Complete Works of Emile Zola (956 page)

“Cigars! Madame Lengaigne,” thundered Hyacinthe at last. “Expensive ones, mind! Penny each!”

As night was falling, and the petroleum lamps were being lit, Madame Bécu came in to look for her husband. But he had started on a monstrous game at cards.

“Are you coming?” she said; “it’s past eight. You must have some dinner.”

He stared at her with tipsy majesty.

“Go to blazes!” he replied.

Then Hyacinthe displayed intense delight. “Madame Bécu,” said he, “I invite you. Eh? Yes, we’ll just peck a bit, between the three of us. D’ye hear there, mistress? Give us your best: some ham, some rabbit, and dessert. And don’t be anxious. Just look here. Attention!”

He then pretended to fumble himself all over. Then he suddenly produced his third coin, and held it up.

“Cuckoo! Aha, there it is!”

Everybody was doubled up with laughter, and one fat man all but suffocated. That rascal Hyacinthe was thunder­ing funny! And some of them, by way of a joke, felt him from head to foot, as if he had had crowns all over him.

“I say, La Bécu,” he repeated a dozen times over while he was eating, “if Bécu don’t mind, we’ll sleep together? What do you say?”

She was very dirty, not having known, she said, that she should stop at the fête; and she laughed, did this dark pole-cat of a woman, wiry and rusty like an old needle; while Hyacinthe, without further delay, grabbed hold of her legs under the table. Meantime the husband, blind drunk, dribbled and chuckled, shouting out that two men would be none too many for the hussy.

It was ten o’clock when the ball began. Through the com­municating doorway the four lamps, fastened by iron wires to the beams, could be seen blazing. Clou, the farrier, was there with his trombone, as well as the nephew of a Bazoches-le-Doyen rope-maker, who played the violin. The admission was free, but you paid two sous for each dance you joined in. The beaten soil underfoot had just been watered, on account of the dust. Whenever the instruments left off playing, the sharp, regular detonations of the neighbouring shooting-gallery could be heard. The road, usually so gloomy, was all ablaze with the reflectors of the two other booths; the trinket stall glittered with gildings, while the turn-about was bedecked with mirrors and hung with red curtains like a chapel.

“Hallo! Why, there’s my little daughter!” cried Hyacinthe, with swimming eyes.

So it was. La Trouille was just coming into the ball, attended by Delphin and Nénesse; and the father did not seem at all surprised to see her there, although he had locked her in. She not merely had the red bunch of ribbons flaunting in her hair, for round her neck there was now a heavy imitation coral necklace, formed of beads of sealing-wax, which showed blood-red against her dark skin. All three of them, moreover, tired of rambling about in front of the booths, were dull and sticky with sweetmeats, of which they had eaten more than they could digest. Delphin, who was only happy when out and about in all the hidden nooks of the country-side, wore a blouse, and his shaggy round savage-like head was bare. Nénesse, on the other hand, already yearning after the refine­ments of town life, was clad in a suit of dittos bought at Lambourdieu’s, one of those scant outfits turned out wholesale by cheap Paris clothiers; and he wore a round felt hat, to mark his contempt of the village, which he looked down upon.

“Petty!” called Hyacinthe. “Little daughter, come and taste this. First-rate, ain’t it?”

He let her drink out of his glass, while Madame Bécu asked Delphin sternly:

“What have you done with your cap?”

“Lost it.”

“Lost it? Come here, and I’ll cuff you?” But Bécu interposed, chuckling complacently at the recollection of his son’s precocious gallantries.

“Let him be! He’s getting a big boy now. And so, you scum of the earth, you’ve been amusing yourselves together? Ah! the lickerish dog.”

“Go and play,” concluded Hyacinthe paternally. “And mind you’re to be good.”

“They’re as drunk as pigs,” said Nénesse, with an air of disgust, as he went back to the ball-room.

La Trouille laughed.

“I should just think so! I quite expected it. That’s why they’re so amiable.”

The dancing was getting lively. The explosive blasts of Clou’s trombone, which smothered the faint music of the little fiddle, were all that could be heard. The ground, watered over copiously, was turning to mud under the thick-soled boots of the dancers; and presently, from all the shaken petticoats, from the jackets and bodices that grew moist under the arm­pits with broad stains of sweat, there uprose a strong goat-like smell, accentuated by the smoky acridity of the lamps. Between two quadrilles, a sensation was created by the arrival of Berthe, Macqueron’s daughter, arrayed in a foulard dress, exactly like those that the tax-collector’s young ladies had worn at Cloyes, on Saint Lubin’s day. Could her parents have given her leave to come? Or had she slipped out behind their backs? It was observable that she danced all the time with the son of a wheelwright, whom her father had forbidden her to speak to, on account of a family quarrel. Jests were bandied about. Apparently she was no longer content with her pernicious solitary habits.

Hyacinthe, tipsy as he was, had, for the last moment or so, noticed that beast Lequeu, stationed beside the communicating door-way, and watching Berthe as she curvetted about in her gallant’s arms. He could not restrain himself.

“I say, Monsieur Lequeu,” he exclaimed, “you’re not leading your sweetheart out?”

“What sweetheart?” asked the schoolmaster, green with bile.

“Why, the pretty dark-ringed eyes, over there!”

Lequeu, furious at having been detected, turned his back, and stood motionless, in one of those haughty spells of silence in which he enwrapped himself, out of prudence and disdain. Lengaigne having come forward, Hyacinthe buttonholed him. “Aha! he had given that paper-stainer over there one for his nob! Rich girls for him, indeed! Not that Berthe was such a catch, for she had a peculiar physical defect.” Being now thoroughly aflame, he swore to the truth of his assertion. It was current talk from Cloyes to Châteaudun. Stupefied by this information, the others craned over to look at Berthe, mak­ing slight grimaces of repugnance whenever her white skirts came flying round that way, in the course of the dance.

“You old rogue,” resumed Hyacinthe, beginning to address Lengaigne familiarly, “your girl’s all right.”

“Rather!” replied the taverner, complacently.

Suzanne was now in Paris, in the swell set, people said. Lengaigne, acting discreetly, used to hint at a good situation she had there. Meanwhile peasants still kept coming in, and a farmer having asked after Victor, the letter was produced again. “My dear Parents, — This is to tell you that we have been here, at Lille in Flanders. . .” They all listened anew; even people who had already heard the letter read five or six times over, gathered round again. Not really eightpence a quart? Yes, really; eightpence!

“A beastly country!” repeated Bécu. At that moment Jean made his appearance; at once going to glance into the ball­room, as if he were looking for some one. Then he returned looking disappointed and uneasy. For the last two months he had not dared to pay such frequent visits to Buteau, for he felt that the latter was cool, not to say hostile. Doubtless he, Jean, had ill-concealed his feelings for Françoise, the growing affection which now fevered him, and his comrade had noticed it. It must have displeased him, interfering with his plans.

“Good evening,” said Jean, drawing near a table where Fouan and Delhomme were drinking a bottle of beer.

“Will you join us, Corporal?” said Delhomme, politely.

Jean accepted; and after clinking glasses:

“Funny thing Buteau hasn’t turned up,” he said.

“Here he is, pat!” said Fouan.

And, indeed, Buteau now came in, but all by himself, and Jean’s face grew still darker. The other strolled round the tavern, shaking hands; then, on reaching his father and brother-in-law’s table, he stood there, refusing to sit down or to take anything.

“Lise and Françoise don’t dance, then?” Jean finally asked, in a faltering voice.

Buteau looked at him hard out of his little grey eyes.

“Françoise has gone to bed,” he replied; “it’s the best place for young folks.”

An incident near them now attracted their attention, and cut the conversation short. It was Hyacinthe at loggerheads with Flore, whom he had asked for a quart of rum to make some punch, and who refused to bring it.

“No! No more! You’re drunk enough.”

“Hallo! what’s that she’s saying? Do you fancy that I sha’n’t pay? Why, I’ll buy up your whole shanty, if you like. I’ve merely to blow my nose. Here! Look at this!”

He had concealed his fourth five-franc piece in his hand; and now pinching his nose with his fingers, he blew it loudly, and apparently drew out the coin, which he then paraded round like a monstrance.

“That’s what I blow from my nose, when I’ve got a cold!”

A round of applause shook the walls, and Flore, quite vanquished, brought the quart of rum and some sugar. Next a salad-bowl was wanted, and then the scamp took possession of the whole room, stirring the punch, with his elbows squarely set, while his red face was lighted up by the glow of the flames, which increased the heat of the atmosphere, already densely befogged by the lamps and pipes. Buteau, exasperated at sight of the money, suddenly broke out:

“You thundering swine, aren’t you ashamed of tippling away like that with the money you rob our father of?”

The other adopted a low-comedy tone.

“Oh, it’s you, young ‘un! I suppose it’s your empty stomach that makes you talk such rot!”

“I tell you, you’re a dirty beast, and you’ll finish at the galleys. To begin with, it was you that killed our mother with grief.”

The sot rattled his spoon and stirred up a tempest of flame in the salad-bowl, while he split his sides with laughter.

“Right you are; go on. Sure enough it was me — suppos­ing it wasn’t you!”

“And I tell you further that spendthrifts of your kidney don’t deserve that the corn should grow. Only to think that our property — yes, all that land that the old folks took so much trouble to leave us — has been pledged by you, and handed over to others. You dirty blackguard, what have you done with the land?”

At this Hyacinthe was roused. His punch went out, and he settled himself, leaning back in his chair, seeing that all the drinkers were silently listening, to judge between him and his brother.

“The land!” he yelled: “why, what the deuce does the land care for you? You’re its slave, it robs you of your enjoy­ments, your strength, your life! You idiot! And it doesn’t so much as make you rich! While I, who fold my arms and despise it, confining myself to giving it a kick or two, why, I, you see, am independent and can wet my whistle! Oh, you confounded simpleton!”

The peasants laughed again, while Buteau, surprised by the roughness of the attack, could only mutter:

“A good-for-nothing lazy lout; who does no work and boasts of it.”

“Land, indeed! A lot of humbug!” resumed Hyacinthe, now thoroughly aroused. “Well, you must be an ancient, if you still believe in humbug like that! Does it exist, this land? It’s mine, it’s yours, it’s nobody’s. Wasn’t it once the old ‘uns? And hadn’t he to cut it up to give it to us? And won’t you cut it up for your young ‘uns? Very well, then! It comes and goes, increases and diminishes — diminishes especially; for there you are, a fine gentleman with your seven or eight acres, when father had over twenty. I got disgusted with my share. It was too little, so I blued the lot. And, besides, I like sound investments, and, look’ee! young ‘un, land’s shaky! I would not put a copper into it. It’s bad business, and there’s an ugly catastrophe at hand that’ll wipe you all out. Bankruptcy! A set of blockheads!”

A death-like silence gradually spread through the tavern. No one laughed now. The anxious faces of the peasants were turned towards this tall ruffian, who, in his cups, poured out the muddled contents of his brain — the confused ideas that he had formed as an Algerian campaigner, as a hanger-about town, and tavern politician. What was paramount in him was the old leaven of ‘48, the humanitarian communistic views of one who still worshipped at the shrine of ‘89.

“Liberty, equality, fraternity!” he shouted. “We must hark back to the Revolution. We were swindled in the division of property; the gentlefolks have taken everything, and, by God, they shall be forced to give it back. Isn’t one man as good as another? Is it fair, for instance, such a lot of land held by that ass at La Borderie, while I’ve got none? I want my rights; I want my share; everybody shall have his share.”

Bécu, who was too drunk to uphold the principle of autho­rity, approved without understanding. Still, he had a gleam of sense left, and imposed certain limitations.

“That’s so, that’s so,” said he; “but the king’s the king, and what is mine isn’t yours.”

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

“Don’t listen to him; he’s only fit to kill!” There was a fresh burst of laughter, and Hyacinthe, losing all control, stood up, wildly shaking his fists in the air.

“Just you wait a bit. I’ll talk to you, you cursed coward! You’re in fine feather now, because you’ve got the mayor, the assessor, and that twopenny-halfpenny deputy on your side! You lick his boots, and you are fool enough to think that he’s a power and will help you to sell your corn. Well, I, who have nothing to sell, I don’t care a fig for you or your mayor, assessor, deputy, or gendarmes! To-morrow, it’ll be our turn to be the stronger; and it won’t be me alone, it’ll be all the poor devils who are starving to death. Ay, and it’ll be you, too; you, I say! when you’ve got tired of keeping the gentlefolks, without having so much as a crust of bread to eat yourselves. A pretty plight they’ll be in, the landowners. They’ll have their jaws broken, and the land’ll be free for any one to take. D’ye hear, young ‘un? I’ll take that land of yours and — on it!”

“You just try it on, and I’ll shoot you down like a dog!” shouted Buteau, so wild with rage that he went out, slamming the door after him.