Complete Works of Emile Zola (323 page)

The Abbé did not seem to be in the humour that evening to submit to his landlord’s pleasantry. He looked him straight in the face, and said very bluntly:

‘I am much obliged to you, but there is little probability of their accepting your invitation. They are tired in the evening, and they go to bed. And, besides, that is the best thing they can do.’

‘Just as they like, my dear sir,’ replied Mouret, vexed by the Abbé’s rough manner.

When he was alone again with Marthe, he said to her:

‘Does the Abbé, I wonder, think he can persuade us that the moon is made of green cheese? It’s quite clear that he is afraid that those scamps he has taken in will play him some bad trick or other. Didn’t you see how sharply he kept his eye on them this evening when he caught sight of them at the window? They were spying out at us up there. There will be a bad end to all this!’

Marthe was now living in a state of blessed calm. She no longer felt troubled by Mouret’s raillery; the gradual growth of faith within her filled her with exquisite joy, she glided softly and slowly into a life of pious devotion, which seemed to lull her with a sweet restfulness. Abbé Faujas still avoided speaking to her of God. He remained merely a friend, simply exercising influence over her by his grave demeanour and the vague odour of incense exhaled by his cassock. On two or three occasions when she was alone with him she had again broken out into fits of nervous sobbing, without knowing why, but finding a happiness in thus allow­ing herself to weep. On each of these occasions the Abbé had merely taken her hands in silence, calming her with his serene and authoritative gaze. When she wanted to tell him of her strange attacks of sadness, or her secret joys, or her need of guidance, he smiled and hushed her, telling her that these matters were not his concern, and that she must speak of them to Abbé Bourrette. Then she retired completely within herself and remained trembling; while the priest seemed to assume still colder reserve than before, and strode away from her like some unheeding god at whose feet she wished to pour put her soul in humiliation.

Marthe’s chief occupation now was attending the various religious services and works in which she took part. In the vast nave of Saint-Saturnin’s she felt perfectly happy; it was there that she experienced the full sweetness of that purely physical restfulness which she sought. She there forgot everything: it was like an immense window open upon another life, a life that was wide and infinite, and full of an emotion which thrilled and satisfied her. But she still felt some fear of the church, and she went there with a feeling of uneasy bashfulness, and a touch of nervous shame, that made her glance behind her as she passed through the doorway, to see if anyone was watching her. Then, once inside, she abandoned herself, everything around her seemed to assume a melting softness, even the unctuous voice of Abbé Bourrette, who, after he had confessed her, sometimes kept her on her knees for a few minutes longer, while he spoke to her about Madame Rastoil’s dinners or the Rougons’ last reception.

Marthe often returned home in a condition of complete prostration. Religion seemed to break her down. Rose had become all-powerful in the house. She scolded Mouret, found fault with him because he dirtied too much linen, and let him have his dinner at her own hours. She even tried to convert him.

‘Madame does quite right to live a Christian life,’ said she. ‘You will be damned, sir, you will, and it will only be right, for you are not a good man at heart, no, you are not! You ought to go with your wife to mass next Sunday morning.’

Mouret shrugged his shoulders. He let things take their own course, and sometimes even did a bit of house-work him­self, taking a turn or two with the broom when he thought that the dining-room looked particularly dusty. The children gave him most trouble. It was vacation-time, and, as their mother was scarcely ever at home, Désirée and Octave — who had again failed in his examination for his degree — turned the place upside down. Serge was poorly, kept his bed, and spent whole days in reading in his room. He had become Abbé Faujas’s favourite, and the priest lent him books. Mouret thus spent two dreadful months, at his wits’ end how to manage his young folks. Octave was a special trouble to him, and as he did not feel inclined to keep him at home till the end of the vacation, he determined that he should not again return to college, but should be sent to some business-house at Marseilles.

‘Since you won’t look after them at all,’ he said to Marthe, ‘I must find some place or other to put them in. I am quite worn out with them all, and I won’t have them at home any longer. It’s your own fault if it causes you any grief. Octave is quite unbearable. He will never pass his examination, and it will be much better to teach him at once how to gain his own living instead of letting him idle his time away with a lot of good-for-nothings. One meets him roaming all over the town.’

Marthe was very much distressed. She seemed to awake from a dream on hearing that one of her children was about to leave her. She succeeded in getting the departure post­poned for a week, during which she remained more at home, and resumed her active life. But she quickly dropped back again into her previous state of listless languor; and on the day that Octave came to kiss her, telling her that he was to leave for Marseilles in the evening, she had lost all strength and energy, and contented herself with giving him some good advice.

Mouret came back from the railway station with a very heavy heart. He looked about him for his wife, and found her in the garden, crying under the arbour. Then he gave vent to his feelings.

‘There! that’s one the less!’ he exclaimed. ‘You ought to feel glad of it. You will be able to go prowling about the church now as much as you like. Make your mind easy, the other two won’t be here long. I shall keep Serge with me as he is a very quiet lad and is rather young as yet to go and read for the bar; but if he’s at all in your way, just let me know, and I will free you of him at once. As for Désirée, I shall send her to her nurse.’

Marthe went on weeping in silence.

‘But what would you have?’ he continued.
‘
You can’t be both in and out. Since you have taken to keeping away from home, your children have become indifferent to you. That’s logic, isn’t it? Besides it is necessary to find room for all the people who are now living in our house. It isn’t nearly big enough, and we shall be lucky if we don’t get turned out of doors ourselves.’

He had raised his eyes as he spoke, and was looking at the windows of the second-floor. Then, lowering his voice, he added:

‘Don’t go on crying in that ridiculous way! They are watching you. Don’t you see those eyes peeping between the red curtains? They are the eyes of the Abbé’s sister; I know them well enough. You may depend on seeing them there all day long. The Abbé himself may be a decent fellow, but as for those Trouches, I know they are always crouching behind their curtains like wolves waiting to spring on one. I feel quite certain that if the Abbé didn’t prevent them, they would come down in the night to steal my pears. Dry your tears, my dear; you may be quite sure that they are enjoying our disagreement. Even though they have been the cause of the boy’s going away, that is no reason why we should let them see what a trouble his departure has been to us both.’

His voice broke, and he himself seemed on the point of sobbing. Marthe, quite heart-broken, deeply touched by his last words, was prompted to throw herself into his arms. But they were afraid of being observed; and besides they felt as if there were some obstacle between them that prevented them from coming together. So they separated, while Olympe’s eyes still glistened between the red curtains upstairs.

CHAPTER XI

One morning Abbé Bourrette made his appearance, his face betokening the greatest distress. As soon as he caught sight of Marthe on the steps, he hurried up to her and, seizing her hands and pressing them, he stammered:

‘Poor Compan! it is all over with him! he is dying! I am going upstairs, I must see Faujas at once.’

When Marthe showed him his fellow priest, who, accord­ing to his wont, was walking to and fro at the bottom of the garden, reading his breviary, he ran up to him, tottering on his short legs. He tried to speak and tell the other the sad news, but his grief choked him, and he could only throw his arms round Abbé Faujas’s neck, while sobbing bitterly.

‘Hallo! what’s the matter with the two parsons?’ cried Mouret, who had hastily rushed out of the dining-room.

‘The Curé of Saint-Saturnin’s is dying,’ Marthe replied, showing much distress.

Mouret assumed an expression of surprise, and, as he went back into the house, he murmured:

‘Pooh! that worthy Bourrette will manage to console himself to-morrow when he is appointed Curé in the other’s place. He counts on getting the post; he told me so.’

Abbé Faujas disengaged himself from the old priest’s embrace, quietly closed his breviary, and listened to the sad news with a grave face.

‘Compan wants to see you,’ said Abbé Bourrette in a broken voice; ‘he will not last the morning out. Oh! he has been a dear friend to me! We studied together. He is anxious to say good-bye to you. He has been telling me all through the night that you were the only man of courage in the diocese. For more than a year now he has been getting weaker and weaker, and not a single Plassans priest has dared to go and grasp his hand; while you, a stranger, who scarcely knew him, you have spent an afternoon with him every week. The tears came into his eyes just now as he was speaking of you; you must lose no time, my friend.’

Abbé Faujas went up to his room for a moment, while Abbé Bourrette paced impatiently and hopelessly about the passage; and then at last they set off together. The old priest wiped his brow and swayed about on the road as he talked in disconnected fashion:

‘He would have died like a dog without a single prayer being said for him if his sister had not come and told me about him at eleven o’clock last night. She did quite right, the dear lady, though he did not want to compromise any of us, and even would have foregone the last sacraments. Yes, my friend, he was dying all alone, abandoned and deserted, he who had so high a mind, and who has only lived to do good!’

Then Bourrette became silent; but after a few moments he resumed again in a different voice:

‘Do you think that Fenil will ever forgive me for this? Never, I expect! When Compan saw me bringing the viaticum, he was unwilling to let me anoint him and told me to go away. Well, well! it’s all over with me now, and I shall never be Curé! But I am glad that I did it, and that I haven’t let Compan die like a dog. He has been at war with Fenil for thirty years, you know. When he took to his bed he said to me, “Ah! it’s Fenil who is going to carry the day! Now that I am stricken down he will get the better of me!” So think of it! That poor Compan, whom I have seen so high-spirited and energetic at Saint-Saturnin’s! Little Eusèbe, the choir-boy, whom I took to ring the viati­cum bell, was quite embarrassed when he found where we were going. He kept looking behind him at each tinkle, as if he was afraid that Fenil would hear it.’

Abbé Faujas, who was stepping along quickly with bent head and a preoccupied air, kept perfectly silent, and did not even seem to hear what his companion was saying.

‘Has the Bishop been informed?’ he suddenly asked.

But Abbé Bourrette in his turn now appeared to be buried in thought and made no reply; however, just as they reached Abbé Compan’s door he said to his companion:

‘Tell him that we met Fenil and that he bowed to us. It will please him, for he will then think that I shall be appointed Curé.’

They went up the stairs in silence. The Curé’s sister came to the landing, and on seeing them burst into tears. Then she stammered between her sobs:

‘It is all over! He has just passed away in my arms. I was quite alone with him. As he was dying, he looked round him and murmured, “I must have the plague since they have all deserted me.” Ah! gentlemen he died with his eyes full of tears.’

They went into the little room where Abbé Compan, with his head resting on his pillow, seemed to be asleep. His eyes had remained open, and tears yet trickled down his white sad face. Then Abbé Bourrette fell upon his knees, sobbing and praying, with his face pressed to the counterpane. Abbé Faujas at first remained standing, gazing at the dead man; and after having knelt for a moment, he quietly went away. Abbé Bourrette was so absorbed in his grief that he did not even hear his colleague close the door.

Abbé Faujas went straight to the Bishop’s. In Mon­seigneur Rousselot’s ante-chamber he met Abbé Surin, carry­ing a bundle of papers.

‘Do you want to speak to his lordship?’ asked the secretary, with his never-failing smile. ‘You have come at an unfortunate time. His lordship is so busy that he has given orders that no one is to be admitted.’

‘But I want to see him on a very urgent matter,’ quietly said Abbé Faujas. ‘You can at any rate let him know that I am here; and I will wait, if it is necessary.’

‘I am afraid that it would be useless for you to wait. His lordship has several people with him. It would be better if you came again to-morrow.’

But the Abbé took a chair, and just as he was doing so the Bishop opened the door of his study. He appeared much vexed on seeing his visitor, whom at first he pretended not to recognise.

‘My son,’ he said to Surin, ‘when you have arranged those papers, come to me immediately; there is a letter I want to dictate to you.’

Then turning to the priest, who remained respectfully standing, he said:

‘Ah! is it you, Monsieur Faujas? I am very glad to see you. Perhaps you want to say something to me? Come into my study; you are never in the way.’

Monseigneur Rousselot’s study was a very large and rather gloomy room, in which a great wood fire was kept burning in the summer as well as the winter. The heavy carpet and curtains kept out all the air, and the room was like a warm bath. The Bishop, like some dowager shutting her­self up from the world, detesting all noise and excitement, lived a chilly life there in his armchair, committing to Abbé Fenil the care of his diocese. He delighted in the classics, and it was said that he was secretly making a translation of Horace. He was equally fond of the little verses of the Anthology, and broad quotations occasionally escaped from his lips, quotations which he enjoyed with the naïveté of a learned man who cares nothing for the modesty of the vulgar.