Complete Works of Emile Zola (704 page)

The baron, greatly amused, encouraged, her with a nod. Could she be the woman who was to avenge all the others?

When Mouret, after having reminded Vallagnosc that he wanted to show him his machine at work, came up to take his leave, the baron retained him near the window opposite the gardens, now buried in darkness. He yielded at last to the seduction; his confidence had come on seeing him in the midst of these ladies. Both conversed for a moment in a low tone, then the banker said: “Well, I’ll look into the affair. It’s settled if your Monday’s sale proves as important as you expect.”

They shook hands, and Mouret, delighted, took his leave, for he did not enjoy his dinner unless he went and gave a look at the day’s receipts at The Ladies’ Paradise.

CHAPTER IV

The following Monday, the 10th of October, a clear, victorious sun pierced the grey clouds which had darkened Paris during the previous week. It had drizzled all the previous night, a sort of watery mist, the humidity of which dirtied the streets; but in the early morning, thanks to the sharp wind which was driving the clouds away, the pavement had become drier, and the blue sky had a limpid, spring-like gaiety.

Thus The Ladies’ Paradise, after eight o’clock, blazed forth beneath the clear rays of the sun, in all the glory of its great sale of winter novelties. Flags were flying at the door, and pieces of woollens were flapping about in the fresh morning air, animating the Place Gaillon with the bustle of a country fair; whilst in both streets the windows developed symphonies of displays, the clearness of the glass showing up still further the brilliant tones. It was like a debauch of color, a street pleasure which burst forth there, a wealth of goods publicly displayed, where everybody could go and feast their eyes.

But at this hour very few people entered, only a few rare customers, housewives of the neighborhood, women desirous of avoiding the afternoon crush. Behind the stuffs which decorated it, one could feel the shop to be empty, under arms and waiting for customers, with its waxed floors and counters overflowing with goods.

The busy morning crowd barely glanced at the windows, without lingering a moment. In the Rue Neuve-Saint-Augustin and in the Place Gaillon, where the carriages were to take their stand, there were only two cabs at nine o’clock. The inhabitants of the district, especially the small traders, stirred up by such a show of streamers and decorations, formed little groups in the doorways, at the corners of the streets, gazing at the shop, making bitter remarks. What most filled them with indignation was the sight of one of the four delivery vans just introduced by Mouret, which was standing in the Rue de la Michodière, in front of the delivery office. They were green, picked out with yellow and red, their brilliantly varnished panels sparkling in the sun with the brightness of purple and gold. This van, with its brand-new medley of colors, the name of the house painted on each side, and surmounted with an advertisement of the day’s sale, finished by going off at a trot, drawn by a splendid horse, after being filled up with the previous night’s parcels; and Baudu, who was standing on the threshold of The Old Elbeuf, watched it as far as the boulevard, where it disappeared, to spread all over Paris in a starry radiance the hated name of The Ladies’ Paradise.

However, a few cabs were arriving and forming a line. Every time a customer entered, there was a movement amongst the shop messengers, who were drawn up under the lofty doorway, dressed in livery consisting of a light green coat and trousers, and striped red and yellow waistcoat. Jouve, the inspector and retired captain, was also there, in a frockcoat and white tie, wearing his decoration like a sign of respectability and probity, receiving the ladies with a gravely polite air, bending over them to point out the departments. Then they disappeared in the vestibule, which was transformed into an oriental saloon.

From the very threshold it was a marvel, a surprise, which enchanted all of them. It was Mouret who had been struck with this idea. He was the first to buy, in the Levant, at very advantageous rates, a collection of old and new carpets, articles which up to the present had only been sold at curiosity shops, at high prices; and he intended to flood the market with these goods, selling them at a little over cost price, simply drawing from them a splendid decoration destined to attract the best class of art customers to his establishment. From the centre of the Place Gaillon could be seen this oriental saloon, composed solely of carpets and door curtains which had been hung under his orders. The ceiling was covered with a quantity of Smyrna carpets, the complicated designs of which stood out boldly on a red ground. Then from each side there hung Syrian and Karamanian door-curtains, speckled with green, yellow, and vermilion; Diarbekir door-curtains of a commoner type, rough to the touch, like shepherds’ cloaks; besides these there were carpets which could be used as door-curtains and hangings — long Ispahan, Teheran, and Kermancha rugs, the larger Schoumaka and Madras carpets, a strange florescence of peonies and palms, the fancy let loose in a garden of dreams. On the floor were more carpets, a heap of greasy fleeces: in the centre was an Agra carpet, an extraordinary article with a white ground and a broad delicate blue border, through which ran violet-colored ornaments of exquisite design. Everywhere there was an immense display of marvellous fabrics; Mecca carpets with a velvety reflection, prayer carpets from Daghestan with a symbolic point, Kurdistan carpets covered with blossoming flowers; and finally, piled up in a corner, a heap of Gherdes, Koula, and Kirchur rugs from fifteen francs a piece.

This sumptuous pacha’s tent was furnished with divans and arm-chairs, made with camel sacks, some ornamented with many-colored lozenges, others with primitive roses. Turkey, Arabia, and the Indies were all there. They had emptied the palaces, plundered the mosques and bazaars. A barbarous gold tone prevailed in the waft of the old carpets, the faded tints of which still preserved a somber warmth, as of an extinguished furnace, a beautiful burnt hue suggestive of the old masters. Visions of the East floated beneath the luxury of this barbarous art, amid the strong odor which the old wools had retained of the country of vermin and of the rising sun.

In the morning at eight o’clock, when Denise, who was to commence on that very Monday, had crossed the oriental saloon, she stood there, lost in astonishment, unable to recognize the shop entrance, entirely overcome by this harem-like decoration planted at the door. A messenger having shown her to the top of the house, and handed her over to Madame Cabin, who cleaned and looked after the rooms, this person installed her in No. 7, where her box had already been put. It was a narrow cell, opening on the roof by a skylight, furnished with a small bed, a walnut-wood wardrobe, a toilet-table, and two chairs. Twenty similar rooms ran along the convent-like corridor, painted yellow; and, out of the thirty five young ladies in the house, the twenty who had no friends in Paris slept there, whilst the remaining fifteen lodged outside, a few with borrowed aunts and cousins. Denise at once took off her shabby woollen dress, worn thin by brushing and mended at the sleeves, the only one she had brought from Valognes; she then put on the uniform of her department, a black silk dress which had been altered for her and which she found ready on the bed. This dress was still too large, too wide across the shoulders; but she was so hurried in her emotion that she paid no heed to these details of coquetry. She had never worn silk before. When she went downstairs again, dressed up, uncomfortable, she looked at the shining skirt, feeling ashamed of the noisy rustling of the silk.

Down below, as she was entering her department, a quarrel burst out. She heard Clara say, in a shrill voice:

“Madame, I came in before her.”

“It isn’t true,” replied Marguerite. “She pushed past me at the door, but I had already one foot in the room.”

It was for the inscription on the list of turns, which regulated the sales. The saleswomen wrote their names on a slate in the order of their arrival, and whenever one of them had served a customer, she re-wrote her name beneath the others. Madame Aurélie finished by deciding in Marguerite’s favor.

“Always some injustice here!” muttered Clara, furiously.

But Denise’s entry reconciled these young ladies. They looked at her, then smiled to each other. How could a person truss herself up in that way! The young girl went and awkwardly wrote her name on the list, where she found herself last. Meanwhile, Madame Aurélie was examining her with an anxious face. She could not help saying:

“My dear, two like you could get into your dress; you must have it taken in. Besides, you don’t know how to dress yourself. Come here and let me arrange you a bit.”

And she placed herself before one of the tall glasses alternating with the doors of the cupboards containing the dresses. The vast apartment, surrounded by these glasses and the wood-work in carved oak, the floor covered with red Wilton carpet of a large pattern, resembled the commonplace drawing-room of an hotel, traversed by a continual stream of travelers. The young ladies completed the resemblance, dressed in the regulation silk, promenading their commercial charms about, without ever sitting down on the dozen chairs reserved for the customers. All wore between two buttonholes of the body of their dresses, as if stuck in their bosoms, a long pencil, with its point in the air; and half out of their pockets, could be seen the white cover of the book of debit-notes. Several risked wearing jewelry — rings, brooches, chains; but their great coquetry, the luxury they all struggled for in the forced uniformity of their dress, was their bare hair, quantities of it, augmented by plaits and chignons when their own did not suffice, combed, curled, and decked out in every way.

“Pull the waist down in front,” said Madame Aurélie. “There, you have now no hump on your back. And your hair, how can you massacre it like that? It would be superb, if you only took a little trouble.”

This was, in fact, Denise’s only beauty. Of a beautiful flaxen hue, it fell down to her ankles; and when she did it up, it was so troublesome that she simply rolled it in a knot, keeping it together under the strong teeth of a bone comb. Clara, greatly annoyed by this head of hair, affected to laugh at it, so strange did it look, twisted up anyhow in its savage grace. She made a sign to a saleswoman in the under-linen department, a girl with a large face and agreeable manner. The two departments, which were close together, were in continual hostility; but the young ladies sometimes joined together in laughing at other people.

“Mademoiselle Cugnot, just look at that mane,” said Clara, whom Marguerite was nudging, feigning also to be on the point of bursting out laughing.

But Mademoiselle Cugnot was not in the humor for joking. She had been looking at Denise for a moment, and she remembered what she had suffered herself during the first few months of her arrival in the establishment.

“Well, what?” said she. “Everybody hasn’t got a mane like that!”

And she returned to her place, leaving the two others very crestfallen. Denise, who had heard all, followed her with a look of thanks, while Madame Aurélie gave our heroine a book of debit-notes with her name on it, saying: “Tomorrow you’ll get yourself up better; and, now, try and pick up the ways of the house, wait your turn for selling. Today’s work will be very hard; we shall be able to judge of your capabilities.”

However, the department still remained deserted; very few customers came up at this early hour. The young ladies reserved themselves, prudently preparing for the fatigues of the afternoon. Denise, intimidated by the thought that they were watching her, sharpened her pencil, for the sake of something to do; then, imitating the others, she stuck it into her bosom, between two buttonholes, and summoned up all her courage, determined to conquer a position. The previous evening they had told her she entered as a probationer, that is to say without any fixed salary; she would simply have the commission and a certain allowance on everything she sold. But she fully hoped to earn twelve hundred francs a year in this way, knowing that the good saleswomen earned as much as two thousand, when they liked to take the trouble. Her expenses were regulated; a hundred francs a month would enable her to pay Pépé’s board and lodging, assist Jean, who did not earn a sou, and procure some clothes and linen for herself. But, in order to attain this large sum, she would have to show herself industrious and pushing, taking no notice of the ill-will displayed by those around her, fighting for her share, even snatching it from her comrades if necessary. As she was thus working herself up for the struggle, a tall young man, passing the department, smiled at her; and when she saw it was Deloche, who had been engaged in the lace department the previous day, she returned his smile, happy at the friendship which thus presented itself, accepting this smile as a good omen.

At half-past nine a bell rang for the first luncheon. Then a fresh peal announced the second; and still no customers appeared. The second-hand, Madame Frédéric, who, in her disagreeable widow’s harshness, delighted in prophesying disasters, declared in short sentences that the day was lost, that they would not see a soul, that they might close the cupboards and go away; predictions which darkened Marguerite’s flat face, she being a girl who looked sharp after her profits, whilst Clara, with her runaway-horse appearance, was already dreaming of an excursion to the Verrières woods, if the house failed. As for Madame Aurélie, she was there, silent and serious, promenading her Caesar-like mask about the empty department, like a general who has a certain responsibility in victory and in defeat. About eleven o’clock a few ladies appeared. Denise’s turn for serving had arrived. Just at that moment a customer came up.

“The fat old girl from the country,” murmured Marguerite.

It was a woman of forty-five, who occasionally journeyed to Paris from the depths of some out-of-the-way place. There she saved up for months; then, hardly out of the train, she made straight for The Ladies’ Paradise, and spent all her savings. She very rarely ordered anything by letter, she liked to see and handle the goods, and laid in a stock of everything, even down to needles, which she said were excessively dear in her small town. The whole staff knew her, that her name was Boutarel, and that she lived at Albi, but troubled no further about her, neither about her position nor her mode of life.