcing-machine, and a mechanical mincer, which, with their wheels and
cranks, imparted to the place an uncanny and mysterious aspect,
suggesting some kitchen of the infernal regions.

Then, all round the walls upon shelves, and even under the tables, were
iron pots, earthenware pans, dishes, pails, various kinds of tin
utensils, a perfect battery of deep copper saucepans, and swelling
funnels, racks of knives and choppers, rows of larding-pins and
needles—a perfect world of greasy things. In spite of the extreme
cleanliness, grease was paramount; it oozed forth from between the blue
and white tiles on the wall, glistened on the red tiles of the
flooring, gave a greyish glitter to the stove, and polished the edges
of the chopping-block with the transparent sheen of varnished oak. And,
indeed, amidst the ever-rising steam, the continuous evaporation from
the three big pots, in which pork was boiling and melting, there was
not a single nail from ceiling to floor from which grease did not
exude.

The Quenu-Gradelles prepared nearly all their stock themselves. All
that they procured from outside were the potted meats of celebrated
firms, with jars of pickles and preserves, sardines, cheese, and edible
snails. They consequently became very busy after September in filling
the cellars which had been emptied during the summer. They continued
working even after the shop had been closed for the night. Assisted by
Auguste and Leon, Quenu would stuff sausages-skins, prepare hams, melt
down lard, and salt the different sorts of bacon. There was a
tremendous noise of cauldrons and cleavers, and the odour of cooking
spread through the whole house. All this was quite independent of the
daily business in fresh pork, _paté de fois gras_, hare patty,
galantine, saveloys and black-puddings.

That evening, at about eleven o’clock, Quenu, after placing a couple of
pots on the fire in order to melt down some lard, began to prepare the
black-puddings. Auguste assisted him. At one corner of the square table
Lisa and Augustine sat mending linen, whilst opposite to them, on the
other side, with his face turned towards the fireplace, was Florent.
Leon was mincing some sausage-meat on the oak block in a slow,
rhythmical fashion.

Auguste first of all went out into the yard to fetch a couple of
jug-like cans full of pigs’ blood. It was he who stuck the animals in
the slaughter house. He himself would carry away the blood and interior
portions of the pigs, leaving the men who scalded the carcasses to
bring them home completely dressed in their carts. Quenu asserted that
no assistant in all Paris was Auguste’ equal as a pig-sticker. The
truth was that Auguste was a wonderfully keen judge of the quality of
the blood; and the black-pudding proved good every time that he said
such would be the case.

“Well, will the black-pudding be good this time?” asked Lisa.

August put down the two cans and slowly answered: “I believe so, Madame
Quenu; yes, I believe so. I tell it at first by the way the blood
flows. If it spurts out very gently when I pull out the knife, that’s a
bad sign, and shows that the blood is poor.”

“But doesn’t that depend on how far the knife has been stuck in?” asked
Quenu.

A smile came over Auguste’s pale face. “No,” he replied; “I always let
four digits of the blade go in; that’s the right way to measure. But
the best sign of all is when the blood runs out and I beat it with my
hand when it pours into the pail; it ought to be of a good warmth, and
creamy, without being too thick.”

Augustine had put down her needle, and with her eyes raised was now
gazing at Auguste. On her ruddy face, crowned by wiry chestnut hair,
there was an expression of profound attention. Lisa and even little
Pauline were also listening with deep interest.

“Well, I beat it, and beat it, and beat it,” continued the young man,
whisking his hand about as though he were whipping cream. “And then,
when I take my hand out and look at it, it ought to be greased, as it
were, by the blood and equally coated all over. And if that’s the case,
anyone can say without fear of mistake that the black-puddings will be
good.”

He remained for a moment in an easy attitude, complacently holding his
hand in the air. This hand, which spent so much of its time in pails of
blood, had brightly gleaming nails, and looked very rosy above his
white sleeve. Quenu had nodded his head in approbation, and an interval
of silence followed. Leon was still mincing. Pauline, however, after
remaining thoughtful for a little while, mounted upon Florent’s feet
again, and in her clear voice exclaimed: “I say, cousin, tell me the
story of the gentleman who was eaten by the wild beasts!”

It was probably the mention of the pig’s blood which had aroused in the
child’s mind the recollection of “the gentleman who had been eaten by
the wild beasts.” Florent did not at first understand what she referred
to, and asked her what gentleman she meant. Lisa began to smile.

“She wants you to tell her,” she said, “the story of that unfortunate
man—you know whom I mean—which you told to Gavard one evening. She must
have heard you.”

At this Florent grew very grave. The little girl got up, and taking the
big cat in her arms, placed it on his knees, saying that Mouton also
would like to hear the story. Mouton, however, leapt on to the table,
where, with rounded back, he remained contemplating the tall, scraggy
individual who for the last fortnight had apparently afforded him
matter for deep reflection. Pauline meantime began to grow impatient,
stamping her feet and insisting on hearing the story.

“Oh, tell her what she wants,” said Lisa, as the child persisted and
became quite unbearable; “she’ll leave us in peace then.”

Florent remained silent for a moment longer, with his eyes turned
towards the floor. Then slowly raising his head he let his gaze rest
first on the two women who were plying their needles, and next on Quenu
and Auguste, who were preparing the pot for the black-puddings. The gas
was burning quietly, the stove diffused a gentle warmth, and all the
grease of the kitchen glistened in an atmosphere of comfort such as
attends good digestion

Then, taking little Pauline upon his knee, and smiling a sad smile,
Florent addressed himself to the child as follows[*]:—

[*] Florent’s narrative is not romance, but is based on the statements
of several of the innocent victims whom the third Napoleon transported
to Cayenne when wading through blood to the power which he so
misused.—Translator.


“Once upon a time there was a poor man who was sent away, a long, long
way off, right across the sea. On the ship which carried him were four
hundred convicts, and he was thrown among them. He was forced to live
for five weeks amidst all those scoundrels, dressed like them in coarse
canvas, and feeding at their mess. Foul insects preyed on him, and
terrible sweats robbed him of all his strength. The kitchen, the
bakehouse, and the engine-room made the orlop deck so terribly hot that
ten of the convicts died from it. In the daytime they were sent up in
batches of fifty to get a little fresh air from the sea; and as the
crew of the ship feared them, a couple of cannons were pointed at the
little bit of deck where they took exercise. The poor fellow was very
glad indeed when his turn to go up came. His terrible perspiration then
abated somewhat; still, he could not eat, and felt very ill. During the
night, when he was manacled again, and the rolling of the ship in the
rough sea kept knocking him against his companions, he quite broke
down, and began to cry, glad to be able to do so without being seen.”

Pauline was listening with dilated eyes, and her little hands crossed
primly in front of her.

“But this isn’t the story of the gentleman who was eaten by the wild
beasts,” she interrupted. “This is quite a different story; isn’t it
now, cousin?”

“Wait a bit, and you’ll see,” replied Florent gently. “I shall come to
the gentleman presently. I’m telling you the whole story from the
beginning.”

“Oh, thank you,” murmured the child, with a delighted expression.
However, she remained thoughtful, evidently struggling with some great
difficulty to which she could find no explanation. At last she spoke.

“But what had the poor man done,” she asked, “that he was sent away and
put in the ship?”

Lisa and Augustine smiled. They were quite charmed with the child’s
intelligence; and Lisa, without giving the little one a direct reply,
took advantage of the opportunity to teach her a lesson by telling her
that naughty children were also sent away in boats like that.

“Oh, then,” remarked Pauline judiciously, “perhaps it served my
cousin’s poor man quite right if he cried all night long.”

Lisa resumed her sewing, bending over her work. Quenu had not listened.
He had been cutting some little rounds of onion over a pot placed on
the fire; and almost at once the onions began to crackle, raising a
clear shrill chirrup like that of grasshoppers basking in the heat.
They gave out a pleasant odour too, and when Quenu plunged his great
wooden spoon into the pot the chirruping became yet louder, and the
whole kitchen was filled with the penetrating perfume of the onions.
Auguste meantime was preparing some bacon fat in a dish, and Leon’s
chopper fell faster and faster, and every now and then scraped the
block so as to gather together the sausage-meat, now almost a paste.

“When they got across the sea,” Florent continued, “they took the man
to an island called the Devil’s Island,[*] where he found himself
amongst others who had been carried away from their own country. They
were all very unhappy. At first they were kept to hard labour, just
like convicts. The gendarme who had charge of them counted them three
times every day, so as to be sure that none were missing. Later on,
they were left free to do as they liked, being merely locked up at
night in a big wooden hut, where they slept in hammocks stretched
between two bars. At the end of the year they went about barefooted, as
their boots were quite worn out, and their clothes had become so ragged
that their flesh showed through them. They had built themselves some
huts with trunks of trees as a shelter against the sun, which is
terribly hot in those parts; but these huts did not shield them against
the mosquitoes, which covered them with pimples and swellings during
the night. Many of them died, and the others turned quite yellow, so
shrunken and wretched, with their long, unkempt beards, that one could
not behold them without pity.”

[*] The Île du Diable. This spot was selected as the place of detention
of Captain Dreyfus, the French officer convicted in 1894 of having
divulged important military documents to foreign powers.—Translator.


“Auguste, give me the fat,” cried Quenu; and when the apprentice had
handed him the dish he let the pieces of bacon-fat slide gently into
the pot, and then stirred them with his spoon. A yet denser steam now
rose from the fireplace.

“What did they give them to eat?” asked little Pauline, who seemed
deeply interested.

“They gave them maggoty rice and foul meat,” answered Florent, whose
voice grew lower as he spoke. “The rice could scarcely be eaten. When
the meat was roasted and very well done it was just possible to swallow
it; but if it was boiled, it smelt so dreadfully that the men had
nausea and stomach ache.”

“I’d rather have lived upon dry bread,” said the child, after thinking
the matter carefully over.

Leon, having finished the mincing, now placed the sausage-meat upon the
square table in a dish. Mouton, who had remained seated with his eyes
fixed upon Florent, as though filled with amazement by his story, was
obliged to retreat a few steps, which he did with a very bad grace.
Then he rolled himself up, with his nose close to the sausage-meat, and
began to purr.

Lisa was unable to conceal her disgust and amazement. That foul rice,
that evil-smelling meat, seemed to her to be scarcely credible
abominations, which disgraced those who had eaten them as much as it
did those who had provided them; and her calm, handsome face and round
neck quivered with vague fear of the man who had lived upon such horrid
food.

“No, indeed, it was not a land of delights,” Florent resumed,
forgetting all about little Pauline, and fixing his dreamy eyes upon
the steaming pot. “Every day brought fresh annoyances—perpetual
grinding tyranny, the violation of every principle of justice, contempt
for all human charity, which exasperated the prisoners, and slowly
consumed them with a fever of sickly rancour. They lived like wild
beasts, with the lash ceaselessly raised over their backs. Those
torturers would have liked to kill the poor man—Oh, no; it can never be
forgotten; it is impossible! Such sufferings will some day claim
vengeance.”

His voice had fallen, and the pieces of fat hissing merrily in the pot
drowned it with the sound of their boiling. Lisa, however, heard him,
and was frightened by the implacable expression which had suddenly come
over his face; and, recollecting the gentle look which he habitually
wore, she judged him to be a hypocrite.

Florent’s hollow voice had brought Pauline’s interest and delight to
the highest pitch, and she fidgeted with pleasure on his knee.

“But the man?” she exclaimed. “Go on about the man!”

Florent looked at her, and then appeared to remember, and smiled his
sad smile again.

“The man,” he continued, “was weary of remaining on the island, and had
but one thought—that of making his escape by crossing the sea and
reaching the mainland, whose white coast line could be seen on the
horizon in clear weather. But it was no easy matter to escape. It was
necessary that a raft should be built, and as several of the prisoners
had already made their escape, all the trees on the island had been
felled to prevent the others from obtaining timber. The island was,
indeed, so bare and naked, so scorched by the blazing sun, that life in
it had become yet more perilous and terrible. However, it occurred to
the man and two of his companions to employ the timbers of which their
huts were built; and one evening they put out to sea on some rotten
beams, which they had fastened together with dry branches. The wind
carried them towards the coast. Just as daylight was about to appear,
the raft struck on a sandbank with such violence that the beams were
severed from their lashings and carried out to sea. The three poor
fellows were almost engulfed in the sand. Two of them sank in it to
their waists, while the third disappeared up to his chin, and his
companions were obliged to pull him out. At last they reached a rock,
so small that there was scarcely room for them to sit down upon it.
When the sun rose they could see the coast in front of them, a bar of
grey cliffs stretching all along the horizon. Two, who knew how to
swim, determined to reach those cliffs. They preferred to run the risk
of being drowned at once to that of slowly starving on the rock. But
they promised their companion that they would return for him when they
had reached land and had been able to procure a boat.”

“Ah, I know now!” cried little Pauline, clapping her hands with glee.
“It’s the story of the gentleman who was eaten by the crabs!”

“They succeeded in reaching the coast,” continued Florent, “but it was
quite deserted; and it was only at the end of four days that they were
able to get a boat. When they returned to the rock, they found their
companion lying on his back, dead, and half-eaten by crabs, which were
still swarming over what remained of his body.”[*]

[*] In deference to the easily shocked feelings of the average English
reader I have somewhat modified this passage. In the original M. Zola
fully describes the awful appearance of the body.—Translator.


A murmur of disgust escaped Lisa and Augustine, and a horrified grimace
passed over the face of Leon, who was preparing the skins for the
black-puddings. Quenu stopped in the midst of his work and looked at
Auguste, who seemed to have turned faint. Only little Pauline was
smiling. In imagination the others could picture those swarming,
ravenous crabs crawling all over the kitchen, and mingling gruesome
odours with the aroma of the bacon-fat and onions.

“Give me the blood,” cried Quenu, who had not been following the story.

Auguste came up to him with the two cans, from which he slowly poured
the blood, while Quenu, as it fell, vigorously stirred the now
thickening contents of the pot. When the cans were emptied, Quenu
reached up to one of the drawers above the range, and took out some
pinches of spice. Then he added a plentiful seasoning of pepper.

“They left him there, didn’t they,” Lisa now asked of Florent, “and
returned themselves in safety?”

“As they were going back,” continued Florent, “the wind changed, and
they were driven out into the open sea. A wave carried away one of
their oars, and the water swept so furiously into the boat that their
whole time was taken up in baling it out with their hands. They tossed
about in this way in sight of the coast, carried away by squalls and
then brought back again by the tide, without a mouthful of bread to
eat, for their scanty stock of provisions had been consumed. This went
on for three days.”

“Three days!” cried Lisa in stupefaction; “three days without food!”

“Yes, three days without food. When the east wind at last brought them
to shore, one of them was so weak that he lay on the beach the whole
day. In the evening he died. His companion had vainly attempted to get
him to chew some leaves which he gathered from the trees.”

At this point Augustine broke into a slight laugh. Then, ashamed at
having done so and not wishing to be considered heartless, she
stammered out in confusion: “Oh! I wasn’t laughing at that. It was
Mouton. Do just look at Mouton, madame.”

Then Lisa in her turn began to smile. Mouton, who had been lying all
this time with his nose close to the dish of sausage-meat, had probably
begun to feel distressed and disgusted by the presence of all this
food, for he had risen and was rapidly scratching the table with his
paws as though he wanted to bury the dish and its contents. At last,
however, turning his back to it and lying down on his side, he
stretched himself out, half closing his eyes and rubbing his head
against the table with languid pleasure. Then they all began to
compliment Mouton. He never stole anything, they said, and could be
safely left with the meat. Pauline related that he licked her fingers
and washed her face after dinner without trying to bite her.

However, Lisa now came back to the question as to whether it were
possible to live for three days without food. In her opinion it was
not. “No,” she said, “I can’t believe it. No one ever goes three days
without food. When people talk of a person dying of hunger, it is a
mere expression. They always get something to eat, more or less. It is
only the most abandoned wretches, people who are utterly lost——”

She was doubtless going to add, “vagrant rogues,” but she stopped short
and looked at Florent. The scornful pout of her lips and the expression
of her bright eyes plainly signified that in her belief only villains
made such prolonged fasts. It seemed to her that a man able to remain
without food for three days must necessarily be a very dangerous
character. For, indeed, honest folks never placed themselves in such a
position.

Florent was now almost stifling. In front of him the stove, into which
Leon had just thrown several shovelfuls of coal, was snoring like a lay
clerk asleep in the sun; and the heat was very great. Auguste, who had
taken charge of the lard melting in the pots, was watching over it in a
state of perspiration, and Quenu wiped his brow with his sleeve whilst
waiting for the blood to mix. A drowsiness such as follows gross
feeding, an atmosphere heavy with indigestion, pervaded the kitchen.

“When the man had buried his comrade in the sand,” Florent continued
slowly, “he walked off alone straight in front of him. Dutch Guiana, in
which country he now was, is a land of forests intermingled with rivers
and swamps. The man walked on for more than a week without coming
across a single human dwelling-place. All around, death seemed to be
lurking and lying in wait for him. Though his stomach was racked by
hunger, he often did not dare to eat the bright-coloured fruits which
hung from the trees; he was afraid to touch the glittering berries,
fearing lest they should be poisonous. For whole days he did not see a
patch of sky, but tramped on beneath a canopy of branches, amidst a
greenish gloom that swarmed with horrible living creatures. Great birds
flew over his head with a terrible flapping of wings and sudden strange
calls resembling death groans; apes sprang, wild animals rushed through
the thickets around him, bending the saplings and bringing down a rain
of leaves, as though a gale were passing. But it was particularly the
serpents that turned his blood cold when, stepping upon a matting of
moving, withered leaves, he caught sight of their slim heads gliding
amidst a horrid maze of roots. In certain nooks, nooks of dank shadow,
swarming colonies of reptiles—some black, some yellow, some purple,
some striped, some spotted, and some resembling withered reeds—suddenly
awakened into life and wriggled away. At such times the man would stop
and look about for a stone on which he might take refuge from the soft
yielding ground into which his feet sank; and there he would remain for
hours, terror-stricken on espying in some open space near by a boa,
who, with tail coiled and head erect, swayed like the trunk of a big
tree splotched with gold.

“At night he used to sleep in the trees, alarmed by the slightest
rustling of the branches, and fancying that he could hear endless
swarms of serpents gliding through the gloom. He almost stifled beneath
the interminable expanse of foliage. The gloomy shade reeked with
close, oppressive heat, a clammy dankness and pestilential sweat,
impregnated with the coarse aroma of scented wood and malodorous
flowers.

“And when at last, after a long weary tramp, the man made his way out
of the forest and beheld the sky again, he found himself confronted by
wide rivers which barred his way. He skirted their banks, keeping a
watchful eye on the grey backs of the alligators and the masses of
drifting vegetation, and then, when he came to a less
suspicious-looking spot, he swam across. And beyond the rivers the
forests began again. At other times there were vast prairie lands,
leagues of thick vegetation, in which, at distant intervals, small
lakes gleamed bluely. The man then made a wide detour, and sounded the
ground beneath him before advancing, having but narrowly escaped from
being swallowed up and buried beneath one of those smiling plains which
he could hear cracking at each step he took. The giant grass, nourished
by all the collected humus, concealed pestiferous marshes, depths of
liquid mud; and amongst the expanses of verdure spread over the
glaucous immensity to the very horizon there were only narrow stretches
of firm ground with which the traveller must be acquainted if he would
avoid disappearing for ever. One night the man sank down as far as his
waist. At each effort he made to extricate himself the mud threatened
to rise to his mouth. Then he remained quite still for nearly a couple
of hours; and when the moon rose he was fortunately able to catch hold
of a branch of a tree above his head. By the time he reached a human
dwelling his hands and feet were bruised and bleeding, swollen with
poisonous stings. He presented such a pitiable, famished appearance
that those who saw him were afraid of him. They tossed him some food
fifty yards away from the house, and the master of it kept guard over
his door with a loaded gun.”

Florent stopped, his voice choked by emotion, and his eyes gazing
blankly before him. For some minutes he had seemed to be speaking to
himself alone. Little Pauline, who had grown drowsy, was lying in his
arms with her head thrown back, though striving to keep her wondering
eyes open. And Quenu, for his part, appeared to be getting impatient.

“Why, you stupid!” he shouted to Leon, “don’t you know how to hold a
skin yet? What do you stand staring at me for? It’s the skin you should
look at, not me! There, hold it like that, and don’t move again!”

With his right hand Leon was raising a long string of sausage-skin, at
one end of which a very wide funnel was inserted; while with his left
hand he coiled the black-pudding round a metal bowl as fast as Quenu
filled the funnel with big spoonfuls of the meat. The latter, black and
steaming, flowed through the funnel, gradually inflating the skin,
which fell down again, gorged to repletion and curving languidly. As
Quenu had removed the pot from the range both he and Leon stood out
prominently, he broad visaged, and the lad slender of profile, in the
burning glow which cast over their pale faces and white garments a
flood of rosy light.

Lisa and Augustine watched the filling of the skin with great interest,
Lisa especially; and she in her turn found fault with Leon because he
nipped the skin too tightly with his fingers, which caused knots to
form, she said. When the skin was quite full, Quenu let it slip gently
into a pot of boiling water; and seemed quite easy in his mind again,
for now nothing remained but to leave it to boil.

“And the man—go on about the man!” murmured Pauline, opening her eyes,
and surprised at no longer hearing the narrative.

Florent rocked her on his knee, and resumed his story in a slow,
murmuring voice, suggestive of that of a nurse singing an infant to
sleep.

“The man,” he said, “arrived at a large town. There he was at first
taken for an escaped convict, and was kept in prison for several
months. Then he was released, and turned his hand to all sorts of work.
He kept accounts and taught children to read, and at one time he was
even employed as a navvy in making an embankment. He was continually
hoping to return to his own country. He had saved the necessary amount
of money when he was attacked by yellow fever. Then, believing him to
be dead, those about him divided his clothes amongst themselves; so
that when he at last recovered he had not even a shirt left. He had to
begin all over again. The man was very weak, and was afraid he might
have to remain where he was. But at last he was able to get away, and
he returned.”

His voice had sunk lower and lower, and now died away altogether in a
final quivering of his lips. The close of the story had lulled little
Pauline to sleep, and she was now slumbering with her head on Florent’s
shoulder. He held her with one arm, and still gently rocked her on his
knee. No one seemed to pay any further attention to him, so he remained
still and quiet where he was, holding the sleeping child.

Now came the tug of war, as Quenu said. He had to remove the
black-puddings from the pot. In order to avoid breaking them or getting
them entangled, he coiled them round a thick wooden pin as he drew them
out, and then carried them into the yard and hung them on screens,
where they quickly dried. Leon helped him, holding up the drooping
ends. And as these reeking festoons of black-pudding crossed the
kitchen they left behind them a trail of odorous steam, which still
further thickened the dense atmosphere.

Auguste, on his side, after giving a hasty glance at the lard moulds,
now took the covers off the two pots in which the fat was simmering,
and each bursting bubble discharged an acrid vapour into the kitchen.
The greasy haze had been gradually rising ever since the beginning of
the evening, and now it shrouded the gas and pervaded the whole room,
streaming everywhere, and veiling the ruddy whiteness of Quenu and his
two assistants. Lisa and Augustine had risen from their seats; and all
were panting as though they had eaten too much.

Augustine carried the sleeping Pauline upstairs; and Quenu, who liked
to fasten up the kitchen himself, gave Auguste and Leon leave to go to
bed, saying that he would fetch the black-pudding himself. The younger
apprentice stole off with a very red face, having managed to secrete
under his shirt nearly a yard of the pudding, which must have almost
scalded him. Then the Quenus and Florent remained alone, in silence.
Lisa stood nibbling a little piece of the hot pudding, keeping her
pretty lips well apart all the while, for fear of burning them, and
gradually the black compound vanished in her rosy mouth.

“Well,” said she, “La Normande was foolish in behaving so rudely; the
black-pudding’s excellent to-day.”

However, there was a knock at the passage door, and Gavard, who stayed
at Monsieur Lebigre’s every evening until midnight, came in. He had
called for a definite answer about the fish inspectorship.

“You must understand,” he said, “that Monsieur Verlaque cannot wait any
longer; he is too ill. So Florent must make up his mind. I have
promised to give a positive answer early to-morrow.”

“Well, Florent accepts,” Lisa quietly remarked, taking another nibble
at some black-pudding.

Florent, who had remained in his chair, overcome by a strange feeling
of prostration, vainly endeavoured to rise and protest.

“No, no, say nothing,” continued Lisa; “the matter is quite settled.
You have suffered quite enough already, my dear Florent. What you have
just been telling us is enough to make one shudder. It is time now for
you to settle down. You belong to a respectable family, you received a
good education, and it is really not fitting that you should go
wandering about the highways like a vagrant. At your age childishness
is no longer excusable. You have been foolish; well, all that will be
forgotten and forgiven. You will take your place again among those of
your own class—the class of respectable folks—and live in future like
other people.”

Florent listened in astonishment, quite unable to say a word. Lisa was,
doubtless, right. She looked so healthy, so serene, that it was
impossible to imagine that she desired anything but what was proper. It
was he, with his fleshless body and dark, equivocal-looking
countenance, who must be in the wrong, and indulging in unrighteous
dreams. He could, indeed, no longer understand why he had hitherto
resisted.

Lisa, however, continued to talk to him with an abundant flow of words,
as though he were a little boy found in fault and threatened with the
police. She assumed, indeed, a most maternal manner, and plied him with
the most convincing reasons. And at last, as a final argument, she
said:

“Do it for us, Florent. We occupy a fair position in the neighbourhood
which obliges us to use a certain amount of circumspection; and, to
tell you the truth, between ourselves, I’m afraid that people will
begin to talk. This inspectorship will set everything right; you will
be somebody; you will even be an honour to us.”

Her manner had become caressingly persuasive, and Florent was
penetrated by all the surrounding plenteousness, all the aroma filling
the kitchen, where he fed, as it were, on the nourishment floating in
the atmosphere. He sank into blissful meanness, born of all the copious
feeding that went on in the sphere of plenty in which he had been
living during the last fortnight. He felt, as it were, the titillation
of forming fat which spread slowly all over his body. He experienced
the languid beatitude of shopkeepers, whose chief concern is to fill
their bellies. At this late hour of night, in the warm atmosphere of
the kitchen, all his acerbity and determination melted away. That
peaceable evening, with the odour of the black-pudding and the lard,
and the sight of plump little Pauline slumbering on his knee, had so
enervated him that he found himself wishing for a succession of such
evenings—endless ones which would make him fat.

However, it was the sight of Mouton that chiefly decided him. Mouton
was sound asleep, with his stomach turned upwards, one of his paws
resting on his nose, and his tail twisted over this side, as though to
keep him warm; and he was slumbering with such an expression of feline
happiness that Florent, as he gazed at him, murmured: “No, it would be
too foolish! I accept the berth. Say that I accept it, Gavard.”

Then Lisa finished eating her black-pudding, and wiped her fingers on
the edge of her apron. And next she got her brother-in-law’s candle
ready for him, while Gavard and Quenu congratulated him on his
decision. It was always necessary for a man to settle down, said they;
the breakneck freaks of politics did not provide one with food. And,
meantime, Lisa, standing there with the lighted candle in her hand,
looked at him with an expression of satisfaction resting on her
handsome face, placid like that of some sacred cow.




CHAPTER III


Three days later the necessary formalities were gone through, and
without demur the police authorities at the Prefecture accepted Florent
on Monsieur Verlaque’s recommendation as his substitute. Gavard, by the
way, had made it a point to accompany them. When he again found himself
alone with Florent he kept nudging his ribs with his elbow as they
walked along together, and laughed, without saying anything, while
winking his eyes in a jeering way. He seemed to find something very
ridiculous in the appearance of the police officers whom they met on
the Quai de l’Horloge, for, as he passed them, he slightly shrugged his
shoulders and made the grimace of a man seeking to restrain himself
from laughing in people’s faces.

On the following morning Monsieur Verlaque began to initiate the new
inspector into the duties of his office. It had been arranged that
during the next few days he should make him acquainted with the
turbulent sphere which he would have to supervise. Poor Verlaque, as
Gavard called him was a pale little man, swathed in flannels,
handkerchiefs, and mufflers. Constantly coughing, he made his way
through the cool, moist atmosphere, and running waters of the fish
market, on a pair of scraggy legs like those of a sickly child.

When Florent made his appearance on the first morning, at seven
o’clock, he felt quite distracted; his eyes were dazed, his head ached
with all the noise and riot. Retail dealers were already prowling about
the auction pavilion; clerks were arriving with their ledgers, and
consigners’ agents, with leather bags slung over their shoulders, sat
on overturned chairs by the salesmen’s desks, waiting to receive their
cash. Fish was being unloaded and unpacked not only in the enclosure,
but even on the footways. All along the latter were piles of small
baskets, an endless arrival of cases and hampers, and sacks of mussels,
from which streamlets of water trickled. The auctioneers’ assistants,
all looking very busy, sprang over the heaps, tore away the straw at
the tops of the baskets, emptied the latter, and tossed them aside.
They then speedily transferred their contents in lots to huge
wickerwork trays, arranging them with a turn of the hand so that they
might show to the best advantage. And when the large tray-like baskets
were all set out, Florent could almost fancy that a whole shoal of fish
had got stranded there, still quivering with life, and gleaming with
rosy nacre, scarlet coral, and milky pearl, all the soft, pale, sheeny
hues of the ocean.

The deep-lying forests of seaweed, in which the mysterious life of the
ocean slumbers, seemed at one haul of the nets to have yielded up all
they contained. There were cod, keeling, whiting, flounders, plaice,
dabs, and other sorts of common fish of a dingy grey with whitish
splotches; there were conger-eels, huge serpent-like creatures, with
small black eyes and muddy, bluish skins, so slimy that they still
seemed to be gliding along, yet alive. There were broad flat skate with
pale undersides edged with a soft red, and superb backs bumpy with
vertebrae, and marbled down to the tautly stretched ribs of their fins
with splotches of cinnabar, intersected by streaks of the tint of
Florentine bronze—a dark medley of colour suggestive of the hues of a
toad or some poisonous flower. Then, too, there were hideous dog-fish,
with round heads, widely-gaping mouths like those of Chinese idols, and
short fins like bats’ wings; fit monsters to keep yelping guard over
the treasures of the ocean grottoes. And next came the finer fish,
displayed singly on the osier trays; salmon that gleamed like chased
silver, every scale seemingly outlined by a graving-tool on a polished
metal surface; mullet with larger scales and coarser markings; large
turbot and huge brill with firm flesh white like curdled milk;
tunny-fish, smooth and glossy, like bags of blackish leather; and
rounded bass, with widely gaping mouths which a soul too large for the
body seemed to have rent asunder as it forced its way out amidst the
stupefaction of death. And on all sides there were sole, brown and
grey, in pairs; sand-eels, slim and stiff, like shavings of pewter;
herrings, slightly twisted, with bleeding gills showing on their
silver-worked skins; fat dories tinged with just a suspicion of
carmine; burnished mackerel with green-streaked backs, and sides
gleaming with ever-changing iridescence; and rosy gurnets with white
bellies, their head towards the centre of the baskets and their tails
radiating all around, so that they simulated some strange florescence
splotched with pearly white and brilliant vermilion. There were rock
mullet, too, with delicious flesh, flushed with the pinky tinge
peculiar to the Cyprinus family; boxes of whiting with opaline
reflections; and baskets of smelts—neat little baskets, pretty as those
used for strawberries, and exhaling a strong scent of violets. And
meantime the tiny black eyes of the shrimps dotted as with beads of jet
their soft-toned mass of pink and grey; and spiny crawfish and lobsters
striped with black, all still alive, raised a grating sound as they
tried to crawl along with their broken claws.

Florent gave but indifferent attention to Monsieur Verlaque’s
explanations. A flood of sunshine suddenly streamed through the lofty
glass roof of the covered way, lighting up all these precious colours,
toned and softened by the waves—the iridescent flesh-tints of the
shell-fish, the opal of the whiting, the pearly nacre of the mackerel,
the ruddy gold of the mullets, the plated skins of the herrings, and
massive silver of the salmon. It was as though the jewel-cases of some
sea-nymph had been emptied there—a mass of fantastical, undreamt-of
ornaments, a streaming and heaping of necklaces, monstrous bracelets,
gigantic brooches, barbaric gems and jewels, the use of which could not
be divined. On the backs of the skate and the dog-fish you saw, as it
were, big dull green and purple stones set in dark metal, while the
slender forms of the sand-eels and the tails and fins of the smelts
displayed all the delicacy of finely wrought silver-work.

And meantime Florent’s face was fanned by a fresh breeze, a sharp, salt
breeze redolent of the sea. It reminded him of the coasts of Guiana and
his voyages. He half fancied that he was gazing at some bay left dry by
the receding tide, with the seaweed steaming in the sun, the bare rocks
drying, and the beach smelling strongly of the brine. All around him
the fish in their perfect freshness exhaled a pleasant perfume, that
slightly sharp, irritating perfume which depraves the appetite.

Monsieur Verlaque coughed. The dampness was affecting him, and he
wrapped his muffler more closely about his neck.

“Now,” said he, “we will pass on to the fresh water fish.”

This was in a pavilion beside the fruit market, the last one, indeed,
in the direction of the Rue Rambuteau. On either side of the space
reserved for the auctions were large circular stone basins, divided
into separate compartments by iron gratings. Slender streams of water
flowed from brass jets shaped like swan’s necks; and the compartments
were filled with swarming colonies of crawfish, black-backed carp ever
on the move, and mazy tangles of eels, incessantly knotting and
unknotting themselves. Again was Monsieur Verlaque attacked by an
obstinate fit of coughing. The moisture of the atmosphere was more
insipid here than amongst the sea water fish: there was a riverside
scent, as of sun-warmed water slumbering on a bed of sand.

A great number of crawfishes had arrived from Germany that morning in
cases and hampers, and the market was also crowded with river fish from
Holland and England. Several men were unpacking shiny carp from the
Rhine, lustrous with ruddy metallic hues, their scales resembling
bronzed _cloisonne_ enamel; and others were busy with huge pike, the
cruel iron-grey brigands of the waters, who ravenously protruded their
savage jaws; or with magnificent dark-hued with verdigris. And amidst
these suggestions of copper, iron, and bronze, the gudgeon and perch,
the trout, the bleak, and the flat-fish taken in sweep-nets showed
brightly white, the steel-blue tints of their backs gradually toning
down to the soft transparency of their bellies. However, it was the fat
snowy-white barbel that supplied the liveliest brightness in this
gigantic collection of still life.

Bags of young carp were being gently emptied into the basins. The fish
spun round, then remained motionless for a moment, and at last shot
away and disappeared. Little eels were turned out of their hampers in a
mass, and fell to the bottom of the compartments like tangled knots of
snakes; while the larger ones—those whose bodies were about as thick as
a child’s arm—raised their heads and slipped of their own accord into
the water with the supple motion of serpents gliding into the
concealment of a thicket. And meantime the other fish, whose death
agony had been lasting all the morning as they lay on the soiled osiers
of the basket-trays, slowly expired amidst all the uproar of the
auctions, opening their mouths as though to inhale the moisture of the
air, with great silent gasps, renewed every few seconds.

However, Monsieur Verlaque brought Florent back to the salt water fish.
He took him all over the place and gave him the minutest particulars
about everything. Round the nine salesmen’s desks ranged along three
sides of the pavilion there was now a dense crowd of surging, swaying
heads, above which appeared the clerks, perched upon high chairs and
making entries in their ledgers.

“Are all these clerks employed by the salesmen?” asked Florent.

By way of reply Monsieur Verlaque made a detour along the outside
footway, led him into the enclosure of one of the auctions, and then
explained the working of the various departments of the big yellow
office, which smelt strongly of fish and was stained all over by
drippings and splashings from the hampers. In a little glazed
compartment up above, the collector of the municipal dues took note of
the prices realised by the different lots of fish. Lower down, seated
upon high chairs and with their wrists resting upon little desks, were
two female clerks, who kept account of the business on behalf of the
salesmen. At each end of the stone table in front of the office was a
crier who brought the basket-trays forward in turn, and in a bawling
voice announced what each lot consisted of; while above him the female
clerk, pen in hand, waited to register the price at which the lots were
knocked down. And outside the enclosure, shut up in another little
office of yellow wood, Monsieur Verlaque showed Florent the cashier, a
fat old woman, who was ranging coppers and five-franc pieces in piles.

“There is a double control, you see,” said Monsieur Verlaque; “the
control of the Prefecture of the Seine and that of the Prefecture of
Police. The latter, which licenses the salesmen, claims to have the
right of supervision over them; and the municipality asserts its right
to be represented at the transactions as they are subject to taxation.”

He went on expatiating at length in his faint cold voice respecting the
rival claims of the two Prefectures. Florent, however, was paying but
little heed, his attention being concentrated on a female clerk sitting
on one of the high chairs just in front of him. She was a tall, dark
woman of thirty, with big black eyes and an easy calmness of manner,
and she wrote with outstretched fingers like a girl who had been taught
the regulation method of the art.

However, Florent’s attention was diverted by the yelping of the crier,
who was just offering a magnificent turbot for sale.

“I’ve a bid of thirty francs! Thirty francs, now; thirty francs!”

He repeated these words in all sorts of keys, running up and down a
strange scale of notes full of sudden changes. Humpbacked and with his
face twisted askew, and his hair rough and disorderly, he wore a great
blue apron with a bib; and with flaming eyes and outstretched arms he
cried vociferously: “Thirty-one! thirty-two! thirty-three! Thirty-three
francs fifty centimes! thirty-three fifty!”

Then he paused to take breath, turning the basket-tray and pushing it
farther upon the table. The fish-wives bent forward and gently touched
the turbot with their finger-tips. Then the crier began again with
renewed energy, hurling his figures towards the buyers with a wave of
the hand and catching the slightest indication of a fresh bid—the
raising of a finger, a twist of the eyebrows, a pouting of the lips, a
wink, and all with such rapidity and such a ceaseless jumble of words
that Florent, utterly unable to follow him, felt quite disconcerted
when, in a sing-song voice like that of a priest intoning the final
words of a versicle, he chanted: “Forty-two! forty-two! The turbot goes
for forty-two francs.”

It was the beautiful Norman who had made the last bid. Florent
recognised her as she stood in the line of fish-wives crowding against
the iron rails which surrounded the enclosure. The morning was fresh
and sharp, and there was a row of tippets above the display of big
white aprons, covering the prominent bosoms and stomachs and sturdy
shoulders. With high-set chignon set off with curls, and white and
dainty skin, the beautiful Norman flaunted her lace bow amidst tangled
shocks of hair covered with dirty kerchiefs, red noses eloquent of
drink, sneering mouths, and battered faces suggestive of old pots. And
she also recognised Madame Quenu’s cousin, and was so surprised to see
him there that she began gossiping to her neighbours about him.

The uproar of voices had become so great that Monsieur Verlaque
renounced all further attempt to explain matters to Florent. On the
footway close by, men were calling out the larger fish with prolonged
shouts, which sounded as though they came from gigantic
speaking-trumpets; and there was one individual who roared “Mussels!
Mussels!” in such a hoarse, cracked, clamorous voice that the very
roofs of the market shook. Some sacks of mussels were turned upside
down, and their contents poured into hampers, while others were emptied
with shovels. And there was a ceaseless procession of basket-trays
containing skate, soles, mackerel, conger-eels, and salmon, carried
backwards and forwards amidst the ever-increasing cackle and pushing of
the fish-women as they crowded against the iron rails which creaked
with their pressure. The humpbacked crier, now fairly on the job, waved
his skinny arms in the air and protruded his jaws. Presently, seemingly
lashed into a state of frenzy by the flood of figures that spurted from
his lips, he sprang upon a stool, where, with his mouth twisted
spasmodically and his hair streaming behind him, he could force nothing
more than unintelligible hisses from his parched throat. And in the
meantime, up above, the collector of municipal dues, a little old man,
muffled in a collar of imitation astrachan, remained with nothing but
his nose showing under his black velvet skullcap. And the tall,
dark-complexioned female clerk, with eyes shining calmly in her face,
which had been slightly reddened by the cold, sat on her high wooden
chair, quietly writing, apparently unruffled by the continuous rattle
which came from the hunchback below her.

“That fellow Logre is wonderful,” muttered Monsieur Verlaque with a
smile. “He is the best crier in the markets. I believe he could make
people buy boot soles in the belief they were fish!”

Then he and Florent went back into the pavilion. As they again passed
the spot where the fresh water fish was being sold by auction, and
where the bidding seemed much quieter, Monsieur Verlaque explained that
French river fishing was in a bad way.[*] The crier here, a fair,
sorry-looking fellow, who scarcely moved his arms, was disposing of
some lots of eels and crawfish in a monotonous voice, while the
assistants fished fresh supplies out of the stone basins with their
short-handled nets.

[*] M. Zola refers, of course, to the earlier years of the Second
Empire. Under the present republican Government, which has largely
fostered fish culture, matters have considerably improved.—Translator.


However, the crowd round the salesmen’s desks was still increasing.
Monsieur Verlaque played his part as Florent’s instructor in the most
conscientious manner, clearing the way by means of his elbows, and
guiding his successor through the busiest parts. The upper-class retail
dealers were there, quietly waiting for some of the finer fish, or
loading the porters with their purchases of turbot, tunny, and salmon.
The street-hawkers who had clubbed together to buy lots of herrings and
small flat-fish were dividing them on the pavement. There were also
some people of the smaller middle class, from distant parts of the
city, who had come down at four o’clock in the morning to buy a really
fresh fish, and had ended by allowing some enormous lot, costing from
forty to fifty francs, to be knocked down to them, with the result that
they would be obliged to spend the whole day in getting their friends
and acquaintances to take the surplus off their hands. Every now and
then some violent pushing would force a gap through part of the crowd.
A fish-wife, who had got tightly jammed, freed herself, shaking her
fists and pouring out a torrent of abuse. Then a compact mass of people
again collected, and Florent, almost suffocated, declared that he had
seen quite enough, and understood all that was necessary.

As Monsieur Verlaque was helping him to extricate himself from the
crowd, they found themselves face to face with the handsome Norman. She
remained stock-still in front of them, and with her queenly air
inquired:

“Well, is it quite settled? You are going to desert us, Monsieur
Verlaque?”

“Yes, yes,” replied the little man; “I am going to take a rest in the
country, at Clamart. The smell of the fish is bad for me, it seems.
Here, this is the gentleman who is going to take my place.”

So speaking he turned round to introduce Florent to her. The handsome
Norman almost choked; however, as Florent went off, he fancied he could
hear her whisper to her neighbours, with a laugh: “Well, we shall have
some fine fun now, see if we don’t!”

The fish-wives had begun to set out their stalls. From all the taps at
the corners of the marble slabs water was gushing freely; and there was
a rustling sound all round, like the plashing of rain, a streaming of
stiff jets of water hissing and spurting. And then, from the lower side
of the sloping slabs, great drops fell with a softened murmur,
splashing on the flagstones where a mass of tiny streams flowed along
here and there, turning holes and depressions into miniature lakes, and
afterwards gliding in a thousand rills down the slope towards the Rue
Rambuteau. A moist haze ascended, a sort of rainy dust, bringing fresh
whiffs of air to Florent’s face, whiffs of that salt, pungent sea
breeze which he remembered so well; while in such fish as was already
laid out he once more beheld the rosy nacres, gleaming corals, and
milky pearls, all the rippling colour and glaucous pallidity of the
ocean world.

That first morning left him much in doubt; indeed, he regretted that he
had yielded to Lisa’s insistence. Ever since his escape from the greasy
drowsiness of the kitchen he had been accusing himself of base weakness
with such violence that tears had almost risen in his eyes. But he did
not dare to go back on his word. He was a little afraid of Lisa, and
could see the curl of her lips and the look of mute reproach upon her
handsome face. He felt that she was too serious a woman to be trifled
with. However, Gavard happily inspired him with a consoling thought. On
the evening of the day on which Monsieur Verlaque had conducted him
through the auction sales, Gavard took him aside and told him, with a
good deal of hesitation, that “the poor devil” was not at all well off.
And after various remarks about the scoundrelly Government which ground
the life out of its servants without allowing them even the means to
die in comfort, he ended by hinting that it would be charitable on
Florent’s part to surrender a part of his salary to the old inspector.
Florent welcomed the suggestion with delight. It was only right, he
considered, for he looked upon himself simply as Monsieur Verlaque’s
temporary substitute; and besides, he himself really required nothing,
as he boarded and lodged with his brother. Gavard added that he thought
if Florent gave up fifty francs out of the hundred and fifty which he
would receive monthly, the arrangement would be everything that could
be desired; and, lowering his voice, he added that it would not be for
long, for the poor fellow was consumptive to his very bones. Finally it
was settled that Florent should see Monsieur Verlaque’s wife, and
arrange matters with her, to avoid any possibility of hurting the old
man’s feelings.

The thought of this kindly action afforded Florent great relief, and he
now accepted his duties with the object of doing good, thus continuing
to play the part which he had been fulfilling all his life. However, he
made the poultry dealer promise that he would not speak of the matter
to anyone; and as Gavard also felt a vague fear of Lisa, he kept the
secret, which was really very meritorious in him.

And now the whole pork shop seemed happy. Handsome Lisa manifested the
greatest friendliness towards her brother-in-law. She took care that he
went to bed early, so as to be able to rise in good time; she kept his
breakfast hot for him; and she no longer felt ashamed at being seen
talking to him on the footway, now that he wore a laced cap. Quenu,
quite delighted by all these good signs, sat down to table in the
evening between his wife and brother with a lighter heart than ever.
They often lingered over dinner till nine o’clock, leaving the shop in
Augustine’s charge, and indulging in a leisurely digestion interspersed
with gossip about the neighbourhood, and the dogmatic opinions of Lisa
on political topics; Florent also had to relate how matters had gone in
the fish market that day. He gradually grew less frigid, and began to
taste the happiness of a well-regulated existence. There was a
well-to-do comfort and trimness about the light yellowish dining room
which had a softening influence upon him as soon as he crossed its
threshold. Handsome Lisa’s kindly attentions wrapped him, as it were,
in cotton-wool; and mutual esteem and concord reigned paramount.

Gavard, however, considered the Quenu-Gradelles’ home to be too drowsy.
He forgave Lisa her weakness for the Emperor, because, he said, one
ought never to discuss politics with women, and beautiful Madame Quenu
was, after all, a very worthy person, who managed her business
admirably. Nevertheless, he much preferred to spend his evenings at
Monsieur Lebigre’s, where he met a group of friends who shared his own
opinions. Thus when Florent was appointed to the inspectorship of the
fish market, Gavard began to lead him astray, taking him off for hours,
and prompting him to lead a bachelor’s life now that he had obtained a
berth.

Monsieur Lebigre was the proprietor of a very fine establishment,
fitted up in the modern luxurious style. Occupying the right-hand
corner of the Rue Pirouette, and looking on to the Rue Rambuteau, it
formed, with its four small Norwegian pines in green-painted tubs
flanking the doorway, a worthy pendant to the big pork shop of the
Quenu-Gradelles. Through the clear glass windows you could see the
interior, which was decorated with festoons of foliage, vine branches,
and grapes, painted on a soft green ground. The floor was tiled with
large black and white squares. At the far end was the yawning cellar
entrance, above which rose a spiral staircase hung with red drapery,
and leading to the billiard-room on the first floor. The counter or
“bar” on the right looked especially rich, and glittered like polished
silver. Its zinc-work, hanging with a broad bulging border over the
sub-structure of white and red marble, edged it with a rippling sheet
of metal as if it were some high altar laden with embroidery. At one
end, over a gas stove, stood porcelain pots, decorated with circles of
brass, and containing punch and hot wine. At the other extremity was a
tall and richly sculptured marble fountain, from which a fine stream of
water, so steady and continuous that it looked as though it were
motionless, flowed into a basin. In the centre, edged on three sides by
the sloping zinc surface of the counter, was a second basin for rinsing
and cooling purposes, where quart bottles of draught wine, partially
empty, reared their greenish necks. Then on the counter, to the right
and left of this central basin, were batches of glasses symmetrically
arranged: little glasses for brandy, thick tumblers for draught wine,
cup glasses for brandied fruits, glasses for absinthe, glass mugs for
beer, and tall goblets, all turned upside down and reflecting the
glitter of the counter. On the left, moreover, was a metal urn, serving
as a receptacle for gratuities; whilst a similar one on the right
bristled with a fan-like arrangement of coffee spoons.

Monsieur Lebigre was generally to be found enthroned behind his counter
upon a seat covered with buttoned crimson leather. Within easy reach of
his hand were the liqueurs in cut-glass decanters protruding from the
compartments of a stand. His round back rested against a huge mirror
which completely filled the panel behind him; across it ran two glass
shelves supporting an array of jars and bottles. Upon one of them the
glass jars of preserved fruits, cherries, plums, and peaches, stood out
darkly; while on the other, between symmetrically arranged packets of
finger biscuits, were bright flasks of soft green and red and yellow
glass, suggesting strange mysterious liqueurs, or floral extracts of
exquisite limpidity. Standing on the glass shelf in the white glow of
the mirror, these flasks, flashing as if on fire, seemed to be
suspended in the air.

To give his premises the appearance of a café, Monsieur Lebigre had
placed two small tables of bronzed iron and four chairs against the
wall, in front of the counter. A chandelier with five lights and
frosted globes hung down from the ceiling. On the left was a round gilt
timepiece, above a _tourniquet_[*] fixed to the wall. Then at the far
end came the private “cabinet,” a corner of the shop shut off by a
partition glazed with frosted glass of a small square pattern. In the
daytime this little room received a dim light from a window that looked
on to the Rue Pirouette; and in the evening, a gas jet burnt over the
two tables painted to resemble marble. It was there that Gavard and his
political friends met each evening after dinner. They looked upon
themselves as being quite at home there, and had prevailed on the
landlord to reserve the place for them. When Monsieur Lebigre had
closed the door of the glazed partition, they knew themselves to be so
safely screened from intrusion that they spoke quite unreservedly of
the great “sweep out” which they were fond of discussing. No
unprivileged customer would have dared to enter.

[*] This is a kind of dial turning on a pivot, and usually enclosed in
a brass frame, from which radiate a few small handles or spokes. Round
the face of the dial—usually of paper—are various numerals, and between
the face and its glass covering is a small marble or wooden ball. The
appliance is used in lieu of dice or coins when two or more customers
are “tossing” for drinks. Each in turn sends the dial spinning round,
and wins or loses according to the numeral against which the ball rests
when the dial stops. As I can find no English name for the appliance, I
have thought it best to describe it.—Translator.


On the first day that Gavard took Florent off he gave him some
particulars of Monsieur Lebigre. He was a good fellow, he said, who
sometimes came to drink his coffee with them; and, as he had said one
day that he had fought in ‘48, no one felt the least constraint in his
presence. He spoke but little, and seemed rather thick-headed. As the
gentlemen passed him on their way to the private room they grasped his
hand in silence across the glasses and bottles. By his side on the
crimson leather seat behind the counter there was generally a fair
little woman, whom he had engaged as counter assistant in addition to
the white-aproned waiter who attended to the tables and the
billiard-room. The young woman’s name was Rose, and she seemed a very
gentle and submissive being. Gavard, with a wink of his eye, told
Florent that he fancied Lebigre had a weakness for her. It was she, by
the way, who waited upon the friends in the private room, coming and
going, with her happy, humble air, amidst the stormiest political
discussions.

Upon the day on which the poultry dealer took Florent to Lebigre’s to
present him to his friends, the only person whom the pair found in the
little room when they entered it was a man of some fifty years of age,
of a mild and thoughtful appearance. He wore a rather shabby-looking
hat and a long chestnut-coloured overcoat, and sat, with his chin
resting on the ivory knob of a thick cane, in front of a glass mug full
of beer. His mouth was so completely concealed by a vigorous growth of
beard that his face had a dumb, lipless appearance.

“How are you, Robine?” exclaimed Gavard.

Robine silently thrust out his hand, without making any reply, though
his eyes softened into a slight smile of welcome. Then he let his chin
drop on to the knob of his cane again, and looked at Florent over his
beer. Florent had made Gavard swear to keep his story a secret for fear
of some dangerous indiscretion; and he was not displeased to observe a
touch of distrust in the discreet demeanour of the gentleman with the
heavy beard. However, he was really mistaken in this, for Robine never
talked more than he did now. He was always the first to arrive, just as
the clock struck eight; and he always sat in the same corner, never
letting go his hold of his cane, and never taking off either his hat or
his overcoat. No one had ever seen him without his hat upon his head.
He remained there listening to the talk of the others till midnight,
taking four hours to empty his mug of beer, and gazing successively at
the different speakers as though he heard them with his eyes. When
Florent afterwards questioned Gavard about Robine, the poultry dealer
spoke of the latter as though he held him in high esteem. Robine, he
asserted, was an extremely clever and able man, and, though he was
unable to say exactly where he had given proof of his hostility to the
established order of things, he declared that he was one of the most
dreaded of the Government’s opponents. He lived in the Rue Saint Denis,
in rooms to which no one as a rule could gain admission. The poultry
dealer, however, asserted that he himself had once been in them. The
wax floors, he said, were protected by strips of green linen; and there
were covers over the furniture, and an alabaster timepiece with
columns. He had caught a glimpse of the back of a lady, who was just
disappearing through one doorway as he was entering by another, and had
taken her to be Madame Robine. She appeared to be an old lady of very
genteel appearance, with her hair arranged in corkscrew curls; but of
this he could not be quite certain. No one knew why they had taken up
their abode amidst all the uproar of a business neighbourhood; for the
husband did nothing at all, spending his days no one knew how and
living on no one knew what, though he made his appearance every evening
as though he were tired but delighted with some excursion into the
highest regions of politics.

“Well, have you read the speech from the throne?” asked Gavard, taking
up a newspaper that was lying on the table.

Robine shrugged his shoulders. Just at that moment, however, the door
of the glazed partition clattered noisily, and a hunchback made his
appearance. Florent at once recognised the deformed crier of the fish
market, though his hands were now washed and he was neatly dressed,
with his neck encircled by a great red muffler, one end of which hung
down over his hump like the skirt of a Venetian cloak.

“Ah, here’s Logre!” exclaimed the poultry dealer. “Now we shall hear
what he thinks about the speech from the throne.”

Logre, however, was apparently furious. To begin with he almost broke
the pegs off in hanging up his hat and muffler. Then he threw himself
violently into a chair, and brought his fist down on the table, while
tossing away the newspaper.

“Do you think I read their fearful lies?” he cried.

Then he gave vent to the anger raging within him. “Did ever anyone
hear,” he cried, “of masters making such fools of their people? For two
whole hours I’ve been waiting for my pay! There were ten of us in the
office kicking our heels there. Then at last Monsieur Manoury arrived
in a cab. Where he had come from I don’t know, and don’t care, but I’m
quite sure it wasn’t any respectable place. Those salesmen are all a
parcel of thieves and libertines! And then, too, the hog actually gave
me all my money in small change!”

Robine expressed his sympathy with Logre by the slight movement of his
eyelids. But suddenly the hunchback bethought him of a victim upon whom
to pour out his wrath. “Rose! Rose!” he cried, stretching his head out
of the little room.

The young woman quickly responded to the call, trembling all over.

“Well,” shouted Logre, “what do you stand staring at me like that for?
Much good that’ll do! You saw me come in, didn’t you? Why haven’t you
brought me my glass of black coffee, then?”

Gavard ordered two similar glasses, and Rose made all haste to bring
what was required, while Logre glared sternly at the glasses and little
sugar trays as if studying them. When he had taken a drink he seemed to
grow somewhat calmer.

“But it’s Charvet who must be getting bored,” he said presently. “He is
waiting outside on the pavement for Clemence.”

Charvet, however, now made his appearance, followed by Clemence. He was
a tall, scraggy young man, carefully shaved, with a skinny nose and
thin lips. He lived in the Rue Vavin, behind the Luxembourg, and called
himself a professor. In politics he was a disciple of Hébert.[*] He
wore his hair very long, and the collar and lapels of his threadbare
frock-coat were broadly turned back. Affecting the manner and speech of
a member of the National Convention, he would pour out such a flood of
bitter words and make such a haughty display of pedantic learning that
he generally crushed his adversaries. Gavard was afraid of him, though
he would not confess it; still, in Charvet’s absence he would say that
he really went too far. Robine, for his part, expressed approval of
everything with his eyes. Logre sometimes opposed Charvet on the
question of salaries; but the other was really the autocrat of the
coterie, having the greatest fund of information and the most
overbearing manner. For more than ten years he and Clemence had lived
together as man and wife, in accordance with a previously arranged
contract, the terms of which were strictly observed by both parties to
it. Florent looked at the young woman with some little surprise, but at
last he recollected where he had previously seen her. This was at the
fish auction. She was, indeed, none other than the tall dark female
clerk whom he had observed writing with outstretched fingers, after the
manner of one who had been carefully instructed in the art of holding a
pen.

[*] Hébert, as the reader will remember, was the furious demagogue with
the foul tongue and poisoned pen who edited the _Père Duchesne_ at the
time of the first French Revolution. We had a revival of his politics
and his journal in Paris during the Commune of 1871.—Translator.


Rose made her appearance at the heels of the two newcomers. Without
saying a word she placed a mug of beer before Charvet and a tray before
Clemence, who in a leisurely way began to compound a glass of “grog,”
pouring some hot water over a slice of lemon, which she crushed with
her spoon, and glancing carefully at the decanter as she poured out
some rum, so as not to add more of it than a small liqueur glass could
contain.

Gavard now presented Florent to the company, but more especially to
Charvet. He introduced them to one another as professors, and very able
men, who would be sure to get on well together. But it was probable
that he had already been guilty of some indiscretion, for all the men
at once shook hands with a tight and somewhat masonic squeeze of each
other’s fingers. Charvet, for his part, showed himself almost amiable;
and whether he and the others knew anything of Florent’s antecedents,
they at all events indulged in no embarrassing allusions.

“Did Manoury pay you in small change?” Logre asked Clemence.

She answered affirmatively, and produced a roll of francs and another
of two-franc pieces, and unwrapped them. Charvet watched her, and his
eyes followed the rolls as she replaced them in her pocket, after
counting their contents and satisfying herself that they were correct.

“We have our accounts to settle,” he said in a low voice.

“Yes, we’ll settle up to-night,” the young woman replied. “But we are
about even, I should think. I’ve breakfasted with you four times,
haven’t I? But I lent you a hundred sous last week, you know.”

Florent, surprised at hearing this, discreetly turned his head away.
Then Clemence slipped the last roll of silver into her pocket, drank a
little of her grog, and, leaning against the glazed partition, quietly
settled herself down to listen to the men talking politics. Gavard had
taken up the newspaper again, and, in tones which he strove to render
comic, was reading out some passages of the speech from the throne
which had been delivered that morning at the opening of the Chambers.
Charvet made fine sport of the official phraseology; there was not a
single line of it which he did not tear to pieces. One sentence
afforded especial amusement to them all. It was this: “We are
confident, gentlemen, that, leaning on your lights[*] and the
conservative sentiments of the country, we shall succeed in increasing
the national prosperity day by day.”

[*] In the sense of illumination of mind. It has been necessary to give
a literal translation of this phrase to enable the reader to realise
the point of subsequent witticisms in which Clemence and Gavard
indulge. —Translator.


Logre rose up and repeated this sentence, and by speaking through his
nose succeeded fairly well in mimicking the Emperor’s drawling voice.

“It’s lovely, that prosperity of his; why, everyone’s dying of hunger!”
said Charvet.

“Trade is shocking,” asserted Gavard.

“And what in the name of goodness is the meaning of anybody ‘leaning on
lights’?” continued Clemence, who prided herself upon literary culture.

Robine himself even allowed a faint laugh to escape from the depths of
his beard. The discussion began to grow warm. The party fell foul of
the Corps Législatif, and spoke of it with great severity. Logre did
not cease ranting, and Florent found him the same as when he cried the
fish at the auctions—protruding his jaws and hurling his words forward
with a wave of the arm, whilst retaining the crouching attitude of a
snarling dog. Indeed, he talked politics in just the same furious
manner as he offered a tray full of soles for sale.

Charvet, on the other hand, became quieter and colder amidst the smoke
of the pipes and the fumes of the gas which were now filling the little
den; and his voice assumed a dry incisive tone, sharp like a guillotine
blade, while Robine gently wagged his head without once removing his
chin from the ivory knob of his cane. However, some remark of Gavard’s
led the conversation to the subject of women.

“Woman,” declared Charvet drily, “is the equal of man; and, that being
so, she ought not to inconvenience him in the management of his life.
Marriage is a partnership, in which everything should be halved. Isn’t
that so, Clemence?”

“Clearly so,” replied the young woman, leaning back with her head
against the wall and gazing into the air.

However, Florent now saw Lacaille, the costermonger, and Alexandre, the
porter, Claude Lantier’s friend, come into the little room. In the past
these two had long remained at the other table in the sanctum; they did
not belong to the same class as the others. By the help of politics,
however, their chairs had drawn nearer, and they had ended by forming
part of the circle. Charvet, in whose eyes they represented “the
people,” did his best to indoctrinate them with his advanced political
theories, while Gavard played the part of the shopkeeper free from all
social prejudices by clinking glasses with them. Alexandre was a
cheerful, good-humoured giant, with the manner of a big merry lad.
Lacaille, on the other hand, was embittered; his hair was already
grizzling; and, bent and wearied by his ceaseless perambulations
through the streets of Paris, he would at times glance loweringly at
the placid figure of Robine, and his sound boots and heavy coat.

That evening both Lacaille and Alexandre called for a liqueur glass of
brandy, and then the conversation was renewed with increased warmth and
excitement, the party being now quite complete. A little later, while
the door of the cabinet was left ajar, Florent caught sight of
Mademoiselle Saget standing in front of the counter. She had taken a
bottle from under her apron, and was watching Rose as the latter poured
into it a large measureful of black-currant syrup and a smaller one of
brandy. Then the bottle disappeared under the apron again, and
Mademoiselle Saget, with her hands out of sight, remained talking in
the bright glow of the counter, face to face with the big mirror, in
which the flasks and bottles of liqueurs were reflected like rows of
Venetian lanterns. In the evening all the metal and glass of the
establishment helped to illuminate it with wonderful brilliancy. The
old maid, standing there in her black skirts, looked almost like some
big strange insect amidst all the crude brightness. Florent noticed
that she was trying to inveigle Rose into a conversation, and shrewdly
suspected that she had caught sight of him through the half open
doorway. Since he had been on duty at the markets he had met her at
almost every step, loitering in one or another of the covered ways, and
generally in the company of Madame Lecœur and La Sarriette. He had
noticed also that the three women stealthily examined him, and seemed
lost in amazement at seeing him installed in the position of inspector.
That evening, however, Rose was no doubt loath to enter into
conversation with the old maid, for the latter at last turned round,
apparently with the intention of approaching Monsieur Lebigre, who was
playing piquet with a customer at one of the bronzed tables. Creeping
quietly along, Mademoiselle Saget had at last managed to install
herself beside the partition of the cabinet, when she was observed by
Gavard, who detested her.

“Shut the door, Florent!” he cried unceremoniously. “We can’t even be
by ourselves, it seems!”

When midnight came and Lacaille went away he exchanged a few whispered
words with Monsieur Lebigre, and as the latter shook hands with him he
slipped four five-franc pieces into his palm, without anyone noticing
it. “That’ll make twenty-two francs that you’ll have to pay to-morrow,
remember,” he whispered in his ear. “The person who lends the money
won’t do it for less in future. Don’t forget, too, that you owe three
days’ truck hire. You must pay everything off.”

Then Monsieur Lebigre wished the friends good night. He was very sleepy
and should sleep well, he said, with a yawn which revealed his big
teeth, while Rose gazed at him with an air of submissive humility.
However, he gave her a push, and told her to go and turn out the gas in
the little room.

On reaching the pavement, Gavard stumbled and nearly fell. And being in
a humorous vein, he thereupon exclaimed: “Confound it all! At any rate,
I don’t seem to be leaning on anybody’s lights.”

This remark seemed to amuse the others, and the party broke up. A
little later Florent returned to Lebigre’s, and indeed he became quite
attached to the “cabinet,” finding a seductive charm in Robine’s
contemplative silence, Logre’s fiery outbursts, and Charvet’s cool
venom. When he went home, he did not at once retire to bed. He had
grown very fond of his attic, that girlish bedroom, where Augustine had
left scraps of ribbons, souvenirs, and other feminine trifles lying
about. There still remained some hair-pins on the mantelpiece, with
gilt cardboard boxes of buttons and lozenges, cutout pictures, and
empty pomade pots that retained an odour of jasmine. Then there were
some reels of thread, needles, and a missal lying by the side of a
soiled Dream-book in the drawer of the rickety deal table. A white
summer dress with yellow spots hung forgotten from a nail; while upon
the board which served as a toilet-table a big stain behind the
water-jug showed where a bottle of bandoline had been overturned. The
little chamber, with its narrow iron bed, its two rush-bottomed chairs,
and its faded grey wallpaper, was instinct with innocent simplicity.
The plain white curtains, the childishness suggested by the cardboard
boxes and the Dream-book, and the clumsy coquetry which had stained the
walls, all charmed Florent and brought him back to dreams of youth. He
would have preferred not to have known that plain, wiry-haired
Augustine, but to have been able to imagine that he was occupying the
room of a sister, some bright sweet girl of whose budding womanhood
every trifle around him spoke.

Yet another pleasure which he took was to lean out of the garret window
at nighttime. In front of it was a narrow ledge of roof, enclosed by an
iron railing, and forming a sort of balcony, on which Augustine had
grown a pomegranate in a box. Since the nights had turned cold, Florent
had brought the pomegranate indoors and kept it by the foot of his bed
till morning. He would linger for a few minutes by the open window,
inhaling deep draughts of the sharp fresh air which was wafted up from
the Seine, over the housetops of the Rue de Rivoli. Below him the roofs
of the markets spread confusedly in a grey expanse, like slumbering
lakes on whose surface the furtive reflection of a pane of glass
gleamed every now and then like a silvery ripple. Farther away the
roofs of the meat and poultry pavilions lay in deeper gloom, and became
mere masses of shadow barring the horizon. Florent delighted in the
great stretch of open sky in front of him, in that spreading expanse of
the markets which amidst all the narrow city streets brought him a dim
vision of some strip of sea coast, of the still grey waters of a bay
scarce quivering from the roll of the distant billows. He used to lose
himself in dreams as he stood there; each night he conjured up the
vision of some fresh coast line. To return in mind to the eight years
of despair which he had spent away from France rendered him both very
sad and very happy. Then at last, shivering all over, he would close
the window. Often, as he stood in front of the fireplace taking off his
collar, the photograph of Auguste and Augustine would fill him with
disquietude. They seemed to be watching him as they stood there, hand
in hand, smiling faintly.

Florent’s first few weeks at the fish market were very painful to him.
The Mehudins treated him with open hostility, which infected the whole
market with a spirit of opposition. The beautiful Norman intended to
revenge herself on the handsome Lisa, and the latter’s cousin seemed a
victim ready to hand.

The Mehudins came from Rouen. Louise’s mother still related how she had
first arrived in Paris with a basket of eels. She had ever afterwards
remained in the fish trade. She had married a man employed in the
Octroi service, who had died leaving her with two little girls. It was
she who by her full figure and glowing freshness had won for herself in
earlier days the nickname of “the beautiful Norman,” which her eldest
daughter had inherited. Now five and sixty years of age, Madame Mehudin
had become flabby and shapeless, and the damp air of the fish market
had rendered her voice rough and hoarse, and given a bluish tinge to
her skin. Sedentary life had made her extremely bulky, and her head was
thrown backwards by the exuberance of her bosom. She had never been
willing to renounce the fashions of her younger days, but still wore
the flowered gown, the yellow kerchief, and turban-like head-gear of
the classic fish-wife, besides retaining the latter’s loud voice and
rapidity of gesture as she stood with her hands on her hips, shouting
out the whole abusive vocabulary of her calling.

She looked back regretfully to the old Marché des Innocents, which the
new central markets had supplanted. She would talk of the ancient
rights of the market “ladies,” and mingle stories of fisticuffs
exchanged with the police with reminiscences of the visits she had paid
the Court in the time of Charles X and Louis Philippe, dressed in silk,
and carrying a bouquet of flowers in her hand. Old Mother Mehudin, as
she was now generally called, had for a long time been the
banner-bearer of the Sisterhood of the Virgin at St. Leu. She would
relate that in the processions in the church there she had worn a dress
and cap of tulle trimmed with satin ribbons, whilst holding aloft in
her puffy fingers the gilded staff of the richly-fringed silk standard
on which the figure of the Holy Mother was embroidered.

According to the gossip of the neighbourhood, the old woman had made a
fairly substantial fortune, though the only signs of it were the
massive gold ornaments with which she loaded her neck and arms and
bosom on important occasions. Her two daughters got on badly together
as they grew up. The younger one, Claire, an idle, fair-complexioned
girl, complained of the ill-treatment which she received from her
sister Louise, protesting, in her languid voice, that she could never
submit to be the other’s servant. As they would certainly have ended by
coming to blows, their mother separated them. She gave her stall in the
fish market to Louise, while Claire, whom the smell of the skate and
the herrings affected in the lungs, installed herself among the fresh
water fish. And from that time the old mother, although she pretended
to have retired from business altogether, would flit from one stall to
the other, still interfering in the selling of the fish, and causing
her daughters continual annoyance by the foul insolence with which she
would at times speak to customers.

Claire was a fantastical creature, very gentle in her manner, and yet
continually at loggerheads with others. People said that she invariably
followed her own whimsical inclinations. In spite of her dreamy,
girlish face she was imbued with a nature of silent firmness, a spirit
of independence which prompted her to live apart; she never took things
as other people did, but would one day evince perfect fairness, and the
next day arrant injustice. She would sometimes throw the market into
confusion by suddenly increasing or lowering the prices at her stall,
without anyone being able to guess her reason for doing so. She herself
would refuse to explain her motive. By the time she reached her
thirtieth year, her delicate physique and fine skin, which the water of
the tanks seemed to keep continually fresh and soft, her small,
faintly-marked face and lissome limbs would probably become heavy,
coarse, and flabby, till she would look like some faded saint that had
stepped from a stained-glass window into the degrading sphere of the
markets. At twenty-two, however, Claire, in the midst of her carp and
eels, was, to use Claude Lantier’s expression, a Murillo. A Murillo,
that is, whose hair was often in disorder, who wore heavy shoes and
clumsily cut dresses, which left her without any figure. But she was
free from all coquetry, and she assumed an air of scornful contempt
when Louise, displaying her bows and ribbons, chaffed her about her
clumsily knotted neckerchiefs. Moreover, she was virtuous; it was said
that the son of a rich shopkeeper in the neighbourhood had gone abroad
in despair at having failed to induce her to listen to his suit.

Louise, the beautiful Norman, was of a different nature. She had been
engaged to be married to a clerk in the corn market; but a sack of
flour falling upon the young man had broken his back and killed him.
Not very long afterwards Louise had given birth to a boy. In the
Mehudins’ circle of acquaintance she was looked upon as a widow; and
the old fish-wife in conversation would occasionally refer to the time
when her son-in-law was alive.

The Mehudins were a power in the markets. When Monsieur Verlaque had
finished instructing Florent in his new duties, he advised him to
conciliate certain of the stall-holders, if he wished his life to be
endurable; and he even carried his sympathy so far as to put him in
possession of the little secrets of the office, such as the various
little breaches of rule that it was necessary to wink at, and those at
which he would have to feign stern displeasure; and also the
circumstances under which he might accept a small present. A market
inspector is at once a constable and a magistrate; he has to maintain
proper order and cleanliness, and settle in a conciliatory spirit all
disputes between buyers and sellers. Florent, who was of a weak
disposition put on an artificial sternness when he was obliged to
exercise his authority, and generally over-acted his part. Moreover,
his gloomy, pariah-like face and bitterness of spirit, the result of
long suffering, were against him.

The beautiful Norman’s idea was to involve him in some quarrel or
other. She had sworn that he would not keep his berth a fortnight.
“That fat Lisa’s much mistaken,” said she one morning on meeting Madame
Lecœur, “if she thinks that she’s going to put people over us. We don’t
want such ugly wretches here. That sweetheart of hers is a perfect
fright!”

After the auctions, when Florent commenced his round of inspection,
strolling slowly through the dripping alleys, he could plainly see the
beautiful Norman watching him with an impudent smile on her face. Her
stall, which was in the second row on the left, near the fresh water
fish department faced the Rue Rambuteau. She would turn round, however,
and never take her eyes off her victim whilst making fun of him with
her neighbours. And when he passed in front of her, slowly examining
the slabs, she feigned hilarious merriment, slapped her fish with her
hand, and turned her jets of water on at full stream, flooding the
pathway. Nevertheless Florent remained perfectly calm.

At last, one morning as was bound to happen, war broke out. As Florent
reached La Normande’s stall that day an unbearable stench assailed his
nostrils. On the marble slab, in addition to part of a magnificent
salmon, showing its soft roseate flesh, there lay some turbots of
creamy whiteness, a few conger-eels pierced with black pins to mark
their divisions, several pairs of soles, and some bass and red
mullet—in fact, quite a display of fresh fish. But in the midst of it,
amongst all these fish whose eyes still gleamed and whose gills were of
a bright crimson, there lay a huge skate of a ruddy tinge, splotched
with dark stains—superb, indeed, with all its strange colourings.
Unfortunately, it was rotten; its tail was falling off and the ribs of
its fins were breaking through the skin.

“You must throw that skate away,” said Florent as he came up.

The beautiful Norman broke into a slight laugh. Florent raised his eyes
and saw her standing before him, with her back against the bronze lamp
post which lighted the stalls in her division. She had mounted upon a
box to keep her feet out of the damp, and appeared very tall as he
glanced at her. She looked also handsomer than usual, with her hair
arranged in little curls, her sly face slightly bent, her lips
compressed, and her hands showing somewhat too rosily against her big
white apron. Florent had never before seen her decked with so much
jewellery. She had long pendants in her ears, a chain round her neck, a
brooch in her dress body, and quite a collection of rings on two
fingers of her left hand and one of her right.

As she still continued to look slyly at Florent, without making any
reply, the latter continued: “Do you hear? You must remove that skate.”

He had not yet noticed the presence of old Madame Mehudin, who sat all
of a heap on a chair in a corner. She now got up, however, and, with
her fists resting on the marble slap, insolently exclaimed: “Dear me!
And why is she to throw her skate away? You won’t pay her for it, I’ll
bet!”

Florent immediately understood the position. The women at the other
stalls began to titter, and he felt that he was surrounded by covert
rebellion, which a word might cause to blaze forth. He therefore
restrained himself, and in person drew the refuse-pail from under the
stall and dropped the skate into it. Old Madame Mehudin had already
stuck her hands on her hips, while the beautiful Norman, who had not
spoken a word, burst into another malicious laugh as Florent strode
sternly away amidst a chorus of jeers, which he pretended not to hear.

Each day now some new trick was played upon him, and he was obliged to
walk through the market alleys as warily as though he were in a hostile
country. He was splashed with water from the sponges employed to
cleanse the slabs; he stumbled and almost fell over slippery refuse
intentionally spread in his way; and even the porters contrived to run
their baskets against the nape of his neck. One day, moreover, when two
of the fish-wives were quarrelling, and he hastened up to prevent them
coming to blows, he was obliged to duck in order to escape being
slapped on either cheek by a shower of little dabs which passed over
his head. There was a general outburst of laughter on this occasion,
and Florent always believed that the two fish-wives were in league with
the Mehudins. However, his old-time experiences as a teacher had
endowed him with angelic patience, and he was able to maintain a
magisterial coolness of manner even when anger was hotly rising within
him, and his whole being quivered with a sense of humiliation. Still,
the young scamps of the Rue de l’Estrapade had never manifested the
savagery of these fish-wives, the cruel tenacity of these huge females,
whose massive figures heaved and shook with a giant-like joy whenever
he fell into any trap. They stared him out of countenance with their
red faces; and in the coarse tones of their voices and the impudent
gesture of their hands he could read volumes of filthy abuse levelled
at himself. Gavard would have been quite in his element amidst all
these petticoats, and would have freely cuffed them all round; but
Florent, who had always been afraid of women, gradually felt
overwhelmed as by a sort of nightmare in which giant women, buxom
beyond all imagination, danced threateningly around him, shouting at
him in hoarse voices and brandishing bare arms, as massive as any
prize-fighter’s.

Amongst this hoard of females, however, Florent had one friend. Claire
unhesitatingly declared that the new inspector was a very good fellow.
When he passed in front of her, pursued by the coarse abuse of the
others, she gave him a pleasant smile, sitting nonchalantly behind her
stall, with unruly errant locks of pale hair straying over her neck and
her brow, and the bodice of her dress pinned all askew. He also often
saw her dipping her hands into her tanks, transferring the fish from
one compartment to another, and amusing herself by turning on the brass
taps, shaped like little dolphins with open mouths, from which the
water poured in streamlets. Amidst the rustling sound of the water she
had some of the quivering grace of a girl who has just been bathing and
has hurriedly slipped on her clothes.

One morning she was particularly amiable. She called the inspector to
her to show him a huge eel which had been the wonder of the market when
exhibited at the auction. She opened the grating, which she had
previously closed over the basin in whose depths the eel seemed to be
lying sound asleep.

“Wait a moment,” she said, “and I’ll show it to you.”

Then she gently slipped her bare arm into the water; it was not a very
plump arm, and its veins showed softly blue beneath its satiny skin. As
soon as the eel felt her touch, it rapidly twisted round, and seemed to
fill the narrow trough with its glistening greenish coils. And directly
it had settled down to rest again Claire once more stirred it with her
fingertips.

“It is an enormous creature,” Florent felt bound to say. “I have rarely
seen such a fine one.”

Claire thereupon confessed to him that she had at first been frightened
of eels; but now she had learned how to tighten her grip so that they
could not slip away. From another compartment she took a smaller one,
which began to wriggle both with head and tail, as she held it about
the middle in her closed fist. This made her laugh. She let it go, then
seized another and another, scouring the basin and stirring up the
whole heap of snaky-looking creatures with her slim fingers.

Afterwards she began to speak of the slackness of trade. The hawkers on
the foot-pavement of the covered way did the regular saleswomen a great
deal of injury, she said. Meantime her bare arm, which she had not
wiped, was glistening and dripping with water. Big drops trickled from
each finger.

“Oh,” she exclaimed suddenly, “I must show you my carp, too!”

She now removed another grating, and, using both hands, lifted out a
large carp, which began to flap its tail and gasp. It was too big to be
held conveniently, so she sought another one. This was smaller, and she
could hold it with one hand, but the latter was forced slightly open by
the panting of the sides each time that the fish gasped. To amuse
herself it occurred to Claire to pop the tip of her thumb into the
carp’s mouth whilst it was dilated. “It won’t bite,” said she with her
gentle laugh; “it’s not spiteful. No more are the crawfishes; I’m not
the least afraid of them.”

She plunged her arm into the water again, and from a compartment full
of a confused crawling mass brought up a crawfish that had caught her
little finger in its claws. She gave the creature a shake, but it no
doubt gripped her too tightly, for she turned very red, and snapped off
its claw with a quick, angry gesture, though still continuing to smile.

“By the way,” she continued quickly, to conceal her emotion, “I
wouldn’t trust myself with a pike; he’d cut off my fingers like a
knife.”

She thereupon showed him some big pike arranged in order of size upon
clean scoured shelves, beside some bronze-hued tench and little heaps
of gudgeon. Her hands were now quite slimy with handling the carp, and
as she stood there in the dampness rising from the tanks, she held them
outstretched over the dripping fish on the stall. She seemed enveloped
by an odour of spawn, that heavy scent which rises from among the reeds
and water-lilies when the fish, languid in the sunlight, discharge
their eggs. Then she wiped her hands on her apron, still smiling the
placid smile of a girl who knew nothing of passion in that quivering
atmosphere of the frigid loves of the river.

The kindliness which Claire showed to Florent was but a slight
consolation to him. By stopping to talk to the girl he only drew upon
himself still coarser jeers from the other stallkeepers. Claire
shrugged her shoulders, and said that her mother was an old jade, and
her sister a worthless creature. The injustice of the market folk
towards the new inspector filled her with indignation. The war between
them, however, grew more bitter every day. Florent had serious thoughts
of resigning his post; indeed, he would not have retained it for
another twenty-four hours if he had not been afraid that Lisa might
imagine him to be a coward. He was frightened of what she might say and
what she might think. She was naturally well aware of the contest which
was going on between the fish-wives and their inspector; for the whole
echoing market resounded with it, and the entire neighbourhood
discussed each fresh incident with endless comments.

“Ah, well,” Lisa would often say in the evening, after dinner, “I’d
soon bring them to reason if I had anything to do with them! Why, they
are a lot of dirty jades that I wouldn’t touch with the tip of my
finger! That Normande is the lowest of the low! I’d soon crush her,
that I would! You should really use your authority, Florent. You are
wrong to behave as you do. Put your foot down, and they’ll all come to
their senses very quickly, you’ll see.”

A terrible climax was presently reached. One morning the servant of
Madame Taboureau, the baker, came to the market to buy a brill; and the
beautiful Norman, having noticed her lingering near her stall for
several minutes, began to make overtures to her in a coaxing way: “Come
and see me; I’ll suit you,” she said. “Would you like a pair of soles,
or a fine turbot?”

Then as the servant at last came up, and sniffed at a brill with that
dissatisfied pout which buyers assume in the hope of getting what they
want at a lower price, La Normande continued:

“Just feel the weight of that, now,” and so saying she laid the brill,
wrapped in a sheet of thick yellow paper, on the woman’s open palm.

The servant, a mournful little woman from Auvergne, felt the weight of
the brill, and examined its gills, still pouting, and saying not a
word.

“And how much do you want for it?” she asked presently, in a reluctant
tone.

“Fifteen francs,” replied La Normande.

At this the servant hastily laid the brill on the stall again, and
seemed anxious to hurry away, but the other detained her. “Wait a
moment,” said she. “What do you offer?”

“No, no, I can’t take it. It is much too dear.”

“Come, now, make me an offer.”

“Well, will you take eight francs?”

Old Madame Mehudin, who was there, suddenly seemed to wake up, and
broke out into a contemptuous laugh. Did people think that she and her
daughter stole the fish they sold? “Eight francs for a brill that
size!” she exclaimed. “You’ll be wanting one for nothing next, to use
as a cooling plaster!”

Meantime La Normande turned her head away, as though greatly offended.
However, the servant came back twice and offered nine francs; and
finally she increased her bid to ten.

“All right, come on, give me your money!” cried the fish-girl, seeing
that the woman was now really going away.

The servant took her stand in front of the stall and entered into a
friendly gossip with old Madame Mehudin. Madame Taboureau, she said,
was so exacting! She had got some people coming to dinner that evening,
some cousins from Blois a notary and his wife. Madame Taboureau’s
family, she added, was a very respectable one, and she herself,
although only a baker, had received an excellent education.

“You’ll clean it nicely for me, won’t you?” added the woman, pausing in
her chatter.

With a jerk of her finger La Normande had removed the fish’s entrails
and tossed them into a pail. Then she slipped a corner of her apron
under its gills to wipe away a few grains of sand. “There, my dear,”
she said, putting the fish into the servant’s basket, “you’ll come back
to thank me.”

Certainly the servant did come back a quarter of an hour afterwards,
but it was with a flushed, red face. She had been crying, and her
little body was trembling all over with anger. Tossing the brill on to
the marble slab, she pointed to a broad gash in its belly that reached
the bone. Then a flood of broken words burst from her throat, which was
still contracted by sobbing: “Madame Taboureau won’t have it. She says
she couldn’t put it on her table. She told me, too, that I was an
idiot, and let myself be cheated by anyone. You can see for yourself
that the fish is spoilt. I never thought of turning it round; I quite
trusted you. Give me my ten francs back.”

“You should look at what you buy,” the handsome Norman calmly observed.

And then, as the servant was just raising her voice again, old Madame
Mehudin got up. “Just you shut up!” she cried. “We’re not going to take
back a fish that’s been knocking about in other people’s houses. How do
we know that you didn’t let it fall and damage it yourself?”

“I! I damage it!” The little servant was choking with indignation. “Ah!
you’re a couple of thieves!” she cried, sobbing bitterly. “Yes, a
couple of thieves! Madame Taboureau herself told me so!”

Matters then became uproarious. Boiling over with rage and brandishing
their fists, both mother and daughter fairly exploded; while the poor
little servant, quite bewildered by their voices, the one hoarse and
the other shrill, which belaboured her with insults as though they were
battledores and she a shuttlecock, sobbed on more bitterly than ever.

“Be off with you! Your Madame Taboureau would like to be half as fresh
as that fish is! She’d like us to sew it up for her, no doubt!”

“A whole fish for ten francs! What’ll she want next!”

Then came coarse words and foul accusations. Had the servant been the
most worthless of her sex she could not have been more bitterly
upbraided.

Florent, whom the market keeper had gone to fetch, made his appearance
when the quarrel was at its hottest. The whole pavilion seemed to be in
a state of insurrection. The fish-wives, who manifest the keenest
jealousy of each other when the sale of a penny herring is in question,
display a united front when a quarrel arises with a buyer. They sang
the popular old ditty, “The baker’s wife has heaps of crowns, which
cost her precious little”; they stamped their feet, and goaded the
Mehudins as though the latter were dogs which they were urging on to
bite and devour. And there were even some, having stalls at the other
end of the alley, who rushed up wildly, as though they meant to spring
at the chignon of the poor little woman, she meantime being quite
submerged by the flood of insulting abuse poured upon her.

“Return mademoiselle her ten francs,” said Florent sternly, when he had
learned what had taken place.

But old Madame Mehudin had her blood up. “As for you, my little man,”
quoth she, “go to blazes! Here, that’s how I’ll return the ten francs!”

As she spoke, she flung the brill with all her force at the head of
Madame Taboureau’s servant, who received it full in the face. The blood
spurted from her nose, and the brill, after adhering for a moment to
her cheeks, fell to the ground and burst with a flop like that of a wet
clout. This brutal act threw Florent into a fury. The beautiful Norman
felt frightened and recoiled, as he cried out: “I suspend you for a
week, and I will have your licence withdrawn. You hear me?”

Then, as the other fish-wives were still jeering behind him, he turned
round with such a threatening air that they quailed like wild beasts
mastered by the tamer, and tried to assume an expression of innocence.
When the Mehudins had returned the ten francs, Florent peremptorily
ordered them to cease selling at once. The old woman was choking with
rage, while the daughter kept silent, but turned very white. She, the
beautiful Norman, to be driven out of her stall!

Claire said in her quiet voice that it served her mother and sister
right, a remark which nearly resulted in the two girls tearing each
other’s hair out that evening when they returned home to the Rue
Pirouette. However, when the Mehudins came back to the market at the
week’s end, they remained very quiet, reserved, and curt of speech,
though full of a cold-blooded wrath. Moreover, they found the pavilion
quite calm and restored to order again. From that day forward the
beautiful Norman must have harboured the thought of some terrible
vengeance. She felt that she really had Lisa to thank for what had
happened. She had met her, the day after the battle, carrying her head
so high, that she had sworn she would make her pay dearly for her
glance of triumph. She held interminable confabulations with Madame
Saget, Madame Lecœur, and La Sarriette, in quiet corners of the market;
however, all their chatter about the shameless conduct which they
slanderously ascribed to Lisa and her cousin, and about the hairs which
they declared were found in Quenu’s chitterlings, brought La Normande
little consolation. She was trying to think of some very malicious plan
of vengeance, which would strike her rival to the heart.

Her child was growing up in the fish market in all freedom and neglect.
When but three years old the youngster had been brought there, and day
by day remained squatting on some rag amidst the fish. He would fall
asleep beside the big tunnies as though he were one of them, and awake
among the mackerel and whiting. The little rascal smelt of fish as
strongly as though he were some big fish’s offspring. For a long time
his favourite pastime, whenever his mother’s back was turned, was to
build walls and houses of herrings; and he would also play at soldiers
on the marble slab, arranging the red gurnets in confronting lines,
pushing them against each other, and battering their heads, while
imitating the sound of drum and trumpet with his lips; after which he
would throw them all into a heap again, and exclaim that they were
dead. When he grew older he would prowl about his aunt Claire’s stall
to get hold of the bladders of the carp and pike which she gutted. He
placed them on the ground and made them burst, an amusement which
afforded him vast delight. When he was seven he rushed about the
alleys, crawled under the stalls, ferreted amongst the zinc bound fish
boxes, and became the spoiled pet of all the women. Whenever they
showed him something fresh which pleased him, he would clasp his hands
and exclaim in ecstasy, “Oh, isn’t it stunning!” _Muche_ was the exact
word which he used; _muche_ being the equivalent of “stunning” in the
lingo of the markets; and he used the expression so often that it clung
to him as a nickname. He became known all over the place as “Muche.” It
was Muche here, there and everywhere; no one called him anything else.
He was to be met with in every nook; in out-of-the-way corners of the
offices in the auction pavilion; among the piles of oyster baskets, and
betwixt the buckets where the refuse was thrown. With a pinky fairness
of skin, he was like a young barbel frisking and gliding about in deep
water. He was as fond of running, streaming water as any young fry. He
was ever dabbling in the pools in the alleys. He wetted himself with
the drippings from the tables, and when no one was looking often slyly
turned on the taps, rejoicing in the bursting gush of water. But it was
especially beside the fountains near the cellar steps that his mother
went to seek him in the evening, and she would bring him thence with
his hands quite blue, and his shoes, and even his pockets, full of
water.

At seven years old Muche was as pretty as an angel, and as coarse in
his manners as any carter. He had curly chestnut hair, beautiful eyes,
and an innocent-looking mouth which gave vent to language that even a
gendarme would have hesitated to use. Brought up amidst all the
ribaldry and profanity of the markets, he had the whole vocabulary of
the place on the tip of his tongue. With his hands on his hips he often
mimicked Grandmother Mehudin in her anger, and at these times the
coarsest and vilest expressions would stream from his lips in a voice
of crystalline purity that might have belonged to some little chorister
chanting the _Ave Maria_. He would even try to assume a hoarse
roughness of tone, seek to degrade and taint that exquisite freshness
of childhood which made him resemble a _bambino_ on the Madonna’s
knees. The fish-wives laughed at him till they cried; and he,
encouraged, could scarcely say a couple of words without rapping out an
oath. But in spite of all this he still remained charming,
understanding nothing of the dirt amidst which he lived, kept in
vigorous health by the fresh breezes and sharp odours of the fish
market, and reciting his vocabulary of coarse indecencies with as pure
a face as though he were saying his prayers.

The winter was approaching, and Muche seemed very sensitive to the
cold. As soon as the chilly weather set in he manifested a strong
predilection for the inspector’s office. This was situated in the
left-hand corner of the pavilion, on the side of the Rue Rambuteau. The
furniture consisted of a table, a stack of drawers, an easy-chair, two
other chairs, and a stove. It was this stove which attracted Muche.
Florent quite worshipped children, and when he saw the little fellow,
with his dripping legs, gazing wistfully through the window, he made
him come inside. His first conversation with the lad caused him
profound amazement. Muche sat down in front of the stove, and in his
quiet voice exclaimed: “I’ll just toast my toes, do you see? It’s d——d
cold this morning.” Then he broke into a rippling laugh, and added:
“Aunt Claire looks awfully blue this morning. Is it true, sir, that you
are sweet on her?”

Amazed though he was, Florent felt quite interested in the odd little
fellow. The handsome Norman retained her surly bearing, but allowed her
son to frequent the inspector’s office without a word of objection.
Florent consequently concluded that he had the mother’s permission to
receive the boy, and every afternoon he asked him in; by degrees
forming the idea of turning him into a steady, respectable young
fellow. He could almost fancy that his brother Quenu had grown little
again, and that they were both in the big room in the Rue Royer-Collard
once more. The life which his self-sacrificing nature pictured to him
as perfect happiness was a life spent with some young being who would
never grow up, whom he could go on teaching for ever, and in whose
innocence he might still love his fellow man. On the third day of his
acquaintance with Muche he brought an alphabet to the office, and the
lad delighted him by the intelligence he manifested. He learned his
letters with all the sharp precocity which marks the Parisian street
arab, and derived great amusement from the woodcuts illustrating the
alphabet.

He found opportunities, too, for plenty of fine fun in the little
office, where the stove still remained the chief attraction and a
source of endless enjoyment. At first he cooked potatoes and chestnuts
at it, but presently these seemed insipid, and he thereupon stole some
gudgeons from his aunt Claire, roasted them one by one, suspended from
a string in front of the glowing fire, and then devoured them with
gusto, though he had no bread. One day he even brought a carp with him;
but it was impossible to roast it sufficiently, and it made such a
smell in the office that both window and door had to be thrown open.
Sometimes, when the odour of all these culinary operations became too
strong, Florent would throw the fish into the street, but as a rule he
only laughed. By the end of a couple of months Muche was able to read
fairly well, and his copy-books did him credit.

Meantime, every evening the lad wearied his mother with his talk about
his good friend Florent. His good friend Florent had drawn him pictures
of trees and of men in huts, said he. His good friend Florent waved his
arm and said that men would be far better if they all knew how to read.
And at last La Normande heard so much about Florent that she seemed to
be almost intimate with this man against whom she harboured so much
rancour. One day she shut Muche up at home to prevent him from going to
the inspector’s, but he cried so bitterly that she gave him his liberty
again on the following morning. There was very little determination
about her, in spite of her broad shoulders and bold looks. When the lad
told her how nice and warm he had been in the office, and came back to
her with his clothes quite dry, she felt a sort of vague gratitude, a
pleasure in knowing that he had found a shelter-place where he could
sit with his feet in front of a fire. Later on, she was quite touched
when he read her some words from a scrap of soiled newspaper wrapped
round a slice of conger-eel. By degrees, indeed, she began to think,
though without admitting it, that Florent could not really be a bad
sort of fellow. She felt respect for his knowledge, mingled with an
increasing curiosity to see more of him and learn something of his
life. Then, all at once, she found an excuse for gratifying this
inquisitiveness. She would use it as a means of vengeance. It would be
fine fun to make friends with Florent and embroil him with that great
fat Lisa.

“Does your good friend Florent ever speak to you about me?” she asked
Muche one morning as she was dressing him.

“Oh, no,” replied the boy. “We enjoy ourselves.”

“Well, you can tell him that I’ve quite forgiven him, and that I’m much
obliged to him for having taught you to read.”

Thenceforward the child was entrusted with some message every day. He
went backwards and forwards from his mother to the inspector, and from
the inspector to his mother, charged with kindly words and questions
and answers, which he repeated mechanically without knowing their
meaning. He might, indeed, have been safely trusted with the most
compromising communications. However, the beautiful Norman felt afraid
of appearing timid, and so one day she herself went to the inspector’s
office and sat down on the second chair, while Muche was having his
writing lesson. She proved very suave and complimentary, and Florent
was by far the more embarrassed of the two. They only spoke of the lad;
and when Florent expressed a fear that he might not be able to continue
the lessons in the office, La Normande invited him to come to their
home in the evening. She spoke also of payment; but at this he blushed,
and said that he certainly would not come if any mention were made of
money. Thereupon the young woman determined in her own mind that she
would recompense him with presents of choice fish.

Peace was thus made between them; the beautiful Norman even took
Florent under her protection. Apart from this, however, the whole
market was becoming reconciled to the new inspector, the fish-wives
arriving at the conclusion that he was really a better fellow than
Monsieur Verlaque, notwithstanding his strange eyes. It was only old
Madame Mehudin who still shrugged her shoulders, full of rancour as she
was against the “long lanky-guts,” as she contemptuously called him.
And then, too, a strange thing happened. One morning, when Florent
stopped with a smile before Claire’s tanks, the girl dropped an eel
which she was holding and angrily turned her back upon him, her cheeks
quite swollen and reddened by temper. The inspector was so much
astonished that he spoke to La Normande about it.

“Oh, never mind her,” said the young woman; “she’s cracked. She makes a
point of always differing from everybody else. She only behaved like
that to annoy me.”

La Normande was now triumphant—she strutted about her stall, and became
more coquettish than ever, arranging her hair in the most elaborate
manner. Meeting the handsome Lisa one day she returned her look of
scorn, and even burst out laughing in her face. The certainty she felt
of driving the mistress of the pork shop to despair by winning her
cousin from her endowed her with a gay, sonorous laugh, which rolled up
from her chest and rippled her white plump neck. She now had the whim
of dressing Muche very showily in a little Highland costume and velvet
bonnet. The lad had never previously worn anything but a tattered
blouse. It unfortunately happened, however, that just about this time
he again became very fond of the water. The ice had melted and the
weather was mild, so he gave his Scotch jacket a bath, turning the
fountain tap on at full flow and letting the water pour down his arm
from his elbow to his hand. He called this “playing at gutters.” Then a
little later, when his mother came up and caught him, she found him
with two other young scamps watching a couple of little fishes swimming
about in his velvet cap, which he had filled with water.

For nearly eight months Florent lived in the markets, feeling continual
drowsiness. After his seven years of suffering he had lighted upon such
calm quietude, such unbroken regularity of life, that he was scarcely
conscious of existing. He gave himself up to this jog-trot peacefulness
with a dazed sort of feeling, continually experiencing surprise at
finding himself each morning in the same armchair in the little office.
This office with its bare hut-like appearance had a charm for him. He
here found a quiet and secluded refuge amidst that ceaseless roar of
the markets which made him dream of some surging sea spreading around
him, and isolating him from the world. Gradually, however, a vague
nervousness began to prey upon him; he became discontented, accused
himself of faults which he could not define, and began to rebel against
the emptiness which he experienced more and more acutely in mind and
body. Then, too, the evil smells of the fish market brought him nausea.
By degrees he became unhinged, his vague boredom developing into
restless, nervous excitement.

All his days were precisely alike, spent among the same sounds and the
same odours. In the mornings the noisy buzzing of the auction sales
resounded in his ears like a distant echo of bells; and sometimes, when
there was a delay in the arrival of the fish, the auctions continued
till very late. Upon these occasions he remained in the pavilion till
noon, disturbed at every moment by quarrels and disputes, which he
endeavoured to settle with scrupulous justice. Hours elapsed before he
could get free of some miserable matter or other which was exciting the
market. He paced up and down amidst the crush and uproar of the sales,
slowly perambulating the alleys and occasionally stopping in front of
the stalls which fringed the Rue Rambuteau, and where lay rosy heaps of
prawns and baskets of boiled lobsters with tails tied backwards, while
live ones were gradually dying as they sprawled over the marble slabs.
And then he would watch gentlemen in silk hats and black gloves
bargaining with the fish-wives, and finally going off with boiled
lobsters wrapped in paper in the pockets of their frock-coats.[*]
Farther away, at the temporary stalls, where the commoner sorts of fish
were sold, he would recognise the bareheaded women of the
neighbourhood, who always came at the same hour to make their
purchases.

[*] The little fish-basket for the use of customers, so familiar in
London, is not known in Paris.—Translator.


At times he took an interest in some well-dressed lady trailing her
lace petticoats over the damp stones, and escorted by a servant in a
white apron; and he would follow her at a little distance on noticing
how the fish-wives shrugged their shoulders at sight of her air of
disgust. The medley of hampers and baskets and bags, the crowd of
skirts flitting along the damp alleys, occupied his attention until
lunchtime. He took a delight in the dripping water and the fresh breeze
as he passed from the acrid smell of the shell-fish to the pungent
odour of the salted fish. It was always with the latter that he brought
his official round of inspection to a close. The cases of red herrings,
the Nantes sardines on their layers of leaves, and the rolled cod,
exposed for sale under the eyes of stout, faded fish-wives, brought him
thoughts of a voyage necessitating a vast supply of salted provisions.

In the afternoon the markets became quieter, grew drowsy; and Florent
then shut himself up in his office, made out his reports, and enjoyed
the happiest hours of his day. If he happened to go out and cross the
fish market, he found it almost deserted. There was no longer the
crushing and pushing and uproar of ten o’clock in the morning. The
fish-wives, seated behind their stalls, leant back knitting, while a
few belated purchasers prowled about casting sidelong glances at the
remaining fish, with the thoughtful eyes and compressed lips of women
closely calculating the price of their dinner. At last the twilight
fell, there was a noise of boxes being moved, and the fish was laid for
the night on beds of ice; and then, after witnessing the closing of the
gates, Florent went off, seemingly carrying the fish market along with
him in his clothes and his beard and his hair.

For the first few months this penetrating odour caused him no great
discomfort. The winter was a severe one, the frosts converted the
alleys into slippery mirrors, and the fountains and marble slabs were
fringed with a lacework of ice. In the mornings it was necessary to
place little braziers underneath the taps before a drop of water could
be drawn. The frozen fish had twisted tails; and, dull of hue and hard
to the touch like unpolished metal, gave out a ringing sound akin to
that of pale cast-iron when it snaps. Until February the pavilion
presented a most mournful appearance: it was deserted, and wrapped in a
bristling shroud of ice. But with March came a thaw, with mild weather
and fogs and rain. Then the fish became soft again, and unpleasant
odours mingled with the smell of mud wafted from the neighbouring
streets. These odours were as yet vague, tempered by the moisture which
clung to the ground. But in the blazing June afternoons a reeking
stench arose, and the atmosphere became heavy with a pestilential haze.
The upper windows were then opened, and huge blinds of grey canvas were
drawn beneath the burning sky. Nevertheless, a fiery rain seemed to be
pouring down, heating the market as though it were a big stove, and
there was not a breath of air to waft away the noxious emanations from
the fish. A visible steam went up from the stalls.

The masses of food amongst which Florent lived now began to cause him
the greatest discomfort. The disgust with which the pork shop had
filled him came back in a still more intolerable fashion. He almost
sickened as he passed these masses of fish, which, despite all the
water lavished upon them, turned bad under a sudden whiff of hot air.
Even when he shut himself up in his office his discomfort continued,
for the abominable odour forced its way through the chinks in the
woodwork of the window and door. When the sky was grey and leaden, the
little room remained quite dark; and then the day was like a long
twilight in the depths of some fetid march. He was often attacked by
fits of nervous excitement, and felt a craving desire to walk; and he
would then descend into the cellars by the broad staircase opening in
the middle of the pavilion. In the pent-up air down below, in the dim
light of the occasional gas jets, he once more found the refreshing
coolness diffused by pure cold water. He would stand in front of the
big tank where the reserve stock of live fish was kept, and listen to
the ceaseless murmur of the four streamlets of water falling from the
four corners of the central urn, and then spreading into a broad stream
and gliding beneath the locked gratings of the basins with a gentle and
continuous flow. This subterranean spring, this stream murmuring in the
gloom, had a tranquillising effect upon him. Of an evening, too, he
delighted in the fine sunsets which threw the delicate lacework of the
market buildings blackly against the red glow of the heavens. The
dancing dust of the last sun rays streamed through every opening,
through every chink of the Venetian shutters, and the whole was like
some luminous transparency on which the slender shafts of the columns,
the elegant curves of the girders, and the geometrical tracery of the
roofs were minutely outlined. Florent feasted his eyes on this mighty
diagram washed in with Indian ink on phosphorescent vellum, and his
mind reverted to his old fancy of a colossal machine with wheels and
levers and beams espied in the crimson glow of the fires blazing
beneath its boilers. At each consecutive hour of the day the changing
play of the light—from the bluish haze of early morning and the black
shadows of noon to the flaring of the sinking sun and the paling of its
fires in the ashy grey of the twilight—revealed the markets under a new
aspect; but on the flaming evenings, when the foul smells arose and
forced their way across the broad yellow beams like hot puffs of steam,
Florent again experienced discomfort, and his dream changed, and he
imagined himself in some gigantic knacker’s boiling-house where the fat
of a whole people was being melted down.

The coarseness of the market people, whose words and gestures seemed to
be infected with the evil smell of the place, also made him suffer. He
was very tolerant, and showed no mock modesty; still, these impudent
women often embarrassed him. Madame Francois, whom he had again met,
was the only one with whom he felt at ease. She showed such pleasure on
learning he had found a berth and was quite comfortable and out of
worry, as she put it, that he was quite touched. The laughter of Lisa,
the handsome Norman, and the others disquieted him; but of Madame
Francois he would willingly have made a confidante. She never laughed
mockingly at him; when she did laugh, it was like a woman rejoicing at
another’s happiness. She was a brave, plucky creature, too; hers was a
hard business in winter, during the frosts, and the rainy weather was
still more trying. On some mornings Florent saw her arrive in a pouring
deluge which had been slowly, coldly falling ever since the previous
night. Between Nanterre and Paris the wheels of her cart had sunk up to
the axles in mud, and Balthazar was caked with mire to his belly. His
mistress would pity him and sympathise with him as she wiped him down
with some old aprons.

“The poor creatures are very sensitive,” said she; “a mere nothing
gives them a cold. Ah, my poor old Balthazar! I really thought that we
had tumbled into the Seine as we crossed the Neuilly bridge, the rain
came down in such a deluge!”

While Balthazar was housed in the inn stable his mistress remained in
the pouring rain to sell her vegetables. The footway was transformed
into a lake of liquid mud. The cabbages, carrots, and turnips were
pelted by the grey water, quite drowned by the muddy torrent that
rushed along the pavement. There was no longer any of that glorious
greenery so apparent on bright mornings. The market gardeners, cowering
in their heavy cloaks beneath the downpour, swore at the municipality
which, after due inquiry, had declared that rain was in no way
injurious to vegetables, and that there was accordingly no necessity to
erect any shelters.

Those rainy mornings greatly worried Florent, who thought about Madame
Francois. He always managed to slip away and get a word with her. But
he never found her at all low-spirited. She shook herself like a
poodle, saying that she was quite used to such weather, and was not
made of sugar, to melt away beneath a few drops of rain. However, he
made her seek refuge for a few minutes in one of the covered ways, and
frequently even took her to Monsieur Lebigre’s, where they had some hot
wine together. While she with her peaceful face beamed on him in all
friendliness, he felt quite delighted with the healthy odour of the
fields which she brought into the midst of the foul market atmosphere.
She exhaled a scent of earth, hay, fresh air, and open skies.

“You must come to Nanterre, my lad,” she said to him, “and look at my
kitchen garden. I have put borders of thyme everywhere. How bad your
villainous Paris does smell!”

Then she went off, dripping. Florent, on his side, felt quite
re-invigorated when he parted from her. He tried, too the effect of
work upon the nervous depression from which he suffered. He was a man
of a very methodical temperament, and sometimes carried out his plans
for the allotment of his time with a strictness that bordered on mania.
He shut himself up two evenings a week in order to write an exhaustive
work on Cayenne. His modest bedroom was excellently adapted, he
thought, to calm his mind and incline him to work. He lighted his fire,
saw that the pomegranate at the foot of the bed was looking all right,
and then seated himself at the little table, and remained working till
midnight. He had pushed the missal and Dream-book back in the drawer,
which was now filling with notes, memoranda, manuscripts of all kinds.
The work on Cayenne made but slow progress, however, as it was
constantly being interrupted by other projects, plans for enormous
undertakings which he sketched out in a few words. He successively
drafted an outline of a complete reform of the administrative system of
the markets, a scheme for transforming the city dues, levied on produce
as it entered Paris, into taxes levied upon the sales, a new system of
victualling the poorer neighbourhoods, and, lastly, a somewhat vague
socialist enactment for the storing in common warehouses of all the
provisions brought to the markets, and the ensuring of a minimum daily
supply to each household in Paris. As he sat there, with his head bent
over his table, and his mind absorbed in thoughts of all these weighty
matters, his gloomy figure cast a great black shadow on the soft
peacefulness of the garret. Sometimes a chaffinch which he had picked
up one snowy day in the market would mistake the lamplight for the day,
and break the silence, which only the scratching of Florent’s pen on
his paper disturbed, by a cry.

Florent was fated to revert to politics. He had suffered too much
through them not to make them the dearest occupation of his life. Under
other conditions he might have become a good provincial schoolmaster,
happy in the peaceful life of some little town. But he had been treated
as though he were a wolf, and felt as though he had been marked out by
exile for some great combative task. His nervous discomfort was the
outcome of his long reveries at Cayenne, the brooding bitterness he had
felt at his unmerited sufferings, and the vows he had secretly sworn to
avenge humanity and justice—the former scourged with a whip, and the
latter trodden under foot. Those colossal markets and their teeming
odoriferous masses of food had hastened the crisis. To Florent they
appeared symbolical of some glutted, digesting beast, of Paris,
wallowing in its fat and silently upholding the Empire. He seemed to be
encircled by swelling forms and sleek, fat faces, which ever and ever
protested against his own martyrlike scragginess and sallow,
discontented visage. To him the markets were like the stomach of the
shopkeeping classes, the stomach of all the folks of average rectitude
puffing itself out, rejoicing, glistening in the sunshine, and
declaring that everything was for the best, since peaceable people had
never before grown so beautifully fat. As these thoughts passed through
his mind Florent clenched his fists, and felt ready for a struggle,
more irritated now by the thought of his exile than he had been when he
first returned to France. Hatred resumed entire possession of him. He
often let his pen drop and became absorbed in dreams. The dying fire
cast a bright glow upon his face; the lamp burned smokily, and the
chaffinch fell asleep again on one leg, with its head tucked under its
wing.

Sometimes Auguste, on coming upstairs at eleven o’clock and seeing the
light shining under the door, would knock, before going to bed. Florent
admitted him with some impatience. The assistant sat down in front of
the fire, speaking but little, and never saying why he had come. His
eyes would all the time remain fixed upon the photograph of himself and
Augustine in their Sunday finery. Florent came to the conclusion that
the young man took a pleasure in visiting the room for the simple
reason that it had been occupied by his sweetheart; and one evening he
asked him with a smile if he had guessed rightly.

“Well, perhaps it is so,” replied Auguste, very much surprised at the
discovery which he himself now made of the reasons which actuated him.
“I’d really never thought of that before. I came to see you without
knowing why. But if I were to tell Augustine, how she’d laugh!”

Whenever he showed himself at all loquacious, his one eternal theme was
the pork shop which he was going to set up with Augustine at Plaisance.
He seemed so perfectly assured of arranging his life in accordance with
his desires, that Florent grew to feel a sort of respect for him,
mingled with irritation. After all, the young fellow was very resolute
and energetic, in spite of his seeming stupidity. He made straight for
the goal he had in view, and would doubtless reach it in perfect
assurance and happiness. On the evenings of these visits from the
apprentice, Florent could not settle down to work again; he went off to
bed in a discontented mood, and did not recover his equilibrium till
the thought passed through his mind, “Why, that Auguste is a perfect
animal!”

Every month he went to Clamart to see Monsieur Verlaque. These visits
were almost a delight to him. The poor man still lingered on, to the
great astonishment of Gavard, who had not expected him to last for more
than six months. Every time that Florent went to see him Verlaque would
declare that he was feeling better, and was most anxious to resume his
work again. But the days glided by, and he had serious relapses.
Florent would sit by his bedside, chat about the fish market, and do
what he could to enliven him. He deposited on the pedestal table the
fifty francs which he surrendered to him each month; and the old
inspector, though the payment had been agreed upon, invariably
protested, and seemed disinclined to take the money. Then they would
begin to speak of something else, and the coins remained lying on the
table. When Florent went away, Madame Verlaque always accompanied him
to the street door. She was a gentle little woman, of a very tearful
disposition. Her one topic of conversation was the expense necessitated
by her husband’s illness, the costliness of chicken broth, butcher’s
meat, Bordeaux wine, medicine, and doctors’ fees. Her doleful
conversation greatly embarrassed Florent, and on the first few
occasions he did not understand the drift of it. But at last, as the
poor woman seemed always in a state of tears, and kept saying how happy
and comfortable they had been when they had enjoyed the full salary of
eighteen hundred francs a year, he timidly offered to make her a
private allowance, to be kept secret from her husband. This offer,
however, she declined, inconsistently declaring that the fifty francs
were sufficient. But in the course of the month she frequently wrote to
Florent, calling him their saviour. Her handwriting was small and fine,
yet she would contrive to fill three pages of letter paper with humble,
flowing sentences entreating the loan of ten francs; and this she at
last did so regularly that wellnigh the whole of Florent’s hundred and
fifty francs found its way to the Verlaques. The husband was probably
unaware of it; however, the wife gratefully kissed Florent’s hands.
This charity afforded him the greatest pleasure, and he concealed it as
though it were some forbidden selfish indulgence.

“That rascal Verlaque is making a fool of you,” Gavard would sometimes
say. “He’s coddling himself up finely now that you are doing the work
and paying him an income.”

At last one day Florent replied:

“Oh, we’ve arranged matters together. I’m only to give him twenty-five
francs a month in future.”

As a matter of fact, Florent had but little need of money. The Quenus
continued to provide him with board and lodging; and the few francs
which he kept by him sufficed to pay for the refreshment he took in the
evening at Monsieur Lebigre’s. His life had gradually assumed all the
regularity of clockwork. He worked in his bedroom, continued to teach
little Muche twice a week from eight to nine o’clock, devoted an
evening to Lisa, to avoid offending her, and spent the rest of his
spare time in the little “cabinet” with Gavard and his friends.

When he went to the Mehudins’ there was a touch of tutorial stiffness
in his gentle demeanour. He was pleased with the old house in the Rue
Pirouette. On the ground floor he passed through the faint odours
pervading the premises of the purveyor of cooked vegetables. Big pans
of boiled spinach and sorrel stood cooling in the little backyard. Then
he ascended the winding staircase, greasy and dark, with worn and
bulging steps which sloped in a disquieting manner. The Mehudins
occupied the whole of the second floor. Even when they had attained to
comfortable circumstances the old mother had always declined to move
into fresh quarters, despite all the supplications of her daughters,
who dreamt of living in a new house in a fine broad street. But on this
point the old woman was not to be moved; she had lived there, she said,
and meant to die there. She contented herself, moreover, with a dark
little closet, leaving the largest rooms to Claire and La Normande. The
later, with the authority of the elder born, had taken possession of
the room that overlooked the street; it was the best and largest of the
suite. Claire was so much annoyed at her sister’s action in the matter
that she refused to occupy the adjoining room, whose window overlooked
the yard, and obstinately insisted on sleeping on the other side of the
landing, in a sort of garret, which she did not even have whitewashed.
However, she had her own key, and so was independent; directly anything
happened to displease her she locked herself up in her own quarters.

As a rule, when Florent arrived the Mehudins were just finishing their
dinner. Muche sprang to his neck, and for a moment the young man
remained seated with the lad chattering between his legs. Then, when
the oilcloth cover had been wiped, the lesson began on a corner of the
table. The beautiful Norman gave Florent a cordial welcome. She
generally began to knit or mend some linen, and would draw her chair up
to the table and work by the light of the same lamp as the others; and
she frequently put down her needle to listen to the lesson, which
filled her with surprise. She soon began to feel warm esteem for this
man who seemed so clever, who, in speaking to the little one, showed
himself as gentle as a woman, and manifested angelic patience in again
and again repeating the same instructions. She no longer considered him
at all plain, but even felt somewhat jealous of beautiful Lisa. And
then she drew her chair still nearer, and gazed at Florent with an
embarrassing smile.

“But you are jogging my elbow, mother, and I can’t write,” Muche
exclaimed angrily. “There! see what a blot you’ve made me make! Get
further away, do!”

La Normande now gradually began to say a good many unpleasant things
about beautiful Lisa. She pretended that the latter concealed her real
age, that she laced her stays so tightly that she nearly suffocated
herself, and that if she came down of a morning looking so trim and
neat, without a single hair out of place, it must be because she looked
perfectly hideous when in dishabille. Then La Normande would raise her
arm a little, and say that there was no need for her to wear any stays
to cramp and deform her figure. At these times the lessons would be
interrupted, and Muche gazed with interest at his mother as she raised
her arms. Florent listened to her, and even laughed, thinking to
himself that women were very odd creatures. The rivalry between the
beautiful Norman and beautiful Lisa amused him.

Muche, however, managed to finish his page of writing. Florent, who was
a good penman, set him copies in large hand and round hand on slips of
paper. The words he chose were very long and took up the whole line,
and he evinced a marked partiality for such expressions as
“tyrannically,” “liberticide,” “unconstitutional,” and “revolutionary.”
At times also he made the boy copy such sentences as these: “The day of
justice will surely come”; “The suffering of the just man is the
condemnation of the oppressor”; “When the hour strikes, the guilty
shall fall.” In preparing these copy slips he was, indeed, influenced
by the ideas which haunted his brain; he would for the time become
quite oblivious of Muche, the beautiful Norman, and all his
surroundings. The lad would have copied Rousseau’s “Contrat Social” had
he been told to do so; and thus, drawing each letter in turn, he filled
page after page with lines of “tyrannically” and “unconstitutional.”

As long as the tutor remained there, old Madame Mehudin kept fidgeting
round the table, muttering to herself. She still harboured terrible
rancour against Florent; and asserted that it was folly to make the lad
work in that way at a time when children should be in bed. She would
certainly have turned that “spindle-shanks” out of the house, if the
beautiful Norman, after a stormy scene, had not bluntly told her that
she would go to live elsewhere if she were not allowed to receive whom
she chose. However, the pair began quarrelling again on the subject
every evening.

“You may say what you like,” exclaimed the old woman; “but he’s got
treacherous eyes. And, besides, I’m always suspicious of those skinny
people. A skinny man’s capable of anything. I’ve never come across a
decent one yet. That one’s as flat as a board. And he’s got such an
ugly face, too! Though I’m sixty-five and more, I’d precious soon send
him about his business if he came a-courting of me!”

She said this because she had a shrewd idea of how matters were likely
to turn out. And then she went on to speak in laudatory terms of
Monsieur Lebigre, who, indeed, paid the greatest attention to the
beautiful Norman. Apart from the handsome dowry which he imagined she
would bring with her, he considered that she would be a magnificent
acquisition to his counter. The old woman never missed an opportunity
to sound his praises; there was no lankiness, at any rate, about him,
said she; he was stout and strong, with a pair of calves which would
have done honour even to one of the Emperor’s footmen.

However, La Normande shrugged her shoulders and snappishly replied:
“What do I care whether he’s stout or not? I don’t want him or anybody.
And besides, I shall do as I please.”

Then, if the old woman became too pointed in her remarks, the other
added: “It’s no business of yours, and besides, it isn’t true. Hold
your tongue and don’t worry me.” And thereupon she would go off into
her room, banging the door behind her. Florent, however, had a yet more
bitter enemy than Madame Mehudin in the house. As soon as ever he
arrived there, Claire would get up without a word, take a candle, and
go off to her own room on the other side of the landing; and she could
be heard locking her door in a burst of sullen anger. One evening when
her sister asked the tutor to dinner, she prepared her own food on the
landing, and ate it in her bedroom; and now and again she secluded
herself so closely that nothing was seen of her for a week at a time.
She usually retained her appearance of soft lissomness, but
periodically had a fit of iron rigidity, when her eyes blazed from
under her pale tawny locks like those of a distrustful wild animal. Old
Mother Mehudin, fancying that she might relieve herself in her company,
only made her furious by speaking to her of Florent; and thereupon the
old woman, in her exasperation, told everyone that she would have gone
off and left her daughters to themselves had she not been afraid of
their devouring each other if they remained alone together.

As Florent went away one evening, he passed in front of Claire’s door,
which was standing wide open. He saw the girl look at him, and turn
very red. Her hostile demeanour annoyed him; and it was only the
timidity which he felt in the presence of women that restrained him
from seeking an explanation of her conduct. On this particular evening
he would certainly have addressed her if he had not detected
Mademoiselle Saget’s pale face peering over the balustrade of the upper
landing. So he went his way, but had not taken a dozen steps before
Claire’s door was closed behind him with such violence as to shake the
whole staircase. It was after this that Mademoiselle Saget, eager to
propagate slander, went about repeating everywhere that Madame Quenu’s
cousin was “carrying on” most dreadfully with both the Mehudin girls.

Florent, however, gave very little thought to these two handsome young
women. His usual manner towards them was that of a man who has but
little success with the sex. Certainly he had come to entertain a
feeling of genuine friendship for La Normande, who really displayed a
very good heart when her impetuous temper did not run away with her.
But he never went any further than this. Moreover, the queenly
proportions of her robust figure filled him with a kind of alarm; and
of an evening, whenever she drew her chair up to the lamp and bent
forward as though to look at Muche’s copy-book, he drew in his own
sharp bony elbows and shrunken shoulders as if realising what a pitiful
specimen of humanity he was by the side of that buxom, hardy creature
so full of the life of ripe womanhood. Moreover, there was another
reason why he recoiled from her. The smells of the markets distressed
him; on finishing his duties of an evening he would have liked to
escape from the fishy odour amidst which his days were spent; but,
alas! beautiful though La Normande was, this odour seemed to adhere to
her silky skin. She had tried every sort of aromatic oil, and bathed
freely; but as soon as the freshening influence of the bath was over
her blood again impregnated her skin with the faint odour of salmon,
the musky perfume of smelts, and the pungent scent of herrings and
skate. Her skirts, too, as she moved about, exhaled these fishy smells,
and she walked as though amidst an atmosphere redolent of slimy
seaweed. With her tall, goddess-like figure, her purity of form, and
transparency of complexion she resembled some lovely antique marble
that had rolled about in the depths of the sea and had been brought to
land in some fisherman’s net.

Mademoiselle Saget, however, swore by all her gods that Florent was the
young woman’s lover. According to her account, indeed, he courted both
the sisters. She had quarrelled with the beautiful Norman about a
ten-sou dab; and ever since this falling-out she had manifested warm
friendship for handsome Lisa. By this means she hoped the sooner to
arrive at a solution of what she called the Quenus’ mystery. Florent
still continued to elude her curiosity, and she told her friends that
she felt like a body without a soul, though she was careful not to
reveal what was troubling her so grievously. A young girl infatuated
with a hopeless passion could not have been in more distress than this
terrible old woman at finding herself unable to solve the mystery of
the Quenus’ cousin. She was constantly playing the spy on Florent,
following him about, and watching him, in a burning rage at her failure
to satisfy her rampant curiosity. Now that he had begun to visit the
Mehudins she was for ever haunting the stairs and landings. She soon
discovered that handsome Lisa was much annoyed at Florent visiting
“those women,” and accordingly she called at the pork shop every
morning with a budget of information. She went in shrivelled and shrunk
by the frosty air, and, resting her hands on the heating-pan to warm
them, remained in front of the counter buying nothing, but repeating in
her shrill voice: “He was with them again yesterday; he seems to live
there now. I heard La Normande call him ‘my dear’ on the staircase.”

She indulged like this in all sorts of lies in order to remain in the
shop and continue warming her hands for a little longer. On the morning
after the evening when she had heard Claire close her door behind
Florent, she spun out her story for a good half hour, inventing all
sorts of mendacious and abominable particulars.

Lisa, who had assumed a look of contemptuous scorn, said but little,
simply encouraging Mademoiselle Saget’s gossip by her silence. At last,
however, she interrupted her. “No, no,” she said; “I can’t really
listen to all that. Is it possible that there can be such women?”

Thereupon Mademoiselle Saget told Lisa that unfortunately all women
were not so well conducted as herself. And then she pretended to find
all sorts of excuses for Florent: it wasn’t his fault; he was no doubt
a bachelor; these women had very likely inveigled him in their snares.
In this way she hinted questions without openly asking them. But Lisa
preserved silence with respect to her cousin, merely shrugging her
shoulders and compressing her lips. When Mademoiselle Saget at last
went away, the mistress of the shop glanced with disgust at the cover
of the heating-pan, the glistening metal of which had been tarnished by
the impression of the old woman’s little hands.

“Augustine,” she cried, “bring a duster, and wipe the cover of the
heating-pan. It’s quite filthy!”

The rivalry between the beautiful Lisa and the beautiful Norman now
became formidable. The beautiful Norman flattered herself that she had
carried a lover off from her enemy; and the beautiful Lisa was
indignant with the hussy who, by luring the sly cousin to her home,
would surely end by compromising them all. The natural temperament of
each woman manifested itself in the hostilities which ensued. The one
remained calm and scornful, like a lady who holds up her skirts to keep
them from being soiled by the mud; while the other, much less subject
to shame, displayed insolent gaiety and swaggered along the footways
with the airs of a duellist seeking a cause of quarrel. Each of their
skirmishes would be the talk of the fish market for the whole day. When
the beautiful Norman saw the beautiful Lisa standing at the door of her
shop, she would go out of her way in order to pass her, and brush
against her with her apron; and then the angry glances of the two
rivals crossed like rapiers, with the rapid flash and thrust of pointed
steel. When the beautiful Lisa, on the other hand, went to the fish
market, she assumed an expression of disgust on approaching the
beautiful Norman’s stall. And then she proceeded to purchase some big
fish—a turbot or a salmon—of a neighbouring dealer, spreading her money
out on the marble slab as she did so, for she had noticed that this
seemed to have a painful effect upon the “hussy,” who ceased laughing
at the sight. To hear the two rivals speak, anyone would have supposed
that the fish and pork they sold were quite unfit for food. However,
their principal engagements took place when the beautiful Norman was
seated at her stall and the beautiful Lisa at her counter, and they
glowered blackly at each other across the Rue Rambuteau. They sat in
state in their big white aprons, decked out with showy toilets and
jewels, and the battle between them would commence early in the
morning.

“Hallo, the fat woman’s got up!” the beautiful Norman would exclaim.
“She ties herself up as tightly as her sausages! Ah, she’s got
Saturday’s collar on again, and she’s still wearing that poplin dress!”

At the same moment, on the opposite side of the street, beautiful Lisa
was saying to her shop girl: “Just look at that creature staring at us
over yonder, Augustine! She’s getting quite deformed by the life she
leads. Do you see her earrings? She’s wearing those big drops of hers,
isn’t she? It makes one feel ashamed to see a girl like that with
brilliants.”

All complaisance, Augustine echoed her mistress’s words.

When either of them was able to display a new ornament it was like
scoring a victory—the other one almost choked with spleen. Every day
they would scrutinise and count each other’s customers, and manifest
the greatest annoyance if they thought that the “big thing over the
way” was doing the better business. Then they spied out what each had
for lunch. Each knew what the other ate, and even watched to see how
she digested it. In the afternoon, while the one sat amidst her cooked
meats and the other amidst her fish, they posed and gave themselves
airs, as though they were queens of beauty. It was then that the
victory of the day was decided. The beautiful Norman embroidered,
selecting the most delicate and difficult work, and this aroused Lisa’s
exasperation.

“Ah!” she said, speaking of her rival, “she had far better mend her
boy’s stockings. He’s running about quite barefooted. Just look at that
fine lady, with her red hands stinking of fish!”

For her part, Lisa usually knitted.

“She’s still at that same sock,” La Normande would say, as she watched
her. “She eats so much that she goes to sleep over her work. I pity her
poor husband if he’s waiting for those socks to keep his feet warm!”

They would sit glowering at each other with this implacable hostility
until evening, taking note of every customer, and displaying such keen
eyesight that they detected the smallest details of each other’s dress
and person when other women declared that they could see nothing at
such a distance. Mademoiselle Saget expressed the highest admiration
for Madame Quenu’s wonderful sight when she one day detected a scratch
on the fish-girl’s left cheek. With eyes like those, said the old maid,
one might even see through a door. However, the victory often remained
undecided when night fell; sometimes one or other of the rivals was
temporarily crushed, but she took her revenge on the morrow. Several
people of the neighbourhood actually laid wagers on these contests,
some backing the beautiful Lisa and others the beautiful Norman.

At last they ended by forbidding their children to speak to one
another. Pauline and Muche had formerly been good friends,
notwithstanding the girl’s stiff petticoats and lady-like demeanour,
and the lad’s tattered appearance, coarse language, and rough manners.
They had at times played together at horses on the broad footway in
front of the fish market, Pauline always being the horse and Muche the
driver. One day, however, when the boy came in all simplicity to seek
his playmate, Lisa turned him out of the house, declaring that he was a
dirty little street arab.

“One can’t tell what may happen with children who have been so
shockingly brought up,” she observed.

“Yes, indeed; you are quite right,” replied Mademoiselle Saget, who
happened to be present.

When Muche, who was barely seven years old, came in tears to his mother
to tell her of what had happened, La Normande broke out into a terrible
passion. At the first moment she felt a strong inclination to rush over
to the Quenu-Gradelles’ and smash everything in their shop. But
eventually she contented herself with giving Muche a whipping.

“If ever I catch you going there again,” she cried, boiling over with
anger, “you’ll get it hot from me, I can tell you!”

Florent, however, was the real victim of the two women. It was he, in
truth, who had set them by the ears, and it was on his account that
they were fighting each other. Ever since he had appeared upon the
scene things had been going from bad to worse. He compromised and
disturbed and embittered all these people, who had previously lived in
such sleek peace and harmony. The beautiful Norman felt inclined to
claw him when he lingered too long with the Quenus, and it was chiefly
from an impulse of hostile rivalry that she desired to win him to
herself. The beautiful Lisa, on her side, maintained a cold judicial
bearing, and although extremely annoyed, forced herself to silence
whenever she saw Florent leaving the pork shop to go to the Rue
Pirouette.

Still, there was now much less cordiality than formerly round the
Quenus’ dinner-table in the evening. The clean, prim dining-room seemed
to have assumed an aspect of chilling severity. Florent divined a
reproach, a sort of condemnation in the bright oak, the polished lamp,
and the new matting. He scarcely dared to eat for fear of letting
crumbs fall on the floor or soiling his plate. There was a guileless
simplicity about him which prevented him from seeing how the land
really lay. He still praised Lisa’s affectionate kindliness on all
sides; and outwardly, indeed, she did continue to treat him with all
gentleness.

“It is very strange,” she said to him one day with a smile, as though
she were joking; “although you don’t eat at all badly now, you don’t
get fatter. Your food doesn’t seem to do you any good.”

At this Quenu laughed aloud, and tapping his brother’s stomach,
protested that the whole contents of the pork shop might pass through
it without depositing a layer of fat as thick as a two-sou piece.
However, Lisa’s insistence on this particular subject was instinct with
that same suspicious dislike for fleshless men which Madame Mehudin
manifested more outspokenly; and behind it all there was likewise a
veiled allusion to the disorderly life which she imagined Florent was
leading. She never, however, spoke a word to him about La Normande.
Quenu had attempted a joke on the subject one evening, but Lisa had
received it so icily that the good man had not ventured to refer to the
matter again. They would remain seated at table for a few moments after
dessert, and Florent, who had noticed his sister-in-law’s vexation if
ever he went off too soon, tried to find something to talk about. On
these occasions Lisa would be near him, and certainly he did not suffer
in her presence from that fishy smell which assailed him when he was in
the company of La Normande. The mistress of the pork shop, on the
contrary, exhaled an odour of fat and rich meats. Moreover, not a
thrill of life stirred her tight-fitting bodice; she was all
massiveness and all sedateness. Gavard once said to Florent in
confidence that Madame Quenu was no doubt handsome, but that for his
part he did not admire such armour-plated women.

Lisa avoided talking to Quenu of Florent. She habitually prided herself
on her patience, and considered, too, that it would not be proper to
cause any unpleasantness between the brothers, unless some peremptory
reason for her interference should arise. As she said, she could put up
with a good deal, but, of course, she must not be tried too far. She
had now reached the period of courteous tolerance, wearing an
expressionless face, affecting perfect indifference and strict
politeness, and carefully avoiding everything which might seem to hint
that Florent was boarding and lodging with them without their receiving
the slightest payment from him. Not, indeed, that she would have
accepted any payment from him, she was above all that; still he might,
at any rate, she thought, have lunched away from the house.

“We never seem to be alone now,” she remarked to Quenu one day. “If
there is anything we want to say to one another we have to wait till we
go upstairs at night.”

And then, one night when they were in bed, she said to him: “Your
brother earns a hundred and fifty francs a month, doesn’t he? Well,
it’s strange he can’t put a trifle by to buy himself some more linen.
I’ve been obliged to give him three more of your old shirts.”

“Oh, that doesn’t matter,” Quenu replied. “Florent’s not hard to
please; and we must let him keep his money for himself.”

“Oh, yes, of course,” said Lisa, without pressing the matter further.
“I didn’t mention it for that reason. Whether he spends his money well
or ill, it isn’t our business.”

In her own mind she felt quite sure that he wasted his salary at the
Mehudins’.

Only on one occasion did she break through her habitual calmness of
demeanour, the quiet reserve which was the result of both natural
temperament and preconceived design. The beautiful Norman had made
Florent a present of a magnificent salmon. Feeling very much
embarrassed with the fish, and not daring to refuse it, he brought it
to Lisa.

“You can make a pasty of it,” he said ingenuously.

Lisa looked at him sternly with whitening lips. Then, striving to
restrain her anger, she exclaimed: “Do you think that we are short of
food? Thank God, we’ve got quite enough to eat here! Take it back!”

“Well, at any rate, cook it for me,” replied Florent, amazed by her
anger; “I’ll eat it myself.”

At this she burst out furiously.

“The house isn’t an inn! Tell those who gave you the fish to cook it
for you! I won’t have my pans tainted and infected! Take it back again!
Do you hear?”

If he had not gone away with it, she would certainly have seized it and
hurled it into the street. Florent took it to Monsieur Lebigre’s, where
Rose was ordered to make a pasty of it; and one evening the pasty was
eaten in the little “cabinet,” Gavard, who was present, “standing” some
oysters for the occasion. Florent now gradually came more and more
frequently to Monsieur Lebigre’s, till at last he was constantly to be
met in the little private room. He there found an atmosphere of heated
excitement in which his political feverishness could pulsate freely. At
times, now, when he shut himself up in his garret to work, the quiet
simplicity of the little room irritated him, his theoretical search for
liberty proved quite insufficient, and it became necessary that he
should go downstairs, sally out, and seek satisfaction in the trenchant
axioms of Charvet and the wild outbursts of Logre. During the first few
evenings the clamour and chatter had made him feel ill at ease; he was
then quite conscious of their utter emptiness, but he felt a need of
drowning his thoughts, of goading himself on to some extreme resolution
which might calm his mental disquietude. The atmosphere of the little
room, reeking with the odour of spirits and warm with tobacco smoke,
intoxicated him and filled him with peculiar beatitude, prompting a
kind of self-surrender which made him willing to acquiesce in the
wildest ideas. He grew attached to those he met there, and looked for
them and awaited their coming with a pleasure which increased with
habit. Robine’s mild, bearded countenance, Clemence’s serious profile,
Charvet’s fleshless pallor, Logre’s hump, Gavard, Alexandre, and
Lacaille, all entered into his life, and assumed a larger and larger
place in it. He took quite a sensual enjoyment in these meetings. When
his fingers closed round the brass knob on the door of the little
cabinet it seemed to be animated with life, to warm him, and turn of
its own accord. Had he grasped the supple wrist of a woman he could not
have felt a more thrilling emotion.

To tell the truth, very serious things took place in that little room.
One evening, Logre, after indulging in wilder outbursts than usual,
banged his fist upon the table, declaring that if they were men they
would make a clean sweep of the Government. And he added that it was
necessary they should come to an understanding without further delay,
if they desired to be fully prepared when the time for action arrived.
Then they all bent their heads together, discussed the matter in lower
tones, and decided to form a little “group,” which should be ready for
whatever might happen. From that day forward Gavard flattered himself
that he was a member of a secret society, and was engaged in a
conspiracy. The little circle received no new members, but Logre
promised to put it into communication with other associations with
which he was acquainted; and then, as soon as they held all Paris in
their grasp, they would rise and make the Tuileries’ people dance. A
series of endless discussions, renewed during several months, then
began—discussions on questions of organisation, on questions of ways
and means, on questions of strategy, and of the form of the future
Government. As soon as Rose had brought Clemence’s grog, Charvet’s and
Robine’s beer, the coffee for Logre, Gavard, and Florent, and the
liqueur glasses of brandy for Lacaille and Alexandre, the door of the
cabinet was carefully fastened, and the debate began.

Charvet and Florent were naturally those whose utterances were listened
to with the greatest attention. Gavard had not been able to keep his
tongue from wagging, but had gradually related the whole story of
Cayenne; and Florent found himself surrounded by a halo of martyrdom.
His words were received as though they were the expression of
indisputable dogmas. One evening, however, the poultry dealer, vexed at
hearing his friend, who happened to be absent, attacked, exclaimed:
“Don’t say anything against Florent; he’s been to Cayenne!”

Charvet was rather annoyed by the advantage which this circumstance
gave to Florent. “Cayenne, Cayenne,” he muttered between his teeth.
“Ah, well, they were not so badly off there, after all.”

Then he attempted to prove that exile was a mere nothing, and that real
suffering consisted in remaining in one’s oppressed country, gagged in
presence of triumphant despotism. And besides, he urged, it wasn’t his
fault that he hadn’t been arrested on the Second of December. Next,
however, he hinted that those who had allowed themselves to be captured
were imbeciles. His secret jealousy made him a systematic opponent of
Florent; and the general discussions always ended in a duel between
these two, who, while their companions listened in silence, would speak
against one another for hours at a time, without either of them
allowing that he was beaten.

One of the favourite subjects of discussion was that of the
reorganisation of the country which would have to be effected on the
morrow of their victory.

“We are the conquerors, are we not?” began Gavard.

And, triumph being taken for granted, everyone offered his opinion.
There were two rival parties. Charvet, who was a disciple of Hébert,
was supported by Logre and Robine; while Florent, who was always
absorbed in humanitarian dreams, and called himself a Socialist, was
backed by Alexandre and Lacaille. As for Gavard, he felt no repugnance
for violent action; but, as he was often twitted about his fortune with
no end of sarcastic witticisms which annoyed him, he declared himself a
Communist.

“We must make a clean sweep of everything,” Charvet would curtly say,
as though he were delivering a blow with a cleaver. “The trunk is
rotten, and it must come down.”

“Yes! yes!” cried Logre, standing up that he might look taller, and
making the partition shake with the excited motion of his hump.
“Everything will be levelled to the ground; take my word for it. After
that we shall see what to do.”

Robine signified approval by wagging his beard. His silence seemed
instinct with delight whenever violent revolutionary propositions were
made. His eyes assumed a soft ecstatic expression at the mention of the
guillotine. He half closed them, as though he could see the machine,
and was filled with pleasant emotion at the sight; and next he would
gently rub his chin against the knob of his stick, with a subdued purr
of satisfaction.

“All the same,” said Florent, in whose voice a vague touch of sadness
lingered, “if you cut down the tree it will be necessary to preserve
some seed. For my part, I think that the tree ought to be preserved, so
that we may graft new life on it. The political revolution, you know,
has already taken place; to-day we have got to think of the labourer,
the working man. Our movement must be altogether a social one. I defy
you to reject the claims of the people. They are weary of waiting, and
are determined to have their share of happiness.”

These words aroused Alexandre’s enthusiasm. With a beaming, radiant
face he declared that this was true, that the people were weary of
waiting.

“And we will have our share,” added Lacaille, with a more menacing
expression. “All the revolutions that have taken place have been for
the good of the middle classes. We’ve had quite enough of that sort of
thing, and the next one shall be for our benefit.”

From this moment disagreement set in. Gavard offered to make a division
of his property, but Logre declined, asserting that he cared nothing
for money. Then Charvet gradually overcame the tumult, till at last he
alone was heard speaking.

“The selfishness of the different classes does more than anything else
to uphold tyranny,” said he. “It is wrong of the people to display
egotism. If they assist us they shall have their share. But why should
I fight for the working man if the working man won’t fight for me?
Moreover, that is not the question at present. Ten years of
revolutionary dictatorship will be necessary to accustom a nation like
France to the fitting enjoyment of liberty.”

“All the more so as the working man is not ripe for it, and requires to
be directed,” said Clemence bluntly.

She but seldom spoke. This tall, serious looking girl, alone among so
many men, listened to all the political chatter with a learnedly
critical air. She leaned back against the partition, and every now and
then sipped her grog whilst gazing at the speakers with frowning brows
or inflated nostrils, thus silently signifying her approval or
disapproval, and making it quite clear that she held decided opinions
upon the most complicated matters. At times she would roll a cigarette,
and puff slender whiffs of smoke from the corners of her mouth, whilst
lending increased attention to what was being debated. It was as though
she were presiding over the discussion, and would award the prize to
the victor when it was finished. She certainly considered that it
became her, as a woman, to display some reserve in her opinions, and to
remain calm whilst the men grew more and more excited. Now and then,
however, in the heat of the debate, she would let a word or a phrase
escape her and “clench the matter” even for Charvet himself, as Gavard
said. In her heart she believed herself the superior of all these
fellows. The only one of them for whom she felt any respect was Robine,
and she would thoughtfully contemplate his silent bearing.

Neither Florent nor any of the others paid any special attention to
Clemence. They treated her just as though she were a man, shaking hands
with her so roughly as almost to dislocate her arms. One evening
Florent witnessed the periodical settlement of accounts between her and
Charvet. She had just received her pay, and Charvet wanted to borrow
ten francs from her; but she first of all insisted that they must
reckon up how matters stood between them. They lived together in a
voluntary partnership, each having complete control of his or her
earnings, and strictly paying his or her expenses. By so doing, said
they, they were under no obligations to one another, but retained
entire freedom. Rent, food, washing, and amusements, were all noted
down and added up. That evening, when the accounts had been verified,
Clemence proved to Charvet that he already owed her five francs. Then
she handed him the other ten which he wished to borrow, and exclaimed:
“Recollect that you now owe me fifteen. I shall expect you to repay me
on the fifth, when you get paid for teaching little Lehudier.”

When Rose was summoned to receive payment for the “drinks,” each
produced the few coppers required to discharge his or her liability.
Charvet laughingly called Clemence an aristocrat because she drank
grog. She wanted to humiliate him, said he, and make him feel that he
earned less than she did, which, as it happened, was the fact. Beneath
his laugh, however, there was a feeling of bitterness that the girl
should be better circumstanced than himself, for, in spite of his
theory of the equality of the sexes, this lowered him.

Although the discussions in the little room had virtually no result,
they served to exercise the speakers’ lungs. A tremendous hubbub
proceeded from the sanctum, and the panes of frosted glass vibrated
like drum-skins. Sometimes the uproar became so great that Rose, while
languidly serving some blouse-wearing customer in the shop, would turn
her head uneasily.

“Why, they’re surely fighting together in there,” the customer would
say, as he put his glass down on the zinc-covered counter, and wiped
his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Oh, there’s no fear of that,” Monsieur Lebigre tranquilly replied.
“It’s only some gentlemen talking together.”

Monsieur Lebigre, indeed, although very strict with his other
customers, allowed the politicians to shout as loudly as they pleased,
and never made the least remark on the subject. He would sit for hours
together on the bench behind the counter, with his big head lolling
drowsily against the mirror, whilst he watched Rose uncorking the
bottles and giving a wipe here and there with her duster. And in spite
of the somniferous effects of the wine fumes and the warm streaming
gaslight, he would keep his ears open to the sounds proceeding from the
little room. At times, when the voices grew noisier than usual, he got
up from his seat and went to lean against the partition; and
occasionally he even pushed the door open, and went inside and sat down
there for a few minutes, giving Gavard a friendly slap on the thigh.
And then he would nod approval of everything that was said. The poultry
dealer asserted that although friend Lebigre hadn’t the stuff of an
orator in him, they might safely reckon on him when the “shindy” came.

One morning, however, at the markets, when a tremendous row broke out
between Rose and one of the fish-wives, through the former accidentally
knocking over a basket of herrings, Florent heard Rose’s employer
spoken of as a “dirty spy” in the pay of the police. And after he had
succeeded in restoring peace, all sorts of stories about Monsieur
Lebigre were poured into his ears. Yes, the wine seller was in the pay
of the police, the fish-wives said; all the neighbourhood knew it.
Before Mademoiselle Saget had begun to deal with him she had once met
him entering the Prefecture to make his report. It was asserted, too,
that he was a money-monger, a usurer, and lent petty sums by the day to
costermongers, and let out barrows to them, exacting a scandalous rate
of interest in return. Florent was greatly disturbed by all this, and
felt it his duty to repeat it that evening to his fellow politicians.
The latter, however, only shrugged their shoulders, and laughed at his
uneasiness.

“Poor Florent!” Charvet exclaimed sarcastically; “he imagines the whole
police force is on his track, just because he happens to have been sent
to Cayenne!”

Gavard gave his word of honour that Lebigre was perfectly staunch and
true, while Logre, for his part, manifested extreme irritation. He
fumed and declared that it would be quite impossible for them to get on
if everyone was to be accused of being a police spy; for his own part,
he would rather stay at home, and have nothing more to do with
politics. Why, hadn’t people even dared to say that he, Logre himself,
who had fought in ‘48 and ‘51, and had twice narrowly escaped
transportation, was a spy as well? As he shouted this out, he thrust
his jaws forward, and glared at the others as though he would have
liked to ram the conviction that he had nothing to do with the police
down their throats. At the sight of his furious glances his companions
made gestures of protestation. However, Lacaille, on hearing Monsieur
Lebigre accused of usury, silently lowered his head.

The incident was forgotten in the discussions which ensued. Since Logre
had suggested a conspiracy, Monsieur Lebigre had grasped the hands of
the frequenters of the little room with more vigor than ever. Their
custom, to tell the truth, was of but small value to him, for they
never ordered more than one “drink” apiece. They drained the last drops
just as they rose to leave, having been careful to allow a little to
remain in their glasses, even during their most heated arguments. In
this wise the one “shout” lasted throughout the evening. They shivered
as they turned out into the cold dampness of the night, and for a
moment or two remained standing on the footway with dazzled eyes and
buzzing ears, as though surprised by the dark silence of the street.
Rose, meanwhile, fastened the shutters behind them. Then, quite
exhausted, at a loss for another word they shook hands, separated, and
went their different ways, still mentally continuing the discussion of
the evening, and regretting that they could not ram their particular
theories down each other’s throats. Robine walked away, with his bent
back bobbing up and down, in the direction of the Rue Rambuteau; whilst
Charvet and Clemence went off through the markets on their return to
the Luxembourg quarter, their heels sounding on the flag-stones in
military fashion, whilst they still discussed some question of politics
or philosophy, walking along side by side, but never arm-in-arm.

The conspiracy ripened very slowly. At the commencement of the summer
the plotters had got no further than agreeing that it was necessary a
stroke should be attempted. Florent, who had at first looked upon the
whole business with a kind of distrust, had now, however, come to
believe in the possibility of a revolutionary movement. He took up the
matter seriously; making notes, and preparing plans in writing, while
the others still did nothing but talk. For his part, he began to
concentrate his whole life in the one persistent idea which made his
brain throb night after night; and this to such a degree that he at
last took his brother Quenu with him to Monsieur Lebigre’s, as though
such a course were quite natural. Certainly he had no thought of doing
anything improper. He still looked upon Quenu as in some degree his
pupil, and may even have considered it his duty to start him on the
proper path. Quenu was an absolute novice in politics, but after
spending five or six evenings in the little room he found himself quite
in accord with the others. When Lisa was not present he manifested much
docility, a sort of respect for his brother’s opinions. But the
greatest charm of the affair for him was really the mild dissipation of
leaving his shop and shutting himself up in the little room where the
others shouted so loudly, and where Clemence’s presence, in his
opinion, gave a tinge of rakishness and romance to the proceedings. He
now made all haste with his chitterlings in order that he might get
away as early as possible, anxious to lose not a single word of the
discussions, which seemed to him to be very brilliant, though he was
not always able to follow them. The beautiful Lisa did not fail to
notice his hurry to be gone, but as yet she refrained from saying
anything. When Florent took him off, she simply went to the door-step,
and watched them enter Monsieur Lebigre’s, her face paling somewhat,
and a severe expression coming into her eyes.

One evening, as Mademoiselle Saget was peering out of her garret
casement, she recognised Quenu’s shadow on the frosted glass of the
“cabinet” window facing the Rue Pirouette. She had found her casement
an excellent post of observation, as it overlooked that milky
transparency, on which the gaslight threw silhouettes of the
politicians, with noses suddenly appearing and disappearing, gaping
jaws abruptly springing into sight and then vanishing, and huge arms,
apparently destitute of bodies, waving hither and thither. This
extraordinary jumble of detached limbs, these silent but frantic
profiles, bore witness to the heated discussions that went on in the
little room, and kept the old maid peering from behind her muslin
curtains until the transparency turned black. She shrewdly suspected
some “bit of trickery,” as she phrased it. By continual watching she
had come to recognise the different shadows by their hands and hair and
clothes. As she gazed upon the chaos of clenched fists, angry heads,
and swaying shoulders, which seemed to have become detached from their
trunks and to roll about one atop of the other, she would exclaim
unhesitatingly, “Ah, there’s that big booby of a cousin; there’s that
miserly old Gavard; and there’s the hunchback; and there’s that maypole
of a Clemence!” Then, when the action of the shadow-play became more
pronounced, and they all seemed to have lost control over themselves,
she felt an irresistible impulse to go downstairs to try to find out
what was happening. Thus she now made a point of buying her
black-currant syrup at nights, pretending that she felt out-of-sorts in
the morning, and was obliged to take a sip as soon as ever she was out
of bed. On the evening when she noticed Quenu’s massive head shadowed
on the transparency in close proximity to Charvet’s fist, she made her
appearance at Monsieur Lebigre’s in a breathless condition. To gain
more time, she made Rose rinse out her little bottle for her; however,
she was about to return to her room when she heard the pork butcher
exclaim with a sort of childish candour:

“No, indeed, we’ll stand for it no longer! We’ll make a clean sweep of
all those humbugging Deputies and Ministers! Yes, we’ll send the whole
lot packing.”

Eight o’clock had scarcely struck on the following morning when
Mademoiselle Saget was already at the pork shop. She found Madame
Lecœur and La Sarriette there, dipping their noses into the
heating-pan, and buying hot sausages for breakfast. As the old maid had
managed to draw them into her quarrel with La Normande with respect to
the ten-sou dab, they had at once made friends again with Lisa, and
they now had nothing but contempt for the handsome fish-girl, and
assailed her and her sister as good-for-nothing hussies, whose only aim
was to fleece men of their money. This opinion had been inspired by the
assertions of Mademoiselle Saget, who had declared to Madame Lecœur
that Florent had induced one of the two girls to coquette with Gavard,
and that the four of them had indulged in the wildest dissipation at
Barratte’s—of course, at the poultry dealer’s expense. From the effects
of this impudent story Madame Lecœur had not yet recovered; she wore a
doleful appearance, and her eyes were quite yellow with spleen.

That morning, however, it was for Madame Quenu that the old maid had a
shock in store. She looked round the counter, and then in her most
gentle voice remarked:

“I saw Monsieur Quenu last night. They seem to enjoy themselves
immensely in that little room at Lebigre’s, if one may judge from the
noise they make.”

Lisa had turned her head towards the street, listening very
attentively, but apparently unwilling to show it. The old maid paused,
hoping that one of the others would question her; and then, in a lower
tone, she added: “They had a woman with them. Oh, I don’t mean Monsieur
Quenu, of course! I didn’t say that; I don’t know—”

“It must be Clemence,” interrupted La Sarriette; “a big scraggy
creature who gives herself all sorts of airs just because she went to
boarding school. She lives with a threadbare usher. I’ve seen them
together; they always look as though they were taking each other off to
the police station.”

“Oh, yes; I know,” replied the old maid, who, indeed, knew everything
about Charvet and Clemence, and whose only purpose was to alarm Lisa.

The mistress of the pork shop, however, never flinched. She seemed to
be absorbed in watching something of great interest in the market
yonder. Accordingly the old maid had recourse to stronger measures. “I
think,” said she, addressing herself to Madame Lecœur, “that you ought
to advise your brother-in-law to be careful. Last night they were
shouting out the most shocking things in that little room. Men really
seem to lose their heads over politics. If anyone had heard them, it
might have been a very serious matter for them.”

“Oh! Gavard will go his own way,” sighed Madame Lecœur. “It only wanted
this to fill my cup. I shall die of anxiety, I am sure, if he ever gets
arrested.”

As she spoke, a gleam shot from her dim eyes. La Sarriette, however,
laughed and wagged her little face, bright with the freshness of the
morning air.

“You should hear what Jules says of those who speak against the
Empire,” she remarked. “They ought all to be thrown into the Seine, he
told me; for it seems there isn’t a single respectable person amongst
them.”

“Oh! there’s no harm done, of course, so long as only people like
myself hear their foolish talk,” resumed Mademoiselle Saget. “I’d
rather cut my hand off, you know, than make mischief. Last night now,
for instance, Monsieur Quenu was saying——”

She again paused. Lisa had started slightly.

“Monsieur Quenu was saying that the Ministers and Deputies and all who
are in power ought to be shot.”

At this Lisa turned sharply, her face quite white and her hands
clenched beneath her apron.

“Quenu said that?” she curtly asked.

“Yes, indeed, and several other similar things that I can’t recollect
now. I heard him myself. But don’t distress yourself like that, Madame
Quenu. You know very well that I sha’n’t breathe a word. I’m quite old
enough to know what might harm a man if it came out. Oh, no; it will go
no further.”

Lisa had recovered her equanimity. She took a pride in the happy
peacefulness of her home; she would not acknowledge that there had ever
been the slightest difference between herself and her husband. And so
now she shrugged her shoulders and said with a smile: “Oh, it’s all a
pack of foolish nonsense.”

When the three others were in the street together they agreed that
handsome Lisa had pulled a very doleful face; and they were unanimously
of opinion that the mysterious goings-on of the cousin, the Mehudins,
Gavard, and the Quenus would end in trouble. Madame Lecœur inquired
what was done to the people who got arrested “for politics,” but on
this point Mademoiselle Saget could not enlighten her; she only knew
that they were never seen again—no, never. And this induced La
Sarriette to suggest that perhaps they were thrown into the Seine, as
Jules had said they ought to be.

Lisa avoided all reference to the subject at breakfast and dinner that
day; and even in the evening, when Florent and Quenu went off together
to Monsieur Lebigre’s, there was no unwonted severity in her glance. On
that particular evening, however, the question of framing a
constitution for the future came under discussion, and it was one
o’clock in the morning before the politicians could tear themselves
away from the little room. The shutters had already been fastened, and
they were obliged to leave by a small door, passing out one at a time
with bent backs. Quenu returned home with an uneasy conscience. He
opened the three or four doors on his way to bed as gently as possible,
walking on tip-toe and stretching out his hands as he passed through
the sitting-room, to avoid a collision with any of the furniture. The
whole house seemed to be asleep. When he reached the bedroom, he was
annoyed to find that Lisa had not extinguished the candle, which was
burning with a tall, mournful flame in the midst of the deep silence.
As Quenu took off his shoes, and put them down in a corner, the
time-piece struck half past one with such a clear, ringing sound that
he turned in alarm, almost frightened to move, and gazing with an
expression of angry reproach at the shining gilded Gutenberg standing
there, with his finger on a book. Lisa’s head was buried in her pillow,
and Quenu could only see her back; but he divined that she was merely
feigning sleep, and her conduct in turning her back upon him was so
instinct with reproach that he felt sorely ill at ease. At last he
slipped beneath the bed-clothes, blew out the candle, and lay perfectly
still. He could have sworn that his wife was awake, though she did not
speak to him; and presently he fell asleep, feeling intensely
miserable, and lacking the courage to say good night.

He slept till late, and when he awoke he found himself sprawling in the
middle of the bed with the eider-down quilt up to his chin, whilst Lisa
sat in front of the secrétaire, arranging some papers. His slumber had
been so heavy that he had not heard her rise. However, he now took
courage, and spoke to her from the depths of the alcove: “Why didn’t
you wake me? What are you doing there?”

“I’m sorting the papers in these drawers,” she replied in her usual
tone of voice.

Quenu felt relieved. But Lisa added: “One never knows what may happen.
If the police were to come—”

“What! the police?”

“Yes, indeed, the police; for you’re mixing yourself up with politics
now.”

At this Quenu sat up in bed, quite dazed and confounded by such a
violent and unexpected attack.

“I mix myself up with politics! I mix myself up with politics!” he
repeated. “It’s no concern of the police. I’ve nothing to do with any
compromising matters.”

“No,” replied Lisa, shrugging her shoulders; “you merely talk about
shooting everybody.”

“I! I!”

“Yes. And you bawl it out in a public-house! Mademoiselle Saget heard
you. All the neighbourhood knows by this time that you are a Red
Republican!”

Quenu fell back in bed again. He was not perfectly awake as yet. Lisa’s
words resounded in his ears as though he already heard the heavy tramp
of gendarmes at the bedroom door. He looked at her as she sat there,
with her hair already arranged, her figure tightly imprisoned in her
stays, her whole appearance the same as it was on any other morning;
and he felt more astonished than ever that she should be so neat and
prim under such extraordinary circumstances.

“I leave you absolutely free, you know,” she continued, as she went on
arranging the papers. “I don’t want to wear the breeches, as the saying
goes. You are the master, and you are at liberty to endanger your
position, compromise our credit, and ruin our business.”

Then, as Quenu tried to protest, she silenced him with a gesture. “No,
no; don’t say anything,” she continued. “This is no quarrel, and I am
not even asking an explanation from you. But if you had consulted me,
and we had talked the matter over together, I might have intervened.
Ah! it’s a great mistake to imagine that women understand nothing about
politics. Shall I tell you what my politics are?”

She had risen from her seat whilst speaking, and was now walking to and
fro between the bed and the window, wiping as she went some specks of
dust from the bright mahogany of the mirrored wardrobe and the
dressing-table.

“My politics are the politics of honest folks,” said she. “I’m grateful
to the Government when business is prosperous, when I can eat my meals
in peace and comfort, and can sleep at nights without being awakened by
the firing of guns. There were pretty times in ‘48, were there not? You
remember our uncle Gradelle, the worthy man, showing us his books for
that year? He lost more than six thousand francs. Now that we have got
the Empire, however, everything prospers. We sell our goods readily
enough. You can’t deny it. Well, then, what is it that you want? How
will you be better off when you have shot everybody?”

She took her stand in front of the little night-table, crossed her arms
over her breast, and fixed her eyes upon Quenu, who had shuffled
himself beneath the bed-clothes, almost out of sight. He attempted to
explain what it was that his friends wanted, but he got quite confused
in his endeavours to summarise Florent’s and Charvet’s political and
social systems; and could only talk about the disregard shown to
principles, the accession of the democracy to power, and the
regeneration of society, in such a strange tangled way that Lisa
shrugged her shoulders, quite unable to understand him. At last,
however, he extricated himself from his difficulties by declaring that
the Empire was the reign of licentiousness, swindling finance, and
highway robbery. And, recalling an expression of Logre’s he added: “We
are the prey of a band of adventurers, who are pillaging, violating,
and assassinating France. We’ll have no more of them.”

Lisa, however, still shrugged her shoulders.

“Well, and is that all you have got to say?” she asked with perfect
coolness. “What has all that got to do with me? Even supposing it were
true, what then? Have I ever advised you to practise dishonest courses?
Have I ever prompted you to dishonour your acceptances, or cheat your
customers, or pile up money by fraudulent practices? Really, you’ll end
by making me quite angry! We are honest folks, and we don’t pillage or
assassinate anybody. That’s quite sufficient. What other folks do is no
concern of ours. If they choose to be rogues it’s their affair.”

She looked quite majestic and triumphant; and again pacing the room,
drawing herself up to her full height, she resumed: “A pretty notion it
is that people are to let their business go to rack and ruin just to
please those who are penniless. For my part, I’m in favour of making
hay while the sun shines, and supporting a Government which promotes
trade. If it does do dishonourable things, I prefer to know nothing
about them. I know that I myself commit none, and that no one in the
neighbourhood can point a finger at me. It’s only fools who go tilting
at windmills. At the time of the last elections, you remember, Gavard
said that the Emperor’s candidate had been bankrupt, and was mixed up
in all sorts of scandalous matters. Well, perhaps that was true, I
don’t deny it; but all the same, you acted wisely in voting for him,
for all that was not in question; you were not asked to lend the man
any money or to transact any business with him, but merely to show the
Government that you were pleased with the prosperity of the pork
trade.”

At this moment Quenu called to mind a sentence of Charvet’s, asserting
that “the bloated bourgeois, the sleek shopkeepers, who backed up that
Government of universal gormandising, ought to be hurled into the
sewers before all others, for it was owing to them and their gluttonous
egotism that tyranny had succeeded in mastering and preying upon the
nation.” He was trying to complete this piece of eloquence when Lisa,
carried off by her indignation, cut him short.

“Don’t talk such stuff! My conscience doesn’t reproach me with
anything. I don’t owe a copper to anybody; I’m not mixed up in any
dishonest business; I buy and sell good sound stuff; and I charge no
more than others do. What you say may perhaps apply to people like our
cousins, the Saccards. They pretend to be even ignorant that I am in
Paris; but I am prouder than they are, and I don’t care a rap for their
millions. It’s said that Saccard speculates in condemned buildings, and
cheats and robs everybody. I’m not surprised to hear it, for he was
always that way inclined. He loves money just for the sake of wallowing
in it, and then tossing it out of his windows, like the imbecile he is.
I can understand people attacking men of his stamp, who pile up
excessive fortunes. For my part, if you care to know it, I have but a
bad opinion of Saccard. But we—we who live so quietly and peaceably,
who will need at least fifteen years to put by sufficient money to make
ourselves comfortably independent, we who have no reason to meddle in
politics, and whose only aim is to bring up our daughter respectably,
and to see that our business prospers—why you must be joking to talk
such stuff about us. We are honest folks!”

She came and sat down on the edge of the bed. Quenu was already much
shaken in his opinions.

“Listen to me, now,” she resumed in a more serious voice. “You surely
don’t want to see your own shop pillaged, your cellar emptied, and your
money taken from you? If these men who meet at Monsieur Lebigre’s
should prove triumphant, do you think that you would then lie as
comfortably in your bed as you do now? And on going down into the
kitchen, do you imagine that you would set about making your galantines
as peacefully as you will presently? No, no, indeed! So why do you talk
about overthrowing a Government which protects you, and enables you to
put money by? You have a wife and a daughter, and your first duty is
towards them. You would be in fault if you imperilled their happiness.
It is only those who have neither home nor hearth, who have nothing to
lose, who want to be shooting people. Surely you don’t want to pull the
chestnuts out of the fire for _them_! So stay quietly at home, you
foolish fellow, sleep comfortably, eat well, make money, keep an easy
conscience, and leave France to free herself of the Empire if the
Empire annoys her. France can get on very well without _you_.”

She laughed her bright melodious laugh as she finished; and Quenu was
now altogether convinced. Yes, she was right, after all; and she looked
so charming, he thought, as she sat there on the edge of the bed, so
trim, although it was so early, so bright, and so fresh in the dazzling
whiteness of her linen. As he listened to her his eyes fell on their
portraits hanging on either side of the fireplace. Yes, they were
certainly honest folks; they had such a respectable, well-to-do air in
their black clothes and their gilded frames! The bedroom, too, looked
as though it belonged to people of some account in the world. The lace
squares seemed to give a dignified appearance to the chairs; and the
carpet, the curtains, and the vases decorated with painted
landscapes—all spoke of their exertions to get on in the world and
their taste for comfort. Thereupon he plunged yet further beneath the
eider-down quilt, which kept him in a state of pleasant warmth. He
began to feel that he had risked losing all these things at Monsieur
Lebigre’s—his huge bed, his cosy room, and his business, on which his
thoughts now dwelt with tender remorse. And from Lisa, from the
furniture, from all his cosy surroundings, he derived a sense of
comfort which thrilled him with a delightful, overpowering charm.

“You foolish fellow!” said his wife, seeing that he was now quite
conquered. “A pretty business it was that you’d embarked upon; but
you’d have had to reckon with Pauline and me, I can tell you! And now
don’t bother your head any more about the Government. To begin with,
all Governments are alike, and if we didn’t have this one, we should
have another. A Government is necessary. But the one thing is to be
able to live on, to spend one’s savings in peace and comfort when one
grows old, and to know that one has gained one’s means honestly.”

Quenu nodded his head in acquiescence, and tried to commence a
justification of his conduct.

“It was Gavard—,” he began.

But Lisa’s face again assumed a serious expression, and she interrupted
him sharply.

“No, it was not Gavard. I know very well who it was; and it would be a
great deal better if he would look after his own safety before
compromising that of others.”

“Is it Florent you mean?” Quenu timidly inquired after a pause.

Lisa did not immediately reply. She got up and went back to the
secrétaire, as if trying to restrain herself.

“Yes, it is Florent,” she said presently, in incisive tones. “You know
how patient I am. I would bear almost anything rather than come between
you and your brother. The tie of relationship is a sacred thing. But
the cup is filled to overflowing now. Since your brother came here
things have been constantly getting worse and worse. But now, I won’t
say anything more; it is better that I shouldn’t.”

There was another pause. Then, as her husband gazed up at the ceiling
with an air of embarrassment, she continued, with increased violence:

“Really, he seems to ignore all that we have done for him. We have put
ourselves to great inconvenience for his sake; we have given him
Augustine’s bedroom, and the poor girl sleeps without a murmur in a
stuffy little closet where she can scarcely breathe. We board and lodge
him and give him every attention—but no, he takes it all quite as a
matter of course. He is earning money, but what he does with it nobody
knows; or, rather, one knows only too well.”

“But there’s his share of the inheritance, you know,” Quenu ventured to
say, pained at hearing his brother attacked.

Lisa suddenly stiffened herself as though she were stunned, and her
anger vanished.

“Yes, you are right; there is his share of the inheritance. Here is the
statement of it, in this drawer. But he refused to take it; you
remember, you were present, and heard him. That only proves that he is
a brainless, worthless fellow. If he had had an idea in his head, he
would have made something out of that money by now. For my own part, I
should be very glad to get rid of it; it would be a relief to us. I
have told him so twice, but he won’t listen to me. You ought to
persuade him to take it. Talk to him about it, will you?”

Quenu growled something in reply; and Lisa refrained from pressing the
point further, being of opinion that she had done all that could be
expected of her.

“He is not like other men,” she resumed. “He’s not a comfortable sort
of person to have in the house. I shouldn’t have said this if we hadn’t
got talking on the subject. I don’t busy myself about his conduct,
though it’s setting the whole neighbourhood gossiping about us. Let him
eat and sleep here, and put us about, if he likes; we can get over
that; but what I won’t tolerate is that he should involve us in his
politics. If he tries to lead you off again, or compromises us in the
least degree, I shall turn him out of the house without the least
hesitation. I warn you, and now you understand!”

Florent was doomed. Lisa was making a great effort to restrain herself,
to prevent the animosity which had long been rankling in her heart from
flowing forth. But Florent and his ways jarred against her every
instinct; he wounded her, frightened her, and made her quite miserable.

“A man who has made such a discreditable career,” she murmured, “who
has never been able to get a roof of his own over his head! I can very
well understand his partiality for bullets! He can go and stand in
their way if he chooses; but let him leave honest folks to their
families! And then, he isn’t pleasant to have about one! He reeks of
fish in the evening at dinner! It prevents me from eating. He himself
never lets a mouthful go past him, though it’s little better he seems
to be for it all! He can’t even grow decently stout, the wretched
fellow, to such a degree do his bad instincts prey on him!”

She had stepped up to the window whilst speaking, and now saw Florent
crossing the Rue Rambuteau on his way to the fish market. There was a
very large arrival of fish that morning; the tray-like baskets were
covered with rippling silver, and the auction rooms roared with the
hubbub of their sales. Lisa kept her eyes on the bony shoulders of her
brother-in-law as he made his way into the pungent smells of the
market, stooping beneath the sickening sensation which they brought
him; and the glance with which she followed his steps was that of a
woman bent on combat and resolved to be victorious.

When she turned round again, Quenu was getting up. As he sat on the
edge of the bed in his night-shirt, still warm from the pleasant heat
of the eider-down quilt and with his feet resting on the soft fluffy
rug below him, he looked quite pale, quite distressed at the
misunderstanding between his wife and his brother. Lisa, however, gave
him one of her sweetest smiles, and he felt deeply touched when she
handed him his socks.




CHAPTER IV


Marjolin had been found in a heap of cabbages at the Market of the
Innocents. He was sleeping under the shelter of a large white-hearted
one, a broad leaf of which concealed his rosy childish face It was
never known what poverty-stricken mother had laid him there. When he
was found he was already a fine little fellow of two or three years of
age, very plump and merry, but so backward and dense that he could
scarcely stammer a few words, and only seemed able to smile. When one
of the vegetable saleswomen found him lying under the big white cabbage
she raised such a loud cry of surprise that her neighbours rushed up to
see what was the matter, while the youngster, still in petticoats, and
wrapped in a scrap of old blanket, held out his arms towards her. He
could not tell who his mother was, but opened his eyes in wide
astonishment as he squeezed against the shoulder of a stout tripe
dealer who eventually took him up. The whole market busied itself about
him throughout the day. He soon recovered confidence, ate slices of
bread and butter, and smiled at all the women. The stout tripe dealer
kept him for a time, then a neighbour took him; and a month later a
third woman gave him shelter. When they asked him where his mother was,
he waved his little hand with a pretty gesture which embraced all the
women present. He became the adopted child of the place, always
clinging to the skirts of one or another of the women, and always
finding a corner of a bed and a share of a meal somewhere. Somehow,
too, he managed to find clothes, and he even had a copper or two at the
bottom of his ragged pockets. It was a buxom, ruddy girl dealing in
medicinal herbs who gave him the name of Marjolin,[*] though no one
knew why.

[*] Literally “Marjoram.”


When Marjolin was nearly four years of age, old Mother Chantemesse also
happened to find a child, a little girl, lying on the footway of the
Rue Saint Denis, near the corner of the market. Judging by the little
one’s size, she seemed to be a couple of years old, but she could
already chatter like a magpie, murdering her words in an incessant
childish babble. Old Mother Chantemesse after a time gathered that her
name was Cadine, and that on the previous evening her mother had left
her sitting on a doorstep, with instructions to wait till she returned.
The child had fallen asleep there, and did not cry. She related that
she was beaten at home; and she gladly followed Mother Chantemesse,
seemingly quite enchanted with that huge square, where there were so
many people and such piles of vegetables. Mother Chantemesse, a retail
dealer by trade, was a crusty but very worthy woman, approaching her
sixtieth year. She was extremely fond of children, and had lost three
boys of her own when they were mere babies. She came to the opinion
that the chit she had found “was far too wide awake to kick the
bucket,” and so she adopted her.

One evening, however, as she was going off home with her right hand
clasping Cadine’s, Marjolin came up and unceremoniously caught hold of
her left hand.

“Nay, my lad,” said the old woman, stopping, “the place is filled. Have
you left your big Therese, then? What a fickle little gadabout you
are!”

The boy gazed at her with his smiling eyes, without letting go of her
hand. He looked so pretty with his curly hair that she could not resist
him. “Well, come along, then, you little scamp,” said she; “I’ll put
you to bed as well.”

Thus she made her appearance in the Rue au Lard, where she lived, with
a child clinging to either hand. Marjolin made himself quite at home
there. When the two children proved too noisy the old woman cuffed
them, delighted to shout and worry herself, and wash the youngsters,
and pack them away beneath the blankets. She had fixed them up a little
bed in an old costermonger’s barrow, the wheels and shafts of which had
disappeared. It was like a big cradle, a trifle hard, but retaining a
strong scent of the vegetables which it had long kept fresh and cool
beneath a covering of damp cloths. And there, when four years old,
Cadine and Marjolin slept locked in each other’s arms.

They grew up together, and were always to be seen with their arms about
one another’s waist. At night time old Mother Chantemesse heard them
prattling softly. Cadine’s clear treble went chattering on for hours
together, while Marjolin listened with occasional expressions of
astonishment vented in a deeper tone. The girl was a mischievous young
creature, and concocted all sorts of stories to frighten her companion;
telling him, for instance, that she had one night seen a man, dressed
all in white, looking at them and putting out a great red tongue, at
the foot of the bed. Marjolin quite perspired with terror, and
anxiously asked for further particulars; but the girl would then begin
to jeer at him, and end by calling him a big donkey. At other times
they were not so peaceably disposed, but kicked each other beneath the
blankets. Cadine would pull up her legs, and try to restrain her
laughter as Marjolin missed his aim, and sent his feet banging against
the wall. When this happened, old Madame Chantemesse was obliged to get
up to put the bed-clothes straight again; and, by way of sending the
children to sleep, she would administer a box on the ear to both of
them. For a long time their bed was a sort of playground. They carried
their toys into it, and munched stolen carrots and turnips as they lay
side by side. Every morning their adopted mother was amazed at the
strange things she found in the bed—pebbles, leaves, apple cores, and
dolls made out of scraps of rags. When the very cold weather came, she
went off to her work, leaving them sleeping there, Cadine’s black mop
mingling with Marjolin’s sunny curls, and their mouths so near together
that they looked as though they were keeping each other warm with their
breath.

The room in the Rue au Lard was a big, dilapidated garret, with a
single window, the panes of which were dimmed by the rain. The children
would play at hide-and-seek in the tall walnut wardrobe and underneath
Mother Chantemesse’s colossal bed. There were also two or three tables
in the room, and they crawled under these on all fours. They found the
place a very charming playground, on account of the dim light and the
vegetables scattered about in the dark corners. The street itself, too,
narrow and very quiet, with a broad arcade opening into the Rue de la
Lingerie, provided them with plenty of entertainment. The door of the
house was by the side of the arcade; it was a low door and could only
be opened half way owing to the near proximity of the greasy corkscrew
staircase. The house, which had a projecting pent roof and a bulging
front, dark with damp, and displaying greenish drain-sinks near the
windows of each floor, also served as a big toy for the young couple.
They spent their mornings below in throwing stones up into the
drain-sinks, and the stones thereupon fell down the pipes with a very
merry clatter. In thus amusing themselves, however, they managed to
break a couple of windows, and filled the drains with stones, so that
Mother Chantemesse, who had lived in the house for three and forty
years, narrowly escaped being turned out of it.

Cadine and Marjolin then directed their attention to the vans and drays
and tumbrels which were drawn up in the quiet street. They clambered on
to the wheels, swung from the dangling chains, and larked about amongst
the piles of boxes and hampers. Here also were the back premises of the
commission agents of the Rue de la Poterie—huge, gloomy warehouses,
each day filled and emptied afresh, and affording a constant succession
of delightful hiding-places, where the youngsters buried themselves
amidst the scent of dried fruits, oranges, and fresh apples. When they
got tired of playing in his way, they went off to join old Madame
Chantemesse at the Market of the Innocents. They arrived there
arm-in-arm, laughing gaily as they crossed the streets with never the
slightest fear of being run over by the endless vehicles. They knew the
pavement well, and plunged their little legs knee-deep in the vegetable
refuse without ever slipping. They jeered merrily at any porter in
heavy boots who, in stepping over an artichoke stem, fell sprawling
full-length upon the ground. They were the rosy-cheeked familiar
spirits of those greasy streets. They were to be seen everywhere.

On rainy days they walked gravely beneath the shelter of a ragged old
umbrella, with which Mother Chantemesse had protected her
stock-in-trade for twenty years, and sticking it up in a corner of the
market they called it their house. On sunny days they romped to such a
degree that when evening came they were almost too tired to move. They
bathed their feet in the fountains, dammed up the gutters, or hid
themselves beneath piles of vegetables, and remained there prattling to
each other just as they did in bed at night. People passing some huge
mountain of cos or cabbage lettuces often heard a muffled sound of
chatter coming from it. And when the green-stuff was removed, the two
children would be discovered lying side by side on their couch of
verdure, their eyes glistening uneasily like those of birds discovered
in the depth of a thicket. As time went on, Cadine could not get along
without Marjolin, and Marjolin began to cry when he lost sight of
Cadine. If they happened to get separated, they sought one another
behind the petticoats of every stallkeeper in the markets, amongst the
boxes and under the cabbages. If was, indeed, chiefly under the
cabbages that they grew up and learned to love each other.

Marjolin was nearly eight years old, and Cadine six, when old Madame
Chantemesse began to reproach them for their idleness. She told them
that she would interest them in her business, and pay them a sou a day
to assist her in paring her vegetables. During the first few days the
children displayed eager zeal; they squatted down on either side of the
big flat basket with little knives in their hands, and worked away
energetically. Mother Chantemesse made a specialty of pared vegetables;
on her stall, covered with a strip of damp black lining, were little
lots of potatoes, turnips, carrots, and white onions, arranged in
pyramids of four—three at the base and one at the apex, all quite ready
to be popped into the pans of dilatory housewives. She also had bundles
duly stringed in readiness for the soup-pot—four leeks, three carrots,
a parsnip, two turnips, and a couple of springs of celery. Then there
were finely cut vegetables for julienne soup laid out on squares of
paper, cabbages cut into quarters, and little heaps of tomatoes and
slices of pumpkin which gleamed like red stars and golden crescents
amidst the pale hues of the other vegetables. Cadine evinced much more
dexterity than Marjolin, although she was younger. The peelings of the
potatoes she pared were so thin that you could see through them; she
tied up the bundles for the soup-pot so artistically that they looked
like bouquets; and she had a way of making the little heaps she set up,
though they contained but three carrots or turnips, look like very big
ones. The passers-by would stop and smile when she called out in her
shrill childish voice: “Madame! madame! come and try me! Each little
pile for two sous.”

She had her regular customers, and her little piles and bundles were
widely known. Old Mother Chantemesse, seated between the two children,
would indulge in a silent laugh which made her bosom rise almost to her
chin, at seeing them working away so seriously. She paid them their
daily sous most faithfully. But they soon began to weary of the little
heaps and bundles; they were growing up, and began to dream of some
more lucrative business. Marjolin remained very childish for his years,
and this irritated Cadine. He had no more brains than a cabbage, she
often said. And it was, indeed, quite useless for her to devise any
plan for him to make money; he never earned any. He could not even do
an errand satisfactorily. The girl, on the other hand, was very shrewd.
When but eight years old she obtained employment from one of those
women who sit on a bench in the neighbourhood of the markets provided
with a basket of lemons, and employ a troop of children to go about
selling them. Carrying the lemons in her hands and offering them at two
for three sous, Cadine thrust them under every woman’s nose, and ran
after every passer-by. Her hands empty, she hastened back for a fresh
supply. She was paid two sous for every dozen lemons that she sold, and
on good days she could earn some five or six sous. During the following
year she hawked caps at nine sous apiece, which proved a more
profitable business; only she had to keep a sharp look-out, as street
trading of this kind is forbidden unless one be licensed. However, she
scented a policeman at a distance of a hundred yards; and the caps
forthwith disappeared under her skirts, whilst she began to munch an
apple with an air of guileless innocence. Then she took to selling
pastry, cakes, cherry-tarts, gingerbread, and thick yellow maize
biscuits on wicker trays. Marjolin, however, ate up nearly the whole of
her stock-in-trade. At last, when she was eleven years old, she
succeeded in realising a grand idea which had long been worrying her.
In a couple of months she put by four francs, bought a small
_hotte_,[*] and then set up as a dealer in birds’ food.

[*] A basket carried on the back.—Translator.


It was a big affair. She got up early in the morning and purchased her
stock of groundsel, millet, and bird-cake from the wholesale dealers.
Then she set out on her day’s work, crossing the river, and
perambulating the Latin Quarter from the Rue Saint Jacques to the Rue
Dauphine, and even to the Luxembourg. Marjolin used to accompany her,
but she would not let him carry the basket. He was only fit to call
out, she said; and so, in his thick, drawling voice, he would raise the
cry, “Chickweed for the little birds!”

Then Cadine herself, with her flute-like voice, would start on a
strange scale of notes ending in a clear, protracted alto, “Chickweed
for the little birds!”

They each took one side of the road, and looked up in the air as they
walked along. In those days Marjolin wore a big scarlet waistcoat which
hung down to his knees; it had belonged to the defunct Monsieur
Chantemesse, who had been a cab-driver. Cadine for her part wore a
white and blue check gown, made out of an old tartan of Madame
Chantemesse’s. All the canaries in the garrets of the Latin Quarter
knew them; and, as they passed along, repeating their cry, each echoing
the other’s voice, every cage poured out a song.

Cadine sold water-cress, too. “Two sous a bunch! Two sous a bunch!” And
Marjolin went into the shops to offer it for sale. “Fine water-cress!
Health for the body! Fine fresh water-cress!”

However, the new central markets had just been erected, and the girl
would stand gazing in ecstacy at the avenue of flower stalls which runs
through the fruit pavilion. Here on either hand, from end to end, big
clumps of flowers bloom as in the borders of a garden walk. It is a
perfect harvest, sweet with perfume, a double hedge of blossoms,
between which the girls of the neighbourhood love to walk, smiling the
while, though almost stifled by the heavy perfume. And on the top tiers
of the stalls are artificial flowers, with paper leaves, in which
dewdrops are simulated by drops of gum; and memorial wreaths of black
and white beads rippling with bluish reflections. Cadine’s rosy
nostrils would dilate with feline sensuality; she would linger as long
as possible in that sweet freshness, and carry as much of the perfume
away with her as she could. When her hair bobbed under Marjolin’s nose
he would remark that it smelt of pinks. She said that she had given
over using pomatum; that is was quite sufficient for her to stroll
through the flower walk in order to scent her hair. Next she began to
intrigue and scheme with such success that she was engaged by one of
the stallkeepers. And then Marjolin declared that she smelt sweet from
head to foot. She lived in the midst of roses, lilacs, wall-flowers,
and lilies of the valley; and Marjolin would playfully smell at her
skirts, feign a momentary hesitation, and then exclaim, “Ah, that’s
lily of the valley!” Next he would sniff at her waist and bodice: “Ah,
that’s wall-flowers!” And at her sleeves and wrists: “Ah, that’s
lilac!” And at her neck, and her cheeks and lips: “Ah, but that’s
roses!” he would cry. Cadine used to laugh at him, and call him a
“silly stupid,” and tell him to get away, because he was tickling her
with the tip of his nose. As she spoke her breath smelt of jasmine. She
was verily a bouquet, full of warmth and life.

She now got up at four o’clock every morning to assist her mistress in
her purchases. Each day they bought armfuls of flowers from the
suburban florists, with bundles of moss, and bundles of fern fronds,
and periwinkle leaves to garnish the bouquets. Cadine would gaze with
amazement at the diamonds and Valenciennes worn by the daughters of the
great gardeners of Montreuil, who came to the markets amidst their
roses.

On the saints’ days of popular observance, such as Saint Mary’s, Saint
Peter’s, and Saint Joseph’s days, the sale of flowers began at two
o’clock. More than a hundred thousand francs’ worth of cut flowers
would be sold on the footways, and some of the retail dealers would
make as much as two hundred francs in a few hours. On days like those
only Cadine’s curly locks peered over the mounds of pansies,
mignonette, and marguerites. She was quite drowned and lost in the
flood of flowers. Then she would spend all her time in mounting
bouquets on bits of rush. In a few weeks she acquired considerable
skillfulness in her business, and manifested no little originality. Her
bouquets did not always please everybody, however. Sometimes they made
one smile, sometimes they alarmed the eyes. Red predominated in them,
mottled with violent tints of blue, yellow, and violet of a barbaric
charm. On the mornings when she pinched Marjolin, and teased him till
she made him cry, she made up fierce-looking bouquets, suggestive of
her own bad temper, bouquets with strong rough scents and glaring
irritating colours. On other days, however, when she was softened by
some thrill of joy or sorrow, her bouquets would assume a tone of
silvery grey, very soft and subdued, and delicately perfumed.

Then, too, she would set roses, as sanguineous as open hearts, in lakes
of snow-white pinks; arrange bunches of tawny iris that shot up in
tufts of flame from foliage that seemed scared by the brilliance of the
flowers; work elaborate designs, as complicated as those of Smyrna
rugs, adding flower to flower, as on a canvas; and prepare rippling
fanlike bouquets spreading out with all the delicacy of lace. Here was
a cluster of flowers of delicious purity, there a fat nosegay, whatever
one might dream of for the hand of a marchioness or a fish-wife; all
the charming quaint fancies, in short, which the brain of a
sharp-witted child of twelve, budding into womanhood, could devise.

There were only two flowers for which Cadine retained respect; white
lilac, which by the bundle of eight or ten sprays cost from fifteen to
twenty francs in the winter time; and camellias, which were still more
costly, and arrived in boxes of a dozen, lying on beds of moss, and
covered with cotton wool. She handled these as delicately as though
they were jewels, holding her breath for fear of dimming their lustre,
and fastening their short stems to springs of cane with the tenderest
care. She spoke of them with serious reverence. She told Marjolin one
day that a speckless white camellia was a very rare and exceptionally
lovely thing, and, as she was making him admire one, he exclaimed:
“Yes; it’s pretty; but I prefer your neck, you know. It’s much more
soft and transparent than the camellia, and there are some little blue
and pink veins just like the pencillings on a flower.” Then, drawing
near and sniffing, he murmured: “Ah! you smell of orange blossom
to-day.”

Cadine was self-willed, and did not get on well in the position of a
servant, so she ended by setting up in business on her own account. As
she was only thirteen at the time, and could not hope for a big trade
and a stall in the flower avenue, she took to selling one-sou bunches
of violets pricked into a bed of moss in an osier tray which she
carried hanging from her neck. All day long she wandered about the
markets and their precincts with her little bit of hanging garden. She
loved this continual stroll, which relieved the numbness of her limbs
after long hours spent, with bent knees, on a low chair, making
bouquets. She fastened her violets together with marvellous deftness as
she walked along. She counted out six or eight flowers, according to
the season, doubled a sprig of cane in half, added a leaf, twisted some
damp thread round the whole, and broke off the thread with her strong
young teeth. The little bunches seemed to spring spontaneously from the
layer of moss, so rapidly did she stick them into it.

Along the footways, amidst the jostling of the street traffic, her
nimble fingers were ever flowering though she gave them not a glance,
but boldly scanned the shops and passers-by. Sometimes she would rest
in a doorway for a moment; and alongside the gutters, greasy with
kitchen slops, she sat, as it were a patch of springtime, a suggestion
of green woods, and purple blossoms. Her flowers still betokened her
frame of mind, her fits of bad temper and her thrills of tenderness.
Sometimes they bristled and glowered with anger amidst their crumpled
leaves; at other times they spoke only of love and peacefulness as they
smiled in their prim collars. As Cadine passed along, she left a sweet
perfume behind her; Marjolin followed her devoutly. From head to foot
she now exhaled but one scent, and the lad repeated that she was
herself a violet, a great big violet.

“Do you remember the day when we went to Romainville together?” he
would say; “Romainville, where there are so many violets. The scent was
just the same. Oh! don’t change again—you smell too sweetly.”

And she did not change again. This was her last trade. Still, she often
neglected her osier tray to go rambling about the neighbourhood. The
building of the central markets—as yet incomplete—provided both
children with endless opportunities for amusement. They made their way
into the midst of the work-yards through some gap or other between the
planks; they descended into the foundations, and climbed up to the
cast-iron pillars. Every nook, every piece of the framework witnessed
their games and quarrels; the pavilions grew up under the touch of
their little hands. From all this arose the affection which they felt
for the great markets, and which the latter seemed to return. They were
on familiar terms with that gigantic pile, old friends as they were,
who had seen each pin and bolt put into place. They felt no fear of the
huge monster; but slapped it with their childish hands, treated it like
a good friend, a chum whose presence brought no constraint. And the
markets seemed to smile at these two light-hearted children, whose love
was the song, the idyll of their immensity.

Cadine alone now slept at Mother Chantemesse’s. The old woman had
packed Marjolin off to a neighbour’s. This made the two children very
unhappy. Still, they contrived to spend much of their time together. In
the daytime they would hide themselves away in the warehouses of the
Rue au Lard, behind piles of apples and cases of oranges; and in the
evening they would dive into the cellars beneath the poultry market,
and secret themselves among the huge hampers of feathers which stood
near the blocks where the poultry was killed. They were quite alone
there, amidst the strong smell of the poultry, and with never a sound
but the sudden crowing of some rooster to break upon their babble and
their laughter. The feathers amidst which they found themselves were of
all sorts—turkey’s feathers, long and black; goose quills, white and
flexible; the downy plumage of ducks, soft like cotton wool; and the
ruddy and mottled feathers of fowls, which at the faintest breath flew
up in a cloud like a swarm of flies buzzing in the sun. And then in
wintertime there was the purple plumage of the pheasants, the ashen
grey of the larks, the splotched silk of the partridges, quails, and
thrushes. And all these feathers freshly plucked were still warm and
odoriferous, seemingly endowed with life. The spot was as cosy as a
nest; at times a quiver as of flapping wings sped by, and Marjolin and
Cadine, nestling amidst all the plumage, often imagined that they were
being carried aloft by one of those huge birds with outspread pinions
that one hears of in the fairy tales.

As time went on their childish affection took the inevitable turn.
Veritable offsprings of Nature, knowing naught of social conventions
and restraints, they loved one another in all innocence and
guilelessness. They mated even as the birds of the air mate, even as
youth and maid mated in primeval times, because such is Nature’s law.
At sixteen Cadine was a dusky town gipsy, greedy and sensual, whilst
Marjolin, now eighteen, was a tall, strapping fellow, as handsome a
youth as could be met, but still with his mental faculties quite
undeveloped. He had lived, indeed, a mere animal life, which had
strengthened his frame, but left his intellect in a rudimentary state.

When old Madame Chantemesse realised the turn that things were taking
she wrathfully upbraided Cadine and struck out vigorously at her with
her broom. But the hussy only laughed and dodged the blows, and then
hied off to her lover. And gradually the markets became their home,
their manger, their aviary, where they lived and loved amidst the meat,
the butter, the vegetables, and the feathers.

They discovered another little paradise in the pavilion where butter,
eggs, and cheese were sold wholesale. Enormous walls of empty baskets
were here piled up every morning, and amidst these Cadine and Marjolin
burrowed and hollowed out a dark lair for themselves. A mere partition
of osier-work separated them from the market crowd, whose loud voices
rang out all around them. They often shook with laughter when people,
without the least suspicion of their presence, stopped to talk together
a few yards away from them. On these occasions they would contrive
peepholes, and spy through them, and when cherries were in season
Cadine tossed the stones in the faces of all the old women who passed
along—a pastime which amused them the more as the startled old crones
could never make out whence the hail of cherry-stones had come. They
also prowled about the depths of the cellars, knowing every gloomy
corner of them, and contriving to get through the most carefully locked
gates. One of their favourite amusements was to visit the track of the
subterranean railway, which had been laid under the markets, and which
those who planned the latter had intended to connect with the different
goods’ stations of Paris. Sections of this railway were laid beneath
each of the covered ways, between the cellars of each pavilion; the
work, indeed, was in such an advanced state that turn-tables had been
put into position at all the points of intersection, and were in
readiness for use. After much examination, Cadine and Marjolin had at
last succeeded in discovering a loose plank in the hoarding which
enclosed the track, and they had managed to convert it into a door, by
which they could easily gain access to the line. There they were quite
shut off from the world, though they could hear the continuous rumbling
of the street traffic over their heads.

The line stretched through deserted vaults, here and there illumined by
a glimmer of light filtering through iron gratings, while in certain
dark corners gas jets were burning. And Cadine and Marjolin rambled
about as in the secret recesses of some castle of their own, secure
from all interruption, and rejoicing in the buzzy silence, the murky
glimmer, and subterranean secrecy, which imparted a touch of melodrama
to their experiences. All sorts of smells were wafted through the
hoarding from the neighbouring cellars; the musty smell of vegetables,
the pungency of fish, the overpowering stench of cheese, and the warm
reek of poultry.

At other times, on clear nights and fine dawns, they would climb on to
the roofs, ascending thither by the steep staircases of the turrets at
the angles of the pavilions. Up above they found fields of leads,
endless promenades and squares, a stretch of undulating country which
belonged to them. They rambled round the square roofs of the pavilions,
followed the course of the long roofs of the covered ways, climbed and
descended the slopes, and lost themselves in endless perambulations of
discovery. And when they grew tired of the lower levels they ascended
still higher, venturing up the iron ladders, on which Cadine’s skirts
flapped like flags. Then they ran along the second tier of roofs
beneath the open heavens. There was nothing save the stars above them.
All sorts of sounds rose up from the echoing markets, a clattering and
rumbling, a vague roar as of a distant tempest heard at nighttime. At
that height the morning breeze swept away the evil smells, the foul
breath of the awaking markets. They would kiss one another on the edge
of the gutterings like sparrows frisking on the house-tops. The rising
fires of the sun illumined their faces with a ruddy glow. Cadine
laughed with pleasure at being so high up in the air, and her neck
shone with iridescent tints like a dove’s; while Marjolin bent down to
look at the street still wrapped in gloom, with his hands clutching
hold of the leads like the feet of a wood-pigeon. When they descended
to earth again, joyful from their excursion in the fresh air, they
would remark to one another that they were coming back from the
country.

It was in the tripe market that they had made the acquaintance of
Claude Lantier. They went there every day, impelled thereto by an
animal taste for blood, the cruel instinct of urchins who find
amusement in the sight of severed heads. A ruddy stream flowed along
the gutters round the pavilion; they dipped the tips of their shoes in
it, and dammed it up with leaves, so as to form large pools of blood.
They took a strong interest in the arrival of the loads of offal in
carts which always smelt offensively, despite all the drenchings of
water they got; they watched the unloading of the bundles of sheep’s
trotters, which were piled up on the ground like filthy paving-stones,
of the huge stiffened tongues, bleeding at their torn roots, and of the
massive bell-shaped bullocks’ hearts. But the spectacle which, above
all others, made them quiver with delight was that of the big dripping
hampers, full of sheep’s heads, with greasy horns and black muzzles,
and strips of woolly skin dangling from bleeding flesh. The sight of
these conjured up in their minds the idea of some guillotine casting
into the baskets the heads of countless victims.

They followed the baskets into the depths of the cellar, watching them
glide down the rails laid over the steps, and listening to the rasping
noise which the casters of these osier waggons made in their descent.
Down below there was a scene of exquisite horror. They entered into a
charnel-house atmosphere, and walked along through murky puddles,
amidst which every now and then purple eyes seem to be glistening. At
times the soles of their boots stuck to the ground, at others they
splashed through the horrible mire, anxious and yet delighted. The gas
jets burned low, like blinking, bloodshot eyes. Near the water-taps, in
the pale light falling through the gratings, they came upon the blocks;
and there they remained in rapture watching the tripe men, who, in
aprons stiffened by gory splashings, broke the sheep’s heads one after
another with a blow of their mallets. They lingered there for hours,
waiting till all the baskets were empty, fascinated by the crackling of
the bones, unable to tear themselves away till all was over. Sometimes
an attendant passed behind them, cleansing the cellar with a hose;
floods of water rushed out with a sluice-like roar, but although the
violence of the discharge actually ate away the surface of the
flagstones, it was powerless to remove the ruddy stains and stench of
blood.

Cadine and Marjolin were sure of meeting Claude between four and five
in the afternoon at the wholesale auction of the bullocks’ lights. He
was always there amidst the tripe dealers’ carts backed up against the
kerb-stones and the blue-bloused, white-aproned men who jostled him and
deafened his ears by their loud bids. But he never felt their elbows;
he stood in a sort of ecstatic trance before the huge hanging lights,
and often told Cadine and Marjolin that there was no finer sight to be
seen. The lights were of a soft rosy hue, gradually deepening and
turning at the lower edges to a rich carmine; and Claude compared them
to watered satin, finding no other term to describe the soft silkiness
of those flowing lengths of flesh which drooped in broad folds like
ballet dancers’ skirts. He thought, too, of gauze and lace allowing a
glimpse of pinky skin; and when a ray of sunshine fell upon the lights
and girdled them with gold an expression of languorous rapture came
into his eyes, and he felt happier than if he had been privileged to
contemplate the Greek goddesses in their sovereign nudity, or the
chatelaines of romance in their brocaded robes.

The artist became a great friend of the two young scapegraces. He loved
beautiful animals, and such undoubtedly they were. For a long time he
dreamt of a colossal picture which should represent the loves of Cadine
and Marjolin in the central markets, amidst the vegetables, the fish,
and the meat. He would have depicted them seated on some couch of food,
their arms circling each other’s waists, and their lips exchanging an
idyllic kiss. In this conception he saw a manifesto proclaiming the
positivism of art—modern art, experimental and materialistic. And it
seemed to him also that it would be a smart satire on the school which
wishes every painting to embody an “idea,” a slap for the old
traditions and all they represented. But during a couple of years he
began study after study without succeeding in giving the particular
“note” he desired. In this way he spoilt fifteen canvases. His failure
filled him with rancour; however, he continued to associate with his
two models from a sort of hopeless love for his abortive picture. When
he met them prowling about in the afternoon, he often scoured the
neighbourhood with them, strolling around with his hands in his
pockets, and deeply interested in the life of the streets.

They all three trudged along together, dragging their heels over the
footways and monopolising their whole breadth so as to force others to
step down into the road. With their noses in the air they sniffed in
the odours of Paris, and could have recognised every corner blindfold
by the spirituous emanations of the wine shops, the hot puffs that came
from the bakehouses and confectioners’, and the musty odours wafted
from the fruiterers’. They would make the circuit of the whole
district. They delighted in passing through the rotunda of the corn
market, that huge massive stone cage where sacks of flour were piled up
on every side, and where their footsteps echoed in the silence of the
resonant roof. They were fond, too, of the little narrow streets in the
neighbourhood, which had become as deserted, as black, and as mournful
as though they formed part of an abandoned city. These were the Rue
Babille, the Rue Sauval, the Rue des Deux Ecus, and the Rue de Viarmes,
this last pallid from its proximity to the millers’ stores, and at four
o’clock lively by reason of the corn exchange held there. It was
generally at this point that they started on their round. They made
their way slowly along the Rue Vauvilliers, glancing as they went at
the windows of the low eating-houses, and thus reaching the miserably
narrow Rue des Prouvaires, where Claude blinked his eyes as he saw one
of the covered ways of the market, at the far end of which, framed
round by this huge iron nave, appeared a side entrance of St. Eustache
with its rose and its tiers of arched windows. And then, with an air of
defiance, he would remark that all the middle ages and the Renaissance
put together were less mighty than the central markets. Afterwards, as
they paced the broad new streets, the Rue du Pont Neuf and the Rue des
Halles, he explained modern life with its wide footways, its lofty
houses, and its luxurious shops, to the two urchins. He predicted, too,
the advent of new and truly original art, whose approach he could
divine, and despair filled him that its revelation should seemingly be
beyond his own powers.

Cadine and Marjolin, however, preferred the provincial quietness of the
Rue des Bourdonnais, where one can play at marbles without fear of
being run over. The girl perked her head affectedly as she passed the
wholesale glove and hosiery stores, at each door of which bareheaded
assistants, with their pens stuck in their ears, stood watching her
with a weary gaze. And she and her lover had yet a stronger preference
for such bits of olden Paris as still existed: the Rue de la Poterie
and the Rue de la Lingerie, with their butter and egg and cheese
dealers; the Rue de la Ferronerie and the Rue de l’Aiguillerie (the
beautiful streets of far-away times), with their dark narrow shops; and
especially the Rue Courtalon, a dank, dirty by-way running from the
Place Sainte Opportune to the Rue Saint Denis, and intersected by
foul-smelling alleys where they had romped in their younger days. In
the Rue Saint Denis they entered into the land of dainties; and they
smiled upon the dried apples, the “Spanishwood,” the prunes, and the
sugar-candy in the windows of the grocers and druggists. Their
ramblings always set them dreaming of a feast of good things, and
inspired them with a desire to glut themselves on the contents of the
windows. To them the district seemed like some huge table, always laid
with an everlasting dessert into which they longed to plunge their
fingers.

They devoted but a moment to visiting the other blocks of tumble-down
old houses, the Rue Pirouette, the Rue de Mondetour, the Rue de la
Petite Truanderie, and the Rue de la Grande Truanderie, for they took
little interest in the shops of the dealers in edible snails, cooked
vegetables, tripe, and drink. In the Rue de la Grand Truanderie,
however, there was a soap factory, an oasis of sweetness in the midst
of all the foul odours, and Marjolin was fond of standing outside it
till some one happened to enter or come out, so that the perfume which
swept through the doorway might blow full in his face. Then with all
speed they returned to the Rue Pierre Lescot and the Rue Rambuteau.
Cadine was extremely fond of salted provisions; she stood in admiration
before the bundles of red-herrings, the barrels of anchovies and
capers, and the little casks of gherkins and olives, standing on end
with wooden spoons inside them. The smell of the vinegar titillated her
throat; the pungent odour of the rolled cod, smoked salmon, bacon and
ham, and the sharp acidity of the baskets of lemons, made her mouth
water longingly. She was also fond of feasting her eyes on the boxes of
sardines piled up in metallic columns amidst the cases and sacks. In
the Rue Montorgueil and the Rue Montmartre were other tempting-looking
groceries and restaurants, from whose basements appetising odours were
wafted, with glorious shows of game and poultry, and
preserved-provision shops, which last displayed beside their doors open
kegs overflowing with yellow sour-krout suggestive of old lacework.
Then they lingered in the Rue Coquillière, inhaling the odour of
truffles from the premises of a notable dealer in comestibles, which
threw so strong a perfume into the street that Cadine and Marjolin
closed their eyes and imagined they were swallowing all kinds of
delicious things. These perfumes, however, distressed Claude. They made
him realise the emptiness of his stomach, he said; and, leaving the
“two animals” to feast on the odour of the truffles—the most
penetrating odour to be found in all the neighbourhood—he went off
again to the corn market by way of the Rue Oblin, studying on his road
the old women who sold green-stuff in the doorways and the displays of
cheap pottery spread out on the foot-pavements.

Such were their rambles in common; but when Cadine set out alone with
her bunches of violets she often went farther afield, making it a point
to visit certain shops for which she had a particular partiality. She
had an especial weakness for the Taboureau bakery establishment, one of
the windows of which was exclusively devoted to pastry. She would
follow the Rue Turbigo and retrace her steps a dozen times in order to
pass again and again before the almond cakes, the _savarins_, the St.
Honoré tarts, the fruit tarts, and the various dishes containing
bunlike _babas_ redolent of rum, eclairs combining the finger biscuit
with chocolate, and _choux a la crème_, little rounds of pastry
overflowing with whipped white of egg. The glass jars full of dry
biscuits, macaroons, and _madeleines_ also made her mouth water; and
the bright shop with its big mirrors, its marble slabs, its gilding,
its bread-bins of ornamental ironwork, and its second window in which
long glistening loaves were displayed slantwise, with one end resting
on a crystal shelf whilst above they were upheld by a brass rod, was so
warm and odoriferous of baked dough that her features expanded with
pleasure when, yielding to temptation, she went in to buy a _brioche_
for two sous.

Another shop, one in front of the Square des Innocents, also filled her
with gluttonous inquisitiveness, a fever of longing desire. This shop
made a specialty of forcemeat pasties. In addition to the ordinary ones
there were pasties of pike and pasties of truffled _foie gras_; and the
girl would gaze yearningly at them, saying to herself that she would
really have to eat one some day.

Cadine also had her moments of vanity and coquetry. When these fits
were on her, she bought herself in imagination some of the magnificent
dresses displayed in the windows of the “Fabriques de France” which
made the Pointe Saint Eustache gaudy with their pieces of bright stuff
hanging from the first floor to the footway and flapping in the breeze.
Somewhat incommoded by the flat basket hanging before her, amidst the
crowd of market women in dirty aprons gazing at future Sunday dresses,
the girl would feel the woollens, flannels, and cottons to test the
texture and suppleness of the material; and she would promise herself a
gown of bright-coloured flannelling, flowered print, or scarlet poplin.
Sometimes even from amongst the pieces draped and set off to advantage
by the window-dressers she would choose some soft sky-blue or
apple-green silk, and dream of wearing it with pink ribbons. In the
evenings she would dazzle herself with the displays in the windows of
the big jewellers in the Rue Montmartre. That terrible street deafened
her with its ceaseless flow of vehicles, and the streaming crowd never
ceased to jostle her; still she did not stir, but remained feasting her
eyes on the blazing splendour set out in the light of the reflecting
lamps which hung outside the windows. On one side all was white with
the bright glitter of silver: watches in rows, chains hanging, spoons
and forks laid crossways, cups, snuff-boxes, napkin-rings, and combs
arranged on shelves. The silver thimbles, dotting a porcelain stand
covered with a glass shade, had an especial attraction for her. Then on
the other side the windows glistened with the tawny glow of gold. A
cascade of long pendant chains descended from above, rippling with
ruddy gleams; small ladies’ watches, with the backs of their cases
displayed, sparkled like fallen stars; wedding rings clustered round
slender rods; bracelets, broaches, and other costly ornaments glittered
on the black velvet linings of their cases; jewelled rings set their
stands aglow with blue, green, yellow, and violet flamelets; while on
every tier of the shelves superposed rows of earrings and crosses and
lockets hung against the crystal like the rich fringes of altar-cloths.
The glow of this gold illumined the street half way across with a
sun-like radiance. And Cadine, as she gazed at it, almost fancied that
she was in presence of something holy, or on the threshold of the
Emperor’s treasure chamber. She would for a long time scrutinise all
this show of gaudy jewellery, adapted to the taste of the fish-wives,
and carefully read the large figures on the tickets affixed to each
article; and eventually she would select for herself a pair of
earrings—pear-shaped drops of imitation coral hanging from golden
roses.

One morning Claude caught her standing in ecstasy before a
hair-dresser’s window in the Rue Saint Honoré. She was gazing at the
display of hair with an expression of intense envy. High up in the
window was a streaming cascade of long manes, soft wisps, loose
tresses, frizzy falls, undulating comb-curls, a perfect cataract of
silky and bristling hair, real and artificial, now in coils of a
flaming red, now in thick black crops, now in pale golden locks, and
even in snowy white ones for the coquette of sixty. In cardboard boxes
down below were cleverly arranged fringes, curling side-ringlets, and
carefully combed chignons glossy with pomade. And amidst this
framework, in a sort of shrine beneath the ravelled ends of the hanging
locks, there revolved the bust of a woman, arrayed in a wrapper of
cherry-coloured satin fastened between the breasts with a brass brooch.
The figure wore a lofty bridal coiffure picked out with sprigs of
orange blossom, and smiled with a dollish smile. Its eyes were pale
blue; its eyebrows were very stiff and of exaggerated length; and its
waxen cheeks and shoulders bore evident traces of the heat and smoke of
the gas. Cadine waited till the revolving figure again displayed its
smiling face, and as its profile showed more distinctly and it slowly
went round from left to right she felt perfectly happy. Claude,
however, was indignant, and, shaking Cadine, he asked her what she was
doing in front of “that abomination, that corpse-like hussy picked up
at the Morgue!” He flew into a temper with the “dummy’s” cadaverous
face and shoulders, that disfigurement of the beautiful, and remarked
that artists painted nothing but that unreal type of woman nowadays.
Cadine, however, remained unconvinced by his oratory, and considered
the lady extremely beautiful. Then, resisting the attempts of the
artist to drag her away by the arm, and scratching her black mop in
vexation, she pointed to an enormous ruddy tail, severed from the
quarters of some vigorous mare, and told him she would have liked to
have a crop of hair like that.

During the long rambles when Claude, Cadine, and Marjolin prowled about
the neighbourhood of the markets, they saw the iron ribs of the giant
building at the end of every street. Wherever they turned they caught
sudden glimpses of it; the horizon was always bounded by it; merely the
aspect under which it was seen varied. Claude was perpetually turning
round, and particularly in the Rue Montmartre, after passing the
church. From that point the markets, seen obliquely in the distance,
filled him with enthusiasm. A huge arcade, a giant, gaping gateway, was
open before him; then came the crowding pavilions with their lower and
upper roofs, their countless Venetian shutters and endless blinds, a
vision, as it were, of superposed houses and palaces; a Babylon of
metal of Hindoo delicacy of workmanship, intersected by hanging
terraces, aerial galleries, and flying bridges poised over space. The
trio always returned to this city round which they strolled, unable to
stray more than a hundred yards away. They came back to it during the
hot afternoons when the Venetian shutters were closed and the blinds
lowered. In the covered ways all seemed to be asleep, the ashy greyness
was streaked by yellow bars of sunlight falling through the high
windows. Only a subdued murmur broke the silence; the steps of a few
hurrying passers-by resounded on the footways; whilst the badge-wearing
porters sat in rows on the stone ledges at the corners of the
pavilions, taking off their boots and nursing their aching feet. The
quietude was that of a colossus at rest, interrupted at times by some
cock-crow rising from the cellars below.

Claude, Cadine, and Marjolin then often went to see the empty hampers
piled upon the drays, which came to fetch them every afternoon so that
they might be sent back to the consignors. There were mountains of
them, labelled with black letters and figures, in front of the
salesmen’s warehouses in the Rue Berger. The porters arranged them
symmetrically, tier by tier, on the vehicles. When the pile rose,
however, to the height of a first floor, the porter who stood below
balancing the next batch of hampers had to make a spring in order to
toss them up to his mate, who was perched aloft with arms extended.
Claude, who delighted in feats of strength and dexterity, would stand
for hours watching the flight of these masses of osier, and would burst
into a hearty laugh whenever too vigorous a toss sent them flying over
the pile into the roadway beyond. He was fond, too, of the footways of
the Rue Rambuteau and the Rue du Pont Neuf, near the fruit market,
where the retail dealers congregated. The sight of the vegetables
displayed in the open air, on trestle-tables covered with damp black
rags, was full of charm for him. At four in the afternoon the whole of
this nook of greenery was aglow with sunshine; and Claude wandered
between the stalls, inspecting the bright-coloured heads of the
saleswomen with keen artistic relish. The younger ones, with their hair
in nets, had already lost all freshness of complexion through the rough
life they led; while the older ones were bent and shrivelled, with
wrinkled, flaring faces showing under the yellow kerchiefs bound round
their heads. Cadine and Marjolin refused to accompany him hither, as
they could perceive old Mother Chantemesse shaking her fist at them, in
her anger at seeing them prowling about together. He joined them again,
however, on the opposite footway, where he found a splendid subject for
a picture in the stallkeepers squatting under their huge umbrellas of
faded red, blue, and violet, which, mounted upon poles, filled the
whole market-side with bumps, and showed conspicuously against the
fiery glow of the sinking sun, whose rays faded amidst the carrots and
the turnips. One tattered harridan, a century old, was sheltering three
spare-looking lettuces beneath an umbrella of pink silk, shockingly
split and stained.

Cadine and Marjolin had struck up an acquaintance with Leon, Quenu’s
apprentice, one day when he was taking a pie to a house in the
neighbourhood. They saw him cautiously raise the lid of his pan in a
secluded corner of the Rue de Mondetour, and delicately take out a ball
of forcemeat. They smiled at the sight, which gave them a very high
opinion of Leon. And the idea came to Cadine that she might at last
satisfy one of her most ardent longings. Indeed, the very next time
that she met the lad with his basket she made herself very agreeable,
and induced him to offer her a forcemeat ball. But, although she
laughed and licked her fingers, she experienced some disappointment.
The forcemeat did not prove nearly so nice as she had anticipated. On
the other hand, the lad, with his sly, greedy phiz and his white
garments, which made him look like a girl going to her first communion,
somewhat took her fancy.

She invited him to a monster lunch which she gave amongst the hampers
in the auction room at the butter market. The three of them—herself,
Marjolin, and Leon—completely secluded themselves from the world within
four walls of osier. The feast was laid out on a large flat basket.
There were pears, nuts, cream-cheese, shrimps, fried potatoes, and
radishes. The cheese came from a fruiterer’s in the Rue de la
Cossonnerie, and was a present; and a “frier” of the Rue de la Grande
Truanderie had given Cadine credit for two sous’ worth of potatoes. The
rest of the feast, the pears, the nuts, the shrimps, and the radishes,
had been pilfered from different parts of the market. It was a
delicious treat; and Leon, desirous of returning the hospitality, gave
a supper in his bedroom at one o’clock in the morning. The bill of fare
included cold black-pudding, slices of polony, a piece of salt pork,
some gherkins, and some goose-fat. The Quenu-Gradelles’ shop had
provided everything. And matters did not stop there. Dainty suppers
alternated with delicate luncheons, and invitation upon invitation.
Three times a week there were banquets, either amidst the hampers or in
Leon’s garret, where Florent, on the nights when he lay awake, could
hear a stifled sound of munching and rippling laughter until day began
to break.

The loves of Cadine and Marjolin now took another turn. The youth
played the gallant, and just as another might entertain his
_innamorata_ at a champagne supper _en tête à tête_ in a private room,
he led Cadine into some quiet corner of the market cellars to munch
apples or sprigs of celery. One day he stole a red-herring, which they
devoured with immense enjoyment on the roof of the fish market beside
the guttering. There was not a single shady nook in the whole place
where they did not indulge in secret feasts. The district, with its
rows of open shops full of fruit and cakes and preserves, was no longer
a closed paradise, in front of which they prowled with greedy, covetous
appetites. As they passed the shops they now extended their hands and
pilfered a prune, a few cherries, or a bit of cod. They also
provisioned themselves at the markets, keeping a sharp look-out as they
made their way between the stalls, picking up everything that fell, and
often assisting the fall by a push of their shoulders.

In spite, however, of all the marauding, some terrible scores had to be
run up with the “frier” of the Rue de la Grand Truanderie. This
“frier,” whose shanty leaned against a tumble-down house, and was
propped up by heavy joists, green with moss, made a display of boiled
mussels lying in large earthenware bowls filled to the brim with clear
water; of dishes of little yellow dabs stiffened by too thick a coating
of paste; of squares of tripe simmering in a pan; and of grilled
herrings, black and charred, and so hard that if you tapped them they
sounded like wood. On certain weeks Cadine owed the frier as much as
twenty sous, a crushing debt, which required the sale of an
incalculable number of bunches of violets, for she could count upon no
assistance from Marjolin. Moreover, she was bound to return Leon’s
hospitalities; and she even felt some little shame at never being able
to offer him a scrap of meat. He himself had now taken to purloining
entire hams. As a rule, he stowed everything away under his shirt; and
at night when he reached his bedroom he drew from his bosom hunks of
polony, slices of _paté de foie gras_, and bundles of pork rind. They
had to do without bread, and there was nothing to drink; but no matter.
One night Marjolin saw Leon kiss Cadine between two mouthfuls; however,
he only laughed. He could have smashed the little fellow with a blow
from his fist, but he felt no jealousy in respect of Cadine. He treated
her simply as a comrade with whom he had chummed for years.

Claude never participated in these feasts. Having caught Cadine one day
stealing a beet-root from a little hamper lined with hay, he had pulled
her ears and given her a sound rating. These thieving propensities made
her perfect as a ne’er-do-well. However, in spite of himself, he could
not help feeling a sort of admiration for these sensual, pilfering,
greedy creatures, who preyed upon everything that lay about, feasting
off the crumbs that fell from the giant’s table.

At last Marjolin nominally took service under Gavard, happy in having
nothing to do except to listen to his master’s flow of talk, while
Cadine still continued to sell violets, quite accustomed by this time
to old Mother Chantemesse’s scoldings. They were still the same
children as ever, giving way to their instincts and appetites without
the slightest shame—they were the growth of the slimy pavements of the
market district, where, even in fine weather, the mud remains black and
sticky. However, as Cadine walked along the footways, mechanically
twisting her bunches of violets, she was sometimes disturbed by
disquieting reveries; and Marjolin, too, suffered from an uneasiness
which he could not explain. He would occasionally leave the girl and
miss some ramble or feast in order to go and gaze at Madame Quenu
through the windows of her pork shop. She was so handsome and plump and
round that it did him good to look at her. As he stood gazing at her,
he felt full and satisfied, as though he had just eaten or drunk
something extremely nice. And when he went off, a sort of hunger and
thirst to see her again suddenly came upon him. This had been going on
for a couple of months. At first he had looked at her with the
respectful glance which he bestowed upon the shop-fronts of the grocers
and provision dealers; but subsequently, when he and Cadine had taken
to general pilfering, he began to regard her smooth cheeks much as he
regarded the barrels of olives and boxes of dried apples.

For some time past Marjolin had seen handsome Lisa every day, in the
morning. She would pass Gavard’s stall, and stop for a moment or two to
chat with the poultry dealer. She now did her marketing herself, so
that she might be cheated as little as possible, she said. The truth,
however, was that she wished to make Gavard speak out. In the pork shop
he was always distrustful, but at his stall he chatted and talked with
the utmost freedom. Now, Lisa had made up her mind to ascertain from
him exactly what took place in the little room at Monsieur Lebigre’s;
for she had no great confidence in her secret police office,
Mademoiselle Saget. In a short time she learnt from the incorrigible
chatterbox a lot of vague details which very much alarmed her. Two days
after her explanation with Quenu she returned home from the market
looking very pale. She beckoned to her husband to follow her into the
dining-room, and having carefully closed the door she said to him: “Is
your brother determined to send us to the scaffold, then? Why did you
conceal from me what you knew?”

Quenu declared that he knew nothing. He even swore a great oath that he
had not returned to Monsieur Lebigre’s, and would never go there again.

“You will do well not to do so,” replied Lisa, shrugging her shoulders,
“unless you want to get yourself into a serious scrape. Florent is up
to some evil trick, I’m certain of it! I have just learned quite
sufficient to show me where he is going. He’s going back to Cayenne, do
you hear?”

Then, after a pause, she continued in calmer ones: “Oh, the unhappy
man! He had everything here that he could wish for. He might have
redeemed his character; he had nothing but good examples before him.
But no, it is in his blood! He will come to a violent end with his
politics! I insist upon there being an end to all this! You hear me,
Quenu? I gave you due warning long ago!”

She spoke the last words very incisively. Quenu bent his head, as if
awaiting sentence.

“To begin with,” continued Lisa, “he shall cease to take his meals
here. It will be quite sufficient if we give him a bed. He is earning
money; let him feed himself.”

Quenu seemed on the point of protesting, but his wife silenced him by
adding energetically:

“Make your choice between him and me. If he remains here, I swear to
you that I will go away, and take my daughter with me. Do you want me
to tell you the whole truth about him? He is a man capable of anything;
he has come here to bring discord into our household. But I will set
things right, you may depend on it. You have your choice between him
and me; you hear me?”

Then, leaving her husband in silent consternation, she returned to the
shop, where she served a customer with her usual affable smile. The
fact was that, having artfully inveigled Gavard into a political
discussion, the poultry dealer had told her that she would soon see how
the land lay, that they were going to make a clean sweep of everything,
and that two determined men like her brother-in-law and himself would
suffice to set the fire blazing. This was the evil trick of which she
had spoken to Quenu, some conspiracy to which Gavard was always making
mysterious allusions with a sniggering grin from which he seemingly
desired a great deal to be inferred. And in imagination Lisa already
saw the gendarmes invading the pork shop, gagging herself, her husband,
and Pauline, and casting them into some underground dungeon.

In the evening, at dinner, she evinced an icy frigidity. She made no
offers to serve Florent, but several times remarked: “It’s very strange
what an amount of bread we’ve got through lately.”

Florent at last understood. He felt that he was being treated like a
poor relation who is gradually turned out of doors. For the last two
months Lisa had dressed him in Quenu’s old trousers and coats; and, as
he was as thin as his brother was fat, these ragged garments had a most
extraordinary appearance upon him. She also turned her oldest linen
over to him: pocket-handkerchiefs which had been darned a score of
times, ragged towels, sheets which were only fit to be cut up into
dusters and dish-cloths, and worn-out shirts, distended by Quenu’s
corpulent figure, and so short that they would have served Florent as
under-vests. Moreover, he no longer found around him the same
good-natured kindliness as in the earlier days. The whole household
seemed to shrug its shoulders after the example set by handsome Lisa.
Auguste and Augustine turned their backs upon him, and little Pauline,
with the cruel frankness of childhood, let fall some bitter remarks
about the stains on his coat and the holes in his shirt. However,
during the last days he suffered most at table. He scarcely dared to
eat, as he saw the mother and daughter fix their gaze upon him whenever
he cut himself a piece of bread. Quenu meantime peered into his plate,
to avoid having to take any part in what went on.

That which most tortured Florent was his inability to invent a reason
for leaving the house. During a week he kept on revolving in his mind a
sentence expressing his resolve to take his meals elsewhere, but could
not bring himself to utter it. Indeed, this man of tender nature lived
in such a world of illusions that he feared he might hurt his brother
and sister-in-law by ceasing to lunch and dine with them. It had taken
him over two months to detect Lisa’s latent hostility; and even now he
was sometimes inclined to think that he must be mistaken, and that she
was in reality kindly disposed towards him. Unselfishness with him
extended to forgetfulness of his requirements; it was no longer a
virtue, but utter indifference to self, an absolute obliteration of
personality. Even when he recognised that he was being gradually turned
out of the house, his mind never for a moment dwelt upon his share in
old Gradelle’s fortune, or upon the accounts which Lisa had offered
him. He had already planned out his expenditure for the future;
reckoning that with what Madame Verlaque still allowed him to retain of
his salary, and the thirty francs a month which a pupil, obtained
through La Normande, paid him he would be able to spend eighteen sous
on his breakfast and twenty-six sous on his dinner. This, he thought,
would be ample. And so, at last, taking as his excuse the lessons which
he was giving his new pupil, he emboldened himself one morning to
pretend that it would be impossible for him in future to come to the
house at mealtimes. He blushed as he gave utterance to this laboriously
constructed lie, which had given him so much trouble, and continued
apologetically:

“You mustn’t be offended; the boy only has those hours free. I can
easily get something to eat, you know; and I will come and have a chat
with you in the evenings.”

Beautiful Lisa maintained her icy reserve, and this increased Florent’s
feeling of trouble. In order to have no cause for self-reproach she had
been unwilling to send him about his business, preferring to wait till
he should weary of the situation and go of his own accord. Now he was
going, and it was a good riddance; and she studiously refrained from
all show of kindliness for fear it might induce him to remain. Quenu,
however, showed some signs of emotion, and exclaimed: “Don’t think of
putting yourself about; take your meals elsewhere by all means, if it
is more convenient. It isn’t we who are turning you way; you’ll at all
events dine with us sometimes on Sundays, eh?”

Florent hurried off. His heart was very heavy. When he had gone, the
beautiful Lisa did not venture to reproach her husband for his weakness
in giving that invitation for Sundays. She had conquered, and again
breathed freely amongst the light oak of her dining-room, where she
would have liked to burn some sugar to drive away the odour of perverse
leanness which seemed to linger about. Moreover, she continued to
remain on the defensive; and at the end of another week she felt more
alarmed than ever. She only occasionally saw Florent in the evenings,
and began to have all sorts of dreadful thoughts, imagining that her
brother-in-law was constructing some infernal machine upstairs in
Augustine’s bedroom, or else making signals which would result in
barricades covering the whole neighbourhood. Gavard, who had become
gloomy, merely nodded or shook his head when she spoke to him, and left
his stall for days together in Marjolin’s charge. The beautiful Lisa,
however, determined that she would get to the bottom of affairs. She
knew that Florent had obtained a day’s leave, and intended to spend it
with Claude Lantier, at Madame Francois’s, at Nanterre. As he would
start in the morning, and remain away till night, she conceived the
idea of inviting Gavard to dinner. He would be sure to talk freely, at
table, she thought. But throughout the morning she was unable to meet
the poultry dealer, and so in the afternoon she went back again to the
markets.

Marjolin was in the stall alone. He used to drowse there for hours,
recouping himself from the fatigue of his long rambles. He generally
sat upon one chair with his legs resting upon another, and his head
leaning against a little dresser. In the wintertime he took a keen
delight in lolling there and contemplating the display of game; the
bucks hanging head downwards, with their fore-legs broken and twisted
round their necks; the larks festooning the stall like garlands; the
big ruddy hares, the mottled partridges, the water-fowl of a
bronze-grey hue, the Russian black cocks and hazel hens, which arrived
in a packing of oat straw and charcoal;[*] and the pheasants, the
magnificent pheasants, with their scarlet hoods, their stomachers of
green satin, their mantles of embossed gold, and their flaming tails,
that trailed like trains of court robes. All this show of plumage
reminded Marjolin of his rambles in the cellars with Cadine amongst the
hampers of feathers.

[*] The baskets in which these are sent to Paris are identical with
those which in many provinces of Russia serve the _moujiks_ as cradles
for their infants.—Translator.


That afternoon the beautiful Lisa found Marjolin in the midst of the
poultry. It was warm, and whiffs of hot air passed along the narrow
alleys of the pavilion. She was obliged to stoop before she could see
him stretched out inside the stall, below the bare flesh of the birds.
From the hooked bar up above hung fat geese, the hooks sticking in the
bleeding wounds of their long stiffened necks, while their huge bodies
bulged out, glowing ruddily beneath their fine down, and, with their
snowy tails and wings, suggesting nudity encompassed by fine linen. And
also hanging from the bar, with ears thrown back and feet parted as
though they were bent on some vigorous leap, were grey rabbits whose
turned-up tails gleamed whitely, whilst their heads, with sharp teeth
and dim eyes, laughed with the grin of death. On the counter of the
stall plucked fowls showed their strained fleshy breasts; pigeons,
crowded on osier trays, displayed the soft bare skin of innocents;
ducks, with skin of rougher texture, exhibited their webbed feet; and
three magnificent turkeys, speckled with blue dots, like freshly-shaven
chins, slumbered on their backs amidst the black fans of their expanded
tails. On plates near by were giblets, livers, gizzards, necks, feet,
and wings; while an oval dish contained a skinned and gutted rabbit,
with its four legs wide apart, its head bleeding, and is kidneys
showing through its gashed belly. A streamlet of dark blood, after
trickling along its back to its tail, had fallen drop by drop, staining
the whiteness of the dish. Marjolin had not even taken the trouble to
wipe the block, near which the rabbit’s feet were still lying. He
reclined there with his eyes half closed, encompassed by other piles of
dead poultry which crowded the shelves of the stall, poultry in paper
wrappers like bouquets, rows upon rows of protuberant breasts and bent
legs showing confusedly. And amidst all this mass of food, the young
fellow’s big, fair figure, the flesh of his cheeks, hands, and powerful
neck covered with ruddy down seemed as soft as that of the magnificent
turkeys, and as plump as the breasts of the fat geese.

When he caught sight of Lisa, he at once sprang up, blushing at having
been caught sprawling in this way. He always seemed very nervous and
ill at ease in Madame Quenu’s presence; and when she asked him if
Monsieur Gavard was there, he stammered out: “No, I don’t think so. He
was here a little while ago, but he want away again.”

Lisa looked at him, smiling; she had a great liking for him. But
feeling something warm brush against her hand, which was hanging by her
side, she raised a little shriek. Some live rabbits were thrusting
their noses out of a box under the counter of the stall, and sniffing
at her skirts.

“Oh,” she exclaimed with a laugh, “it’s your rabbits that are tickling
me.”

Then she stooped and attempted to stroke a white rabbit, which darted
in alarm into a corner of the box.

“Will Monsieur Gavard be back soon, do you think?” she asked, as she
again rose erect.

Marjolin once more replied that he did not know; then in a hesitating
way he continued: “He’s very likely gone down into the cellars. He told
me, I think, that he was going there.”

“Well, I think I’ll wait for him, then,” replied Lisa. “Could you let
him know that I am here? or I might go down to him, perhaps. Yes,
that’s a good idea; I’ve been intending to go and have a look at the
cellars for these last five years. You’ll take me down, won’t you, and
explain things to me?”

Marjolin blushed crimson, and, hurrying out of the stall, walked on in
front of her, leaving the poultry to look after itself. “Of course I
will,” said he. “I’ll do anything you wish, Madame Lisa.”

When they got down below, the beautiful Lisa felt quite suffocated by
the dank atmosphere of the cellar. She stood at the bottom step, and
raised her eyes to look at the vaulted roofing of red and white bricks
arching slightly between the iron ribs upheld by small columns. What
made her hesitate more than the gloominess of the place was a warm,
penetrating odour, the exhalations of large numbers of living
creatures, which irritated her nostrils and throat.

“What a nasty smell!” she exclaimed. “It must be very unhealthy down
here.”

“It never does me any harm,” replied Marjolin in astonishment. “There’s
nothing unpleasant about the smell when you’ve got accustomed to it;
and it’s very warm and cosy down here in the wintertime.”

As Lisa followed him, however, she declared that the strong scent of
the poultry quite turned her stomach, and that she would certainly not
be able to eat a fowl for the next two months. All around her, the
storerooms, the small cabins where the stallkeepers keep their live
stock, formed regular streets, intersecting each other at right angles.
There were only a few scattered gas lights, and the little alleys
seemed wrapped in sleep like the lanes of a village where the
inhabitants have all gone to bed. Marjolin made Lisa feel the
close-meshed wiring, stretched on a framework of cast iron; and as she
made her way along one of the streets she amused herself by reading the
names of the different tenants, which were inscribed on blue labels.

“Monsieur Gavard’s place is quite at the far end,” said the young man,
still walking on.

They turned to the left, and found themselves in a sort of blind alley,
a dark, gloomy spot where not a ray of light penetrated. Gavard was not
there.

“Oh, it makes no difference,” said Marjolin. “I can show you our birds
just the same. I have a key of the storeroom.”

Lisa followed him into the darkness.

“You don’t suppose that I can see your birds in this black oven, do
you?” she asked, laughing.

Marjolin did not reply at once; but presently he stammered out that
there was always a candle in the storeroom. He was fumbling about the
lock, and seemed quite unable to find the keyhole. As Lisa came up to
help him, she felt a hot breath on her neck; and when the young man had
at last succeeded in opening the door and lighted the candle, she saw
that he was trembling.

“You silly fellow!” she exclaimed, “to get yourself into such a state
just because a door won’t open! Why, you’re no better than a girl, in
spite of your big fists!”

She stepped inside the storeroom. Gavard had rented two compartments,
which he had thrown into one by removing the partition between them. In
the dirt on the floor wallowed the larger birds—the geese, turkeys, and
ducks—while up above, on tiers of shelves, were boxes with barred
fronts containing fowls and rabbits. The grating of the storeroom was
so coated with dust and cobwebs that it looked as though covered with
grey blinds. The woodwork down below was rotting, and covered with
filth. Lisa, however, not wishing to vex Marjolin, refrained from any
further expression of disgust. She pushed her fingers between the bars
of the boxes, and began to lament the fate of the unhappy fowls, which
were so closely huddled together and could not even stand upright. Then
she stroked a duck with a broken leg which was squatting in a corner,
and the young man told her that it would be killed that very evening,
for fear lest it should die during the night.

“But what do they do for food?” asked Lisa.

Thereupon he explained to her that poultry would not eat in the dark,
and that it was necessary to light a candle and wait there till they
had finished their meal.

“It amuses me to watch them,” he continued; “I often stay here with a
light for hours altogether. You should see how they peck away; and when
I hide the flame of the candle with my hand they all stand stock-still
with their necks in the air, just as though the sun had set. It is
against the rules to leave a lighted candle here and go away. One of
the dealers, old Mother Palette—you know her, don’t you?—nearly burned
the whole place down the other day. A fowl must have knocked the candle
over into the straw while she was away.”

“A pretty thing, isn’t it,” said Lisa, “for fowls to insist upon having
the chandeliers lighted up every time they take a meal?”

This idea made her laugh. Then she came out of the storeroom, wiping
her feet, and holding up her skirts to keep them from the filth.
Marjolin blew out the candle and locked the door. Lisa felt rather
nervous at finding herself in the dark again with this big young
fellow, and so she hastened on in front.

“I’m glad I came, all the same,” she presently said, as he joined her.
“There is a great deal more under these markets than I ever imagined.
But I must make haste now and get home again. They’ll wonder what has
become of me at the shop. If Monsieur Gavard comes back, tell him that
I want to speak to him immediately.”

“I expect he’s in the killing-room,” said Marjolin. “We’ll go and see,
if you like.”

Lisa made no reply. She felt oppressed by the close atmosphere which
warmed her face. She was quite flushed, and her bodice, generally so
still and lifeless, began to heave. Moreover, the sound of Marjolin’s
hurrying steps behind her filled her with an uneasy feeling. At last
she stepped aside, and let him go on in front. The lanes of this
underground village were still fast asleep. Lisa noticed that her
companion was taking the longest way. When they came out in front of
the railway track he told her that he had wished to show it to her; and
they stood for a moment or two looking through the chinks in the
hoarding of heavy beams. Then Marjolin proposed to take her on to the
line; but she refused, saying that it was not worth while, as she could
see things well enough where she was.

As they returned to the poultry cellars they found old Madame Palette
in front of her storeroom, removing the cords of a large square hamper,
in which a furious fluttering of wings and scraping of feet could be
heard. As she unfastened the last knot the lid suddenly flew open, as
though shot up by a spring, and some big geese thrust out their heads
and necks. Then, in wild alarm, they sprang from their prison and
rushed away, craning their necks, and filling the dark cellars with a
frightful noise of hissing and clattering of beaks. Lisa could not help
laughing, in spite of the lamentations of the old woman, who swore like
a carter as she caught hold of two of the absconding birds and dragged
them back by the neck. Marjolin, meantime, set off in pursuit of a
third. They could hear him running along the narrow alleys, hunting for
the runaway, and delighting in the chase. Then, far off in the
distance, they heard the sounds of a struggle, and presently Marjolin
came back again, bringing the goose with him. Mother Palette, a
sallow-faced old woman, took it in her arms and clasped it for a moment
to her bosom, in the classic attitude of Leda.

“Well, well, I’m sure I don’t know what I should have done if you
hadn’t been here,” said she. “The other day I had a regular fight with
one of the brutes; but I had my knife with me, and I cut its throat.”

Marjolin was quite out of breath. When they reached the stone blocks
where the poultry were killed, and where the gas burnt more brightly,
Lisa could see that he was perspiring, and had bold, glistening eyes.
She thought he looked very handsome like that, with his broad
shoulders, big flushed face, and fair curly hair, and she looked at him
so complacently, with that air of admiration which women feel they may
safely express for quite young lads, that he relapsed into timid
bashfulness again.

“Well, Monsieur Gavard isn’t here, you see,” she said. “You’ve only
made me waste my time.”

Marjolin, however, began rapidly explaining the killing of the poultry
to her. Five huge stone slabs stretched out in the direction of the Rue
Rambuteau under the yellow light of the gas jets. A woman was killing
fowls at one end; and this led him to tell Lisa that the birds were
plucked almost before they were dead, the operation thus being much
easier. Then he wanted her to feel the feathers which were lying in
heaps on the stone slabs; and told her that they were sorted and sold
for as much as nine sous the pound, according to their quality. To
satisfy him, she was also obliged to plunge her hand into the big
hampers full of down. Then he turned the water-taps, of which there was
one by every pillar. There was no end to the particulars he gave. The
blood, he said, streamed along the stone blocks, and collected into
pools on the paved floor, which attendants sluiced with water every two
hours, removing the more recent stains with coarse brushes.

When Lisa stooped over the drain which carries away the swillings,
Marjolin found a fresh text for talk. On rainy days, said he, the water
sometimes rose through this orifice and flooded the place. It had once
risen a foot high; and they had been obliged to transport all the
poultry to the other end of the cellar, which is on a higher level. He
laughed as he recalled the wild flutter of the terrified creatures.
However, he had now finished, and it seemed as though there remained
nothing else for him to show, when all at once he bethought himself of
the ventilator. Thereupon he took Lisa off to the far end of the
cellar, and told her to look up; and inside one of the turrets at the
corner angles of the pavilion she observed a sort of escape-pipe, by
which the foul atmosphere of the storerooms ascended into space.

Here, in this corner, reeking with abominable odours, Marjolin’s
nostrils quivered, and his breath came and went violently. His long
stroll with Lisa in these cellars, full of warm animal perfumes, had
gradually intoxicated him.

She had again turned towards him. “Well,” said she, “it was very kind
of you to show me all this, and when you come to the shop I will give
you something.”

Whilst speaking she took hold of his soft chin, as she often did,
without recognising that he was no longer a child; and perhaps she
allowed her hand to linger there a little longer than was her wont. At
all events, Marjolin, usually so bashful, was thrilled by the caress,
and all at once he impetuously sprang forward, clasped Lisa by the
shoulders, and pressed his lips to her soft cheeks. She raised no cry,
but turned very pale at this sudden attack, which showed her how
imprudent she had been. And then, freeing herself from the embrace, she
raised her arm, as she had seen men do in slaughter houses, clenched
her comely fist, and knocked Marjolin down with a single blow, planted
straight between his eyes; and as he fell his head came into collision
with one of the stone slabs, and was split open. Just at that moment
the hoarse and prolonged crowing of a cock sounded through the gloom.

Handsome Lisa, however, remained perfectly cool. Her lips were tightly
compressed, and her bosom had recovered its wonted immobility. Up above
she could hear the heavy rumbling of the markets, and through the
vent-holes alongside the Rue Rambuteau the noise of the street traffic
made its way into the oppressive silence of the cellar. Lisa reflected
that her own strong arm had saved her; and then, fearing lest some one
should come and find her there, she hastened off, without giving a
glance at Marjolin. As she climbed the steps, after passing through the
grated entrance of the cellars, the daylight brought her great relief.

She returned to the shop, quite calm, and only looking a little pale.

“You’ve been a long time,” Quenu said to her.

“I can’t find Gavard. I have looked for him everywhere,” she quietly
replied. “We shall have to eat our leg of mutton without him.”

Then she filled the lard pot, which she noticed was empty; and cut some
pork chops for her friend Madame Taboureau, who had sent her little
servant for them. The blows which she dealt with her cleaver reminded
her of Marjolin. She felt that she had nothing to reproach herself
with. She had acted like an honest woman. She was not going to disturb
her peace of mind; she was too happy to do anything to compromise
herself. However, she glanced at Quenu, whose neck was coarse and
ruddy, and whose shaven chin looked as rough as knotted wood; whereas
Marjolin’s chin and neck resembled rosy satin. But then she must not
think of him any more, for he was no longer a child. She regretted it,
and could not help thinking that children grew up much too quickly.

A slight flush came back to her cheeks, and Quenu considered that she
looked wonderfully blooming. He came and sat down beside her at the
counter for a moment or two. “You ought to go out oftener,” said he;
“it does you good. We’ll go to the theatre together one of these
nights, if you like; to the Gaité, eh? Madame Taboureau has been to see
the piece they are playing there, and she declares it’s splendid.”

Lisa smiled, and said they would see about it, and then once more she
took herself off. Quenu thought that it was too good of her to take so
much trouble in running about after that brute Gavard. In point of
fact, however, she had simply gone upstairs to Florent’s bedroom, the
key of which was hanging from a nail in the kitchen. She hoped to find
out something or other by an inspection of this room, since the poultry
dealer had failed her. She went slowly round it, examining the bed, the
mantelpiece, and every corner. The window with the little balcony was
open, and the budding pomegranate was steeped in the golden beams of
the setting sun. The room looked to her as though Augustine had never
left it—had slept there only the night before. There seemed to be
nothing masculine about the place. She was quite surprised, for she had
expected to find some suspicious-looking chests, and coffers with
strong locks. She went to feel Augustine’s summer gown, which was still
hanging against the wall. Then she sat down at the table, and began to
read an unfinished page of manuscript, in which the word “revolution”
occurred twice. This alarmed her, and she opened the drawer, which she
saw was full of papers. But her sense of honour awoke within her in
presence of the secret which the rickety deal table so badly guarded.
She remained bending over the papers, trying to understand them without
touching them, in a state of great emotion, when the shrill song of the
chaffinch, on whose cage streamed a ray of sunshine, made her start.
She closed the drawer. It was a base thing that she had contemplated,
she thought.

Then, as she lingered by the window, reflecting that she ought to go
and ask counsel of Abbé Roustan, who was a very sensible man, she saw a
crowd of people round a stretcher in the market square below. The night
was falling, still she distinctly recognised Cadine weeping in the
midst of the crowd; while Florent and Claude, whose boots were white
with dust, stood together talking earnestly at the edge of the footway.
She hurried downstairs again, surprised to see them back so soon, and
scarcely had she reached her counter when Mademoiselle Saget entered
the shop.

“They have found that scamp of a Marjolin in the cellar, with his head
split open,” exclaimed the old maid. “Won’t you come to see him, Madame
Quenu?”

Lisa crossed the road to look at him. The young fellow was lying on his
back on the stretcher, looking very pale. His eyes were closed, and a
stiff wisp of his fair hair was clotted with blood. The bystanders,
however, declared that there was no serious harm done, and, besides,
the scamp had only himself to blame, for he was always playing all
sorts of wild pranks in the cellars. It was generally supposed that he
had been trying to jump over one of the stone blocks—one of his
favourite amusements—and had fallen with his head against the slab.

“I dare say that hussy there gave him a shove,” remarked Mademoiselle
Saget, pointing to Cadine, who was weeping. “They are always larking
together.”

Meantime the fresh air had restored Marjolin to consciousness, and he
opened his eyes in wide astonishment. He looked round at everybody, and
then, observing Lisa bending over him, he gently smiled at her with an
expression of mingled humility and affection. He seemed to have
forgotten all that had happened. Lisa, feeling relieved, said that he
ought to be taken to the hospital at once, and promised to go and see
him there, and take him some oranges and biscuits. However, Marjolin’s
head had fallen back, and when the stretcher was carried away Cadine
followed it, with her flat basket slung round her neck, and her hot
tears rolling down upon the bunches of violets in their mossy bed. She
certainly had no thoughts for the flowers that she was thus scalding
with her bitter grief.

As Lisa went back to her shop, she heard Claude say, as he shook hands
with Florent and parted from him: “Ah! the confounded young scamp! He’s
quite spoiled my day for me! Still, we had a very enjoyable time,
didn’t we?”

Claude and Florent had returned both worried and happy, bringing with
them the pleasant freshness of the country air. Madame Francois had
disposed of all her vegetables that morning before daylight; and they
had all three gone to the Golden Compasses, in the Rue Montorgueil, to
get the cart. Here, in the middle of Paris, they found a foretaste of
the country. Behind the Restaurant Philippe, with its frontage of gilt
woodwork rising to the first floor, there was a yard like that of a
farm, dirty, teeming with life, reeking with the odour of manure and
straw. Bands of fowls were pecking at the soft ground. Sheds and
staircases and galleries of greeny wood clung to the old houses around,
and at the far end, in a shanty of big beams, was Balthazar, harnessed
to the cart, and eating the oats in his nosebag. He went down the Rue
Montorgueil at a slow trot, seemingly well pleased to return to
Nanterre so soon. However, he was not going home without a load. Madame
Francois had a contract with the company which undertook the scavenging
of the markets, and twice a week she carried off with her a load of
leaves, forked up from the mass of refuse which littered the square. It
made excellent manure. In a few minutes the cart was filled to
overflowing. Claude and Florent stretched themselves out on the deep
bed of greenery; Madame Francois grasped her reins, and Balthazar went
off at his slow, steady pace, his head somewhat bent by reason of there
being so many passengers to pull along.

This excursion had been talked of for a long time past. Madame Francois
laughed cheerily. She was partial to the two men, and promised them an
_omelette au lard_ as had never been eaten, said she, in “that
villainous Paris.” Florent and Claude revelled in the thought of this
day of lounging idleness which as yet had scarcely begun to dawn.
Nanterre seemed to be some distant paradise into which they would
presently enter.

“Are you quite comfortable?” Madame Francois asked as the cart turned
into the Rue du Pont Neuf.

Claude declared that their couch was as soft as a bridal bed. Lying on
their backs, with their hands crossed under their heads, both men were
looking up at the pale sky from which the stars were vanishing. All
along the Rue de Rivoli they kept unbroken silence, waiting till they
should have got clear of the houses, and listening to the worthy woman
as she chattered to Balthazar: “Take your time, old man,” she said to
him in kindly tones. “We’re in no hurry; we shall be sure to get there
at last.”

On reaching the Champs Elysees, when the artist saw nothing but
tree-tops on either side of him, and the great green mass of the
Tuileries gardens in the distance, he woke up, as it were, and began to
talk. When the cart had passed the end of the Rue du Roule he had
caught a glimpse of the side entrance of Saint Eustache under the giant
roofing of one of the market covered-ways. He was constantly referring
to this view of the church, and tried to give it a symbolical meaning.

“It’s an odd mixture,” he said, “that bit of church framed round by an
avenue of cast iron. The one will kill the other; the iron will slay
the stone, and the time is not very far off. Do you believe in chance,
Florent? For my part, I don’t think that it was any mere chance of
position that set a rose-window of Saint Eustache right in the middle
of the central markets. No; there’s a whole manifesto in it. It is
modern art, realism, naturalism—whatever you like to call it—that has
grown up and dominates ancient art. Don’t you agree with me?”

Then, as Florent still kept silence, Claude continued: “Besides, that
church is a piece of bastard architecture, made up of the dying gasp of
the middle ages, and the first stammering of the Renaissance. Have you
noticed what sort of churches are built nowadays? They resemble all
kinds of things—libraries, observatories, pigeon-cotes, barracks; and
surely no one can imagine that the Deity dwells in such places. The
pious old builders are all dead and gone; and it would be better to
cease erecting those hideous carcasses of stone, in which we have no
belief to enshrine. Since the beginning of the century there has only
been one large original pile of buildings erected in Paris—a pile in
accordance with modern developments—and that’s the central markets. You
hear me, Florent? Ah! they are a fine bit of building, though they but
faintly indicate what we shall see in the twentieth century! And so,
you see, Saint Eustache is done for! It stands there with its
rose-windows, deserted by worshippers, while the markets spread out by
its side and teem with noisy life. Yes! that’s how I understand it all,
my friend.”

“Ah! Monsieur Claude,” said Madame Francois, laughing, “the woman who
cut your tongue-string certainly earned her money. Look at Balthazar
laying his ears back to listen to you. Come, come, get along,
Balthazar!”

The cart was slowly making its way up the incline. At this early hour
of the morning the avenue, with its double lines of iron chairs on
either pathway, and its lawns, dotted with flowerbeds and clumps of
shrubbery, stretching away under the blue shadows of the trees, was
quite deserted; however, at the Rond-Point a lady and gentleman on
horseback passed the cart at a gentle trot. Florent, who had made
himself a pillow with a bundle of cabbage-leaves, was still gazing at
the sky, in which a far-stretching rosy glow was appearing. Every now
and then he would close his eyes, the better to enjoy the fresh breeze
of the morning as it fanned his face. He was so happy to escape from
the markets, and travel on through the pure air, that he remained
speechless, and did not even listen to what was being said around him.

“And then, too, what fine jokers are those fellows who imprison art in
a toy-box!” resumed Claude, after a pause. “They are always repeating
the same idiotic words: ‘You can’t create art out of science,’ says
one; ‘Mechanical appliances kill poetry,’ says another; and a pack of
fools wail over the fate of the flowers, as though anybody wished the
flowers any harm! I’m sick of all such twaddle; I should like to answer
all that snivelling with some work of open defiance. I should take a
pleasure in shocking those good people. Shall I tell you what was the
finest thing I ever produced since I first began to work, and the one
which I recall with the greatest pleasure? It’s quite a story. When I
was at my Aunt Lisa’s on Christmas Eve last year that idiot of an
Auguste, the assistant, was setting out the shop-window. Well, he quite
irritated me by the weak, spiritless way in which he arranged the
display; and at last I requested him to take himself off, saying that I
would group the things myself in a proper manner. You see, I had plenty
of bright colours to work with—the red of the tongues, the yellow of
the hams, the blue of the paper shavings, the rosy pink of the things
that had been cut into, the green of the sprigs of heath, and the black
of the black-puddings—ah! a magnificent black, which I have never
managed to produce on my palette. And naturally, the _crepine_, the
small sausages, the chitterlings, and the crumbed trotters provided me
with delicate greys and browns. I produced a perfect work of art. I
took the dishes, the plates, the pans, and the jars, and arranged the
different colours; and I devised a wonderful picture of still life,
with subtle scales of tints leading up to brilliant flashes of colour.
The red tongues seemed to thrust themselves out like greedy flames, and
the black-puddings, surrounded by pale sausages, suggested a dark night
fraught with terrible indigestion. I had produced, you see, a picture
symbolical of the gluttony of Christmas Eve, when people meet and
sup—the midnight feasting, the ravenous gorging of stomachs void and
faint after all the singing of hymns.[*] At the top of everything a
huge turkey exhibited its white breast, marbled blackly by the truffles
showing through its skin. It was something barbaric and superb,
suggesting a paunch amidst a halo of glory; but there was such a
cutting, sarcastic touch about it all that people crowded to the
window, alarmed by the fierce flare of the shop-front. When my aunt
Lisa came back from the kitchen she was quite frightened, and thought
I’d set the fat in the shop on fire; and she considered the appearance
of the turkey so indelicate that she turned me out of the place while
Auguste re-arranged the window after his own idiotic fashion. Such
brutes will never understand the language of a red splotch by the side
of a grey one. Ah, well! that was my masterpiece. I have never done
anything better.”

[*] An allusion to the “midnight mass” usually celebrated in Roman
Catholic churches on Christmas Eve.—Translator.


He relapsed into silence, smiling and dwelling with gratification on
this reminiscence. The cart had now reached the Arc de Triomphe, and
strong currents of air swept from the avenues across the expanse of
open ground. Florent sat up, and inhaled with zest the first odours of
grass wafted from the fortifications. He turned his back on Paris,
anxious to behold the country in the distance. At the corner of the Rue
de Longchamp, Madame Francois pointed out to him the spot where she had
picked him up. This rendered him thoughtful, and he gazed at her as she
sat there, so healthy-looking and serene, with her arms slightly
extended so as to grasp the reins. She looked even handsomer than Lisa,
with her neckerchief tied over her head, her robust glow of health, and
her brusque, kindly air. When she gave a slight cluck with her tongue,
Balthazar pricked up his ears and rattled down the road at a quicker
pace.

On arriving at Nanterre, the cart turned to the left into a narrow
lane, skirted some blank walls, and finally came to a standstill at the
end of a sort of blind alley. It was the end of the world, Madame
Francois used to say. The load of vegetable leaves now had to be
discharged. Claude and Florent would not hear of the journeyman
gardener, who was planting lettuces, leaving his work, but armed
themselves with pitchforks and proceeded to toss the leaves into the
manure pit. This occupation afforded them much amusement. Claude had
quite a liking for manure, since it symbolises the world and its life.
The strippings and parings of the vegetables, the scourings of the
markets, the refuse that fell from that colossal table, remained full
of life, and returned to the spot where the vegetables had previously
sprouted, to warm and nourish fresh generations of cabbages, turnips,
and carrots. They rose again in fertile crops, and once more went to
spread themselves out upon the market square. Paris rotted everything,
and returned everything to the soil, which never wearied of repairing
the ravages of death.

“Ah!” exclaimed Claude, as he plied his fork for the last time, “here’s
a cabbage-stalk that I’m sure I recognise. It has grown up at least
half a score of times in that corner yonder by the apricot tree.”

This remark made Florent laugh. But he soon became grave again, and
strolled slowly through the kitchen garden, while Claude made a sketch
of the stable, and Madame Francois got breakfast ready. The kitchen
garden was a long strip of ground, divided in the middle by a narrow
path; it rose slightly, and at the top end, on raising the head, you
could perceive the low barracks of Mont Valerien. Green hedges
separated it from other plots of land, and these lofty walls of
hawthorn fringed the horizon with a curtain of greenery in such wise
that of all the surrounding country Mont Valerien alone seemed to rise
inquisitively on tip-toe in order to peer into Madame Francois’s close.
Great peacefulness came from the countryside which could not be seen.
Along the kitchen garden, between the four hedges, the May sun shone
with a languid heat, a silence disturbed only by the buzzing of
insects, a somnolence suggestive of painless parturition. Every now and
then a faint cracking sound, a soft sigh, made one fancy that one could
hear the vegetables sprout into being. The patches of spinach and
sorrel, the borders of radishes, carrots, and turnips, the beds of
potatoes and cabbages, spread out in even regularity, displaying their
dark leaf-mould between their tufts of greenery. Farther away, the
trenched lettuces, onions, leeks, and celery, planted by line in long
straight rows, looked like soldiers on parade; while the peas and beans
were beginning to twine their slender tendrils round a forest of
sticks, which, when June came, they would transform into a thick and
verdant wood. There was not a weed to be seen. The garden resembled two
parallel strips of carpet of a geometrical pattern of green on a
reddish ground, which were carefully swept every morning. Borders of
thyme grew like greyish fringe along each side of the pathway.

Florent paced backwards and forwards amidst the perfume of the thyme,
which the sun was warming. He felt profoundly happy in the peacefulness
and cleanliness of the garden. For nearly a year past he had only seen
vegetables bruised and crushed by the jolting of the market-carts;
vegetables torn up on the previous evening, and still bleeding. He
rejoiced to find them at home, in peace in the dark mould, and sound in
every part. The cabbages had a bulky, prosperous appearance; the
carrots looked bright and gay; and the lettuces lounged in line with an
air of careless indolence. And as he looked at them all, the markets
which he had left behind him that morning seemed to him like a vast
mortuary, an abode of death, where only corpses could be found, a
charnel-house reeking with foul smells and putrefaction. He slackened
his steps, and rested in that kitchen garden, as after a long
perambulation amidst deafening noises and repulsive odours. The uproar
and the sickening humidity of the fish market had departed from him;
and he felt as though he were being born anew in the pure fresh air.
Claude was right, he thought. The markets were a sphere of death. The
soil was the life, the eternal cradle, the health of the world.

“The omelet’s ready!” suddenly cried Madame Francois.

When they were all three seated round the table in the kitchen, with
the door thrown open to the sunshine, they ate their breakfast with
such light-hearted gaiety that Madame Francois looked at Florent in
amazement, repeating between each mouthful: “You’re quite altered.
You’re ten years younger. It is that villainous Paris which makes you
seem so gloomy. You’ve got a little sunshine in your eyes now. Ah!
those big towns do one’s health no good, you ought to come and live
here.”

Claude laughed, and retorted that Paris was a glorious place. He stuck
up for it and all that belonged to it, even to its gutters; though at
the same time retaining a keen affection for the country.

In the afternoon Madame Francois and Florent found themselves alone at
the end of the garden, in a corner planted with a few fruit trees.
Seated on the ground, they talked somewhat seriously together. The good
woman advised Florent with an affectionate and quite maternal kindness.
She asked him endless questions about his life, and his intentions for
the future, and begged him to remember that he might always count upon
her, if ever he thought that she could in the slightest degree
contribute to his happiness. Florent was deeply touched. No woman had
ever spoken to him in that way before. Madame Francois seemed to him
like some healthy, robust plant that had grown up with the vegetables
in the leaf-mould of the garden; while the Lisas, the Normans, and
other pretty women of the markets appeared to him like flesh of
doubtful freshness decked out for exhibition. He here enjoyed several
hours of perfect well-being, delivered from all that reek of food which
sickened him in the markets, and reviving to new life amidst the
fertile atmosphere of the country, like that cabbage stalk which Claude
declared he had seen sprout up more than half a score of times.

The two men took leave of Madame Francois at about five o’clock. They
had decided to walk back to Paris; and the market gardener accompanied
them into the lane. As she bade good-bye to Florent, she kept his hand
in her own for a moment, and said gently: “If ever anything happens to
trouble you, remember to come to me.”

For a quarter of an hour Florent walked on without speaking, already
getting gloomy again, and reflecting that he was leaving health behind
him. The road to Courbevoie was white with dust. However, both men were
fond of long walks and the ringing of stout boots on the hard ground.
Little clouds of dust rose up behind their heels at every step, while
the rays of the sinking sun darted obliquely over the avenue,
lengthening their shadows in such wise that their heads reached the
other side of the road, and journeyed along the opposite footway.

Claude, swinging his arms, and taking long, regular strides,
complacently watched these two shadows, whilst enjoying the rhythmical
cadence of his steps, which he accentuated by a motion of his
shoulders. Presently, however, as though just awaking from a dream, he
exclaimed: “Do you know the ‘Battle of the Fat and the Thin’?”

Florent, surprised by the question, replied in the negative; and
thereupon Claude waxed enthusiastic, talking of that series of prints
in very eulogical fashion. He mentioned certain incidents: the Fat, so
swollen that they almost burst, preparing their evening debauch, while
the Thin, bent double by fasting, looked in from the street with the
appearance of envious laths; and then, again, the Fat, with hanging
cheeks, driving off one of the Thin, who had been audacious enough to
introduce himself into their midst in lowly humility, and who looked
like a ninepin amongst a population of balls.

In these designs Claude detected the entire drama of human life, and he
ended by classifying men into Fat and Thin, two hostile groups, one of
which devours the other, and grows fat and sleek and enjoys itself.

“Cain,” said he, “was certainly one of the Fat, and Abel one of the
Thin. Ever since that first murder, there have been rampant appetites
which have drained the life-blood of small eaters. It’s a continual
preying of the stronger upon the weaker; each swallowing his neighbour,
and then getting swallowed in his turn. Beware of the Fat, my friend.”

He relapsed into silence for a moment, still watching their two
shadows, which the setting sun elongated more than ever. Then he
murmured: “You see, we belong to the Thin—you and I. Those who are no
more corpulent than we are don’t take up much room in the sunlight,
eh?”

Florent glanced at the two shadows, and smiled. But Claude waxed angry,
and exclaimed: “You make a mistake if you think it is a laughing
matter. For my own part, I greatly suffer from being one of the Thin.
If I were one of the Fat, I could paint at my ease; I should have a
fine studio, and sell my pictures for their weight in gold. But,
instead of that, I’m one of the Thin; and I have to grind my life out
in producing things which simply make the Fat ones shrug their
shoulders. I shall die of it all in the end, I’m sure of it, with my
skin clinging to my bones, and so flattened that they will be able to
bury me between two leaves of a book. And you, too, you are one of the
Thin, a wonderful one; the very king of Thin, in fact! Do you remember
your quarrel with the fish-wives? It was magnificent; all those
colossal bosoms flying at your scraggy breast! Oh! they were simply
acting from natural instinct; they were pursuing one of the Thin just
as cats pursue a mouse. The Fat, you know, have an instinctive hatred
of the Thin, to such an extent that they must needs drive the latter
from their sight, either by means of their teeth or their feet. And
that is why, if I were in your place, I should take my precautions. The
Quenus belong to the Fat, and so do the Mehudins; indeed, you have none
but Fat ones around you. I should feel uneasy under such
circumstances.”

“And what about Gavard, and Mademoiselle Saget, and your friend
Marjolin?” asked Florent, still smiling.

“Oh, if you like, I will classify all our acquaintances for you,”
replied Claude. “I’ve had their heads in a portfolio in my studio for a
long time past, with memoranda of the order to which they belong.
Gavard is one of the Fat, but of the kind which pretends to belong to
the Thin. The variety is by no means uncommon. Mademoiselle Saget and
Madame Lecœur belong to the Thin, but to a variety which is much to be
feared—the Thin ones whom envy drives to despair, and who are capable
of anything in their craving to fatten themselves. My friend Marjolin,
little Cadine, and La Sarriette are three Fat ones, still innocent,
however, and having nothing but the guileless hunger of youth. I may
remark that the Fat, so long as they’ve not grown old, are charming
creatures. Monsieur Lebigre is one of the Fat—don’t you think so? As
for your political friends, Charvet, Clemence, Logre, and Lacaille,
they mostly belong to the Thin. I only except that big animal
Alexandre, and that prodigy Robine, who has caused me a vast amount of
annoyance.”

The artist continued to talk in this strain from the Pont de Neuilly to
the Arc de Triomphe. He returned to some of those whom he had already
mentioned, and completed their portraits with a few characteristic
touches. Logre, he said, was one of the Thin whose belly had been
placed between his shoulders. Beautiful Lisa was all stomach, and the
beautiful Norman all bosom. Mademoiselle Saget, in her earlier life,
must have certainly lost some opportunity to fatten herself, for she
detested the Fat, while, at the same time, she despised the Thin. As
for Gavard, he was compromising his position as one of the Fat, and
would end by becoming as flat as a bug.

“And what about Madame Francois?” Florent asked.

Claude seemed much embarrassed by this question. He cast about for an
answer, and at last stammered:

“Madame Francois, Madame Francois—well, no, I really don’t know; I
never thought about classifying her. But she’s a dear good soul, and
that’s quite sufficient. She’s neither one of the Fat nor one of the
Thin!”

They both laughed. They were now in front of the Arc de Triomphe. The
sun, over by the hills of Suresnes, was so low on the horizon that
their colossal shadows streaked the whiteness of the great structure
even above the huge groups of statuary, like strokes made with a piece
of charcoal. This increased Claude’s merriment, he waved his arms and
bent his body; and then, as he started on his way again, he said; “Did
you notice—just as the sun set our two heads shot up to the sky!”

But Florent no longer smiled. Paris was grasping him again, that Paris
which now frightened him so much, after having cost him so many tears
at Cayenne. When he reached the markets night was falling, and there
was a suffocating smell. He bent his head as he once more returned to
the nightmare of endless food, whilst preserving the sweet yet sad
recollection of that day of bright health odorous with the perfume of
thyme.




CHAPTER V


At about four o’clock on the afternoon of the following day Lisa betook
herself to Saint Eustache. For the short walk across the square she had
arrayed herself very seriously in a black silk gown and thick woollen
shawl. The handsome Norman, who, from her stall in the fish market,
watched her till she vanished into the church porch, was quite amazed.

“Hallo! So the fat thing’s gone in for priests now, has she?” she
exclaimed, with a sneer. “Well, a little holy water may do her good!”

She was mistaken in her surmises, however, for Lisa was not a devotee.
She did not observe the ordinances of the Church, but said that she did
her best to lead an honest life, and that this was all that was
necessary. At the same time, however, she disliked to hear religion
spoken ill of, and often silenced Gavard, who delighted in scandalous
stories of priests and their doings. Talk of that sort seemed to her
altogether improper. Everyone, in her opinion, should be allowed to
believe as they pleased, and every scruple should be respected.
Besides, the majority of the clergy were most estimable men. She knew
Abbé Roustan, of Saint Eustache—a distinguished priest, a man of shrewd
sense, and one, she thought, whose friendship might be safely relied
upon. And she would wind up by explaining that religion was absolutely
necessary for the people; she looked upon it as a sort of police force
that helped to maintain order, and without which no government would be
possible. When Gavard went too far on this subject and asserted that
the priests ought to be turned into the streets and have their shops
shut up, Lisa, shrugged her shoulders and replied: “A great deal of
good that would do! Why, before a month was over the people would be
murdering one another in the streets, and you would be compelled to
invent another God. That was just what happened in ‘93. You know very
well that I’m not given to mixing with the priests, but for all that I
say that they are necessary, as we couldn’t do without them.”

And so when Lisa happened to enter a church she always manifested the
utmost decorum. She had bought a handsome missal, which she never
opened, for use when she was invited to a funeral or a wedding. She
knelt and rose at the proper times, and made a point of conducting
herself with all propriety. She assumed, indeed, what she considered a
sort of official demeanour, such as all well-to-do folks, tradespeople,
and house-owners ought to observe with regard to religion.

As she entered Saint Eustache that afternoon she let the double doors,
covered with green baize, faded and worn by the frequent touch of pious
hands, close gently behind her. Then she dipped her fingers in the holy
water and crossed herself in the correct fashion. And afterwards, with
hushed footsteps, she made her way to the chapel of Saint Agnes, where
two kneeling women with their faces buried in their hands were waiting,
whilst the blue skirts of a third protruded from the confessional. Lisa
seemed rather put out by the sight of these women, and, addressing a
verger who happened to pass along, wearing a black skullcap and
dragging his feet over the slabs, she inquired: “Is this Monsieur
l’Abbé Roustan’s day for hearing confessions?”

The verger replied that his reverence had only two more penitents
waiting, and that they would not detain him long, so that if Lisa would
take a chair her turn would speedily come. She thanked him, without
telling him that she had not come to confess; and, making up her mind
to wait, she began to pace the church, going as far as the chief
entrance, whence she gazed at the lofty, severe, bare nave stretching
between the brightly coloured aisles. Raising her head a little, she
examined the high altar, which she considered too plain, having no
taste for the cold grandeur of stonework, but preferring the gilding
and gaudy colouring of the side chapels. Those on the side of the Rue
du Jour looked greyish in the light which filtered through their dusty
windows, but on the side of the markets the sunset was lighting up the
stained glass with lovely tints, limpid greens and yellows in
particular, which reminded Lisa of the bottle of liqueurs in front of
Monsieur Lebigre’s mirror. She came back by this side, which seemed to
be warmed by the glow of light, and took a passing interest in the
reliquaries, altar ornaments, and paintings steeped in prismatic
reflections. The church was empty, quivering with the silence that fell
from its vaulted roofing. Here and there a woman’s dress showed like a
dark splotch amidst the vague yellow of the chairs; and a low buzzing
came from the closed confessionals. As Lisa again passed the chapel of
Saint Agnes she saw the blue dress still kneeling at Abbé Roustan’s
feet.

“Why, if I’d wanted to confess I could have said everything in ten
seconds,” she thought, proud of her irreproachable integrity.

Then she went on to the end of the church. Behind the high altar, in
the gloom of a double row of pillars, is the chapel of the Blessed
Virgin, damp and dark and silent. The dim stained windows only show the
flowing crimson and violet robes of saints, which blaze like flames of
mystic love in the solemn, silent adoration of the darkness. It is a
weird, mysterious spot, like some crepuscular nook of paradise solely
illumined by the gleaming stars of two tapers. The four brass lamps
hanging from the roof remain unlighted, and are but faintly seen; on
espying them you think of the golden censers which the angels swing
before the throne of Mary. And kneeling on the chairs between the
pillars there are always women surrendering themselves languorously to
the dim spot’s voluptuous charm.

Lisa stood and gazed tranquilly around her. She did not feel the least
emotion, but considered that it was a mistake not to light the lamps.
Their brightness would have given the place a more cheerful look. The
gloom even struck her as savouring of impropriety. Her face was warmed
by the flames of some candles burning in a candelabrum by her side, and
an old woman armed with a big knife was scraping off the wax which had
trickled down and congealed into pale tears. And amidst the quivering
silence, the mute ecstasy of adoration prevailing in the chapel, Lisa
would distinctly hear the rumbling of the vehicles turning out of the
Rue Montmartre, behind the scarlet and purple saints on the windows,
whilst in the distance the markets roared without a moment’s pause.

Just as Lisa was leaving the chapel, she saw the younger of the
Mehudins, Claire, the dealer in fresh water fish, come in. The girl
lighted a taper at the candelabrum, and then went to kneel behind a
pillar, her knees pressed upon the hard stones, and her face so pale
beneath her loose fair hair that she seemed a corpse. And believing
herself to be securely screened from observation, she gave way to
violent emotion, and wept hot tears with a passionate outpouring of
prayer which bent her like a rushing wind. Lisa looked on in amazement,
for the Mehudins were not known to be particularly pious; indeed,
Claire was accustomed to speak of religion and priests in such terms as
to horrify one.

“What’s the meaning of this, I wonder?” pondered Lisa, as she again
made her way to the chapel of Saint Agnes. “The hussy must have been
poisoning some one or other.”

Abbé Roustan was at last coming out of his confessional. He was a
handsome man, of some forty years of age, with a smiling, kindly air.
When he recognised Madame Quenu he grasped her hand, called her “dear
lady,” and conducted her to the vestry, where, taking off his surplice,
he told her that he would be entirely at her service in a moment. They
returned, the priest in his cassock, bareheaded, and Lisa strutting
along in her shawl, and paced up and down in front of the side-chapels
adjacent to the Rue du Jour. They conversed together in low tones. The
sunlight was departing from the stained windows, the church was growing
dark, and the retreating footsteps of the last worshippers sounded but
faintly over the flagstones.

Lisa explained her doubts and scruples to Abbé Roustan. There had never
been any question of religion between them; she never confessed, but
merely consulted him in cases of difficulty, because he was shrewd and
discreet, and she preferred him, as she sometimes said, to shady
business men redolent of the galleys. The abbe, on his side, manifested
inexhaustible complaisance. He looked up points of law for her in the
Code, pointed out profitable investments, resolved her moral
difficulties with great tact, recommended tradespeople to her,
invariably having an answer ready however diverse and complicated her
requirements might be. And he supplied all this help in a natural
matter-of-fact way, without ever introducing the Deity into his talk,
or seeking to obtain any advantage either for himself or the cause of
religion. A word of thanks and a smile sufficed him. He seemed glad to
have an opportunity of obliging the handsome Madame Quenu, of whom his
housekeeper often spoke to him in terms of praise, as of a woman who
was highly respected in the neighbourhood.

Their consultation that afternoon was of a peculiarly delicate nature.
Lisa was anxious to know what steps she might legitimately take, as a
woman of honour, with respect to her brother-in-law. Had she a right to
keep a watch upon him, and to do what she could to prevent him from
compromising her husband, her daughter, and herself? And then how far
might she go in circumstances of pressing danger? She did not bluntly
put these questions to the abbe, but asked them with such skilful
circumlocutions that he was able to discuss the matter without entering
into personalities. He brought forward arguments on both sides of the
question, but the conclusion he came to was that a person of integrity
was entitled, indeed bound, to prevent evil, and was justified in using
whatever means might be necessary to ensure the triumph of that which
was right and proper.

“That is my opinion, dear lady,” he said in conclusion. “The question
of means is always a very grave one. It is a snare in which souls of
average virtue often become entangled. But I know your scrupulous
conscience. Deliberate carefully over each step you think of taking,
and if it contains nothing repugnant to you, go on boldly. Pure natures
have the marvelous gift of purifying all that they touch.”

Then, changing his tone of voice, he continued: “Pray give my kind
regards to Monsieur Quenu. I’ll come in to kiss my dear little Pauline
some time when I’m passing. And now good-bye, dear lady; remember that
I’m always at your service.”

Thereupon he returned to the vestry. Lisa, on her way out, was curious
to see if Claire was still praying, but the girl had gone back to her
eels and carp; and in front of the Lady-chapel, which was already
shrouded in darkness, there was now but a litter of chairs overturned
by the ardent vehemence of the woman who had knelt there.

When the handsome Lisa again crossed the square, La Normande, who had
been watching for her exit from the church, recognised her in the
twilight by the rotundity of her skirts.

“Good gracious!” she exclaimed, “she’s been more than an hour in there!
When the priests set about cleansing her of her sins, the choir-boys
have to form in line to pass the buckets of filth and empty them in the
street!”

The next morning Lisa went straight up to Florent’s bedroom and settled
herself there with perfect equanimity. She felt certain that she would
not be disturbed, and, moreover, she had made up her mind to tell a
falsehood and say that she had come to see if the linen was clean,
should Florent by any chance return. Whilst in the shop, however, she
had observed him busily engaged in the fish market. Seating herself in
front of the little table, she pulled out the drawer, placed it upon
her knees, and began to examine its contents, taking the greatest care
to restore them to their original positions.

First of all she came upon the opening chapters of the work on Cayenne;
then upon the drafts of Florent’s various plans and projects, his
schemes for converting the Octroi duties into taxes upon sales, for
reforming the administrative system of the markets, and all the others.
These pages of small writing, which she set herself to read, bored her
extremely, and she was about to restore the drawer to its place,
feeling convinced that Florent concealed the proofs of his wicked
designs elsewhere, and already contemplating a searching visitation of
his mattress, when she discovered a photograph of La Normande in an
envelope. The impression was rather dark. La Normande was standing up
with her right arm resting on a broken column. Decked out with all her
jewels, and attired in a new silk dress, the fish-girl was smiling
impudently, and Lisa, at the sight, forgot all about her
brother-in-law, her fears, and the purpose for which she had come into
the room. She became quite absorbed in her examination of the portrait,
as often happens when one woman scrutinises the photograph of another
at her ease, without fear of being seen. Never before had she so
favourable an opportunity to study her rival. She scrutinised her hair,
her nose, her mouth; held the photograph at a distance, and then
brought it closer again. And, finally, with compressed lips, she read
on the back of it, in a big, ugly scrawl: “Louise, to her friend,
Florent.” This quite scandalised her; to her mind it was a confession,
and she felt a strong impulse to take possession of the photograph, and
keep it as a weapon against her enemy. However, she slowly replaced it
in the envelope on coming to the conclusion that this course would be
wrong, and reflecting that she would always know where to find it
should she want it again.

Then, as she again began turning over the loose sheets of paper, it
occurred to her to look at the back end of the drawer, where Florent
had relegated Augustine’s needles and thread; and there, between the
missal and the Dream-book, she discovered what she sought, some
extremely compromising memoranda, simply screened from observation by a
wrapper of grey paper.

That idea of an insurrection, of the overthrow of the Empire by means
of an armed rising, which Logre had one evening propounded at Monsieur
Lebigre’s, had slowly ripened in Florent’s feverish brain. He soon grew
to see a duty, a mission in it. Therein undoubtedly lay the task to
which his escape from Cayenne and his return to Paris predestined him.
Believing in a call to avenge his leanness upon the city which wallowed
in food while the upholders of right and equity were racked by hunger
in exile, he took upon himself the duties of a justiciary, and dreamt
of rising up, even in the midst of those markets, to sweep away the
reign of gluttony and drunkenness. In a sensitive nature like his, this
idea quickly took root. Everything about him assumed exaggerated
proportions, the wildest fancies possessed him. He imagined that the
markets had been conscious of his arrival, and had seized hold of him
that they might enervate him and poison him with their stenches. Then,
too, Lisa wanted to cast a spell over him, and for two or three days at
a time he would avoid her, as though she were some dissolving agency
which would destroy all his power of will should he approach too
closely. However, these paroxysms of puerile fear, these wild surgings
of his rebellious brain, always ended in thrills of the gentlest
tenderness, with yearnings to love and be loved, which he concealed
with a boyish shame.

It was more especially in the evening that his mind became blurred by
all his wild imaginings. Depressed by his day’s work, but shunning
sleep from a covert fear—the fear of the annihilation it brought with
it—he would remain later than ever at Monsieur Lebigre’s, or at the
Mehudins’; and on his return home he still refrained from going to bed,
and sat up writing and preparing for the great insurrection. By slow
degrees he devised a complete system of organisation. He divided Paris
into twenty sections, one for each arrondissement. Each section would
have a chief, a sort of general, under whose orders there were to be
twenty lieutenants commanding twenty companies of affiliated
associates. Every week, among the chiefs, there would be a
consultation, which was to be held in a different place each time; and,
the better to ensure secrecy and discretion, the associates would only
come in contact with their respective lieutenants, these alone
communicating with the chiefs of the sections. It also occurred to
Florent that it would be as well that the companies should believe
themselves charged with imaginary missions, as a means of putting the
police upon a wrong scent.

As for the employment of the insurrectionary forces, that would be all
simplicity. It would, of course, be necessary to wait till the
companies were quite complete, and then advantage would be taken of the
first public commotion. They would doubtless only have a certain number
of guns used for sporting purposes in their possession, so they would
commence by seizing the police stations and guard-houses, disarming the
soldiers of the line; resorting to violence as little as possible, and
inviting the men to make common cause with the people. Afterwards they
would march upon the Corps Législatif, and thence to the Hôtel de
Ville. This plan, to which Florent returned night after night, as
though it were some dramatic scenario which relieved his over-excited
nervous system, was as yet simply jotted down on scraps of paper, full
of erasures, which showed how the writer had felt his way, and revealed
each successive phase of his scientific yet puerile conception. When
Lisa had glanced through the notes, without understanding some of them,
she remained there trembling with fear; afraid to touch them further
lest they should explode in her hands like live shells.

A last memorandum frightened her more than any of the others. It was a
half sheet of paper on which Florent had sketched the distinguishing
insignia which the chiefs and the lieutenants were to wear. By the side
of these were rough drawings of the standards which the different
companies were to carry; and notes in pencil even described what
colours the banners should assume. The chiefs were to wear red scarves,
and the lieutenants red armlets.

To Lisa this seemed like an immediate realisation of the rising; she
saw all the men with their red badges marching past the pork shop,
firing bullets into her mirrors and marble, and carrying off sausages
and chitterlings from the window. The infamous projects of her
brother-in-law were surely directed against herself—against her own
happiness. She closed the drawer and looked round the room, reflecting
that it was she herself who had provided this man with a home—that he
slept between her sheets and used her furniture. And she was especially
exasperated at his keeping his abominable infernal machine in that
little deal table which she herself had used at Uncle Gradelle’s before
her marriage—a perfectly innocent, rickety little table.

For a while she stood thinking what she should do. In the first place,
it was useless to say anything to Quenu. For a moment it occurred to
her to provoke an explanation with Florent, but she dismissed that
idea, fearing lest he would only go and perpetrate his crime elsewhere,
and maliciously make a point of compromising them. Then gradually
growing somewhat calmer, she came to the conclusion that her best plan
would be to keep a careful watch over her brother-in-law. It would be
time enough to take further steps at the first sign of danger. She
already had quite sufficient evidence to send him back to the galleys.

On returning to the shop again, she found Augustine in a state of great
excitement. Little Pauline had disappeared more than half an hour
before, and to Lisa’s anxious questions the young woman could only
reply: “I don’t know where she can have got to, madame. She was on the
pavement there with a little boy. I was watching them, and then I had
to cut some ham for a gentleman, and I never saw them again.”

“I’ll wager it was Muche!” cried Lisa. “Ah, the young scoundrel!”

It was, indeed, Muche who had enticed Pauline away. The little girl,
who was wearing a new blue-striped frock that day for the first time,
had been anxious to exhibit it, and had accordingly taken her stand
outside the shop, manifesting great propriety of bearing, and
compressing her lips with the grave expression of a little woman of six
who is afraid of soiling her clothes. Her short and stiffly-starched
petticoats stood out like the skirts of a ballet girl, allowing a full
view of her tightly stretched white stockings and little sky-blue
boots. Her pinafore, which hung low about her neck, was finished off at
the shoulders with an edging of embroidery, below which appeared her
pretty little arms, bare and rosy. She had small turquoise rings in her
ears, a cross at her neck, a blue velvet ribbon in her well-brushed
hair; and she displayed all her mother’s plumpness and softness—the
gracefulness, indeed, of a new doll.

Muche had caught sight of her from the market, where he was amusing
himself by dropping little dead fishes into the gutter, following them
along the kerb as the water carried them away, and declaring that they
were swimming. However, the sight of Pauline standing in front of the
shop and looking so smart and pretty made him cross over to her,
capless as he was, with his blouse ragged, his trousers slipping down,
and his whole appearance suggestive of a seven-year-old street-arab.
His mother had certainly forbidden him to play any more with “that fat
booby of a girl who was stuffed by her parents till she almost burst”;
so he stood hesitating for a moment, but at last came up to Pauline,
and wanted to feel her pretty striped frock. The little girl, who had
at first felt flattered, then put on a prim air and stepped back,
exclaiming in a tone of displeasure: “Leave me alone. Mother says I’m
not to have anything to do with you.”

This brought a laugh to the lips of Muche, who was a wily, enterprising
young scamp.

“What a little flat you are!” he retorted. “What does it matter what
your mother says? Let’s go and play at shoving each other, eh?”

He doubtless nourished some wicked idea of dirtying the neat little
girl; but she, on seeing him prepare to give her a push in the back,
retreated as though about to return inside the shop. Muche thereupon
adopted a flattering tone like a born cajoler.

“You silly! I didn’t mean it,” said he. “How nice you look like that!
Is that little cross your mother’s?”

Pauline perked herself up, and replied that it was her own, whereupon
Muche gently led her to the corner of the Rue Pirouette, touching her
skirts the while and expressing his astonishment at their wonderful
stiffness. All this pleased the little girl immensely. She had been
very much vexed at not receiving any notice while she was exhibiting
herself outside the shop. However, in spite of all Muche’s
blandishments, she still refused to leave the footway.

“You stupid fatty!” thereupon exclaimed the youngster, relapsing into
coarseness. “I’ll squat you down in the gutter if you don’t look out,
Miss Fine-airs!”

The girl was dreadfully alarmed. Muche had caught hold of her by the
hand; but, recognising his mistake in policy, he again put on a
wheedling air, and began to fumble in his pocket.

“I’ve got a sou,” said he.

The sight of the coin had a soothing effect upon Pauline. The boy held
up the sou with the tips of his fingers, and the temptation to follow
it proved so great that the girl at last stepped down into the roadway.
Muche’s diplomacy was eminently successful.

“What do you like best?” he asked.

Pauline gave no immediate answer. She could not make up her mind; there
were so many things that she liked. Muche, however, ran over a whole
list of dainties—liquorice, molasses, gum-balls, and powdered sugar.
The powdered sugar made the girl ponder. One dipped one’s fingers into
it and sucked them; it was very nice. For a while she gravely
considered the matter. Then, at last making up her mind, she said:

“No, I like the mixed screws the best.”

Muche thereupon took hold of her arm, and she unresistingly allowed him
to lead her away. They crossed the Rue Rambuteau, followed the broad
footway skirting the markets, and went as far as a grocer’s shop in the
Rue de la Cossonnerie which was celebrated for its mixed screws. These
mixed screws are small screws of paper in which grocers put up all
sorts of damaged odds and ends, broken sugar-plums, fragments of
crystallised chestnuts—all the doubtful residuum of their jars of
sweets. Muche showed himself very gallant, allowed Pauline to choose
the screw—a blue one—paid his sou, and did not attempt to dispossess
her of the sweets. Outside, on the footway, she emptied the
miscellaneous collection of scraps into both pockets of her pinafore;
and they were such little pockets that they were quite filled. Then in
delight she began to munch the fragments one by one, wetting her
fingers to catch the fine sugary dust, with such effect that she melted
the scraps of sweets, and the pockets of her pinafore soon showed two
brownish stains. Muche laughed slily to himself. He had his arm about
the girl’s waist, and rumpled her frock at his ease whilst leading her
round the corner of the Rue Pierre Lescot, in the direction of the
Place des Innocents.

“You’ll come and play now, won’t you?” he asked. “That’s nice what
you’ve got in your pockets, ain’t it? You see that I didn’t want to do
you any harm, you big silly!”

Thereupon he plunged his own fingers into her pockets, and they entered
the square together. To this spot, no doubt, he had all along intended
to lure his victim. He did the honours of the square as though it were
his own private property, and indeed it was a favourite haunt of his,
where he often larked about for whole afternoons. Pauline had never
before strayed so far from home, and would have wept like an abducted
damsel had it not been that her pockets were full of sweets. The
fountain in the middle of the flowered lawn was sending sheets of water
down its tiers of basins, whilst, between the pilasters above, Jean
Goujon’s nymphs, looking very white beside the dingy grey stonework,
inclined their urns and displayed their nude graces in the grimy air of
the Saint Denis quarter. The two children walked round the fountain,
watching the water fall into the basins, and taking an interest in the
grass, with thoughts, no doubt, of crossing the central lawn, or
gliding into the clumps of holly and rhododendrons that bordered the
railings of the square. Little Muche, however, who had now effectually
rumpled the back of the pretty frock, said with his sly smile:

“Let’s play at throwing sand at each other, eh?”

Pauline had no will of her own left; and they began to throw the sand
at each other, keeping their eyes closed meanwhile. The sand made its
way in at the neck of the girl’s low bodice, and trickled down into her
stockings and boots. Muche was delighted to see the white pinafore
become quite yellow. But he doubtless considered that it was still far
too clean.

“Let’s go and plant trees, shall we?” he exclaimed suddenly. “I know
how to make such pretty gardens.”

“Really, gardens!” murmured Pauline full of admiration.

Then, as the keeper of the square happened to be absent, Muche told her
to make some holes in one of the borders; and dropping on her knees in
the middle of the soft mould, and leaning forward till she lay at full
length on her stomach, she dug her pretty little arms into the ground.
He, meantime, began to hunt for scraps of wood, and broke off branches.
These were the garden-trees which he planted in the holes that Pauline
made. He invariably complained, however, that the holes were not deep
enough, and rated the girl as though she were an idle workman and he an
indignant master. When she at last got up, she was black from head to
foot. Her hair was full of mould, her face was smeared with it, she
looked such a sight with her arms as black as a coalheaver’s that Muche
clapped his hands with glee, and exclaimed: “Now we must water the
trees. They won’t grow, you know, if we don’t water them.”

That was the finishing stroke. They went outside the square, scooped
the gutter-water up in the palms of their hands, and then ran back to
pour it over the bits of wood. On the way, Pauline, who was so fat that
she couldn’t run properly, let the water trickle between her fingers on
to her frock, so that by the time of her sixth journey she looked as if
she had been rolled in the gutter. Muche chuckled with delight on
beholding her dreadful condition. He made her sit down beside him under
a rhododendron near the garden they had made, and told her that the
trees were already beginning to grow. He had taken hold of her hand and
called her his little wife.

“You’re not sorry now that you came, are you,” he asked, “instead of
mooning about on the pavement, where there was nothing to do? I know
all sorts of fun we can have in the streets; you must come with me
again. You will, won’t you? But you mustn’t say anything to your
mother, mind. If you say a word to her, I’ll pull your hair the next
time I come past your shop.”

Pauline consented to everything; and then, as a last attention, Muche
filled both pockets of her pinafore with mould. However, all the sweets
were finished, and the girl began to get uneasy, and ceased playing.
Muche thereupon started pinching her, and she burst into tears, sobbing
that she wanted to go away. But at this the lad only grinned, and
played the bully, threatening that he would not take her home at all.
Then she grew terribly alarmed, and sobbed and gasped like a maiden in
the power of a libertine. Muche would certainly have ended by punching
her in order to stop her row, had not a shrill voice, the voice of
Mademoiselle Saget, exclaimed, close by: “Why, I declare it’s Pauline!
Leave her alone, you wicked young scoundrel!”

Then the old maid took the girl by the hand, with endless expressions
of amazement at the pitiful condition of her clothes. Muche showed no
alarm, but followed them, chuckling to himself, and declaring that it
was Pauline who had wanted to come with him, and had tumbled down.

Mademoiselle Saget was a regular frequenter of the Square des
Innocents. Every afternoon she would spend a good hour there to keep
herself well posted in the gossip of the common people. On either side
there is a long crescent of benches placed end to end; and on these the
poor folks who stifle in the hovels of the neighbouring narrow streets
assemble in crowds. There are withered, chilly-looking old women in
tumbled caps, and young ones in loose jackets and carelessly fastened
skirts, with bare heads and tired, faded faces, eloquent of the
wretchedness of their lives. There are some men also: tidy old buffers,
porters in greasy jackets, and equivocal-looking individuals in black
silk hats, while the foot-path is overrun by a swarm of youngsters
dragging toy carts without wheels about, filling pails with sand, and
screaming and fighting; a dreadful crew, with ragged clothes and dirty
noses, teeming in the sunshine like vermin.

Mademoiselle Saget was so slight and thin that she always managed to
insinuate herself into a place on one of the benches. She listened to
what was being said, and started a conversation with her neighbour,
some sallow-faced workingman’s wife, who sat mending linen, from time
to time producing handkerchiefs and stockings riddled with holes from a
little basket patched up with string. Moreover, Mademoiselle Saget had
plenty of acquaintances here. Amidst the excruciating squalling of the
children, and the ceaseless rumble of the traffic in the Rue Saint
Denis, she took part in no end of gossip, everlasting tales about the
tradesmen of the neighbourhood, the grocers, the butchers, and the
bakers, enough, indeed, to fill the columns of a local paper, and the
whole envenomed by refusals of credit and covert envy, such as is
always harboured by the poor. From these wretched creatures she also
obtained the most disgusting revelations, the gossip of low
lodging-houses and doorkeepers’ black-holes, all the filthy scandal of
the neighbourhood, which tickled her inquisitive appetite like hot
spice.

As she sat with her face turned towards the markets, she had
immediately in front of her the square and its three blocks of houses,
into the windows of which her eyes tried to pry. She seemed to
gradually rise and traverse the successive floors right up to the
garret skylights. She stared at the curtains; based an entire drama on
the appearance of a head between two shutters; and, by simply gazing at
the facades, ended by knowing the history of all the dwellers in these
houses. The Baratte Restaurant, with its wine shop, its gilt
wrought-iron _marquise_, forming a sort of terrace whence peeped the
foliage of a few plants in flower-pots, and its four low storeys, all
painted and decorated, had an especial interest for her. She gazed at
its yellow columns standing out against a background of tender blue, at
the whole of its imitation temple-front daubed on the facade of a
decrepit, tumble-down house, crowned at the summit by a parapet of
painted zinc. Behind the red-striped window-blinds she espied visions
of nice little lunches, delicate suppers, and uproarious, unlimited
orgies. And she did not hesitate to invent lies about the place. It was
there, she declared, that Florent came to gorge with those two hussies,
the Mehudins, on whom he lavished his money.

However, Pauline cried yet louder than before when the old maid took
hold of her hand. Mademoiselle Saget at first led her towards the gate
of the square; but before she got there she seemed to change her mind;
for she sat down at the end of a bench and tried to pacify the child.

“Come, now, give over crying, or the policeman will lock you up,” she
said to Pauline. “I’ll take you home safely. You know me, don’t you?
I’m a good friend. Come, come, let me see how prettily you can smile.”

The child, however, was choking with sobs and wanted to go away.
Mademoiselle Saget thereupon quietly allowed her to continue weeping,
reserving further remarks till she should have finished. The poor
little creature was shivering all over; her petticoats and stockings
were wet through, and as she wiped her tears away with her dirty hands
she plastered the whole of her face with earth to the very tips of her
ears. When at last she became a little calmer the old maid resumed in a
caressing tone: “Your mamma isn’t unkind, is she? She’s very fond of
you, isn’t she?”

“Oh, yes, indeed,” replied Pauline, still sobbing.

“And your papa, he’s good to you, too, isn’t he? He doesn’t flog you,
or quarrel with your mother, does he? What do they talk about when they
go to bed?”

“Oh, I don’t know. I’m asleep then.”

“Do they talk about your cousin Florent?”

“I don’t know.”

Mademoiselle Saget thereupon assumed a severe expression, and got up as
if about to go away.

“I’m afraid you are a little story-teller,” she said. “Don’t you know
that it’s very wicked to tell stories? I shall go away and leave you,
if you tell me lies, and then Muche will come back and pinch you.”

Pauline began to cry again at the threat of being abandoned. “Be quiet,
be quiet, you wicked little imp!” cried the old maid shaking her.
“There, there, now, I won’t go away. I’ll buy you a stick of
barley-sugar; yes, a stick of barley-sugar! So you don’t love your
cousin Florent, eh?”

“No, mamma says he isn’t good.”

“Ah, then, so you see your mother does say something.”

“One night when I was in bed with Mouton—I sleep with Mouton sometimes,
you know—I heard her say to father, ‘Your brother has only escaped from
the galleys to take us all back with him there.’”

Mademoiselle Saget gave vent to a faint cry, and sprang to her feet,
quivering all over. A ray of light had just broken upon her. Then
without a word she caught hold of Pauline’s hand and made her run till
they reached the pork shop, her lips meanwhile compressed by an inward
smile, and her eyes glistening with keen delight. At the corner of the
Rue Pirouette, Muche, who had so far followed them, amused at seeing
the girl running along in her muddy stockings, prudently disappeared.

Lisa was now in a state of terrible alarm; and when she saw her
daughter so bedraggled and limp, her consternation was such that she
turned the child round and round, without even thinking of beating her.

“She has been with little Muche,” said the old maid, in her malicious
voice. “I took her away at once, and I’ve brought her home. I found
them together in the square. I don’t know what they’ve been up to; but
that young vagabond is capable of anything.”

Lisa could not find a word to say; and she did not know where to take
hold of her daughter, so great was her disgust at the sight of the
child’s muddy boots, soiled stockings, torn skirts, and filthy face and
hands. The blue velvet ribbon, the earrings, and the necklet were all
concealed beneath a crust of mud. But what put the finishing touch to
Lisa’s exasperation was the discovery of the two pockets filled with
mould. She stooped and emptied them, regardless of the pink and white
flooring of the shop. And as she dragged Pauline away, she could only
gasp: “Come along, you filthy thing!”

Quite enlivened by this scene, Mademoiselle Saget now hurriedly made
her way across the Rue Rambuteau. Her little feet scarcely touched the
ground; her joy seemed to carry her along like a breeze which fanned
her with a caressing touch. She had at last found out what she had so
much wanted to know! For nearly a year she had been consumed by
curiosity, and now at a single stroke she had gained complete power
over Florent! This was unhoped-for contentment, positive salvation, for
she felt that Florent would have brought her to the tomb had she failed
much longer in satisfying her curiosity about him. At present she was
complete mistress of the whole neighbourhood of the markets. There was
no longer any gap in her information. She could have narrated the
secret history of every street, shop by shop. And thus, as she entered
the fruit market, she fairly gasped with delight, in a perfect
transport of pleasure.

“Hallo, Mademoiselle Saget,” cried La Sarriette from her stall, “what
are you smiling to yourself like that about? Have you won the grand
prize in the lottery?”

“No, no. Ah, my dear, if you only knew!”

Standing there amidst her fruit, La Sarriette, in her picturesque
disarray, looked charming. Frizzy hair fell over her brow like vine
branches. Her bare arms and neck, indeed all the rosy flesh she showed,
bloomed with the freshness of peach and cherry. She had playfully hung
some cherries on her ears, black cherries which dangled against her
cheeks when she stooped, shaking with merry laughter. She was eating
currants, and her merriment arose from the way in which she was
smearing her face with them. Her lips were bright red, glistening with
the juice of the fruit, as though they had been painted and perfumed
with some seraglio face-paint. A perfume of plum exhaled from her gown,
while from the kerchief carelessly fastened across her breast came an
odour of strawberries.

Fruits of all kinds were piled around her in her narrow stall. On the
shelves at the back were rows of melons, so-called “cantaloups”
swarming with wart-like knots, “maraichers” whose skin was covered with
grey lace-like netting, and “culs-de-singe” displaying smooth bare
bumps. In front was an array of choice fruits, carefully arranged in
baskets, and showing like smooth round cheeks seeking to hide
themselves, or glimpses of sweet childish faces, half veiled by leaves.
Especially was this the case with the peaches, the blushing peaches of
Montreuil, with skin as delicate and clear as that of northern maidens,
and the yellow, sun-burnt peaches from the south, brown like the
damsels of Provence. The apricots, on their beds of moss, gleamed with
the hue of amber or with that sunset glow which so warmly colours the
necks of brunettes at the nape, just under the little wavy curls which
fall below the chignon. The cherries, ranged one by one, resembled the
short lips of smiling Chinese girls; the Montmorencies suggested the
dumpy mouths of buxom women; the English ones were longer and
graver-looking; the common black ones seemed as though they had been
bruised and crushed by kisses; while the white-hearts, with their
patches of rose and white, appeared to smile with mingled merriment and
vexation. Then piles of apples and pears, built up with architectural
symmetry, often in pyramids, displayed the ruddy glow of budding
breasts and the gleaming sheen of shoulders, quite a show of nudity,
lurking modestly behind a screen of fern-leaves. There were all sorts
of varieties—little red ones so tiny that they seemed to be yet in the
cradle, shapeless “rambours” for baking, “calvilles” in light yellow
gowns, sanguineous-looking “Canadas,” blotched “chataignier” apples,
fair freckled rennets and dusky russets. Then came the pears—the
“blanquettes,” the “British queens,” the “Beurres,” the “messirejeans,”
and the “duchesses”—some dumpy, some long and tapering, some with
slender necks, and others with thick-set shoulders, their green and
yellow bellies picked out at times with a splotch of carmine. By the
side of these the transparent plums resembled tender, chlorotic
virgins; the greengages and the Orleans plums paled as with modest
innocence, while the mirabelles lay like golden beads of a rosary
forgotten in a box amongst sticks of vanilla. And the strawberries
exhaled a sweet perfume—a perfume of youth—especially those little ones
which are gathered in the woods, and which are far more aromatic than
the large ones grown in gardens, for these breathe an insipid odour
suggestive of the watering-pot. Raspberries added their fragrance to
the pure scent. The currants—red, white, and black—smiled with a
knowing air; whilst the heavy clusters of grapes, laden with
intoxication, lay languorously at the edges of their wicker baskets,
over the sides of which dangled some of the berries, scorched by the
hot caresses of the voluptuous sun.

It was there that La Sarriette lived in an orchard, as it were, in an
atmosphere of sweet, intoxicating scents. The cheaper fruits—the
cherries, plums, and strawberries—were piled up in front of her in
paper-lined baskets, and the juice coming from their bruised ripeness
stained the stall-front, and steamed, with a strong perfume, in the
heat. She would feel quite giddy on those blazing July afternoons when
the melons enveloped her with a powerful, vaporous odour of musk; and
then with her loosened kerchief, fresh as she was with the springtide
of life, she brought sudden temptation to all who saw her. It was
she—it was her arms and necks which gave that semblance of amorous
vitality to her fruit. On the stall next to her an old woman, a hideous
old drunkard, displayed nothing but wrinkled apples, pears as flabby as
herself, and cadaverous apricots of a witch-like sallowness. La
Sarriette’s stall, however, spoke of love and passion. The cherries
looked like the red kisses of her bright lips; the silky peaches were
not more delicate than her neck; to the plums she seemed to have lent
the skin from her brow and chin; while some of her own crimson blood
coursed through the veins of the currants. All the scents of the avenue
of flowers behind her stall were but insipid beside the aroma of
vitality which exhaled from her open baskets and falling kerchief.

That day she was quite intoxicated by the scent of a large arrival of
mirabelle plums, which filled the market. She could plainly see that
Mademoiselle Saget had learnt some great piece of news, and she wished
to make her talk. But the old maid stamped impatiently whilst she
repeated: “No, no; I’ve no time. I’m in a great hurry to see Madame
Lecœur. I’ve just learnt something and no mistake. You can come with
me, if you like.”

As a matter of fact, she had simply gone through the fruit market for
the purpose of enticing La Sarriette to go with her. The girl could not
refuse temptation. Monsieur Jules, clean-shaven and as fresh as a
cherub, was seated there, swaying to and fro on his chair.

“Just look after the stall for a minute, will you?” La Sarriette said
to him. “I’ll be back directly.”

Jules, however, got up and called after her, in a thick voice: “Not I;
no fear! I’m off! I’m not going to wait an hour for you, as I did the
other day. And, besides, those cursed plums of yours quite make my head
ache.”

Then he calmly strolled off, with his hands in his pockets, and the
stall was left to look after itself. Mademoiselle Saget went so fast
that La Sarriette had to run. In the butter pavilion a neighbour of
Madame Lecœur’s told them that she was below in the cellar; and so,
whilst La Sarriette went down to find her, the old maid installed
herself amidst the cheeses.

The cellar under the butter market is a very gloomy spot. The rows of
storerooms are protected by a very fine wire meshing, as a safeguard
against fire; and the gas jets, which are very few and far between,
glimmer like yellow splotches destitute of radiance in the heavy,
malordorous atmosphere beneath the low vault. Madame Lecœur, however,
was at work on her butter at one of the tables placed parallel with the
Rue Berger, and here a pale light filtered through the vent-holes. The
tables, which are continually sluiced with a flood of water from the
taps, are as white as though they were quite new. With her back turned
to the pump in the rear, Madame Lecœur was kneading her butter in a
kind of oak box. She took some of different sorts which lay beside her,
and mixed the varieties together, correcting one by another, just as is
done in the blending of wines. Bent almost double, and showing sharp,
bony shoulders, and arms bared to the elbows, as scraggy and knotted as
pea-rods, she dug her fists into the greasy paste in front of her,
which was assuming a whitish and chalky appearance. It was trying work,
and she heaved a sigh at each fresh effort.

“Mademoiselle Saget wants to speak to you, aunt,” said La Sarriette.

Madame Lecœur stopped her work, and pulled her cap over her hair with
her greasy fingers, seemingly quite careless of staining it. “I’ve
nearly finished. Ask her to wait a moment,” she said.

“She’s got something very particular to tell you,” continued La
Sarriette.

“I won’t be more than a minute, my dear.”

Then she again plunged her arms into the butter, which buried them up
to the elbows. Previously softened in warm water, it covered Madame
Lecœur’s parchment-like skin as with an oily film, and threw the big
purple veins that streaked her flesh into strong relief. La Sarriette
was quite disgusted by the sight of those hideous arms working so
frantically amidst the melting mass. However, she could recall the time
when her own pretty little hands had manipulated the butter for whole
afternoons at a time. It had even been a sort of almond-paste to her, a
cosmetic which had kept her skin white and her nails delicately pink;
and even now her slender fingers retained the suppleness it had endowed
them with.

“I don’t think that butter of yours will be very good, aunt,” she
continued, after a pause. “Some of the sorts seem much too strong.”

“I’m quite aware of that,” replied Madame Lecœur, between a couple of
groans. “But what can I do? I must use everything up. There are some
folks who insist upon having butter cheap, and so cheap butter must be
made for them. Oh! it’s always quite good enough for those who buy it.”

La Sarriette reflected that she would hardly care to eat butter which
had been worked by her aunt’s arms. Then she glanced at a little jar
full of a sort of reddish dye. “Your colouring is too pale,” she said.

This colouring-matter—“raucourt,” as the Parisians call it is used to
give the butter a fine yellow tint. The butter women imagine that its
composition is known only to themselves, and keep it very secret.
However, it is merely made from anotta;[*] though a composition of
carrots and marigold is at times substituted for it.

[*] Anotta, which is obtained from the pulp surrounding the seeds of
the _Bixa Orellana_, is used for a good many purposes besides the
colouring of butter and cheese. It frequently enters into the
composition of chocolate, and is employed to dye nankeen. Police court
proceedings have also shown that it is well known to the London
milkmen, who are in the habit of adding water to their merchandise.
—Translator.


“Come, do be quick!” La Sarriette now exclaimed, for she was getting
impatient, and was, moreover, no longer accustomed to the malodorous
atmosphere of the cellar. “Mademoiselle Saget will be going. I fancy
she’s got something very important to tell you abut my uncle Gavard.”

On hearing this, Madame Lecœur abruptly ceased working. She at once
abandoned both butter and dye, and did not even wait to wipe her arms.
With a slight tap of her hand she settled her cap on her head again,
and made her way up the steps, at her niece’s heels, anxiously
repeating: “Do you really think that she’ll have gone away?”

She was reassured, however, on catching sight of Mademoiselle Saget
amidst the cheeses. The old maid had taken good care not to go away
before Madame Lecœur’s arrival. The three women seated themselves at
the far end of the stall, crowding closely together, and their faces
almost touching one another. Mademoiselle Saget remained silent for two
long minutes, and then, seeing that the others were burning with
curiosity, she began, in her shrill voice: “You know that Florent!
Well, I can tell you now where he comes from.”

For another moment she kept them in suspense; and then, in a deep,
melodramatic voice, she said: “He comes from the galleys!”

The cheeses were reeking around the three women. On the two shelves at
the far end of the stall were huge masses of butter: Brittany butters
overflowing from baskets; Normandy butters, wrapped in canvas, and
resembling models of stomachs over which some sculptor had thrown damp
cloths to keep them from drying; while other great blocks had been cut
into, fashioned into perpendicular rocky masses full of crevasses and
valleys, and resembling fallen mountain crests gilded by the pale sun
of an autumn evening.

Beneath the stall show-table, formed of a slab of red marble veined
with grey, baskets of eggs gleamed with a chalky whiteness; while on
layers of straw in boxes were Bondons, placed end to end, and Gournays,
arranged like medals, forming darker patches tinted with green. But it
was upon the table that the cheeses appeared in greatest profusion.
Here, by the side of the pound-rolls of butter lying on white-beet
leaves, spread a gigantic Cantal cheese, cloven here and there as by an
axe; then came a golden-hued Cheshire, and next a Gruyere, resembling a
wheel fallen from some barbarian chariot; whilst farther on were some
Dutch cheeses, suggesting decapitated heads suffused with dry blood,
and having all that hardness of skulls which in France has gained them
the name of “death’s heads.” Amidst the heavy exhalations of these, a
Parmesan set a spicy aroma. Then there came three Brie cheeses
displayed on round platters, and looking like melancholy extinct moons.
Two of them, very dry, were at the full; the third, in its second
quarter, was melting away in a white cream, which had spread into a
pool and flowed over the little wooden barriers with which an attempt
had been made to arrest its course. Next came some Port Saluts, similar
to antique discs, with exergues bearing their makers’ names in print. A
Romantour, in its tin-foil wrapper, suggested a bar of nougat or some
sweet cheese astray amidst all these pungent, fermenting curds. The
Roqueforts under their glass covers also had a princely air, their fat
faces marbled with blue and yellow, as though they were suffering from
some unpleasant malady such as attacks the wealthy gluttons who eat too
many truffles. And on a dish by the side of these, the hard grey goats’
milk cheeses, about the size of a child’s fist, resembled the pebbles
which the billy-goats send rolling down the stony paths as they clamber
along ahead of their flocks. Next came the strong smelling cheeses: the
Mont d’Ors, of a bright yellow hue, and exhaling a comparatively mild
odour; the Troyes, very thick, and bruised at the edges, and of a far
more pungent smell, recalling the dampness of a cellar; the Camemberts,
suggestive of high game; the square Neufchatels, Limbourgs, Marolles,
and Pont l’Eveques, each adding its own particular sharp scent to the
malodorous bouquet, till it became perfectly pestilential; the
Livarots, ruddy in hue, and as irritating to the throat as sulphur
fumes; and, lastly, stronger than all the others, the Olivets, wrapped
in walnut leaves, like the carrion which peasants cover with branches
as it lies rotting in the hedgerow under the blazing sun.

The heat of the afternoon had softened the cheeses; the patches of
mould on their crusts were melting, and glistening with tints of ruddy
bronze and verdigris. Beneath their cover of leaves, the skins of the
Olivets seemed to be heaving as with the slow, deep respiration of a
sleeping man. A Livarot was swarming with life; and in a fragile box
behind the scales a Gerome flavoured with aniseed diffused such a
pestilential smell that all around it the very flies had fallen
lifeless on the gray-veined slap of ruddy marble.

This Gerome was almost immediately under Mademoiselle Saget’s nose; so
she drew back, and leaned her head against the big sheets of white and
yellow paper which were hanging in a corner.

“Yes,” she repeated, with an expression of disgust, “he comes from the
galleys! Ah, those Quenu-Gradelles have no reason to put on so many
airs!”

Madame Lecœur and La Sarriette, however, had burst into exclamations of
astonishment: “It wasn’t possible, surely! What had he done to be sent
to the galleys? Could anyone, now, have ever suspected that Madame
Quenu, whose virtue was the pride of the whole neighbourhood, would
choose a convict for a lover?”

“Ah, but you don’t understand at all!” cried the old maid impatiently.
“Just listen, now, while I explain things. I was quite certain that I
had seen that great lanky fellow somewhere before.”

Then she proceeded to tell them Florent’s story. She had recalled to
mind a vague report which had circulated of a nephew of old Gradelle
being transported to Cayenne for murdering six gendarmes at a
barricade. She had even seen this nephew on one occasion in the Rue
Pirouette. The pretended cousin was undoubtedly the same man. Then she
began to bemoan her waning powers. Her memory was quite going, she
said; she would soon be unable to remember anything. And she bewailed
her perishing memory as bitterly as any learned man might bewail the
loss of his notes representing the work of a life-time, on seeing them
swept away by a gust of wind.

“Six gendarmes!” murmured La Sarriette, admiringly; “he must have a
very heavy fist!”

“And he’s made away with plenty of others, as well,” added Mademoiselle
Saget. “I shouldn’t advise you to meet him at night!”

“What a villain!” stammered out Madame Lecœur, quite terrified.

The slanting beams of the sinking sun were now enfilading the pavilion,
and the odour of the cheeses became stronger than ever. That of the
Marolles seemed to predominate, borne hither and thither in powerful
whiffs. Then, however, the wind appeared to change, and suddenly the
emanations of the Limbourgs were wafted towards the three women,
pungent and bitter, like the last gasps of a dying man.

“But in that case,” resumed Madame Lecœur, “he must be fat Lisa’s
brother-in-law. And we thought that he was her lover!”

The women exchanged glances. This aspect of the case took them by
surprise. They were loth to give up their first theory. However, La
Sarriette, turning to Mademoiselle Saget, remarked: “That must have
been all wrong. Besides, you yourself say that he’s always running
after the two Mehudin girls.”

“Certainly he is,” exclaimed Mademoiselle Saget sharply, fancying that
her word was doubted. “He dangles about them every evening. But, after
all, it’s no concern of ours, is it? We are virtuous women, and what he
does makes no difference to us, the horrid scoundrel!”

“No, certainly not,” agreed the other two. “He’s a consummate villain.”

The affair was becoming tragical. Of course beautiful Lisa was now out
of the question, but for this they found ample consolation in
prophesying that Florent would bring about some frightful catastrophe.
It was quite clear, they said, that he had got some base design in his
head. When people like him escaped from gaol it was only to burn
everything down; and if he had come to the markets it must assuredly be
for some abominable purpose. Then they began to indulge in the wildest
suppositions. The two dealers declared that they would put additional
padlocks to the doors of their storerooms; and La Sarriette called to
mind that a basket of peaches had been stolen from her during the
previous week. Mademoiselle Saget, however, quite frightened the two
others by informing them that that was not the way in which the Reds
behaved; they despised such trifles as baskets of peaches; their plan
was to band themselves together in companies of two or three hundred,
kill everybody they came across, and then plunder and pillage at their
ease. That was “politics,” she said, with the superior air of one who
knew what she was talking about. Madame Lecœur felt quite ill. She
already saw Florent and his accomplices hiding in the cellars, and
rushing out during the night to set the markets in flames and sack
Paris.

“Ah! by the way,” suddenly exclaimed the old maid, “now I think of it,
there’s all that money of old Gradelle’s! Dear me, dear me, those
Quenus can’t be at all at their ease!”

She now looked quite gay again. The conversation took a fresh turn, and
the others fell foul of the Quenus when Mademoiselle Saget had told
them the history of the treasure discovered in the salting-tub, with
every particular of which she was acquainted. She was even able to
inform them of the exact amount of the money found—eighty-five thousand
francs—though neither Lisa nor Quenu was aware of having revealed this
to a living soul. However, it was clear that the Quenus had not given
the great lanky fellow his share. He was too shabbily dressed for that.
Perhaps he had never even heard of the discovery of the treasure.
Plainly enough, they were all thieves in his family. Then the three
women bent their heads together and spoke in lower tones. They were
unanimously of opinion that it might perhaps be dangerous to attack the
beautiful Lisa, but it was decidedly necessary that they should settle
the Red Republican’s hash, so that he might no longer prey upon the
purse of poor Monsieur Gavard.

At the mention of Gavard there came a pause. The gossips looked at each
other with a circumspect air. And then, as they drew breath, they
inhaled the odour of the Camemberts, whose gamy scent had overpowered
the less penetrating emanations of the Marolles and the Limbourgs, and
spread around with remarkable power. Every now and then, however, a
slight whiff, a flutelike note, came from the Parmesan, while the Bries
contributed a soft, musty scent, the gentle, insipid sound, as it were,
of damp tambourines. Next followed an overpowering refrain from the
Livarots, and afterwards the Gerome, flavoured with aniseed, kept up
the symphony with a high prolonged note, like that of a vocalist during
a pause in the accompaniment.

“I have seen Madame Leonce,” Mademoiselle Saget at last continued, with
a significant expression.

At this the two others became extremely attentive. Madame Leonce was
the doorkeeper of the house where Gavard lived in the Rue de la
Cossonnerie. It was an old house standing back, with its ground floor
occupied by an importer of oranges and lemons, who had had the frontage
coloured blue as high as the first floor. Madame Leonce acted as
Gavard’s housekeeper, kept the keys of his cupboards and closets, and
brought him up tisane when he happened to catch cold. She was a
severe-looking woman, between fifty and sixty years of age, and spoke
slowly, but at endless length. Mademoiselle Saget, who went to drink
coffee with her every Wednesday evening, had cultivated her friendship
more closely than ever since the poultry dealer had gone to lodge in
the house. They would talk about the worthy man for hours at a time.
They both professed the greatest affection for him, and a keen desire
to ensure his comfort and happiness.

“Yes, I have seen Madame Leonce,” repeated the old maid. “We had a cup
of coffee together last night. She was greatly worried. It seems that
Monsieur Gavard never comes home now before one o’clock in the morning.
Last Sunday she took him up some broth, as she thought he looked quite
ill.”

“Oh, she knows very well what she’s about,” exclaimed Madame Lecœur,
whom these attentions to Gavard somewhat alarmed.

Mademoiselle Saget felt bound to defend her friend. “Oh, really, you
are quite mistaken,” said she. “Madame Leonce is much above her
position; she is quite a lady. If she wanted to enrich herself at
Monsieur Gavard’s expense, she might easily have done so long ago. It
seems that he leaves everything lying about in the most careless
fashion. It’s about that, indeed, that I want to speak to you. But
you’ll not repeat anything I say, will you? I am telling it you in
strict confidence.”

Both the others swore that they would never breathe a word of what they
might hear; and they craned out their necks with eager curiosity,
whilst the old maid solemnly resumed: “Well, then, Monsieur Gavard has
been behaving very strangely of late. He has been buying firearms—a
great big pistol—one of those which revolve, you know. Madame Leonce
says that things are awful, for this pistol is always lying about on
the table or the mantelpiece; and she daren’t dust anywhere near it.
But that isn’t all. His money—”

“His money!” echoed Madame Lecœur, with blazing cheeks.

“Well, he’s disposed of all his stocks and shares. He’s sold
everything, and keeps a great heap of gold in a cupboard.”

“A heap of gold!” exclaimed La Sarriette in ecstasy.

“Yes, a great heap of gold. It covers a whole shelf, and is quite
dazzling. Madame Leonce told me that one morning Gavard opened the
cupboard in her presence, and that the money quite blinded her, it
shone so.”

There was another pause. The eyes of the three women were blinking as
though the dazzling pile of gold was before them. Presently La
Sarriette began to laugh.

“What a jolly time I would have with Jules if my uncle would give that
money to me!” said she.

Madame Lecœur, however, seemed quite overwhelmed by this revelation,
crushed beneath the weight of the gold which she could not banish from
her sight. Covetous envy thrilled her. But at last, raising her skinny
arms and shrivelled hands, her finger-nails still stuffed with butter,
she stammered in a voice full of bitter distress: “Oh, I mustn’t think
of it! It’s too dreadful!”

“Well, it would all be yours, you know, if anything were to happen to
Monsieur Gavard,” retorted Mademoiselle Saget. “If I were in your
place, I would look after my interests. That revolver means nothing
good, you may depend upon it. Monsieur Gavard has got into the hands of
evil counsellors; and I’m afraid it will all end badly.”

Then the conversation again turned upon Florent. The three women
assailed him more violently than ever. And afterwards, with perfect
composure, they began to discuss what would be the result of all these
dark goings-on so far as he and Gavard were concerned; certainly it
would be no pleasant one if there was any gossiping. And thereupon they
swore that they themselves would never repeat a word of what they knew;
not, however, because that scoundrel Florent merited any consideration,
but because it was necessary, at all costs, to save that worthy
Monsieur Gavard from being compromised. Then they rose from their
seats, and Mademoiselle Saget was burning as if to go away when the
butter dealer asked her: “All the same, in case of accident, do you
think that Madame Leonce can be trusted? I dare say she has the key of
the cupboard.”

“Well, that’s more than I can tell you,” replied the old maid. “I
believe she’s a very honest woman; but, after all, there’s no telling.
There are circumstances, you know, which tempt the best of people.
Anyhow, I’ve warned you both; and you must do what you think proper.”

As the three women stood there, taking leave of each other, the odour
of the cheeses seemed to become more pestilential than ever. It was a
cacophony of smells, ranging from the heavily oppressive odour of the
Dutch cheeses and the Gruyeres to the alkaline pungency of the Olivets.
From the Cantal, the Cheshire, and the goats’ milk cheeses there seemed
to come a deep breath like the sound of a bassoon, amidst which the
sharp, sudden whiffs of the Neufchatels, the Troyes, and the Mont d’Ors
contributed short, detached notes. And then the different odours
appeared to mingle one with another, the reek of the Limbourgs, the
Port Saluts, the Geromes, the Marolles, the Livarots, and the Pont
l’Eveques uniting in one general, overpowering stench sufficient to
provoke asphyxia. And yet it almost seemed as though it were not the
cheeses but the vile words of Madame Lecœur and Mademoiselle Saget that
diffused this awful odour.

“I’m very much obliged to you, indeed I am,” said the butter dealer.
“If ever I get rich, you shall not find yourself forgotten.”

The old maid still lingered in the stall. Taking up a Bondon, she
turned it round, and put it down on the slab again. Then she asked its
price.

“To me!” she added, with a smile.

“Oh, nothing to you,” replied Madame Lecœur. “I’ll make you a present
of it.” And again she exclaimed: “Ah, if I were only rich!”

Mademoiselle Saget thereupon told her that some day or other she would
be rich. The Bondon had already disappeared within the old maid’s bag.
And now the butter dealer returned to the cellar, while Mademoiselle
Saget escorted La Sarriette back to her stall. On reaching it they
talked for a moment or two about Monsieur Jules. The fruits around them
diffused a fresh scent of summer.

“It smells much nicer here than at your aunt’s,” said the old maid. “I
felt quite ill a little time ago. I can’t think how she manages to
exist there. But here it’s very sweet and pleasant. It makes you look
quite rosy, my dear.”

La Sarriette began to laugh, for she was fond of compliments. Then she
served a lady with a pound of mirabelle plums, telling her that they
were as sweet as sugar.

“I should like to buy some of those mirabelles too,” murmured
Mademoiselle Saget, when the lady had gone away; “only I want so few. A
lone woman, you know.”

“Take a handful of them,” exclaimed the pretty brunette. “That won’t
ruin me. Send Jules back to me if you see him, will you? You’ll most
likely find him smoking his cigar on the first bench to the right as
you turn out of the covered way.”

Mademoiselle Saget distended her fingers as widely as possible in order
to take a handful of mirabelles, which joined the Bondon in the bag.
Then she pretended to leave the market, but in reality made a detour by
one of the covered ways, thinking, as she walked slowly along, that the
mirabelles and Bondon would not make a very substantial dinner. When
she was unable, during her afternoon perambulations, to wheedle
stallkeepers into filling her bag for her, she was reduced to dining
off the merest scraps. So she now slyly made her way back to the butter
pavilions, where, on the side of the Rue Berger, at the back of the
offices of the oyster salesmen, there were some stalls at which cooked
meat was sold. Every morning little closed box-like carts, lined with
zinc and furnished with ventilators, drew up in front of the larger
Parisian kitchens and carried away the leavings of the restaurants, the
embassies, and State Ministries. These leavings were conveyed to the
market cellars and there sorted. By nine o’clock plates of food were
displayed for sale at prices ranging from three to five sous, their
contents comprising slices of meat, scraps of game, heads and tails of
fishes, bits of galantine, stray vegetables, and, by way of dessert,
cakes scarcely cut into, and other confectionery. Poor starving
wretches, scantily-paid clerks, and women shivering with fever were to
be seen crowding around, and the street lads occasionally amused
themselves by hooting the pale-faced individuals, known to be misers,
who only made their purchases after slyly glancing about them to see
that they were not observed.[*] Mademoiselle Saget wriggled her way to
a stall, the keeper of which boasted that the scraps she sold came
exclusively from the Tuileries. One day, indeed, she had induced the
old maid to buy a slice of leg of mutton by informing that it had come
from the plate of the Emperor himself; and this slice of mutton, eaten
with no little pride, had been a soothing consolation to Mademoiselle
Saget’s vanity. The wariness of her approach to the stall was,
moreover, solely caused by her desire to keep well with the
neighbouring shop people, whose premises she was eternally haunting
without ever buying anything. Her usual tactics were to quarrel with
them as soon as she had managed to learn their histories, when she
would bestow her patronage upon a fresh set, desert it in due course,
and then gradually make friends again with those with whom she had
quarrelled. In this way she made the complete circuit of the market
neighbourhood, ferreting about in every shop and stall. Anyone would
have imagined that she consumed an enormous amount of provisions,
whereas, in point of fact, she lived solely upon presents and the few
scraps which she was compelled to buy when people were not in the
giving vein.

[*] The dealers in these scraps are called _bijoutiers_, or jewellers,
whilst the scraps themselves are known as _harlequins_, the idea being
that they are of all colours and shapes when mingled together, thus
suggesting harlequin’s variegated attire.—Translator.


On that particular evening there was only a tall old man standing in
front of the stall. He was sniffing at a plate containing a mixture of
meat and fish. Mademoiselle Saget, in her turn, began to sniff at a
plate of cold fried fish. The price of it was three sous, but, by dint
of bargaining, she got it for two. The cold fish then vanished into the
bag. Other customers now arrived, and with a uniform impulse lowered
their noses over the plates. The smell of the stall was very
disgusting, suggestive alike of greasy dishes and a dirty sink.[*]

[*] Particulars of the strange and repulsive trade in harlequins, which
even nowadays is not extinct, will be found in Privat d’Anglemont’s
well-known book _Paris Anecdote_, written at the very period with which
M. Zola deals in the present work. My father, Henry Vizetelly, also
gave some account of it in his _Glances Back through Seventy Years_, in
a chapter describing the odd ways in which certain Parisians contrive
to get a living.—Translator.


“Come and see me to-morrow,” the stallkeeper called out to the old
maid, “and I’ll put something nice on one side for you. There’s going
to be a grand dinner at the Tuileries to-night.”

Mademoiselle Saget was just promising to come, when, happening to turn
round, she discovered Gavard looking at her and listening to what she
was saying. She turned very red, and, contracting her skinny shoulders,
hurried away, affecting not to recognise him. Gavard, however, followed
her for a few yards, shrugging his shoulders and muttering to himself
that he was no longer surprised at the old shrew’s malice, now he knew
that “she poisoned herself with the filth carted away from the
Tuileries.”

On the very next morning vague rumours began to circulate in the
markets. Madame Lecœur and La Sarriette were in their own fashion
keeping the oaths of silence they had taken. For her own part,
Mademoiselle Saget warily held her tongue, leaving the two others to
circulate the story of Florent’s antecedents. At first only a few
meagre details were hawked about in low tones; then various versions of
the facts got into circulation, incidents were exaggerated, and
gradually quite a legend was constructed, in which Florent played the
part of a perfect bogey man. He had killed ten gendarmes at the
barricade in the Rue Greneta, said some; he had returned to France on a
pirate ship whose crew scoured the seas to murder everyone they came
across, said others; whilst a third set declared that ever since his
arrival he had been observed prowling about at nighttime with
suspicious-looking characters, of whom he was undoubtedly the leader.
Soon the imaginative market women indulged in the highest flights of
fancy, revelled in the most melodramatic ideas. There was talk of a
band of smugglers plying their nefarious calling in the very heart of
Paris, and of a vast central association formed for systematically
robbing the stalls in the markets. Much pity was expressed for the
Quenu-Gradelles, mingled with malicious allusions to their uncle’s
fortune. That fortune was an endless subject of discussion. The general
opinion was that Florent had returned to claim his share of the
treasure; however, as no good reason was forthcoming to explain why the
division had not taken place already, it was asserted that Florent was
waiting for some opportunity which might enable him to pocket the whole
amount. The Quenu-Gradelles would certainly be found murdered some
morning, it was said; and a rumour spread that dreadful quarrels
already took place every night between the two brothers and beautiful
Lisa.

When these stories reached the ears of the beautiful Norman, she
shrugged her shoulders and burst out laughing.

“Get away with you!” she cried, “you don’t know him. Why, the dear
fellow’s as gentle as a lamb.”

She had recently refused the hand of Monsieur Lebigre, who had at last
ventured upon a formal proposal. For two months past he had given the
Mehudins a bottle of some liqueur every Sunday. It was Rose who brought
it, and she was always charged with a compliment for La Normande, some
pretty speech which she faithfully repeated, without appearing in the
slightest degree embarrassed by the peculiar commission. When Monsieur
Lebigre was rejected, he did not pine, but to show that he took no
offence and was still hopeful, he sent Rose on the following Sunday
with two bottles of champagne and a large bunch of flowers. She gave
them into the handsome fish-girl’s own hands, repeating, as she did so,
the wine dealer’s prose madrigal:

“Monsieur Lebigre begs you to drink this to his health, which has been
greatly shaken by you know what. He hopes that you will one day be
willing to cure him, by being for him as pretty and as sweet as these
flowers.”

La Normande was much amused by the servant’s delighted air. She kissed
her as she spoke to her of her master, and asked her if he wore braces,
and snored at nights. Then she made her take the champagne and flowers
back with her. “Tell Monsieur Lebigre,” said she, “that he’s not to
send you here again. It quite vexes me to see you coming here so
meekly, with your bottles under your arms.”

“Oh, he wishes me to come,” replied Rose, as she went away. “It is
wrong of you to distress him. He is a very handsome man.”

La Normande, however, was quite conquered by Florent’s affectionate
nature. She continued to follow Muche’s lessons of an evening in the
lamplight, indulging the while in a dream of marrying this man who was
so kind to children. She would still keep her fish stall, while he
would doubtless rise to a position of importance in the administrative
staff of the markets. This dream of hers, however, was scarcely
furthered by the tutor’s respectful bearing towards her. He bowed to
her, and kept himself at a distance, when she have liked to laugh with
him, and love him as she knew how to love. But it was just this covert
resistance on Florent’s part which continually brought her back to the
dream of marrying him. She realised that he lived in a loftier sphere
than her own; and by becoming his wife she imagined that her vanity
would reap no little satisfaction.

She was greatly surprised when she learned the history of the man she
loved. He had never mentioned a word of those things to her; and she
scolded him about it. His extraordinary adventures only increased her
tenderness for him, and for evenings together she made him relate all
that had befallen him. She trembled with fear lest the police should
discover him; but he reassured her, saying that the matter was now too
old for the police to trouble their heads about it. One evening he told
her of the woman on the Boulevard Montmartre, the woman in the pink
bonnet, whose blood had dyed his hands. He still frequently thought of
that poor creature. His anguish-stricken mind had often dwelt upon her
during the clear nights he had passed in Cayenne; and he had returned
to France with a wild dream of meeting her again on some footway in the
bright sunshine, even though he could still feel her corpse-like weight
across his legs. And yet, he thought, she might perhaps have recovered.
At times he received quite a shock while he was walking through the
streets, on fancying that he recognised her; and he followed pink
bonnets and shawl-draped shoulders with a wildly beating heart. When he
closed his eyes he could see her walking, and advancing towards him;
but she let her shawl slip down, showing the two red stains on her
chemisette; and then he saw that her face was pale as wax, and that her
eyes were blank, and her lips distorted by pain. For a long time he
suffered from not knowing her name, from being forced to look upon her
as a mere shadow, whose recollection filled him with sorrow. Whenever
any idea of woman crossed his mind it was always she that rose up
before him, as the one pure, tender wife. He often found himself
fancying that she might be looking for him on that boulevard where she
had fallen dead, and that if she had met him a few seconds sooner she
would have given him a life of joy. And he wished for no other wife;
none other existed for him. When he spoke of her, his voice trembled to
such a degree that La Normande, her wits quickened by her love, guessed
his secret, and felt jealous.

“Oh, it’s really much better that you shouldn’t see her again,” she
said maliciously. “She can’t look particularly nice by this time.”

Florent turned pale with horror at the vision which these words evoked.
His love was rotting in her grave. He could not forgive La Normande’s
savage cruelty, which henceforth made him see the grinning jaws and
hollow eyes of a skeleton within that lovely pink bonnet. Whenever the
fish-girl tried to joke with him on the subject he turned quite angry,
and silenced her with almost coarse language.

That, however, which especially surprised the beautiful Norman in these
revelations was the discovery that she had been quite mistaken in
supposing that she was enticing a lover away from handsome Lisa. This
so diminished her feeling of triumph, that for a week or so her love
for Florent abated. She consoled herself, however, with the story of
the inheritance, no longer calling Lisa a strait-laced prude, but a
thief who kept back her brother-in-law’s money, and assumed
sanctimonious airs to deceive people. Every evening, while Muche took
his writing lesson, the conversation turned upon old Gradelle’s
treasure.

“Did anyone ever hear of such an idea?” the fish-girl would exclaim,
with a laugh. “Did the old man want to salt his money, since he put it
in a salting-tub? Eighty-five thousand francs! That’s a nice sum of
money! And, besides, the Quenus, no doubt, lied about it—there was
perhaps two or three times as much. Ah, if I were in your place, I
shouldn’t lose any time about claiming my share; indeed I shouldn’t.”

“I’ve no need of anything,” was Florent’s invariable answer. “I
shouldn’t know what to do with the money if I had it.”

“Oh, you’re no man!” cried La Normande, losing all control over
herself. “It’s pitiful! Can’t you see that the Quenus are laughing at
you? That great fat thing passes all her husband’s old clothes over to
you. I’m not saying this to hurt your feelings, but everybody makes
remarks about it. Why, the whole neighbourhood has seen the greasy pair
of trousers, which you’re now wearing, on your brother’s legs for three
years and more! If I were in your place I’d throw their dirty rags in
their faces, and insist upon my rights. Your share comes to forty-two
thousand five hundred francs, doesn’t it? Well, I shouldn’t go out of
the place till I’d got forty-two thousand five hundred francs.”

It was useless for Florent to explain to her that his sister-in-law had
offered to pay him his share, that she was taking care of it for him,
and that it was he himself who had refused to receive it. He entered
into the most minute particulars, seeking to convince her of the
Quenus’ honesty, but she sarcastically replied: “Oh, yes, I dare say! I
know all about their honesty. That fat thing folds it up every morning
and puts it away in her wardrobe for fear it should get soiled. Really,
I quite pity you, my poor friend. It’s easy to gull you, for you can’t
see any further than a child of five. One of these days she’ll simply
put your money in her pocket, and you’ll never look on it again. Shall
I go, now, and claim your share for you, just to see what she says?
There’d be some fine fun, I can tell you! I’d either have the money, or
I’d break everything in the house—I swear I would!”

“No, no, it’s no business of yours,” Florent replied, quite alarmed.
“I’ll see about it; I may possibly be wanting some money soon.”

At this La Normande assumed an air of doubt, shrugged her shoulders,
and told him that he was really too chicken-hearted. Her one great aim
now was to embroil him with the Quenu-Gradelles, and she employed every
means she could think of to effect her purpose, both anger and banter,
as well as affectionate tenderness. She also cherished another design.
When she had succeeded in marrying Florent, she would go and administer
a sound cuffing to beautiful Lisa, if the latter did not yield up the
money. As she lay awake in her bed at night she pictured every detail
of the scene. She saw herself sitting down in the middle of the pork
shop in the busiest part of the day, and making a terrible fuss. She
brooded over this idea to such an extent, it obtained such a hold upon
her, that she would have been willing to marry Florent simply in order
to be able to go and demand old Gradelle’s forty-two thousand five
hundred francs.

Old Madame Mehudin, exasperated by La Normande’s dismissal of Monsieur
Lebigre, proclaimed everywhere that her daughter was mad, and that the
“long spindle-shanks” must have administered some insidious drug to
her. When she learned the Cayenne story, her anger was terrible. She
called Florent a convict and murderer, and said it was no wonder that
his villainy had kept him lank and flat. Her versions of Florent’s
biography were the most horrible of all that were circulated in the
neighbourhood. At home she kept a moderately quiet tongue in her head,
and restricted herself to muttered indignation, and a show of locking
up the drawer where the silver was kept whenever Florent arrived. One
day, however, after a quarrel with her elder daughter, she exclaimed:

“Things can’t go on much longer like this! It is that vile man who is
setting you against me. Take care that you don’t try me too far, or
I’ll go and denounce him to the police. I will, as true as I stand
here!”

“You’ll denounce him!” echoed La Normande, trembling violently, and
clenching her fists. “You’d better not! Ah, if you weren’t my mother——”

At this, Claire, who was a spectator of the quarrel, began to laugh,
with a nervous laughter that seemed to rasp her throat. For some time
past she had been gloomier and more erratic than ever, invariably
showing red eyes and a pale face.

“Well, what would you do?” she asked. “Would you give her a cuffing?
Perhaps you’d like to give me, your sister, one as well? I dare say it
will end in that. But I’ll clear the house of him. I’ll go to the
police to save mother the trouble.”

Then, as La Normande almost choked with the angry threats that rose to
her throat, the younger girl added: “I’ll spare you the exertion of
beating me. I’ll throw myself into the river as I come back over the
bridge.”

Big tears were streaming from her eyes; and she rushed off to her
bedroom, banging the doors violently behind her. Old Madame Mehudin
said nothing more about denouncing Florent. Muche, however, told La
Normande that he met his grandma talking with Monsieur Lebigre in every
corner of the neighbourhood.

The rivalry between the beautiful Norman and the beautiful Lisa now
assumed a less aggressive but more disturbing character. In the
afternoon, when the red-striped canvas awning was drawn down in front
of the pork shop, the fish-girl would remark that the big fat thing
felt afraid, and was concealing herself. She was also much exasperated
by the occasional lowering of the window-blind, on which was pictured a
hunting-breakfast in a forest glade, with ladies and gentlemen in
evening dress partaking of a red pasty, as big as themselves, on the
yellow grass.

Beautiful Lisa, however, was by no means afraid. As soon as the sun
began to sink she drew up the blind; and, as she sat knitting behind
her counter, she serenely scanned the market square, where numerous
urchins were poking about in the soil under the gratings which
protected the roots of the plane-trees, while porters smoked their
pipes on the benches along the footway, at either end of which was an
advertisement column covered with theatrical posters, alternately
green, yellow, red, and blue, like some harlequin’s costume. And while
pretending to watch the passing vehicles, Lisa would really be
scrutinising the beautiful Norman. She might occasionally be seen
bending forward, as though her eyes were following the Bastille and
Place Wagram omnibus to the Pointe Saint Eustache, where it always
stopped for a time. But this was only a manoeuvre to enable her to get
a better view of the fish-girl, who, as a set-off against the blind,
retorted by covering her head and fish with large sheets of brown
paper, on the pretext of warding off the rays of the setting sun. The
advantage at present was on Lisa’s side, for as the time for striking
the decisive blow approached she manifested the calmest serenity of
bearing, whereas her rival, in spite of all her efforts to attain the
same air of distinction, always lapsed into some piece of gross
vulgarity, which she afterwards regretted. La Normande’s ambition was
to look “like a lady.” Nothing irritated her more than to hear people
extolling the good manners of her rival. This weak point of hers had
not escaped old Madame Mehudin’s observation, and she now directed all
her attacks upon it.

“I saw Madame Quenu standing at her door this evening,” she would say
sometimes. “It is quite amazing how well she wears. And she’s so
refined-looking, too; quite the lady, indeed. It’s the counter that
does it, I’m sure. A fine counter gives a woman such a respectable
look.”

In this remark there was a veiled allusion to Monsieur Lebigre’s
proposal. The beautiful Norman would make no reply; but for a moment or
two she would seem deep in thought. In her mind’s eye she saw herself
behind the counter of the wine shop at the other corner of the street,
forming a pendent, as it were, to beautiful Lisa. It was this that
first shook her love for Florent.

To tell the truth, it was now becoming a very difficult thing to defend
Florent. The whole neighbourhood was in arms against him; it seemed as
though everyone had an immediate interest in exterminating him. Some of
the market people swore that he had sold himself to the police; while
others asserted that he had been seen in the butter-cellar, attempting
to make holes in the wire grating, with the intention of tossing
lighted matches through them. There was a vast increase of slander, a
perfect flood of abuse, the source of which could not be exactly
determined. The fish pavilion was the last one to join in the revolt
against the inspector. The fish-wives liked Florent on account of his
gentleness, and for some time they defended him; but, influenced by the
stallkeepers of the butter and fruit pavilions, they at last gave way.
Then hostilities began afresh between these huge, swelling women and
the lean and lank inspector. He was lost in the whirl of the voluminous
petticoats and buxom bodices which surged furiously around his scraggy
shoulders. However, he understood nothing, but pursued his course
towards the realisation of his one haunting idea.

At every hour of the day, and in every corner of the market,
Mademoiselle Saget’s black bonnet was now to be seen in the midst of
this outburst of indignation. Her little pale face seemed to multiply.
She had sworn a terrible vengeance against the company which assembled
in Monsieur Lebigre’s little cabinet. She accused them of having
circulated the story that she lived on waste scraps of meat. The truth
was that old Gavard had told the others one evening that the “old
nanny-goat” who came to play the spy upon them gorged herself with the
filth which the Bonapartist clique tossed away. Clemence felt quite ill
on hearing this, and Robine hurriedly gulped down a draught of beer, as
though to wash his throat. In Gavard’s opinion, the scraps of meat left
on the Emperor’s plate were so much political ordure, the putrid
remnants of all the filth of the reign. Thenceforth the party at
Monsieur Lebigre’s looked on Mademoiselle Saget as a creature whom no
one could touch except with tongs. She was regarded as some unclean
animal that battened upon corruption. Clemence and Gavard circulated
the story so freely in the markets that the old maid found herself
seriously injured in her intercourse with the shopkeepers, who
unceremoniously bade her go off to the scrap-stalls when she came to
haggle and gossip at their establishments without the least intention
of buying anything. This cut her off from her sources of information;
and sometimes she was altogether ignorant of what was happening. She
shed tears of rage, and in one such moment of anger she bluntly said to
La Sarriette and Madame Lecœur: “You needn’t give me any more hints:
I’ll settle your Gavard’s hash for him now—that I will!”

The two women were rather startled, but refrained from all
protestation. The next day, however, Mademoiselle Saget had calmed
down, and again expressed much tender-hearted pity for that poor
Monsieur Gavard who was so badly advised, and was certainly hastening
to his ruin.

Gavard was undoubtedly compromising himself. Ever since the conspiracy
had begun to ripen he had carried the revolver, which caused Madame
Leonce so much alarm, in his pocket wherever he went. It was a big,
formidable-looking weapon, which he had bought of the principal
gunmaker in Paris. He exhibited it to all the women in the poultry
market, like a schoolboy who has got some prohibited novel hidden in
his desk. First he would allow the barrel to peer out of his pocket,
and call attention to it with a wink. Then he affected a mysterious
reticence, indulged in vague hints and insinuations—played, in short,
the part of a man who revelled in feigning fear. The possession of this
revolver gave him immense importance, placed him definitely amongst the
dangerous characters of Paris. Sometimes, when he was safe inside his
stall, he would consent to take it out of his pocket, and exhibit it to
two or three of the women. He made them stand before him so as to
conceal him with their petticoats, and then he brandished the weapon,
cocked the lock, caused the breech to revolve, and took aim at one of
the geese or turkeys that were hanging in the stall. He was immensely
delighted at the alarm manifested by the women; but eventually
reassured them by stating that the revolver was not loaded. However, he
carried a supply of cartridges about with him, in a case which he
opened with the most elaborate precautions. When he had allowed his
friends to feel the weight of the cartridges, he would again place both
weapon and ammunition in his pockets. And afterwards, crossing his arms
over his breast, he would chatter away jubilantly for hours.

“A man’s a man when he’s got a weapon like that,” he would say with a
swaggering air. “I don’t care a fig now for the gendarmes. A friend and
I went to try it last Sunday on the plain of Saint Denis. Of course,
you know, a man doesn’t tell everyone that he’s got a plaything of that
sort. But, ah! my dears, we fired at a tree, and hit it every time. Ah,
you’ll see, you’ll see. You’ll hear of Anatole one of these days, I can
tell you.”

He had bestowed the name of Anatole upon the revolver; and he carried
things so far that in a week’s time both weapon and cartridges were
known to all the women in the pavilion. His friendship for Florent
seemed to them suspicious; he was too sleek and rich to be visited with
the hatred that was manifested towards the inspector; still, he lost
the esteem of the shrewder heads amongst his acquaintances, and
succeeded in terrifying the timid ones. This delighted him immensely.

“It is very imprudent for a man to carry firearms about with him,” said
Mademoiselle Saget. “Monsieur Gavard’s revolver will end by playing him
a nasty trick.”

Gavard now showed the most jubilant bearing at Monsieur Lebigre’s.
Florent, since ceasing to take his meals with the Quenus, had come
almost to live in the little “cabinet.” He breakfasted, dined, and
constantly shut himself up there. In fact he had converted the place
almost into a sort of private room of his own, where he left his old
coats and books and papers lying about. Monsieur Lebigre had offered no
objection to these proceedings; indeed, he had even removed one of the
tables to make room for a cushioned bench, on which Florent could have
slept had he felt so inclined. When the inspector manifested any
scruples about taking advantage of Monsieur Lebigre’s kindness, the
latter told him to do as he pleased, saying that the whole house was at
his service. Logre also manifested great friendship for him, and even
constituted himself his lieutenant. He was constantly discussing
affairs with him, rendering an account of the steps he was supposed to
take, and furnishing the names of newly affiliated associates. Logre,
indeed, had now assumed the duties of organiser; on him rested the task
of bringing the various plotters together, forming the different
sections, and weaving each mesh of the gigantic net into which Paris
was to fall at a given signal. Florent meantime remained the leader,
the soul of the conspiracy.

However, much as the hunchback seemed to toil, he attained no
appreciable result. Although he had loudly asserted that in each
district of Paris he knew two or three groups of men as determined and
trustworthy as those who met at Monsieur Lebigre’s, he had never yet
given any precise information about them, but had merely mentioned a
name here and there, and recounted stories of endless alleged secret
expeditions, and the wonderful enthusiasm that the people manifested
for the cause. He made a great point of the hand-grasps he had
received. So-and-so, whom he thou’d and thee’d, had squeezed his
fingers and declared he would join them. At the Gros Caillou a big,
burly fellow, who would make a magnificent sectional leader, had almost
dislocated his arm in his enthusiasm; while in the Rue Popincourt a
whole group of working men had embraced him. He declared that at a
day’s notice a hundred thousand active supporters could be gathered
together. Each time that he made his appearance in the little room,
wearing an exhausted air, and dropping with apparent fatigue on the
bench, he launched into fresh variations of his usual reports, while
Florent duly took notes of what he said, and relied on him to realise
his many promises. And soon in Florent’s pockets the plot assumed life.
The notes were looked upon as realities, as indisputable facts, upon
which the entire plan of the rising was constructed. All that now
remained to be done was to wait for a favourable opportunity, and Logre
asserted with passionate gesticulations that the whole thing would go
on wheels.

Florent was at last perfectly happy. His feet no longer seemed to tread
the ground; he was borne aloft by his burning desire to pass sentence
on all the wickedness he had seen committed. He had all the credulity
of a little child, all the confidence of a hero. If Logre had told him
that the Genius of Liberty perched on the Colonne de Juillet[*] would
have come down and set itself at their head, he would hardly have
expressed any surprise. In the evenings, at Monsieur Lebigre’s, he
showed great enthusiasm and spoke effusively of the approaching battle,
as though it were a festival to which all good and honest folks would
be invited. But although Gavard in his delight began to play with his
revolver, Charvet got more snappish than ever, and sniggered and
shrugged his shoulders. His rival’s assumption of the leadership
angered him extremely; indeed, quite disgusted him with politics. One
evening when, arriving early, he happened to find himself alone with
Logre and Lebigre, he frankly unbosomed himself.

[*] The column erected on the Place de la Bastille in memory of the
Revolution of July 1830, by which Charles X was dethroned.—Translator.


“Why,” said he, “that fellow Florent hasn’t an idea about politics, and
would have done far better to seek a berth as writing master in a
ladies’ school! It would be nothing short of a misfortune if he were to
succeed, for, with his visionary social sentimentalities, he would
crush us down beneath his confounded working men! It’s all that, you
know, which ruins the party. We don’t need any more tearful
sentimentalists, humanitarian poets, people who kiss and slobber over
each other for the merest scratch. But he won’t succeed! He’ll just get
locked up, and that will be the end of it.”

Logre and the wine dealer made no remark, but allowed Charvet to talk
on without interruption.

“And he’d have been locked up long ago,” he continued, “if he were
anything as dangerous as he fancies he is. The airs he puts on just
because he’s been to Cayenne are quite sickening. But I’m sure that the
police knew of his return the very first day he set foot in Paris, and
if they haven’t interfered with him it’s simply because they hold him
in contempt.”

At this Logre gave a slight start.

“They’ve been dogging me for the last fifteen years,” resumed the
Hébertist, with a touch of pride, “but you don’t hear me proclaiming it
from the house-tops. However, he won’t catch me taking part in his
riot. I’m not going to let myself be nabbed like a mere fool. I dare
say he’s already got half a dozen spies at his heels, who will take him
by the scruff of the neck whenever the authorities give the word.”

“Oh, dear, no! What an idea!” exclaimed Monsieur Lebigre, who usually
observed complete silence. He was rather pale, and looked at Logre, who
was gently rubbing his hump against the partition.

“That’s mere imagination,” murmured the hunchback.

“Very well; call it imagination, if you like,” replied the tutor; “but
I know how these things are arranged. At all events, I don’t mean to
let the ‘coppers’ nab me this time. You others, of course, will please
yourselves, but if you take my advice—and you especially, Monsieur
Lebigre—you’ll take care not to let your establishment be compromised,
or the authorities will close it.”

At this Logre could not restrain a smile. On several subsequent
occasions Charvet plied him and Lebigre with similar arguments, as
though he wished to detach them from Florent’s project by frightening
them; and he was much surprised at the calmness and confidence which
they both continued to manifest. For his own part, he still came pretty
regularly in the evening with Clemence. The tall brunette was no longer
a clerk at the fish auctions—Monsieur Manoury had discharged her.

“Those salesmen are all scoundrels!” Logre growled, when he heard of
her dismissal.

Thereupon Clemence, who, lolling back against the partition, was
rolling a cigarette between her long, slim fingers, replied in a sharp
voice: “Oh, it’s fair fighting! We don’t hold the same political views,
you know. That fellow Manoury, who’s making no end of money, would lick
the Emperor’s boots. For my part, if I were an auctioneer, I wouldn’t
keep him in my service for an hour.”

The truth was that she had been indulging in some clumsy pleasantry,
amusing herself one day by inscribing in the sale-book, alongside of
the dabs and skate and mackerel sold by auction, the names of some of
the best-known ladies and gentlemen of the Court. This bestowal of
piscine names upon high dignitaries, these entries of the sale of
duchesses and baronesses at thirty sous apiece, had caused Monsieur
Manoury much alarm. Gavard was still laughing over it.

“Well, never mind!” said he, patting Clemence’s arm; “you are every
inch a man, you are!”

Clemence had discovered a new method of mixing her grog. She began by
filling her glass with hot water; and after adding some sugar she
poured the rum drop by drop upon the slice of lemon floating on the
surface, in such wise that it did not mix with the water. Then she
lighted it and with a grave expression watched it blaze, slowly smoking
her cigarette while the flame of the alcohol cast a greenish tinge over
her face. “Grog,” however, was an expensive luxury in which she could
not afford to indulge after she had lost her place. Charvet told her,
with a strained laugh, that she was no longer a millionaire. She
supported herself by giving French lessons, at a very early hour in the
morning, to a young lady residing in the Rue de Miromesnil, who was
perfecting her education in secrecy, unknown even to her maid. And so
now Clemence merely ordered a glass of beer in the evenings, but this
she drank, it must be admitted, with the most philosophical composure.

The evenings in the little sanctum were now far less noisy than they
had been. Charvet would suddenly lapse into silence, pale with
suppressed rage, when the others deserted him to listen to his rival.
The thought that he had been the king of the place, had ruled the whole
party with despotic power before Florent’s appearance there, gnawed at
his heart, and he felt all the regretful pangs of a dethroned monarch.
If he still came to the meetings, it was only because he could not
resist the attraction of the little room where he had spent so many
happy hours in tyrannising over Gavard and Robine. In those days even
Logre’s hump had been his property, as well as Alexandre’s fleshy arms
and Lacaille’s gloomy face. He had done what he liked with them,
stuffed his opinions down their throats, belaboured their shoulders
with his sceptre. But now he endured much bitterness of spirit; and
ended by quite ceasing to speak, simply shrugging his shoulders and
whistling disdainfully, without condescending to combat the absurdities
vented in his presence. What exasperated him more than anything else
was the gradual way in which he had been ousted from his position of
predominance without being conscious of it. He could not see that
Florent was in any way his superior, and after hearing the latter speak
for hours, in his gentle and somewhat sad voice, he often remarked:
“Why, the fellow’s a parson! He only wants a cassock!”

The others, however, to all appearance eagerly absorbed whatever the
inspector said. When Charvet saw Florent’s clothes hanging from every
peg, he pretended not to know where he could put his hat so that it
would not be soiled. He swept away the papers that lay about the little
room, declaring that there was no longer any comfort for anyone in the
place since that “gentleman” had taken possession of it. He even
complained to the landlord, and asked if the room belonged to a single
customer or to the whole company. This invasion of his realm was indeed
the last straw. Men were brutes, and he conceived an unspeakable scorn
for humanity when he saw Logre and Monsieur Lebigre fixing their eyes
on Florent with rapt attention. Gavard with his revolver irritated him,
and Robine, who sat silent behind his glass of beer, seemed to him to
be the only sensible person in the company, and one who doubtless
judged people by their real value, and was not led away by mere words.
As for Alexandre and Lacaille, they confirmed him in his belief that
“the people” were mere fools, and would require at least ten years of
revolutionary dictatorship to learn how to conduct themselves.

Logre, however, declared that the sections would soon be completely
organised; and Florent began to assign the different parts that each
would have to play. One evening, after a final discussion in which he
again got worsted, Charvet rose up, took his hat, and exclaimed: “Well,
I’ll wish you all good night. You can get your skulls cracked if it
amuses you; but I would have you understand that I won’t take any part
in the business. I have never abetted anybody’s ambition.”

Clemence, who had also risen and was putting on her shawl, coldly
added: “The plan’s absurd.”

Then, as Robine sat watching their departure with a gentle glance,
Charvet asked him if he were not coming with them; but Robine, having
still some beer left in his glass, contented himself with shaking
hands. Charvet and Clemence never returned again; and Lacaille one day
informed the company that they now frequented a beer-house in the Rue
Serpente. He had seen them through the window, gesticulating with great
energy, in the midst of an attentive group of very young men.

Florent was never able to enlist Claude amongst his supporters. He had
once entertained the idea of gaining him over to his own political
views, of making a disciple of him, an assistant in his revolutionary
task; and in order to initiate him he had taken him one evening to
Monsieur Lebigre’s. Claude, however, spent the whole time in making a
sketch of Robine, in his hat and chestnut cloak, and with his beard
resting on the knob of his walking-stick.

“Really, you know,” he said to Florent, as they came away, “all that
you have been saying inside there doesn’t interest me in the least. It
may be very clever, but, for my own part, I see nothing in it. Still,
you’ve got a splendid fellow there, that blessed Robine. He’s as deep
as a well. I’ll come with you again some other time, but it won’t be
for politics. I shall make sketches of Logre and Gavard, so as to put
them with Robine in a picture which I was thinking about while you were
discussing the question of—what do you call it? eh? Oh, the question of
the two Chambers. Just fancy, now, a picture of Gavard and Logre and
Robine talking politics, entrenched behind their glasses of beer! It
would be the success of the Salon, my dear fellow, an overwhelming
success, a genuine modern picture!”

Florent was grieved by the artist’s political scepticism; so he took
him up to his bedroom, and kept him on the narrow balcony in front of
the bluish mass of the markets, till two o’clock in the morning,
lecturing him, and telling him that he was no man to show himself so
indifferent to the happiness of his country.

“Well, you’re perhaps right,” replied Claude, shaking his head; “I’m an
egotist. I can’t even say that I paint for the good of my country; for,
in the first place, my sketches frighten everybody, and then, when I’m
busy painting, I think about nothing but the pleasure I take in it.
When I’m painting, it is as though I were tickling myself; it makes me
laugh all over my body. Well, I can’t help it, you know; it’s my nature
to be like that; and you can’t expect me to go and drown myself in
consequence. Besides, France can get on very well without me, as my
aunt Lisa says. And—may I be quite frank with you?—if I like you it’s
because you seem to me to follow politics just as I follow painting.
You titillate yourself, my good friend.”

Then, as Florent protested, he continued:

“Yes, yes; you are an artist in your own way; you dream of politics,
and I’ll wager you spend hours here at night gazing at the stars and
imagining they are the voting-papers of infinity. And then you
titillate yourself with your ideas of truth and justice; and this is so
evidently the case that those ideas of yours cause just as much alarm
to commonplace middle-class folks as my sketches do. Between ourselves,
now, do you imagine that if you were Robine I should take any pleasure
in your friendship? Ah, no, my friend, you are a great poet!”

Then he began to joke on the subject, saying that politics caused him
no trouble, and that he had got accustomed to hear people discussing
them in beer shops and studios. This led him to speak of a café in the
Rue Vauvilliers; the café on the ground-floor of the house where La
Sarriette lodged. This smoky place, with its torn, velvet-cushioned
seats, and marble table-tops discoloured by the drippings from
coffee-cups, was the chief resort of the young people of the markets.
Monsieur Jules reigned there over a company of porters, apprentices,
and gentlemen in white blouses and velvet caps. Two curling “Newgate
knockers” were glued against his temples; and to keep his neck white he
had it scraped with a razor every Saturday at a hair-dresser’s in the
Rue des Deux Ecus. At the café he gave the tone to his associates,
especially when he played billiards with studied airs and graces,
showing off his figure to the best advantage. After the game the
company would begin to chat. They were a very reactionary set, taking a
delight in the doings of “society.” For his part, Monsieur Jules read
the lighter boulevardian newspapers, and knew the performers at the
smaller theatres, talked familiarly of the celebrities of the day, and
could always tell whether the piece first performed the previous
evening had been a success or a failure. He had a weakness, however,
for politics. His ideal man was Morny, as he curtly called him. He read
the reports of the discussions of the Corps Législatif, and laughed
with glee over the slightest words that fell from Morny’s lips. Ah,
Morny was the man to sit upon your rascally republicans! And he would
assert that only the scum detested the Emperor, for his Majesty desired
that all respectable people should have a good time of it.

“I’ve been to the café occasionally,” Claude said to Florent. “The
young men there are vastly amusing, with their clay pipes and their
talk about the Court balls! To hear them chatter you might almost fancy
they were invited to the Tuileries. La Sarriette’s young man was making
great fun of Gavard the other evening. He called him uncle. When La
Sarriette came downstairs to look for him she was obliged to pay his
bill. It cost her six francs, for he had lost at billiards, and the
drinks they had played for were owing. And now, good night, my friend,
and pleasant dreams. If ever you become a Minister, I’ll give you some
hints on the beautifying of Paris.”

Florent was obliged to relinquish the hope of making a docile disciple
of Claude. This was a source of grief to him, for, blinded though he
was by his fanatical ardour, he at last grew conscious of the
ever-increasing hostility which surrounded him. Even at the Mehudins’
he now met with a colder reception: the old woman would laugh slyly;
Muche no longer obeyed him, and the beautiful Norman cast glances of
hasty impatience at him, unable as she was to overcome his coldness. At
the Quenus’, too, he had lost Auguste’s friendship. The assistant no
longer came to see him in his room on the way to bed, being greatly
alarmed by the reports which he heard concerning this man with whom he
had previously shut himself up till midnight. Augustine had made her
lover swear that he would never again be guilty of such imprudence;
however, it was Lisa who turned the young man into Florent’s determined
enemy by begging him and Augustine to defer their marriage till her
cousin should vacate the little bedroom at the top of the house, as she
did not want to give that poky dressing-room on the first floor to the
new shop girl whom she would have to engage. From that time forward
Auguste was anxious that the “convict” should be arrested. He had found
such a pork shop as he had long dreamed of, not at Plaisance certainly,
but at Montrouge, a little farther away. And now trade had much
improved, and Augustine, with her silly, overgrown girl’s laugh, said
that she was quite ready. So every night, whenever some slight noise
awoke him, August was thrilled with delight as he imagined that the
police were at last arresting Florent.

Nothing was said at the Quenu-Gradelles’ about all the rumours which
circulated. There was a tacit understanding amongst the staff of the
pork shop to keep silent respecting them in the presence of Quenu. The
latter, somewhat saddened by the falling-out between his brother and
his wife, sought consolation in stringing his sausages and salting his
pork. Sometimes he would come and stand on his door-step, with his red
face glowing brightly above his white apron, which his increasing
corpulence stretched quite taut, and never did he suspect all the
gossip which his appearance set on foot in the markets. Some of the
women pitied him, and thought that he was losing flesh, though he was,
indeed, stouter than ever; while others, on the contrary, reproached
him for not having grown thin with shame at having such a brother as
Florent. He, however, like one of those betrayed husbands who are
always the last to know what has befallen them, continued in happy
ignorance, displaying a light-heartedness which was quite affecting. He
would stop some neighbour’s wife on the footway to ask her if she found
his brawn or truffled boar’s head to her liking, and she would at once
assume a sympathetic expression, and speak in a condoling way, as
though all the pork on his premises had got jaundice.

“What do they all mean by looking at me with such a funereal air?” he
asked Lisa one day. “Do you think I’m looking ill?”

Lisa, well aware that he was terribly afraid of illness, and groaned
and made a dreadful disturbance if he suffered the slightest ailment,
reassured him on this point, telling him that he was as blooming as a
rose. The fine pork shop, however, was becoming gloomy; the mirrors
seemed to pale, the marbles grew frigidly white, and the cooked meats
on the counter stagnated in yellow fat or lakes of cloudy jelly. One
day, even, Claude came into the shop to tell his aunt that the display
in the window looked quite “in the dumps.” This was really the truth.
The Strasburg tongues on their beds of blue paper-shavings had a
melancholy whiteness of hue, like the tongues of invalids; and the
whilom chubby hams seemed to be wasting away beneath their mournful
green top-knots. Inside the shop, too, when customers asked for a
black-pudding or ten sous’ worth of bacon, or half a pound of lard,
they spoke in subdued, sorrowful voices, as though they were in the
bed-chamber of a dying man. There were always two or three lachrymose
women in front of the chilled heating-pan. Beautiful Lisa meantime
discharged the duties of chief mourner with silent dignity. Her white
apron fell more primly than ever over her black dress. Her hands,
scrupulously clean and closely girded at the wrists by long white
sleevelets, her face with its becoming air of sadness, plainly told all
the neighbourhood, all the inquisitive gossips who streamed into the
shop from morning to night, that they, the Quenu-Gradelles, were
suffering from unmerited misfortune, but that she knew the cause of it,
and would triumph over it at last. And sometimes she stooped to look at
the two gold-fish, who also seemed ill at ease as they swam languidly
around the aquarium in the window, and her glance seemed to promise
them better days in the future.

Beautiful Lisa now only allowed herself one indulgence. She fearlessly
patted Marjolin’s satiny chin. The young man had just come out of the
hospital. His skull had healed, and he looked as fat and merry as ever;
but even the little intelligence he had possessed had left him, he was
now quite an idiot. The gash in his skull must have reached his brain,
for he had become a mere animal. The mind of a child of five dwelt in
his sturdy frame. He laughed and stammered, he could no longer
pronounce his words properly, and he was as submissively obedient as a
sheep. Cadine took entire possession of him again; surprised, at first,
at the alteration in him, and then quite delighted at having this big
fellow to do exactly as she liked with. He was her doll, her toy, her
slave in all respects but one: she could not prevent him from going off
to Madame Quenu’s every now and then. She thumped him, but he did not
seem to feel her blows; as soon as she had slung her basket round her
neck, and set off to sell her violets in the Rue du Pont Neuf and the
Rue de Turbigo, he went to prowl about in front of the pork shop.

“Come in!” Lisa cried to him.

She generally gave him some gherkins, of which he was extremely fond;
and he ate them, laughing in a childish way, whilst he stood in front
of the counter. The sight of the handsome mistress of the shop filled
him with rapture; he often clapped his hands with joy and began to jump
about and vent little cries of pleasure, like a child delighted at
something shown to it. On the first few occasions when he came to see
her after leaving the hospital Lisa had feared that he might remember
what had happened.

“Does your head still hurt you?” she asked him.

But he swayed about and burst into a merry laugh as he answered no; and
then Lisa gently inquired: “You had a fall, hadn’t you?”

“Yes, a fall, fall, fall,” he sang, in a happy voice, tapping his skull
the while.

Then, as though he were in a sort of ecstasy, he continued in lingering
notes, as he gazed at Lisa, “Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful!” This
quite touched Madame Quenu. She had prevailed upon Gavard to keep him
in his service. It was on the occasions when he so humbly vented his
admiration that she caressed his chin, and told him that he was a good
lad. He smiled with childish satisfaction, at times closing his eyes
like some domestic pet fondled by its mistress; and Lisa thought to
herself that she was making him some compensation for the blow with
which she had felled him in the cellar of the poultry market.

However, the Quenus’ establishment still remained under a cloud.
Florent sometimes ventured to show himself, and shook hands with his
brother, while Lisa observed a frigid silence. He even dined with them
sometimes on Sundays, at long intervals, and Quenu then made great
efforts at gaiety, but could not succeed in imparting any cheerfulness
to the meal. He ate badly, and ended by feeling altogether put out. One
evening, after one of these icy family gatherings, he said to his wife
with tears in his eyes:

“What can be the matter with me? Is it true that I’m not ill? Don’t you
really see anything wrong in my appearance? I feel just as though I’d
got a heavy weight somewhere inside me. And I’m so sad and depressed,
too, without in the least knowing why. What can it be, do you think?”

“Oh, a little attack of indigestion, I dare say,” replied Lisa.

“No, no; it’s been going on too long for that; I feel quite crushed
down. Yet the business is going on all right; I’ve no great worries,
and I am leading just the same steady life as ever. But you, too, my
dear, don’t look well; you seem melancholy. If there isn’t a change for
the better soon, I shall send for the doctor.”

Lisa looked at him with a grave expression.

“There’s no need of a doctor,” she said, “things will soon be all right
again. There’s something unhealthy in the atmosphere just now. All the
neighbourhood is unwell.” Then, as if yielding to an impulse of anxious
affection, she added: “Don’t worry yourself, my dear. I can’t have you
falling ill; that would be the crowning blow.”

As a rule she sent him back to the kitchen, knowing that the noise of
the choppers, the tuneful simmering of the fat, and the bubbling of the
pans had a cheering effect upon him. In this way, too, she kept him at
a distance from the indiscreet chatter of Mademoiselle Saget, who now
spent whole mornings in the shop. The old maid seemed bent on arousing
Lisa’s alarm, and thus driving her to some extreme step. She began by
trying to obtain her confidence.

“What a lot of mischievous folks there are about!” she exclaimed;
“folks who would be much better employed in minding their own business.
If you only knew, my dear Madame Quenu—but no, really, I should never
dare to repeat such things to you.”

And, as Madame Quenu replied that she was quite indifferent to gossip,
and that it had no effect upon her, the old maid whispered into her ear
across the counter: “Well, people say, you know, that Monsieur Florent
isn’t your cousin at all.”

Then she gradually allowed Lisa to see that she knew the whole story;
by way of proving that she had her quite at her mercy. When Lisa
confessed the truth, equally as a matter of diplomacy, in order that
she might have the assistance of some one who would keep her well
posted in all the gossip of the neighbourhood, the old maid swore that
for her own part she would be as mute as a fish, and deny the truth of
the reports about Florent, even if she were to be led to the stake for
it. And afterwards this drama brought her intense enjoyment; every
morning she came to the shop with some fresh piece of disturbing news.

“You must be careful,” she whispered one day; “I have just heard two
women in the tripe market talking about you know what. I can’t
interrupt people and tell them they are lying, you know. It would look
so strange. But the story’s got about, and it’s spreading farther every
day. It can’t be stopped now, I fear; the truth will have to come out.”

A few days later she returned to the assault in all earnest. She made
her appearance looking quite scared, and waited impatiently till there
was no one in the shop, when she burst out in her sibilant voice:

“Do you know what people are saying now? Well, they say that all those
men who meet at Monsieur Lebigre’s have got guns, and are going to
break out again as they did in ‘48. It’s quite distressing to see such
a worthy man as Monsieur Gavard—rich, too, and so respectable—leaguing
himself with such scoundrels! I was very anxious to let you know, on
account of your brother-in-law.”

“Oh, it’s mere nonsense, I’m sure; it can’t be serious,” rejoined Lisa,
just to incite the old maid to tell her more.

“Not serious, indeed! Why, when one passes along the Rue Pirouette in
the evening one can hear them screaming out in the most dreadful way.
Oh! they make no mystery of it all. You know yourself how they tried to
corrupt your husband. And the cartridges which I have seen them making
from my own window, are they mere nonsense? Well, well, I’m only
telling you this for your own good.”

“Oh! I’m sure of that, and I’m very much obliged to you,” replied Lisa;
“but people do invent such stories, you know.”

“Ah, but this is no invention, unfortunately. The whole neighbourhood
is talking of it. It is said, too, that if the police discover the
matter there will be a great many people compromised—Monsieur Gavard,
for instance.”

Madame Quenu shrugged her shoulders as though to say that Monsieur
Gavard was an old fool, and that it would do him good to be locked up.

“Well, I merely mention Monsieur Gavard as I might mention any of the
others, your brother-in-law, for instance,” resumed the old maid with a
wily glance. “Your brother-in-law is the leader, it seems. That’s very
annoying for you, and I’m very sorry indeed; for if the police were to
make a descent here they might march Monsieur Quenu off as well. Two
brothers, you know, they’re like two fingers of the same hand.”

Beautiful Lisa protested against this, but she turned very pale, for
Mademoiselle Saget’s last thrust had touched a vulnerable point. From
that day forward the old maid was ever bringing her stories of innocent
people who had been thrown into prison for extending hospitality to
criminal scoundrels. In the evening, when La Saget went to get her
black-currant syrup at the wine dealer’s, she prepared her budget for
the next morning. Rose was but little given to gossiping, and the old
main reckoned chiefly on her own eyes and ears. She had been struck by
Monsieur Lebigre’s extremely kind and obliging manner towards Florent,
his eagerness to keep him at his establishment, all the polite
civilities, for which the little money which the other spent in the
house could never recoup him. And this conduct of Monsieur Lebigre’s
surprised her the more as she was aware of the position in which the
two men stood in respect to the beautiful Norman.

“It looks as though Lebigre were fattening him up for sale,” she
reflected. “Whom can he want to sell him to, I wonder?”

One evening when she was in the bar she saw Logre fling himself on the
bench in the sanctum, and heard him speak of his perambulations through
the faubourgs, with the remark that he was dead beat. She cast a hasty
glance at his feet, and saw that there was not a speck of dust on his
boots. Then she smiled quietly, and went off with her black-currant
syrup, her lips closely compressed.

She used to complete her budget of information on getting back to her
window. It was very high up, commanding a view of all the neighbouring
houses, and proved a source of endless enjoyment to her. She was
constantly installed at it, as though it were an observatory from which
she kept watch upon everything that went on in the neighbourhood. She
was quite familiar with all the rooms opposite her, both on the right
and the left, even to the smallest details of their furniture. She
could have described, without the least omission, the habits of their
tenants, have related if the latter’s homes were happy or the contrary,
have told when and how they washed themselves, what they had for
dinner, and who it was that came to see them. Then she obtained a side
view of the markets, and not a woman could walk along the Rue Rambuteau
without being seen by her; and she could have correctly stated whence
the woman had come and whither she was going, what she had got in her
basket, and, in short, every detail about her, her husband, her
clothes, her children, and her means. “That’s Madame Loret, over there;
she’s giving her son a fine education; that’s Madame Hutin, a poor
little woman who’s dreadfully neglected by her husband; that’s
Mademoiselle Cecile, the butcher’s daughter, a girl that no one will
marry because she’s scrofulous.” In this way she could have continued
jerking out biographical scraps for days together, deriving
extraordinary amusement from the most trivial, uninteresting incidents.
However, as soon as eight o’clock struck, she only had eyes for the
frosted “cabinet” window on which appeared the black shadows of the
coterie of politicians. She discovered the secession of Charvet and
Clemence by missing their bony silhouettes from the milky transparency.
Not an incident occurred in that room but she sooner or later learnt it
by some sudden motion of those silent arms and heads. She acquired
great skill in interpretation, and could divine the meaning of
protruding noses, spreading fingers, gaping mouths, and shrugging
shoulders; and in this way she followed the progress of the conspiracy
step by step, in such wise that she could have told day by day how
matters stood. One evening the terrible outcome of it all was revealed
to her. She saw the shadow of Gavard’s revolver, a huge silhouette with
pointed muzzle showing very blackly against the glimmering window. It
kept appearing and disappearing so rapidly that it seemed as though the
room was full of revolvers. Those were the firearms of which
Mademoiselle Saget had spoken to Madame Quenu. On another evening she
was much puzzled by the sight of endless lengths of some material or
other, and came to the conclusion that the men must be manufacturing
cartridges. The next morning, however, she made her appearance in the
wine shop by eleven o’clock, on the pretext of asking Rose if she could
let her have a candle, and, glancing furtively into the little sanctum,
she espied a heap of red material lying on the table. This greatly
alarmed her, and her next budget of news was one of decisive gravity.

“I don’t want to alarm you, Madame Quenu,” she said, “but matters are
really looking very serious. Upon my word, I’m quite alarmed. You must
on no account repeat what I am going to confide to you. They would
murder me if they knew I had told you.”

Then, when Lisa had sworn to say nothing that might compromise her, she
told her about the red material.

“I can’t think what it can be. There was a great heap of it. It looked
just like rags soaked in blood. Logre, the hunchback, you know, put one
of the pieces over his shoulder. He looked like a headsman. You may be
sure this is some fresh trickery or other.”

Lisa made no reply, but seemed deep in thought whilst with lowered
eyes, she handled a fork and mechanically arranged some piece of salt
pork on a dish.

“If I were you,” resumed Mademoiselle Saget softly, “I shouldn’t be
easy in mind; I should want to know the meaning of it all. Why
shouldn’t you go upstairs and examine your brother-in-law’s bedroom?”

At this Lisa gave a slight start, let the fork drop, and glanced
uneasily at the old maid, believing that she had discovered her
intentions. But the other continued: “You would certainly be justified
in doing so. There’s no knowing into what danger your brother-in-law
may lead you, if you don’t put a check on him. They were talking about
you yesterday at Madame Taboureau’s. Ah! you have a most devoted friend
in her. Madame Taboureau said that you were much too easy-going, and
that if she were you she would have put an end to all this long ago.”

“Madame Taboureau said that?” murmured Lisa thoughtfully.

“Yes, indeed she did; and Madame Taboureau is a woman whose advice is
worth listening to. Try to find out the meaning of all those red bands;
and if you do, you’ll tell me, won’t you?”

Lisa, however, was no longer listening to her. She was gazing
abstractedly at the edible snails and Gervais cheeses between the
festoons of sausages in the window. She seemed absorbed in a mental
conflict, which brought two little furrows to her brow. The old maid,
however, poked her nose over the dishes on the counter.

“Ah, some slices of saveloy!” she muttered, as though she were speaking
to herself. “They’ll get very dry cut up like that. And that
black-pudding’s broken, I see—a fork’s been stuck into it, I expect. It
might be taken away—it’s soiling the dish.”

Lisa, still absent-minded, gave her the black-pudding and slices of
saveloy. “You may take them,” she said, “if you would care for them.”

The black bag swallowed them up. Mademoiselle Saget was so accustomed
to receiving presents that she had actually ceased to return thanks for
them. Every morning she carried away all the scraps of the pork shop.
And now she went off with the intention of obtaining her dessert from
La Sarriette and Madame Lecœur, by gossiping to them about Gavard.

When Lisa was alone again she installed herself on the bench, behind
the counter, as though she thought she would be able to come to a
sounder decision if she were comfortably seated. For the last week she
had been very anxious. Florent had asked Quenu for five hundred francs
one evening, in the easy, matter-of-course way of a man who had money
lying to his credit at the pork shop. Quenu referred him to his wife.
This was distasteful to Florent, who felt somewhat uneasy on applying
to beautiful Lisa. But she immediately went up to her bedroom, brought
the money down and gave it to him, without saying a word, or making the
least inquiry as to what he intended to do with it. She merely remarked
that she had made a note of the payment on the paper containing the
particulars of Florent’s share of the inheritance. Three days later he
took a thousand francs.

“It was scarcely worth while trying to make himself out so
disinterested,” Lisa said to Quenu that night, as they went to bed. “I
did quite right, you see, in keeping the account. By the way, I haven’t
noted down the thousand francs I gave him to-day.”

She sat down at the secrétaire, and glanced over the page of figures.
Then she added: “I did well to leave a blank space. I’ll put down what
I pay him on the margin. You’ll see, now, he’ll fritter it all away by
degrees. That’s what I’ve been expecting for a long time past.”

Quenu said nothing, but went to bed feeling very much put out. Every
time that his wife opened the secrétaire the drawer gave out a mournful
creak which pierced his heart. He even thought of remonstrating with
his brother, and trying to prevent him from ruining himself with the
Mehudins; but when the time came, he did not dare to do it. Two days
later Florent asked for another fifteen hundred francs. Logre had said
one evening that things would ripen much faster if they could only get
some money. The next day he was enchanted to find these words of his,
uttered quite at random, result in the receipt of a little pile of
gold, which he promptly pocketed, sniggering as he did so, and his
hunch fairly shaking with delight. From that time forward money was
constantly being needed: one section wished to hire a room where they
could meet, while another was compelled to provide for various needy
patriots. Then there were arms and ammunition to be purchased, men to
be enlisted, and private police expenses. Florent would have paid for
anything. He had bethought himself of Uncle Gradelle’s treasure, and
recalled La Normande’s advice. So he made repeated calls upon Lisa’s
secrétaire, being merely kept in check by the vague fear with which his
sister-in-law’s grave face inspired him. Never, thought he, could he
have spent his money in a holier cause. Logre now manifested the
greatest enthusiasm, and wore the most wonderful rose-coloured
neckerchiefs and the shiniest of varnished boots, the sight of which
made Lacaille glower blackly.

“That makes three thousand francs in seven days,” Lisa remarked to
Quenu. “What do you think of that? A pretty state of affairs, isn’t it?
If he goes on at this rate his fifty thousand francs will last him
barely four months. And yet it took old Gradelle forty years to put his
fortune together!”

“It’s all your own fault!” cried Quenu. “There was no occasion for you
to say anything to him about the money.”

Lisa gave her husband a severe glance. “It is his own,” she said; “and
he is entitled to take it all. It’s not the giving him the money that
vexes me, but the knowledge that he must make a bad use of it. I tell
you again, as I have been telling you for a long time past, all this
must come to an end.”

“Do whatever you like; I won’t prevent you,” at last exclaimed the pork
butcher, who was tortured by his cupidity.

He still loved his brother; but the thought of fifty thousand francs
squandered in four months was agony to him. As for his wife, after all
Mademoiselle Saget’s chattering she guessed what became of the money.
The old maid having ventured to refer to the inheritance, Lisa had
taken advantage of the opportunity to let the neighbourhood know that
Florent was drawing his share, and spending it after his own fashion.

It was on the following day that the story of the strips of red
material impelled Lisa to take definite action. For a few moments she
remained struggling with herself whilst gazing at the depressed
appearance of the shop. The sides of pork hung all around in a sullen
fashion, and Mouton, seated beside a bowl of fat, displayed the ruffled
coat and dim eyes of a cat who no longer digests his meals in peace.
Thereupon Lisa called to Augustine and told her to attend to the
counter, and she herself went up to Florent’s room.

When she entered it, she received quite a shock. The bed, hitherto so
spotless, was quite ensanguined by a bundle of long red scarves
dangling down to the floor. On the mantelpiece, between the gilt
cardboard boxes and the old pomatum-pots, were several red armlets and
clusters of red cockades, looking like pools of blood. And hanging from
every nail and peg against the faded grey wallpaper were pieces of
bunting, square flags—yellow, blue, green, and black—in which Lisa
recognised the distinguishing banners of the twenty sections. The
childish simplicity of the room seemed quite scared by all this
revolutionary decoration. The aspect of guileless stupidity which the
shop girl had left behind her, the white innocence of the curtains and
furniture, now glared as with the reflection of a fire; while the
photograph of Auguste and Augustine looked white with terror. Lisa
walked round the room, examining the flags, the armlets, and the
scarves, without touching any of them, as though she feared that the
dreadful things might burn her. She was reflecting that she had not
been mistaken, that it was indeed on these and similar things that
Florent’s money had been spent. And to her this seemed an utter
abomination, an incredibility which set her whole being surging with
indignation. To think that her money, that money which had been so
honestly earned, was being squandered to organise and defray the
expenses of an insurrection!

She stood there, gazing at the expanded blossoms of the pomegranate on
the balcony—blossoms which seemed to her like an additional supply of
crimson cockades—and listening to the sharp notes of the chaffinch,
which resembled the echo of a distant fusillade. And then it struck her
that the insurrection might break out the next day, or perhaps that
very evening. She fancied she could see the banners streaming in the
air and the scarves advancing in line, while a sudden roll of drums
broke on her ear. Then she hastily went downstairs again, without even
glancing at the papers which were lying on the table. She stopped on
the first floor, went into her own room, and dressed herself.

In this critical emergency Lisa arranged her hair with scrupulous care
and perfect calmness. She was quite resolute; not a quiver of
hesitation disturbed her; but a sterner expression than usual had come
into her eyes. As she fastened her black silk dress, straining the
waistband with all the strength of her fingers, she recalled Abbé
Roustan’s words; and she questioned herself, and her conscience
answered that she was going to fulfil a duty. By the time she drew her
broidered shawl round her broad shoulders, she felt that she was about
to perform a deed of high morality. She put on a pair of dark mauve
gloves, secured a thick veil to her bonnet; and before leaving the room
she double-locked the secrétaire, with a hopeful expression on her face
which seemed to say that that much worried piece of furniture would at
last be able to sleep in peace again.

Quenu was exhibiting his white paunch at the shop door when his wife
came down. He was surprised to see her going out in full dress at ten
o’clock in the morning. “Hallo! Where are you off to?” he asked.

She pretended that she was going out with Madame Taboureau, and added
that she would call at the Gaité Theatre to buy some tickets. Quenu
hurried after her to tell her to secure some front seats, so that they
might be able to see well. Then, as he returned to the shop, Lisa made
her way to the cab-stand opposite St. Eustache, got into a cab, pulled
down the blinds, and told the driver to go to the Gaité Theatre. She
felt afraid of being followed. When she had booked two seats, however,
she directed the cabman to drive her to the Palais de Justice. There,
in front of the gate, she discharged him, and then quietly made her way
through the halls and corridors to the Prefecture of Police.

She soon lost herself in a noisy crowd of police officers and gentlemen
in long frock-coats, but at last gave a man half a franc to guide her
to the Prefect’s rooms. She found, however, that the Prefect only
received such persons as came with letters of audience; and she was
shown into a small apartment, furnished after the style of a
boarding-house parlour. A fat, bald-headed official, dressed in black
from head to foot, received her there with sullen coldness. What was
her business? he inquired. Thereupon she raised her veil, gave her
name, and told her story, clearly and distinctly, without a pause. The
bald man listened with a weary air.

“You are this man’s sister-in-law, are you not?” he inquired, when she
had finished.

“Yes,” Lisa candidly replied. “We are honest, straight-forward people,
and I am anxious that my husband should not be compromised.”

The official shrugged his shoulders, as though to say that the whole
affair was a great nuisance.

“Do you know,” he said impatiently, “that I have been pestered with
this business for more than a year past? Denunciation after
denunciation has been sent to me, and I am being continually goaded and
pressed to take action. You will understand that if I haven’t done so
as yet, it is because I prefer to wait. We have good reasons for our
conduct in the matter. Stay, now, here are the papers relating to it.
I’ll let you see them.”

He laid before her an immense collection of papers in a blue wrapper.
Lisa turned them over. They were like detached chapters of the story
she had just been relating. The commissaires of police at Havre, Rouen,
and Vernon notified Florent’s arrival within their respective
jurisdictions. Then came a report which announced that he had taken up
his residence with the Quenu-Gradelles. Next followed his appointment
at the markets, an account of his mode of life, the spending of his
evenings at Monsieur Lebigre’s; not a detail was deficient. Lisa, quite
astounded as she was, noticed that the reports were in duplicate, so
that they must have emanated from two different sources. And at last
she came upon a pile of letters, anonymous letters of every shape, and
in every description of handwriting. They brought her amazement to a
climax. In one letter she recognised the villainous hand of
Mademoiselle Saget, denouncing the people who met in the little sanctum
at Lebigre’s. On a large piece of greasy paper she identified the heavy
pot-hooks of Madame Lecœur; and there was also a sheet of cream-laid
note-paper, ornamented with a yellow pansy, and covered with the
scrawls of La Sarriette and Monsieur Jules. These two letters warned
the Government to beware of Gavard. Farther on Lisa recognised the
coarse style of old Madame Mehudin, who in four pages of almost
indecipherable scribble repeated all the wild stories about Florent
that circulated in the markets. However, what startled her more than
anything else was the discovery of a bill-head of her own
establishment, with the inscription _Quenu-Gradelle, Pork Butcher_, on
its face, whilst on the back of it Auguste had penned a denunciation of
the man whom he looked upon as an obstacle to his marriage.

The official had acted upon a secret idea in placing these papers
before her. “You don’t recognise any of these handwritings, do you?” he
asked.

“No,” she stammered, rising from her seat, quite oppressed by what she
had just learned; and she hastily pulled down her veil again to conceal
the blush of confusion which was rising to her cheeks. Her silk dress
rustled, and her dark gloves disappeared beneath her heavy shawl.

“You see, madame,” said the bald man with a faint smile, “your
information comes a little late. But I promise you that your visit
shall not be forgotten. And tell your husband not to stir. It is
possible that something may happen soon that——”

He did not complete his sentence, but, half rising from his armchair,
made a slight bow to Lisa. It was a dismissal, and she took her leave.
In the ante-room she caught sight of Logre and Monsieur Lebigre, who
hastily turned their faces away; but she was more disturbed than they
were. She went her way through the halls and along the corridors,
feeling as if she were in the clutches of this system of police which,
it now seemed to her, saw and knew everything. At last she came out
upon the Place Dauphine. When she reached the Quai de l’Horloge she
slackened her steps, and felt refreshed by the cool breeze blowing from
the Seine.

She now had a keen perception of the utter uselessness of what she had
done. Her husband was in no danger whatever; and this thought, whilst
relieving her, left her a somewhat remorseful feeling. She was
exasperated with Auguste and the women who had put her in such a
ridiculous position. She walked on yet more slowly, watching the Seine
as it flowed past. Barges, black with coal-dust, were floating down the
greenish water; and all along the bank anglers were casting their
lines. After all, it was not she who had betrayed Florent. This
reflection suddenly occurred to her and astonished her. Would she have
been guilty of a wicked action, then, if she had been his betrayer? She
was quite perplexed; surprised at the possibility of her conscience
having deceived her. Those anonymous letters seemed extremely base. She
herself had gone openly to the authorities, given her name, and saved
innocent people from being compromised. Then at the sudden thought of
old Gradelle’s fortune she again examined herself, and felt ready to
throw the money into the river if such a course should be necessary to
remove the blight which had fallen on the pork shop. No, she was not
avaricious, she was sure she wasn’t; it was no thought of money that
had prompted her in what she had just done. As she crossed the Pont au
Change she grew quite calm again, recovering all her superb equanimity.
On the whole, it was much better, she felt, that others should have
anticipated her at the Prefecture. She would not have to deceive Quenu,
and she would sleep with an easier conscience.

“Have you booked the seats?” Quenu asked her when she returned home.

He wanted to see the tickets, and made Lisa explain to him the exact
position the seats occupied in the dress-circle. Lisa had imagined that
the police would make a descent upon the house immediately after
receiving her information, and her proposal to go to the theatre had
only been a wily scheme for getting Quenu out of the way while the
officers were arresting Florent. She had contemplated taking him for an
outing in the afternoon—one of those little jaunts which they
occasionally allowed themselves. They would then drive in an open cab
to the Bois de Boulogne, dine at a restaurant, and amuse themselves for
an hour or two at some café concern. But there was no need to go out
now, she thought; so she spent the rest of the day behind her counter,
with a rosy glow on her face, and seeming brighter and gayer, as though
she were recovering from some indisposition.

“You see, I told you it was fresh air you wanted!” exclaimed Quenu.
“Your walk this morning has brightened you up wonderfully!”

“No, indeed,” she said after a pause, again assuming her look of
severity; “the streets of Paris are not at all healthy places.”

In the evening they went to the Gaité to see the performance of “La
Grâce de Dieu.” Quenu, in a frock-coat and drab gloves, with his hair
carefully pomatumed and combed, was occupied most of the time in
hunting for the names of the performers in the programme. Lisa looked
superb in her low dress as she rested her hands in their tight-fitting
white gloves on the crimson velvet balustrade. They were both of them
deeply affected by the misfortunes of Marie. The commander, they
thought, was certainly a desperate villain; while Pierrot made them
laugh from the first moment of his appearance on the stage. But at last
Madame Quenu cried. The departure of the child, the prayer in the
maiden’s chamber, the return of the poor mad creature, moistened her
eyes with gentle tears, which she brushed away with her handkerchief.

However, the pleasure which the evening afforded her turned into a
feeling of triumph when she caught sight of La Normande and her mother
sitting in the upper gallery. She thereupon puffed herself out more
than ever, sent Quenu off to the refreshment bar for a box of caramels,
and began to play with her fan, a mother-of-pearl fan, elaborately
gilt. The fish-girl was quite crushed; and bent her head down to listen
to her mother, who was whispering to her. When the performance was over
and beautiful Lisa and the beautiful Norman met in the vestibule they
exchanged a vague smile.

Florent had dined early at Monsieur Lebigre’s that day. He was
expecting Logre, who had promised to introduce to him a retired
sergeant, a capable man, with whom they were to discuss the plan of
attack upon the Palais Bourbon and the Hôtel de Ville. The night closed
in, and the fine rain, which had begun to fall in the afternoon,
shrouded the vast markets in a leaden gloom. They loomed darkly against
the copper-tinted sky, while wisps of murky cloud skimmed by almost on
a level with the roofs, looking as though they were caught and torn by
the points of the lightning-conductors. Florent felt depressed by the
sight of the muddy streets, and the streaming yellowish rain which
seemed to sweep the twilight away and extinguish it in the mire. He
watched the crowds of people who had taken refuge on the foot-pavements
of the covered ways, the umbrellas flitting past in the downpour, and
the cabs that dashed with increased clatter and speed along the
wellnigh deserted roads. Presently there was a rift in the clouds; and
a red glow arose in the west. Then a whole army of street-sweepers came
into sight at the end of the Rue Montmartre, driving a lake of liquid
mud before them with their brooms.

Logre did not turn up with the sergeant; Gavard had gone to dine with
some friends at Batignolles, and so Florent was reduced to spending the
evening alone with Robine. He had all the talking to himself, and ended
by feeling very low-spirited. His companion merely wagged his beard,
and stretched out his hand every quarter of an hour to raise his glass
of beer to his lips. At last Florent grew so bored that he went off to
bed. Robine, however, though left to himself, still lingered there,
contemplating his glass with an expression of deep thought. Rose and
the waiter, who had hoped to shut up early, as the coterie of
politicians was absent, had to wait a long half hour before he at last
made up his mind to leave.

When Florent got to his room, he felt afraid to go to bed. He was
suffering from one of those nervous attacks which sometimes plunged him
into horrible nightmares until dawn. On the previous day he had been to
Clamart to attend the funeral of Monsieur Verlaque, who had died after
terrible sufferings; and he still felt sad at the recollection of the
narrow coffin which he had seen lowered into the earth. Nor could he
banish from his mind the image of Madame Verlaque, who, with a tearful
voice, though there was not a tear in her eyes, kept following him and
speaking to him about the coffin, which was not paid for, and of the
cost of the funeral, which she was quite at a loss about, as she had
not a copper in the place, for the druggist, on hearing of her
husband’s death on the previous day, had insisted upon his bill being
paid. So Florent had been obliged to advance the money for the coffin
and other funeral expenses, and had even given the gratuities to the
mutes. Just as he was going away, Madame Verlaque looked at him with
such a heartbroken expression that he left her twenty francs.

And now Monsieur Verlaque’s death worried him very much. It affected
his situation in the markets. He might lose his berth, or perhaps be
formally appointed inspector. In either case he foresaw vexatious
complications which might arouse the suspicions of the police. He would
have been delighted if the insurrection could have broken out the very
next day, so that he might at once have tossed the laced cap of his
inspectorship into the streets. With his mind full of harassing
thoughts like these, he stepped out upon the balcony, as though
soliciting of the warm night some whiff of air to cool his fevered
brow. The rain had laid the wind, and a stormy heat still reigned
beneath the deep blue, cloudless heavens. The markets, washed by the
downpour, spread out below him, similar in hue to the sky, and, like
the sky, studded with the yellow stars of their gas lamps.

Leaning on the iron balustrade, Florent recollected that sooner or
later he would certainly be punished for having accepted the
inspectorship. It seemed to lie like a stain on his life. He had become
an official of the Prefecture, forswearing himself, serving the Empire
in spite of all the oaths he had taken in his exile. His anxiety to
please Lisa, the charitable purpose to which he had devoted the salary
he received, the just and scrupulous manner in which he had always
struggled to carry out his duties, no longer seemed to him valid
excuses for his base abandonment of principle. If he had suffered in
the midst of all that sleek fatness, he had deserved to suffer. And
before him arose a vision of the evil year which he had just spent, his
persecution by the fish-wives, the sickening sensations he had felt on
close, damp days, the continuous indigestion which had afflicted his
delicate stomach, and the latent hostility which was gathering strength
against him. All these things he now accepted as chastisement. That
dull rumbling of hostility and spite, the cause of which he could not
divine, must forebode some coming catastrophe before whose approach he
already stooped, with the shame of one who knows there is a
transgression that he must expiate. Then he felt furious with himself
as he thought of the popular rising he was preparing; and reflected
that he was no longer unsullied enough to achieve success.

In how many dreams he had indulged in that lofty little room, with his
eyes wandering over the spreading roofs of the market pavilions! They
usually appeared to him like grey seas that spoke to him of far-off
countries. On moonless nights they would darken and turn into stagnant
lakes of black and pestilential water. But on bright nights they became
shimmering fountains of light, the moonbeams streaming over both tiers
like water, gliding along the huge plates of zinc, and flowing over the
edges of the vast superposed basins. Then frosty weather seemed to turn
these roofs into rigid ice, like the Norwegian bays over which skaters
skim; while the warm June nights lulled them into deep sleep. One
December night, on opening his window, he had seen them white with
snow, so lustrously white that they lighted up the coppery sky.
Unsullied by a single footstep, they then stretched out like the lonely
plains of the Far North, where never a sledge intrudes. Their silence
was beautiful, their soft peacefulness suggestive of innocence.

And at each fresh aspect of the ever-changing panorama before him,
Florent yielded to dreams which were now sweet, now full of bitter
pain. The snow calmed him; the vast sheet of whiteness seemed to him
like a veil of purity thrown over the filth of the markets. The bright,
clear nights, the shimmering moonbeams, carried him away into the
fairy-land of story-books. It was only the dark, black nights, the
burning nights of June, when he beheld, as it were, a miasmatic marsh,
the stagnant water of a dead and accursed sea, that filled him with
gloom and grief; and then ever the same dreadful visions haunted his
brain.

The markets were always there. He could never open the window and rest
his elbows on the balustrade without having them before him, filling
the horizon. He left the pavilions in the evening only to behold their
endless roofs as he went to bed. They shut him off from the rest of
Paris, ceaselessly intruded their huge bulk upon him, entered into
every hour of his life. That night again horrible fancies came to him,
fancies aggravated by the vague forebodings of evil which distressed
him. The rain of the afternoon had filled the markets with malodorous
dampness, and as they wallowed there in the centre of the city, like
some drunken man lying, after his last bottle, under the table, they
cast all their foul breath into his face. He seemed to see a thick
vapour rising up from each pavilion. In the distance the meat and tripe
markets reeked with the sickening steam of blood; nearer in, the
vegetable and fruit pavilions diffused the odour of pungent cabbages,
rotten apples, and decaying leaves; the butter and cheese exhaled a
poisonous stench; from the fish market came a sharp, fresh gust; while
from the ventilator in the tower of the poultry pavilion just below
him, he could see a warm steam issuing, a fetid current rising in coils
like the sooty smoke from a factory chimney. And all these exhalations
coalesced above the roofs, drifted towards the neighbouring houses, and
spread themselves out in a heavy cloud which stretched over the whole
of Paris. It was as though the markets were bursting within their tight
belt of iron, were beating the slumber of the gorged city with the
stertorous fumes of their midnight indigestion.

However, on the footway down below Florent presently heard a sound of
voices, the laughter of happy folks. Then the door of the passage was
closed noisily. It was Quenu and Lisa coming home from the theatre.
Stupefied and intoxicated, as it were, by the atmosphere he was
breathing, Florent thereupon left the balcony, his nerves still
painfully excited by the thought of the tempest which he could feel
gathering round his head. The source of his misery was yonder, in those
markets, heated by the day’s excesses. He closed the window with
violence, and left them wallowing in the darkness, naked and perspiring
beneath the stars.




CHAPTER VI


A week later, Florent thought that he would at last be able to proceed
to action. A sufficiently serious outburst of public dissatisfaction
furnished an opportunity for launching his insurrectionary forces upon
Paris. The Corps Législatif, whose members had lately shown great
variance of opinion respecting certain grants to the Imperial family,
was now discussing a bill for the imposition of a very unpopular tax,
at which the lower orders had already begun to growl. The Ministry,
fearing a defeat, was straining every nerve. It was probable, thought
Florent, that no better pretext for a rising would for a long time
present itself.

One morning, at daybreak, he went to reconnoitre the neighbourhood of
the Palais Bourbon. He forgot all about his duties as inspector, and
lingered there, studying the approaches of the palace, till eight
o’clock, without ever thinking that his absence would revolutionise the
fish market. He perambulated all the surrounding streets, the Rue de
Lille, the Rue de l’Université, the Rue de Bourgogne, the Rue Saint
Dominique, and even extended his examination to the Esplanade des
Invalides, stopping at certain crossways, and measuring distances as he
walked along. Then, on coming back to the Quai d’Orsay, he sat down on
the parapet, and determined that the attack should be made
simultaneously from all sides. The contingents from the Gros-Caillou
district should arrive by way of the Champ de Mars; the sections from
the north of Paris should come down by the Madeleine; while those from
the west and the south would follow the quays, or make their way in
small detachments through the then narrow streets of the Faubourg Saint
Germain. However, the other side of the river, the Champs Elysees, with
their open avenues, caused him some uneasiness; for he foresaw that
cannon would be stationed there to sweep the quays. He thereupon
modified several details of his plan, and marked down in a
memorandum-book the different positions which the several sections
should occupy during the combat. The chief attack, he concluded, must
certainly be made from the Rue de Bourgogne and the Rue de
l’Université, while a diversion might be effected on the side of the
river.

Whilst he thus pondered over his plans the eight o’clock sun, warming
the nape of his neck, shone gaily on the broad footways, and gilded the
columns of the great structure in front of him. In imagination he
already saw the contemplated battle; clusters of men clinging round
those columns, the gates burst open, the peristyle invaded; and then
scraggy arms suddenly appearing high aloft and planting a banner there.

At last he slowly went his way homewards again with his gaze fixed upon
the ground. But all at once a cooing sound made him look up, and he saw
that he was passing through the garden of the Tuileries. A number of
wood-pigeons, bridling their necks, were strutting over a lawn near by.
Florent leant for a moment against the tub of an orange-tree, and
looked at the grass and the pigeons steeped in sunshine. Right ahead
under the chestnut-trees all was black. The garden was wrapped in a
warm silence, broken only by the distant rumbling which came from
behind the railings of the Rue de Rivoli. The scent of all the greenery
affected Florent, reminding him of Madame Francois. However, a little
girl ran past, trundling a hoop, and alarmed the pigeons. They flew
off, and settled in a row on the arm of a marble statue of an antique
wrestler standing in the middle of the lawn, and once more, but with
less vivacity, they began to coo and bridle their necks.

As Florent was returning to the markets by way of the Rue Vauvilliers,
he heard Claude Lantier calling to him. The artist was going down into
the basement of the poultry pavilion. “Come with me!” he cried. “I’m
looking for that brute Marjolin.”

Florent followed, glad to forget his thoughts and to defer his return
to the fish market for a little longer. Claude told him that his friend
Marjolin now had nothing further to wish for: he had become an utter
animal. Claude entertained an idea of making him pose on all-fours in
future. Whenever he lost his temper over some disappointing sketch he
came to spend whole hours in the idiot’s company, never speaking, but
striving to catch his expression when he laughed.

“He’ll be feeding his pigeons, I dare say,” he said; “but unfortunately
I don’t know whereabouts Monsieur Gavard’s storeroom is.”

They groped about the cellar. In the middle of it some water was
trickling from a couple of taps in the dim gloom. The storerooms here
are reserved for pigeons exclusively, and all along the trellising they
heard faint cooings, like the hushed notes of birds nestling under the
leaves when daylight is departing. Claude began to laugh as he heard
it.

“It sounds as though all the lovers in Paris were embracing each other
inside here, doesn’t it?” he exclaimed to his companion.

However, they could not find a single storeroom open, and were
beginning to think that Marjolin could not be in the cellar, when a
sound of loud, smacking kisses made them suddenly halt before a door
which stood slightly ajar. Claude pulled it open and beheld Marjolin,
whom Cadine was kissing, whilst he, a mere dummy, offered his face
without feeling the slightest thrill at the touch of her lips.

“Oh, so this is your little game, is it?” said Claude with a laugh.

“Oh,” replied Cadine, quite unabashed, “he likes being kissed, because
he feels afraid now in the dim light. You do feel frightened, don’t
you?”

Like the idiot he was, Marjolin stroked his face with his hands as
though trying to find the kisses which the girl had just printed there.
And he was beginning to stammer out that he was afraid, when Cadine
continued: “And, besides, I came to help him; I’ve been feeding the
pigeons.”

Florent looked at the poor creatures. All along the shelves were rows
of lidless boxes, in which pigeons, showing their motley plumage,
crowded closely on their stiffened legs. Every now and then a tremor
ran along the moving mass; and then the birds settled down again, and
nothing was heard but their confused, subdued notes. Cadine had a
saucepan near her; she filled her mouth with the water and tares which
it contained, and then, taking up the pigeons one by one, shot the food
down their throats with amazing rapidity. The poor creatures struggled
and nearly choked, and finally fell down in the boxes with swimming
eyes, intoxicated, as it were, by all the food which they were thus
forced to swallow.[*]

[*] This is the customary mode of fattening pigeons at the Paris
markets. The work is usually done by men who make a specialty of it,
and are called _gaveurs_.—Translator.


“Poor creatures!” exclaimed Claude.

“Oh, so much the worse for them,” said Cadine, who had now finished.
“They are much nicer eating when they’ve been well fed. In a couple of
hours or so all those over yonder will be given a dose of salt water.
That makes their flesh white and tender. Then two hours afterwards
they’ll be killed. If you would like to see the killing, there are some
here which are quite ready. Marjolin will settle their account for them
in a jiffy.”

Marjolin carried away a box containing some fifty pigeons, and Claude
and Florent followed him. Squatting upon the ground near one of the
water-taps, he placed the box by his side. Then he laid a framework of
slender wooden bars on the top of a kind of zinc trough, and forthwith
began to kill the pigeons. His knife flashed rapidly in his fingers, as
he seized the birds by the wings, stunned them by a blow on the head
from the knife-handle, and then thrust the point of the blade into
their throats. They quivered for an instant, and ruffled their feathers
as Marjolin laid them in a row, with their heads between the wooden
bars above the zinc trough, into which their blood fell drop by drop.
He repeated each different movement with the regularity of clockwork,
the blows from the knife-handle falling with a monotonous tick-tack as
he broke the birds’ skulls, and his hand working backwards and forwards
like a pendulum as he took up the living pigeons on one side and laid
them down dead on the other. Soon, moreover, he worked with increasing
rapidity, gloating over the massacre with glistening eyes, squatting
there like a huge delighted bull-dog enjoying the sight of slaughtered
vermin. “Tick-tack! Tick-tack!” whilst his tongue clucked as an
accompaniment to the rhythmical movements of his knife. The pigeons
hung down like wisps of silken stuff.

“Ah, you enjoy that, don’t you, you great stupid?” exclaimed Cadine.
“How comical those pigeons look when they bury their heads in their
shoulders to hide their necks! They’re horrid things, you know, and
would give one nasty bites if they got the chance.” Then she laughed
more loudly at Marjolin’s increasing, feverish haste; and added: “I’ve
killed them sometimes myself, but I can’t get on as quickly as he does.
One day he killed a hundred in ten minutes.”

The wooden frame was nearly full; the blood could be heard falling into
the zinc trough; and as Claude happened to turn round he saw Florent
looking so pale that he hurriedly led him away. When they got
above-ground again he made him sit down on a step.

“Why, what’s the matter with you?” he exclaimed, tapping him on the
shoulder. “You’re fainting away like a woman!”

“It’s the smell of the cellar,” murmured Florent, feeling a little
ashamed of himself.

The truth was, however, that those pigeons, which were forced to
swallow tares and salt water, and then had their skulls broken and
their throats slit, had reminded him of the wood-pigeons of the
Tuileries gardens, strutting over the green turf, with their satiny
plumage flashing iridescently in the sunlight. He again heard them
cooing on the arm of the marble wrestler amidst the hushed silence of
the garden, while children trundled their hoops in the deep gloom of
the chestnuts. And then, on seeing that big fair-haired animal
massacring his boxful of birds, stunning them with the handle of his
knife and driving its point into their throats, in the depths of that
foul-smelling cellar, he had felt sick and faint, his legs had almost
given way beneath him, while his eyelids quivered tremulously.

“Well, you’d never do for a soldier!” Claude said to him when he
recovered from his faintness. “Those who sent you to Cayenne must have
been very simple-minded folks to fear such a man as you! Why, my good
fellow, if ever you do put yourself at the head of a rising, you won’t
dare to fire a shot. You’ll be too much afraid of killing somebody.”

Florent got up without making any reply. He had become very gloomy, his
face was furrowed by deep wrinkles; and he walked off, leaving Claude
to go back to the cellar alone. As he made his way towards the fish
market his thoughts returned to his plan of attack, to the levies of
armed men who were to invade the Palais Bourbon. Cannon would roar from
the Champs Elysees; the gates would be burst open; blood would stain
the steps, and men’s brains would bespatter the pillars. A vision of
the fight passed rapidly before him; and he beheld himself in the midst
of it, deadly pale, and hiding his face in his hands, not daring to
look around him.

As he was crossing the Rue du Pont Neuf he fancied he espied Auguste’s
pale face peering round the corner of the fruit pavilion. The assistant
seemed to be watching for someone, and his eyes were starting from his
head with an expression of intense excitement. Suddenly, however, he
vanished and hastened back to the pork shop.

“What’s the matter with him?” thought Florent. “Is he frightened of me,
I wonder?”

Some very serious occurrences had taken place that morning at the
Quenu-Gradelles’. Soon after daybreak, Auguste, breathless with
excitement, had awakened his mistress to tell her that the police had
come to arrest Monsieur Florent. And he added, with stammering
incoherence, that the latter had gone out, and that he must have done
so with the intention of escaping. Lisa, careless of appearances, at
once hurried up to her brother-in-law’s room in her dressing-wrapper,
and took possession of La Normande’s photograph, after glancing round
to see if there was anything lying about that might compromise herself
and Quenu. As she was making her way downstairs again, she met the
police agents on the first floor. The commissary requested her to
accompany them to Florent’s room, where, after speaking to her for a
moment in a low tone, he installed himself with his men, bidding her
open the shop as usual so as to avoid giving the alarm to anyone. The
trap was set.

Lisa’s only worry in the matter was the terrible blow that the arrest
would prove to poor Quenu. She was much afraid that if he learned that
the police were in the house, he would spoil everything by his tears;
so she made Auguste swear to observe the most rigid silence on the
subject. Then she went back to her room, put on her stays, and
concocted some story for the benefit of Quenu, who was still drowsy.
Half an hour later she was standing at the door of the shop with all
her usual neatness of appearance, her hair smooth and glossy, and her
face glowing rosily. Auguste was quietly setting out the window. Quenu
came for a moment on to the footway, yawning slightly, and ridding
himself of all sleepiness in the fresh morning air. There was nothing
to indicate the drama that was in preparation upstairs.

The commissary himself, however, gave the alarm to the neighbourhood by
paying a domiciliary visit to the Mehudins’ abode in the Rue Pirouette.
He was in possession of the most precise information. In the anonymous
letters which had been sent to the Prefecture, all sorts of statements
were made respecting Florent’s alleged intrigue with the beautiful
Norman. Perhaps, thought the commissary, he had now taken refuge with
her; and so, accompanied by two of his men, he proceeded to knock at
the door in the name of the law. The Mehudins had only just got up. The
old woman opened the door in a fury; but suddenly calmed down and began
to smile when she learned the business on hand. She seated herself and
fastened her clothes, while declaring to the officers: “We are honest
folks here, and have nothing to be afraid of. You can search wherever
you like.”

However, as La Normande delayed to open the door of her room, the
commissary told his men to break it open. The young woman was scarcely
clad when the others entered, and this unceremonious invasion, which
she could not understand, fairly exasperated her. She flushed crimson
from anger rather than from shame, and seemed as though she were about
to fly at the officers. The commissary, at the sight, stepped forward
to protect his men, repeating in his cold voice: “In the name of the
law! In the name of the law!”

Thereupon La Normande threw herself upon a chair, and burst into a wild
fit of hysterical sobbing at finding herself so powerless. She was
quite at a loss to understand what these men wanted with her. The
commissary, however, had noticed how scantily she was clad, and taking
a shawl from a peg, he flung it over her. Still she did not wrap it
round her, but only sobbed the more bitterly as she watched the men
roughly searching the apartment.

“But what have I done?” she at last stammered out. “What are you
looking for here?”

Thereupon the commissary pronounced the name of Florent; and La
Normande, catching sight of the old woman, who was standing at the
door, cried out: “Oh, the wretch! This is her doing!” and she rushed at
her mother.

She would have struck her if she had reached her; but the police agents
held her back, and forcibly wrapped her in the shawl. Meanwhile, she
struggled violently, and exclaimed in a choking voice:

“What do you take me for? That Florent has never been in this room, I
tell you. There was nothing at all between us. People are always trying
to injure me in the neighbourhood; but just let anyone come here and
say anything before my face, and then you’ll see! You’ll lock me up
afterwards, I dare say, but I don’t mind that! Florent, indeed! What a
lie! What nonsense!”

This flood of words seemed to calm her; and her anger now turned
against Florent, who was the cause of all the trouble. Addressing the
commissary, she sought to justify herself.

“I did not know his real character, sir,” she said. “He had such a mild
manner that he deceived us all. I was unwilling to believe all I heard,
because I know people are so malicious. He only came here to give
lessons to my little boy, and went away directly they were over. I gave
him a meal here now and again, that’s true and sometimes made him a
present of a fine fish. That’s all. But this will be a warning to me,
and you won’t catch me showing the same kindness to anyone again.”

“But hasn’t he given you any of his papers to take care of?” asked the
commissary.

“Oh no, indeed! I swear it. I’d give them up to you at once if he had.
I’ve had quite enough of this, I can tell you! It’s no joke to see you
tossing all my things about and ferreting everywhere in this way. Oh!
you may look; there’s nothing.”

The officers, who examined every article of furniture, now wished to
enter the little closet where Muche slept. The child had been awakened
by the noise, and for the last few moments he had been crying bitterly,
as though he imagined that he was going to be murdered.

“This is my boy’s room,” said La Normande, opening the door.

Muche, quite naked, ran up and threw his arms round his mother’s neck.
She pacified him, and laid him down in her own bed. The officers came
out of the little room again almost immediately, and the commissary had
just made up his mind to retire, when the child, still in tears,
whispered in his mother’s ear: “They’ll take my copy-books. Don’t let
them have my copy-books.”

“Oh, yes; that’s true,” cried La Normande; “there are some copy-books.
Wait a moment, gentlemen, and I’ll give them to you. I want you to see
that I’m not hiding anything from you. Then, you’ll find some of his
writing inside these. You’re quite at liberty to hang him as far as I’m
concerned; you won’t find me trying to cut him down.”

Thereupon she handed Muche’s books and the copies set by Florent to the
commissary. But at this the boy sprang angrily out of bed, and began to
scratch and bite his mother, who put him back again with a box on the
ears. Then he began to bellow.

In the midst of the uproar, Mademoiselle Saget appeared on the
threshold, craning her neck forward. Finding all the doors open, she
had come in to offer her services to old Madame Mehudin. She spied
about and listened, and expressed extreme pity for these poor women,
who had no one to defend them. The commissary, however, had begun to
read the copies with a grave air. The frequent repetition of such words
as “tyrannically,” “liberticide,” “unconstitutional,” and
“revolutionary” made him frown; and on reading the sentence, “When the
hour strikes, the guilty shall fall,” he tapped his fingers on the
paper and said: “This is very serious, very serious indeed.”

Thereupon he gave the books to one of his men, and went off. Claire,
who had hitherto not shown herself, now opened her door, and watched
the police officers go down the stairs. And afterwards she came into
her sister’s bedroom, which she had not entered for a year.
Mademoiselle Saget appeared to be on the best of terms with La
Normande, and was hanging over her in a caressing way, bringing the
shawl forward to cover her the better, and listening to her angry
indignation with an expression of the deepest sympathy.

“You wretched coward!” exclaimed Claire, planting herself in front of
her sister.

La Normande sprang up, quivering with anger, and let the shawl fall to
the floor.

“Ah, you’ve been playing the spy, have you?” she screamed. “Dare to
repeat what you’ve just said!”

“You wretched coward!” repeated Claire, in still more insulting tones
than before.

Thereupon La Normande struck Claire with all her force; and in return
Claire, turning terribly pale, sprang upon her sister and dug her nails
into her neck. They struggled together for a moment or two, tearing at
each other’s hair and trying to choke one another. Claire, fragile
though she was, pushed La Normande backward with such tremendous
violence that they both fell against the wardrobe, smashing the mirror
on its front. Muche was roaring, and old Madame Mehudin called to
Mademoiselle Saget to come and help her separate the sisters. Claire,
however, shook herself free.

“Coward! Coward!” she cried; “I’ll go and tell the poor fellow that it
is you who have betrayed him.”

Her mother, however, blocked the doorway, and would not let her pass,
while La Normande seized her from behind, and then, Mademoiselle Saget
coming to the assistance of the other two, the three of them dragged
Claire into her bedroom and locked the door upon her, in spite of all
her frantic resistance. In her rage she tried to kick the door down,
and smashed everything in the room. Soon afterwards, however, nothing
could be heard except a furious scratching, the sound of metal scarping
at the plaster. The girl was trying to loosen the door hinges with the
points of her scissors.

“She would have murdered me if she had had a knife,” said La Normande,
looking about for her clothes, in order to dress herself. “She’ll be
doing something dreadful, you’ll see, one of these days, with that
jealousy of hers! We mustn’t let her get out on any account: she’d
bring the whole neighbourhood down upon us!”

Mademoiselle Saget went off in all haste. She reached the corner of the
Rue Pirouette just as the commissary of police was re-entering the side
passage of the Quenu-Gradelles’ house. She grasped the situation at
once, and entered the shop with such glistening eyes that Lisa enjoined
silence by a gesture which called her attention to the presence of
Quenu, who was hanging up some pieces of salt pork. As soon as he had
returned to the kitchen, the old maid in a low voice described the
scenes that had just taken place at the Mehudins’. Lisa, as she bent
over the counter, with her hand resting on a dish of larded veal,
listened to her with the happy face of one who triumphs. Then, as a
customer entered the shop, and asked for a couple of pig’s trotters,
Lisa wrapped them up, and handed them over with a thoughtful air.

“For my own part, I bear La Normande no ill-will,” she said to
Mademoiselle Saget, when they were alone again. “I used to be very fond
of her, and have always been sorry that other people made mischief
between us. The proof that I’ve no animosity against her is here in
this photograph, which I saved from falling into the hands of the
police, and which I’m quite ready to give her back if she will come and
ask me for it herself.”

She took the photograph out of her pocket as she spoke. Mademoiselle
Saget scrutinised it and sniggered as she read the inscription,
“Louise, to her dear friend Florent.”

“I’m not sure you’ll be acting wisely,” she said in her cutting voice.
“You’d do better to keep it.”

“No, no,” replied Lisa; “I’m anxious for all this silly nonsense to
come to an end. To-day is the day of reconciliation. We’ve had enough
unpleasantness, and the neighbourhood’s now going to be quiet and
peaceful again.”

“Well, well, shall I go and tell La Normande that you are expecting
her?” asked the old maid.

“Yes; I shall be very glad if you will.”

Mademoiselle Saget then made her way back to the Rue Pirouette, and
greatly frightened the fish-girl by telling her that she had just seen
her photograph in Lisa’s pocket. She could not, however, at once
prevail upon her to comply with her rival’s terms. La Normande
propounded conditions of her own. She would go, but Madame Quenu must
come to the door of the shop to receive her. Thus the old maid was
obliged to make another couple of journeys between the two rivals
before their meeting could be satisfactorily arranged. At last,
however, to her great delight, she succeeded in negotiating the peace
which was destined to cause so much talk and excitement. As she passed
Claire’s door for the last time she still heard the sound of the
scissors scraping away at the plaster.

When she had at last carried a definite reply to Madame Quenu,
Mademoiselle Saget hurried off to find Madame Lecœur and La Sarriette;
and all three of them took up their position on the footway at the
corner of the fish market, just in front of the pork shop. Here they
would be certain to have a good view of every detail of the meeting.
They felt extremely impatient, and while pretending to chat together
kept an anxious look-out in the direction of the Rue Pirouette, along
which La Normande must come. The news of the reconciliation was already
travelling through the markets, and while some saleswomen stood up
behind their stalls trying to get a view of what was taking place,
others, still more inquisitive, actually left their places and took up
a position in the covered way. Every eye in the markets was directed
upon the pork shop; the whole neighbourhood was on the tip-toe of
expectation.

It was a very solemn affair. When La Normande at last turned the corner
of the Rue Pirouette the excitement was so great that the women held
their breath.

“She has got her diamonds on,” murmured La Sarriette.

“Just look how she stalks along,” added Madame Lecœur; “the stuck-up
creature!”

The beautiful Norman was, indeed, advancing with the mien of a queen
who condescends to make peace. She had made a most careful toilet,
frizzing her hair and turning up a corner of her apron to display her
cashmere skirt. She had even put on a new and rich lace bow. Conscious
that the whole market was staring at her, she assumed a still haughtier
air as she approached the pork shop. When she reached the door she
stopped.

“Now it’s beautiful Lisa’s turn,” remarked Mademoiselle Saget. “Mind
you pay attention.”

Beautiful Lisa smilingly quitted her counter. She crossed the
shop-floor at a leisurely pace, and came and offered her hand to the
beautiful Norman. She also was smartly dressed, with her dazzling linen
and scrupulous neatness. A murmur ran through the crowd of fish-wives,
all their heads gathered close together, and animated chatter ensued.
The two women had gone inside the shop, and the _crepines_ in the
window prevented them from being clearly seen. However, they seemed to
be conversing affectionately, addressing pretty compliments to one
another.

“See!” suddenly exclaimed Mademoiselle Saget, “the beautiful Norman’s
buying something! What is it she’s buying? It’s a chitterling, I
believe! Ah! Look! look! You didn’t see it, did you? Well, beautiful
Lisa just gave her the photograph; she slipped it into her hand with
the chitterling.”

Fresh salutations were then seen to pass between the two women; and the
beautiful Lisa, exceeding even the courtesies which had been agreed
upon, accompanied the beautiful Norman to the footway. There they stood
laughing together, exhibiting themselves to the neighbourhood like a
couple of good friends. The markets were quite delighted; and the
saleswomen returned to their stalls, declaring that everything had
passed off extremely well.

Mademoiselle Saget, however, detained Madame Lecœur and La Sarriette.
The drama was not over yet. All three kept their eyes fixed on the
house opposite with such keen curiosity that they seemed trying to
penetrate the very walls. To pass the time away they once more began to
talk of the beautiful Norman.

“She’s without a lover now,” remarked Madame Lecœur.

“Oh! she’s got Monsieur Lebigre,” replied La Sarriette, with a laugh.

“But surely Monsieur Lebigre won’t have anything more to say to her.”

Mademoiselle Saget shrugged her shoulders. “Ah, you don’t know him,”
she said. “He won’t care a straw about all this business. He knows what
he’s about, and La Normande is rich. They’ll come together in a couple
of months, you’ll see. Old Madame Mehudin’s been scheming to bring
about their marriage for a long time past.”

“Well, anyway,” retorted the butter dealer, “the commissary found
Florent at her lodgings.”

“No, no, indeed; I’m sure I never told you that. The long
spindle-shanks had gone way,” replied the old maid. She paused to take
a breath; then resumed in an indignant tone, “What distressed me most
was to hear of all the abominable things that the villain had taught
little Muche. You’d really never believe it. There was a whole bundle
of papers.”

“What sort of abominable things?” asked La Sarriette with interest.

“Oh, all kinds of filth. The commissary said there was quite sufficient
there to hang him. The fellow’s a perfect monster! To go and demoralise
a child! Why, it’s almost past believing! Little Muche is certainly a
scamp, but that’s no reason why he should be given over to the ‘Reds,’
is it?”

“Certainly not,” assented the two others.

“However, all these mysterious goings-on will come to an end now. You
remember my telling you once that there was some strange goings-on at
the Quenus’? Well, you see, I was right in my conclusions, wasn’t I?
Thank God, however, the neighbourhood will now be able to breathe
easily. It was high time strong steps were taken, for things had got to
such a pitch that one actually felt afraid of being murdered in broad
daylight. There was no pleasure in life. All the dreadful stories and
reports one heard were enough to worry one to death. And it was all
owing to that man, that dreadful Florent. Now beautiful Lisa and the
beautiful Norman have sensibly made friends again. It was their duty to
do so for the sake of the peace and quietness of us all. Everything
will go on satisfactorily now, you’ll find. Ah! there’s poor Monsieur
Quenu laughing yonder!”

Quenu had again come on to the footway, and was joking with Madame
Taboureau’s little servant. He seemed quite gay and skittish that
morning. He took hold of the little servant’s hands, and squeezed her
fingers so tightly, in the exuberance of his spirits, that he made her
cry out. Lisa had the greatest trouble to get him to go back into the
kitchen. She was impatiently pacing about the shop, fearing lest
Florent should make his appearance; and she called to her husband to
come away, dreading a meeting between him and his brother.

“She’s getting quite vexed,” said Mademoiselle Saget. “Poor Monsieur
Quenu, you see, knows nothing at all about what’s taking place. Just
look at him there, laughing like a child! Madame Taboureau, you know,
said that she should have nothing more to do with the Quenus if they
persisted in bringing themselves into discredit by keeping that Florent
with them.”

“Well, now, I suppose, they will stick to the fortune,” remarked Madame
Lecœur.

“Oh, no, indeed, my dear. The other one has had his share already.”

“Really? How do you know that?”

“Oh, it’s clear enough, that is!” replied the old maid after a
momentary hesitation, but without giving any proof of her assertions.
“He’s had even more than his share. The Quenus will be several thousand
francs out of pocket. Money flies, you know, when a man has such vices
as he has. I dare say you don’t know that there was another woman mixed
up in it all. Yes, indeed, old Madame Verlaque, the wife of the former
inspector; you know the sallow-faced thing well enough.”

The others protested that it surely wasn’t possible. Why, Madame
Verlaque was positively hideous!

“What! do you think me a liar?” cried Mademoiselle Saget, with angry
indignation. “Why, her letters to him have been found, a whole pile of
letters, in which she asks for money, ten and twenty francs at a time.
There’s no doubt at all about it. I’m quite certain in my own mind that
they killed the husband between them.”

La Sarriette and Madame Lecœur were convinced; but they were beginning
to get very impatient. They had been waiting on the footway for more
than an hour, and feared that somebody might be robbing their stalls
during their long absence. So Mademoiselle Saget began to give them
some further interesting information to keep them from going off.
Florent could not have taken to flight, said she; he was certain to
return, and it would be very interesting to see him arrested. Then she
went on to describe the trap that had been laid for him, while Madame
Lecœur and La Sarriette continued scrutinising the house from top to
bottom, keeping watch upon every opening, and at each moment expecting
to see the hats of the detectives appear at one of the doors or
windows.

“Who would ever imagine, now, that the place was full of police?”
observed the butter dealer.

“Oh! they’re in the garret at the top,” said the old maid. “They’ve
left the window open, you see, just as they found it. Look! I think I
can see one of them hiding behind the pomegranate on the balcony.”

The others excitedly craned out their necks, but could see nothing.

“Ah, no, it’s only a shadow,” continued Mademoiselle Saget. “The little
curtains even are perfectly still. The detectives must be sitting down
in the room, and keeping quiet.”

Just at that moment the women caught sight of Gavard coming out of the
fish market with a thoughtful air. They looked at him with glistening
eyes, without speaking. They had drawn close to one another, and stood
there rigid in their drooping skirts. The poultry dealer came up to
them.

“Have you seen Florent go by?” he asked.

They replied that they had not.

“I want to speak to him at once,” continued Gavard. “He isn’t in the
fish market. He must have gone up to his room. But you would have seen
him, though, if he had.”

The women had turned rather pale. They still kept looking at each other
with a knowing expression, their lips twitching slightly every now and
then. “We have only been here some five minutes, said Madame Lecœur
unblushingly, as her brother-in-law still stood hesitating.

“Well, then, I’ll go upstairs and see. I’ll risk the five flights,”
rejoined Gavard with a laugh.

La Sarriette stepped forward as though she wished to detain him, but
her aunt took hold of her arm and drew her back.

“Let him alone, you big simpleton!” she whispered. “It’s the best thing
that can happen to him. It’ll teach him to treat us with respect in
future.”

“He won’t say again that I ate tainted meat,” muttered Mademoiselle
Saget in a low tone.

They said nothing more. La Sarriette was very red; but the two others
still remained quite yellow. But they now averted their heads, feeling
confused by each other’s looks, and at a loss what to do with their
hands, which they buried beneath their aprons. Presently their eyes
instinctively came back to the house, penetrating the walls, as it
were, following Gavard in his progress up the stairs. When they
imagined that he had entered Florent’s room they again exchanged
furtive glances. La Sarriette laughed nervously. All at once they
fancied they could see the window curtains moving, and this led them to
believe that a struggle was taking place. But the house-front remained
as tranquil as ever in the sunshine; and another quarter of an hour of
unbroken quietness passed away, during which the three women’s nervous
excitement became more and more intense. They were beginning to feel
quite faint when a man hurriedly came out of the passage and ran off to
get a cab. Five minutes later Gavard appeared, followed by two police
officers. Lisa, who had stepped out on to the footway on observing the
cab, hastily hurried back into the shop.

Gavard was very pale. The police had searched him upstairs, and had
discovered the revolver and cartridge case in his possession. Judging
by the commissary’s stern expression on hearing his name, the poultry
dealer deemed himself lost. This was a terrible ending to his plotting
that had never entered into his calculations. The Tuileries would never
forgive him! His legs gave way beneath him as though the firing party
was already awaiting him outside. When he got into the street, however,
his vanity lent him sufficient strength to walk erect; and he even
managed to force a smile, as he knew the market people were looking at
him. They should see him die bravely, he resolved.

However, La Sarriette and Madame Lecœur rushed up to him and anxiously
inquired what was the matter; and the butter dealer began to cry, while
La Sarriette embraced her uncle, manifesting the deepest emotion. As
Gavard held her clasped in his arms, he slipped a key into her hand,
and whispered in her ear: “Take everything, and burn the papers.”

Then he got into the cab with the same mien as he would have ascended
the scaffold. As the vehicle disappeared round the corner of the Rue
Pierre Lescot, Madame Lecœur observed La Sarriette trying to hide the
key in her pocket.

“It’s of no use you trying that little game on me, my dear,” she
exclaimed, clenching her teeth; “I saw him slip it into your hand. As
true as there’s a God in Heaven, I’ll go to the gaol and tell him
everything, if you don’t treat me properly.”

“Of course I shall treat you properly, aunt, dear,” replied La
Sarriette, with an embarrassed smile.

“Very well, then, let us go to his rooms at once. It’s of no use to
give the police time to poke their dirty hands in the cupboards.”

Mademoiselle Saget, who had been listening with gleaming eyes, followed
them, running along in the rear as quickly as her short legs could
carry her. She had no thought, now, of waiting for Florent. From the
Rue Rambuteau to the Rue de la Cossonnerie she manifested the most
humble obsequiousness, and volunteered to explain matters to Madame
Leonce, the doorkeeper.

“We’ll see, we’ll see,” the butter dealer curtly replied.

However, on reaching the house a preliminary parley—as Mademoiselle
Saget had opined—proved to be necessary. Madame Leonce refused to allow
the women to go up to her tenant’s room. She put on an expression of
severe austerity, and seemed greatly shocked by the sight of La
Sarriette’s loosely fastened fichu. However, after the old maid had
whispered a few words to her and she was shown the key, she gave way.
When they got upstairs she surrendered the rooms and furniture to the
others article by article, apparently as heartbroken as if she had been
compelled to show a party of burglars the place where her own money was
secreted.

“There, take everything and have done with it!” she cried at last,
throwing herself into an arm-chair.

La Sarriette was already eagerly trying the key in the locks of
different closets. Madame Lecœur, all suspicion, pressed her so closely
that she exclaimed: “Really, aunt, you get in my way. Do leave my arms
free, at any rate.”

At last they succeeded in opening a wardrobe opposite the window,
between the fireplace and the bed. And then all four women broke into
exclamations. On the middle shelf lay some ten thousand francs in gold,
methodically arranged in little piles. Gavard, who had prudently
deposited the bulk of his fortune in the hands of a notary, had kept
this sum by him for the purposes of the coming outbreak. He had been
wont to say with great solemnity that his contribution to the
revolution was quite ready. The fact was that he had sold out certain
stock, and every night took an intense delight in contemplating those
ten thousand francs, gloating over them, and finding something quite
roysterous and insurrectional in their appearance. Sometimes when he
was in bed he dreamed that a fight was going on in the wardrobe; he
could hear guns being fired there, paving-stones being torn up and
piled into barricades, and voices shouting in clamorous triumph; and he
said to himself that it was his money fighting against the Government.

La Sarriette, however, had stretched out her hands with a cry of
delight.

“Paws off, little one!” exclaimed Madame Lecœur in a hoarse voice.

As she stood there in the reflection of the gold, she looked yellower
than ever—her face discoloured by biliousness, her eyes glowing
feverishly from the liver complaint which was secretly undermining her.
Behind her Mademoiselle Saget on tip-toe was gazing ecstatically into
the wardrobe, and Madame Leonce had now risen from her seat, and was
growling sulkily.

“My uncle said I was to take everything,” declared the girl.

“And am I to have nothing, then; I who have done so much for him?”
cried the doorkeeper.

Madame Lecœur was almost choking with excitement. She pushed the others
away, and clung hold of the wardrobe, screaming: “It all belongs to me!
I am his nearest relative. You are a pack of thieves, you are! I’d
rather throw it all out of the window than see you have it!”

Then silence fell, and they all four stood glowering at each other. The
kerchief that La Sarriette wore over her breast was now altogether
unfastened, and she displayed her bosom heaving with warm life, her
moist red lips, her rosy nostrils. Madame Lecœur grew still more sour
as she saw how lovely the girl looked in the excitement of her longing
desire.

“Well,” she said in a lower tone, “we won’t fight about it. You are his
niece, and I’ll divide the money with you. We will each take a pile in
turn.”

Thereupon they pushed the other two aside. The butter dealer took the
first pile, which at once disappeared within her skirts. Then La
Sarriette took a pile. They kept a close watch upon one another, ready
to fight at the slightest attempt at cheating. Their fingers were
thrust forward in turn, the hideous knotted fingers of the aunt and the
white fingers of the niece, soft and supple as silk. Slowly they filled
their pockets. When there was only one pile left, La Sarriette objected
to her aunt taking it, as she had commenced; and she suddenly divided
it between Mademoiselle Saget and Madame Leonce, who had watched them
pocket the gold with feverish impatience.

“Much obliged to you!” snarled the doorkeeper. “Fifty francs for having
coddled him up with tisane and broth! The old deceiver told me he had
no relatives!”

Before locking the wardrobe up again, Madame Lecœur searched it
thoroughly from top to bottom. It contained all the political works
which were forbidden admission into the country, the pamphlets printed
at Brussels, the scandalous histories of the Bonapartes, and the
foreign caricatures ridiculing the Emperor. One of Gavard’s greatest
delights was to shut himself up with a friend, and show him all these
compromising things.

“He told me that I was to burn all the papers,” said La Sarriette.

“Oh, nonsense! we’ve no fire, and it would take up too long. The police
will soon be here! We must get out of this!”

They all four hastened off; but they had not reached the bottom of the
stairs before the police met them, and made Madame Leonce return with
them upstairs. The three others, making themselves as small as
possible, hurriedly escaped into the street. They walked away in single
file at a brisk pace; the aunt and niece considerably incommoded by the
weight of their drooping pockets. Mademoiselle Saget had kept her fifty
francs in her closed fist, and remained deep in thought, brooding over
a plan for extracting something more from the heavy pockets in front of
her.

“Ah!” she exclaimed, as they reached the corner of the fish market,
“we’ve got here at a lucky moment. There’s Florent yonder, just going
to walk into the trap.”

Florent, indeed, was just then returning to the markets after his
prolonged perambulation. He went into his office to change his coat,
and then set about his daily duties, seeing that the marble slabs were
properly washed, and slowly strolling along the alleys. He fancied that
the fish-wives looked at him in a somewhat strange manner; they
chuckled too, and smiled significantly as he passed them. Some new
vexation, he thought, was in store for him. For some time past those
huge, terrible women had not allowed him a day’s peace. However, as he
passed the Mehudins’ stall he was very much surprised to hear the old
woman address him in a honeyed tone: “There’s just been a gentleman
inquiring for you, Monsieur Florent; a middle-aged gentleman. He’s gone
to wait for you in your room.”

As the old fish-wife, who was squatting, all of a heap, on her chair,
spoke these words, she felt such a delicious thrill of satisfied
vengeance that her huge body fairly quivered. Florent, still doubtful,
glanced at the beautiful Norman; but the young woman, now completely
reconciled with her mother, turned on her tap and slapped her fish,
pretending not to hear what was being said.

“You are quite sure?” said Florent to Mother Mehudin.

“Oh, yes, indeed. Isn’t that so, Louise?” said the old woman in a
shriller voice.

Florent concluded that it must be some one who wanted to see him about
the great business, and he resolved to go up to his room. He was just
about to leave the pavilion, when, happening to turn round, he observed
the beautiful Norman watching him with a grave expression on her face.
Then he passed in front of the three gossips.

“Do you notice that there’s no one in the pork shop?” remarked
Mademoiselle Saget. “Beautiful Lisa’s not the woman to compromise
herself.”

The shop was, indeed, quite empty. The front of the house was still
bright with sunshine; the building looked like some honest, prosperous
pile guilelessly warming itself in the morning rays. Up above, the
pomegranate on the balcony was in full bloom. As Florent crossed the
roadway he gave a friendly nod to Logre and Monsieur Lebigre, who
appeared to be enjoying the fresh air on the doorstep of the latter’s
establishment. They returned his greeting with a smile. Florent was
then about to enter the side-passage, when he fancied he saw Auguste’s
pale face hastily vanishing from its dark and narrow depths. Thereupon
he turned back and glanced into the shop to make sure that the
middle-aged gentleman was not waiting for him there. But he saw no one
but Mouton, who sat on a block displaying his double chin and bristling
whiskers, and gazed at him defiantly with his great yellow eyes. And
when he had at last made up his mind to enter the passage, Lisa’s face
appeared behind the little curtain of a glazed door at the back of the
shop.

A hush had fallen over the fish market. All the huge paunches and
bosoms held their breath, waiting till Florent should disappear from
sight. Then there was an uproarious outbreak; and the bosoms heaved
wildly and the paunches nearly burst with malicious delight. The joke
had succeeded. Nothing could be more comical. As old Mother Mehudin
vented her merriment she shook and quivered like a wine-skin that is
being emptied. Her story of the middle-aged gentleman went the round of
the market, and the fish-wives found it extremely amusing. At last the
long spindle-shanks was collared, and they would no longer always have
his miserable face and gaol-bird’s expression before their eyes. They
all wished him a pleasant journey, and trusted that they might get a
handsome fellow for their next inspector. And in their delight they
rushed about from one stall to another, and felt inclined to dance
round their marble slabs like a lot of holiday-making schoolgirls. The
beautiful Norman, however, watched this outbreak of joy in a rigid
attitude, not daring to move for fear she should burst into tears; and
she kept her hands pressed upon a big skate to cool her feverish
excitement.

“You see how those Mehudins turn their backs upon him now that he’s
come to grief,” said Madame Lecœur.

“Well, and they’re quite right too,” replied Mademoiselle Saget.
“Besides, matters are settled now, my dear, and we’re to have no more
disputes. You’ve every reason to be satisfied; leave the others to act
as they please.”

“It’s only the old woman who is laughing,” La Sarriette remarked; “La
Normande looks anything but happy.”

Meantime, upstairs in his bedroom, Florent allowed himself to be taken
as unresistingly as a sheep. The police officers sprang roughly upon
him, expecting, no doubt, that they would meet with a desperate
resistance. He quietly begged them to leave go of him; and then sat
down on a chair while they packed up his papers, and the red scarves,
armlets, and banners. He did not seem at all surprised at this ending;
indeed, it was something of a relief to him, though he would not
frankly confess it. But he suffered acutely at thought of the bitter
hatred which had sent him into that room; he recalled Auguste’s pale
face and the sniggering looks of the fish-wives; he bethought himself
of old Madame Mehudin’s words, La Normande’s silence, and the empty
shop downstairs. The markets were leagued against him, he reflected;
the whole neighbourhood had conspired to hand him over to the police.
The mud of those greasy streets had risen up all around to overwhelm
him!

And amidst all the round faces which flitted before his mind’s eye
there suddenly appeared that of Quenu, and a spasm of mortal agony
contracted his heart.

“Come, get along downstairs!” exclaimed one of the officers, roughly.

Florent rose and proceeded to go downstairs. When he reached the second
floor he asked to be allowed to return; he had forgotten something, he
said. But the officers refused to let him go back, and began to hustle
him forward. Then he besought them to let him return to his room again,
and even offered them the money he had in his pocket. Two of them at
last consented to return with him, threatening to blow his brains out
should he attempt to play them any trick; and they drew their revolvers
out of their pockets as they spoke. However, on reaching his room once
more Florent simply went straight to the chaffinch’s cage, took the
bird out of it, kissed it between its wings, and set it at liberty. He
watched it fly away through the open window, into the sunshine, and
alight, as though giddy, on the roof of the fish market. Then it flew
off again and disappeared over the markets in the direction of the
Square des Innocents. For a moment longer Florent remained face to face
with the sky, the free and open sky; and he thought of the wood-pigeons
cooing in the garden of the Tuileries, and of those other pigeons down
in the market cellars with their throats slit by Marjolin’s knife. Then
he felt quite broken, and turned and followed the officers, who were
putting their revolvers back into their pockets as they shrugged their
shoulders.

On reaching the bottom of the stairs, Florent stopped before the door
which led into the kitchen. The commissary, who was waiting for him
there, seemed almost touched by his gentle submissiveness, and asked
him: “Would you like to say good-bye to your brother?”

For a moment Florent hesitated. He looked at the door. A tremendous
noise of cleavers and pans came from the kitchen. Lisa, with the design
of keeping her husband occupied, had persuaded him to make the
black-puddings in the morning instead of in the evening, as was his
wont. The onions were simmering on the fire, and over all the noisy
uproar Florent could hear Quenu’s joyous voice exclaiming, “Ah, dash it
all, the pudding will be excellent, that it will! Auguste, hand me the
fat!”

Florent thanked the commissary, but refused his offer. He was afraid to
return any more into that warm kitchen, reeking with the odour of
boiling onions, and so he went on past the door, happy in the thought
that his brother knew nothing of what had happened to him, and
hastening his steps as if to spare the establishment all further worry.
However, on emerging into the open sunshine of the street he felt a
touch of shame, and got into the cab with bent back and ashen face. He
was conscious that the fish market was gazing at him in triumph; it
seemed to him, indeed, as though the whole neighbourhood had gathered
there to rejoice at his fall.

“What a villainous expression he’s got!” said Mademoiselle Saget.

“Yes, indeed, he looks just like a thief caught with his hand in
somebody’s till,” added Madame Lecœur.

“I once saw a man guillotined who looked exactly like he does,”
asserted La Sarriette, showing her white teeth.

They stepped forward, lengthened their necks, and tried to see into the
cab. Just as it was starting, however, the old maid tugged sharply at
the skirts of her companions, and pointed to Claire, who was coming
round the corner of the Rue Pirouette, looking like a mad creature,
with her hair loose and her nails bleeding. She had at last succeeded
in opening her door. When she discovered that she was too late, and
that Florent was being taken off, she darted after the cab, but checked
herself almost immediately with a gesture of impotent rage, and shook
her fists at the receding wheels. Then, with her face quite crimson
beneath the fine plaster dust with which she was covered, she ran back
again towards the Rue Pirouette.

“Had he promised to marry her, eh?” exclaimed La Sarriette, laughing.
“The silly fool must be quite cracked.”

Little by little the neighbourhood calmed down, though throughout the
day groups of people constantly assembled and discussed the events of
the morning. The pork shop was the object of much inquisitive
curiosity. Lisa avoided appearing there, and left the counter in charge
of Augustine. In the afternoon she felt bound to tell Quenu of what had
happened, for fear the news might cause him too great a shock should he
hear it from some gossiping neighbour. She waited till she was alone
with him in the kitchen, knowing that there he was always most
cheerful, and would weep less than if he were anywhere else. Moreover,
she communicated her tidings with all sorts of motherly precautions.
Nevertheless, as soon as he knew the truth he fell on the
chopping-block, and began to cry like a calf.

“Now, now, my poor dear, don’t give way like that; you’ll make yourself
quite ill,” exclaimed Lisa, taking him in her arms.

His tears were inundating his white apron, the whole of his massive,
torpid form quivered with grief. He seemed to be sinking, melting away.
When he was at last able to speak, he stammered: “Oh, you don’t know
how good he was to me when we lived together in the Rue Royer-Collard!
He did everything. He swept the room and cooked the meals. He loved me
as though I were his own child; and after his day’s work he used to
come back splashed with mud, and so tired that he could scarcely move,
while I stayed warm and comfortable in the house, and had nothing to do
but eat. And now they’re going to shoot him!”

At this Lisa protested, saying that he would certainly not be shot. But
Quenu only shook his head.

“I haven’t loved him half as much as I ought to have done,” he
continued. “I can see that very well now. I had a wicked heart, and I
hesitated about giving him his half of the money.”

“Why, I offered it to him a dozen times and more!” Lisa interrupted.
“I’m sure we’ve nothing to reproach ourselves with.”

“Oh, yes, I know that you are everything that is good, and that you
would have given him every copper. But I hesitated, I didn’t like to
part with it; and now it will be a sorrow to me for the rest of my
life. I shall always think that if I’d shared the fortune with him he
wouldn’t have gone wrong a second time. Oh, yes; it’s my fault! It is I
who have driven him to this.”

Then Lisa, expostulating still more gently, assured him that he had
nothing to blame himself for, and even expressed some pity for Florent.
But he was really very culpable, she said, and if he had had more money
he would probably have perpetrated greater follies. Gradually she gave
her husband to understand that it was impossible matters could have had
any other termination, and that now everything would go on much better.
Quenu was still weeping, wiping his cheeks with his apron, trying to
suppress his sobs to listen to her, and then breaking into a wilder fit
of tears than before. His fingers had mechanically sought a heap of
sausage-meat lying on the block, and he was digging holes in it, and
roughly kneading it together.

“And how unwell you were feeling, you know,” Lisa continued. “It was
all because our life had got so shifted out of its usual course. I was
very anxious, though I didn’t tell you so, at seeing you getting so
low.”

“Yes, wasn’t I?” he murmured, ceasing to sob for a moment.

“And the business has been quite under a cloud this year. It was as
though a spell had been cast on it. Come, now, don’t take on so; you’ll
see that everything will look up again now. You must take care of
yourself, you know, for my sake and your daughter’s. You have duties to
us as well as to others, remember.”

Quenu was now kneading the sausage-meat more gently. Another burst of
emotion was thrilling him, but it was a softer emotion, which was
already bringing a vague smile to his grief-stricken face. Lisa felt
that she had convinced him, and she turned and called to Pauline, who
was playing in the shop, and sat her on Quenu’s knee.

“Tell your father, Pauline, that he ought not to give way like this.
Ask him nicely not to go on distressing us so.”

The child did as she was told, and their fat, sleek forms united in a
general embrace. They all three looked at one another, already feeling
cured of that twelve months’ depression from which they had but just
emerged. Their big, round faces smiled, and Lisa softly repeated, “And
after all, my dear, there are only we three, you know, only we three.”

Two months later Florent was again sentenced to transportation. The
affair caused a great stir. The newspapers published all possible
details, and gave portraits of the accused, sketches of the banners and
scarves, and plans of the places where the conspirators had met. For a
fortnight nothing but the great plot of the central markets was talked
of in Paris. The police kept on launching more and more alarming
reports, and it was at last even declared that the whole of the
Montmartre Quarter was undermined. The excitement in the Corps
Législatif was so intense that the members of the Centre and the Right
forgot their temporary disagreement over the Imperial Grant Bill, and
became reconciled. And then by an overwhelming majority they voted the
unpopular tax, of which even the lower classes, in the panic which was
sweeping over the city, dared no longer complain.

The trial lasted a week. Florent was very much surprised at the number
of accomplices with which he found himself credited. Out of the twenty
and more who were placed in the dock with him, he knew only some six or
seven. After the sentence of the court had been read, he fancied he
could see Robine’s innocent-looking hat and back going off quietly
through the crowd. Logre was acquitted, as was also Lacaille; Alexandre
was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment for his child-like complicity
in the conspiracy; while as for Gavard, he, like Florent, was condemned
to transportation. This was a heavy blow, which quite crushed him
amidst the final enjoyment that he derived from those lengthy
proceedings in which he had managed to make himself so conspicuous. He
was paying very dearly for the way in which he had vented the spirit of
perpetual opposition peculiar to the Paris shopkeeping classes. Two big
tears coursed down his scared face—the face of a white-haired child.

And then one morning in August, amidst the busy awakening of the
markets, Claude Lantier, sauntering about in the thick of the arriving
vegetables, with his waist tightly girded by his red sash, came to
grasp Madame Francois’s hand close by Saint Eustache. She was sitting
on her carrots and turnips, and her long face looked very sad. The
artist, too, was gloomy, notwithstanding the bright sun which was
already softening the deep-green velvet of the mountains of cabbages.

“Well, it’s all over now,” he said. “They are sending him back again.
He’s already on his way to Brest, I believe.”

Madame Francois made a gesture of mute grief. Then she gently waved her
hand around, and murmured in a low voice; “Ah, it is all Paris’s doing,
this villainous Paris!”

“No, no, not quite that; but I know whose doing it is, the contemptible
creatures!” exclaimed Claude, clenching his fists. “Do you know, Madame
Francois, there was nothing too ridiculous for those fellows in the
court to say! Why, they even went ferreting in a child’s copy-books!
That great idiot of a Public Prosecutor made a tremendous fuss over
them, and ranted about the respect due to children, and the wickedness
of demagogical education! It makes me quite sick to think of it all!”

A shudder of disgust shook him, and then, burying himself more deeply
in his discoloured cloak, he resumed: “To think of it! A man who was as
gentle as a girl! Why, I saw him turn quite faint at seeing a pigeon
killed! I couldn’t help smiling with pity when I saw him between two
gendarmes. Ah, well, we shall never see him again! He won’t come back
this time.”

“He ought to have listened to me,” said Madame Francois, after a pause,
“and have come to live at Nanterre with my fowls and rabbits. I was
very fond of him, you see, for I could tell that he was a good-hearted
fellow. Ah, we might have been so happy together! It’s a sad pity.
Well, we must bear it as best we can, Monsieur Claude. Come and see me
one of these days. I’ll have an omelet ready for you.”

Her eyes were dim with tears; but all at once she sprang up like a
brave woman who bears her sorrows with fortitude.

“Ah!” she exclaimed, “here’s old Mother Chantemesse coming to buy some
turnips of me. The fat old lady’s as sprightly as ever!”

Claude went off, and strolled about the footways. The dawn had risen in
the white sheaf of light at the end of the Rue Rambuteau; and the sun,
now level with the house-tops, was diffusing rosy rays which already
fell in warm patches on the pavements. Claude was conscious of a gay
awakening in the huge resonant markets—indeed, all over the
neighbourhood—crowded with piles of food. It was like the joy that
comes after cure, the mirth of folks who are at last relieved of a
heavy weight which has been pulling them down. He saw La Sarriette
displaying a gold chain and singing amidst her plums and strawberries,
while she playfully pulled the moustaches of Monsieur Jules, who was
arrayed in a velvet jacket. He also caught sight of Madame Lecœur and
Mademoiselle Saget passing along one of the covered ways, and looking
less sallow than usual—indeed, almost rosy—as they laughed like bosom
friends over some amusing story. In the fish market, old Madame
Mehudin, who had returned to her stall, was slapping her fish, abusing
customers, and snubbing the new inspector, a presumptuous young man
whom she had sworn to spank; while Claire, seemingly more languid and
indolent than ever, extended her hands, blue from immersion in the
water of her tanks, to gather together a great heap of edible snails,
shimmering with silvery slime. In the tripe market Auguste and
Augustine, with the foolish expression of newly-married people, had
just been purchasing some pigs’ trotters, and were starting off in a
trap for their pork shop at Montrouge. Then, as it was now eight
o’clock and already quite warm, Claude, on again coming to the Rue
Rambuteau, perceived Muche and Pauline playing at horses. Muche was
crawling along on all-fours, while Pauline sat on his back, and clung
to his hair to keep herself from falling. However, a moving shadow
which fell from the eaves of the market roof made Claude look up; and
he then espied Cadine and Marjolin aloft, kissing and warming
themselves in the sunshine, parading their loves before the whole
neighbourhood like a pair of light-hearted animals.

Claude shook his fist at them. All this joyousness down below and on
high exasperated him. He reviled the Fat; the Fat, he declared, had
conquered the Thin. All around him he could see none but the Fat
protruding their paunches, bursting with robust health, and greeting
with delight another day of gorging and digestion. And a last blow was
dealt to him by the spectacle which he perceived on either hand as he
halted opposite the Rue Pirouette.

On his right, the beautiful Norman, or the beautiful Madame Lebigre, as
she was now called, stood at the door of her shop. Her husband had at
length been granted the privilege of adding a State tobacco agency[*]
to his wine shop, a long-cherished dream of his which he had finally
been able to realise through the great services he had rendered to the
authorities. And to Claude the beautiful Madame Lebigre looked superb,
with her silk dress and her frizzed hair, quite ready to take her seat
behind her counter, whither all the gentlemen in the neighbourhood
flocked to buy their cigars and packets of tobacco. She had become
quite distinguished, quite the lady. The shop behind her had been newly
painted, with borders of twining vine-branches showing against a soft
background; the zinc-plated wine-counter gleamed brightly, and in the
tall mirror the flasks of liqueurs set brighter flashes of colour than
ever. And the mistress of all these things stood smiling radiantly at
the bright sunshine.

[*] Most readers will remember that the tobacco trade is a State
monopoly in France. The retail tobacconists are merely Government
agents.—Translator.


Then, on Claude’s left, the beautiful Lisa blocked up the doorway of
her shop as she stood on the threshold. Never before had her linen
shone with such dazzling whiteness; never had her serene face and rosy
cheeks appeared in a more lustrous setting of glossy locks. She
displayed the deep calmness of repletion, a massive tranquillity
unruffled even by a smile. She was a picture of absolute quietude, of
perfect felicity, not only cloudless but lifeless, the simple felicity
of basking in the warm atmosphere. Her tightly stretched bodice seemed
to be still digesting the happiness of yesterday; while her dimpled
hands, hidden in the folds of her apron, did not even trouble to grasp
at the happiness of to-day, certain as they were that it would come of
itself. And the shop-window at her side seemed to display the same
felicity. It had recovered from its former blight; the tongues lolled
out, red and healthy; the hams had regained their old chubbiness of
form; the festoons of sausages no longer wore that mournful air which
had so greatly distressed Quenu. Hearty laughter, accompanied by a
jubilant clattering of pans, sounded from the kitchen in the rear. The
whole place again reeked with fat health. The flitches of bacon and the
sides of pork that hung against the marble showed roundly like
paunches, triumphant paunches, whilst Lisa, with her imposing breadth
of shoulders and dignity of mien, bade the markets good morning with
those big eyes of hers which so clearly bespoke a gross feeder.

However, the two women bowed to each other. Beautiful Madame Lebigre
and beautiful Madame Quenu exchanged a friendly salute.

And then Claude, who had certainly forgotten to dine on the previous
day, was thrilled with anger at seeing them standing there, looking so
healthy and well-to-do with their buxom bosoms; and tightening his
sash, he growled in a tone of irritation:

“What blackguards respectable people are!”