Complete Works of Emile Zola (997 page)

It was nearly nine o’clock when he sprang out of bed, and plunged his head into a basin of cold water. He now suddenly came to a resolution. He would neither lay an information, nor would he take any steps to initiate proceedings for the recovery of his share of the furniture. The game was not worth the candle. A feeling of proud independence had re­stored his mind to perfect calmness; he would claim nothing from those swindling wretches; henceforth he would have nothing to do with them. He had no further concern in them, and he would leave them to prey upon themselves. If they would only contrive to make an end of one another all round, it would be a good riddance for everybody. He flushed with anger as he thought of what he had suffered and endured during the ten years he had spent in Rognes; and yet he had been so happy in the thought of leaving the army, after the Italian war; so happy in ceasing to handle the sabre and slay his fellow-men! Still, ever since his dis­charge, he had been living amid filth, surrounded by savages. At the period of his marriage he had had troubles enough, but he had fallen upon even worse times now; the villains had taken to robbery and murder. Ah, they were savage wolves, let loose over that peaceful, far-reaching plain. For his own part, he had had quite enough of it! These devouring wild beasts had spoilt the country for him! What would be the good of hunting down just a couple of them — a male and his female — when the whole pack ought to be destroyed? No; he preferred to go away.

At that moment his eyes happened to light upon a news­paper which he had brought up with him from the public room on the previous evening. He had been interested in an article on the approaching war, for alarming rumours had been in circulation for several days past, and the martial feeling, which he thought extinct within him, had suddenly sprung up into fresh glowing life at the report of a coming call to arms. His last lingering hesitation to leave Rognes, his doubts as to where he should go, were all utterly and entirely swept away as by a rushing blast of wind. Yes, he would go and fight; he would enlist! He had certainly paid the debt he owed his country; but when a man has no occupation left, when life is full of weari­some cares, and when one is angered by the persecution of one’s enemies, the best plan is still to fall upon them boldly.

This determination eased his feelings and thrilled him with stern joy. As he dressed himself, he whistled the bugle-march that had resounded when they advanced to battle in Italy. Man­kind was really too hateful and abominable, and he found a great consolation in the thought of demolishing some of the Prussians. Since he had not found peace in this country nook, where the peasant folk drank each other’s blood, he might just as well return to the carnage of the battlefield. The more of the foe he slew, the redder would the soil be, and the more would he feel avenged for all the hardship and trouble with which men had visited him.

When he came downstairs he ate the two eggs and the rasher of bacon which Flore served him. Then he called Lengaigne and paid his score.

“Are you going to leave us, Corporal?” asked the land­lord.

“Yes.”

“But you’ll be coming back again, won’t you?”

“No.”“

Lengaigne looked at him in amazement, but he kept his reflections to himself. So the great booby was going to give up all his rights!

“What are you thinking of doing now? Do you mean to turn carpenter again?”

“No; soldier.”

Upon hearing this, Lengaigne opened his eyes in still greater amazement, and could no longer restrain a smile of contempt. What a fool the man must be!

Jean had already started on his way to Cloyes, when a last thrill of feeling made him check his steps and turn up the hill. He felt that he could not leave Rognes without saying good­bye to Françoise’s grave. There was also another desire which he wished to satisfy: to gaze once more upon the mighty plain, that mournful La Beauce, which he had learned to love during his long solitary hours of toil.

The graveyard stretched behind the church, enclosed by a crumbling wall so low that, when one stood amid the tombs, a clear view could be obtained from horizon to horizon. A pale March sun was shining coldly in the sky, which was veiled by a soft, white, fleecy haze, scarcely showing a patch of blue. Beneath the softly smiling heavens, La Beauce, still torpid from the winter frosts, seemed to lie half-dozing and half-awake, basking in sweet indolence. The distant fields, bathed in a suffused light, were already green with the wheat, oats, and rye sown during the autumn. In those plough-lands that remained bare, the spring sowing had recently been commenced. All around men could be seen striding over the rich soil scattering their seed with the same uniform gesture. The grains could be distinctly perceived falling like a flashing gilded stream from the hands of the nearer sowers. Then with the increasing distance the figures of the sowers seemed to dwindle in size till they were altogether lost to sight, and as the seed streamed around them it looked like some mere vibration of light. For leagues around, in every direction, the life-germs of the coming summer were raining down amid the sunshine.

Jean stood in front of Françoise’s grave. It was half-way along a row of other graves, and an open one beside it was waiting to receive old Fouan’s body. The graveyard was over-run with a rank growth of weeds, for the municipal council had never consented to grant the rural constable fifty francs to make it neat and trim. Wooden crosses and railings were rotting away, and only a few mouldering stones still stood in position. The charm of this lonely nook, however, lay in its very condition of neglect, in its profound tranquillity, which was only broken by the croaking of the ancient crows which wheeled around the church steeple. Here the villagers slept their last sleep in perfect peace and oblivion. Jean, amid the death-like stillness, dropped into a reverie, gazing at the vast expanse of La Beauce and the seed grains which permeated it as with a thrill of life. But at last he was aroused, hearing the bell toll slowly, first three times, then twice more, and finally break into a continuous clanging. The bearers were lifting Fouan’s coffin, and were bringing it towards the grave­yard.

The bandy-legged gravedigger came limping along to see that the grave was all right.

“Isn’t it too small?” asked Jean, who still tarried, his heart softening with a desire to see the last of the old man.

“Not it,” replied the bandy-legged sexton. “They could get four like him into it. That roasting has brought down his size.”

On the evening following upon Fouan’s death, the Buteaus had awaited the arrival of Doctor Finet with great trepidation. But the surgeon had signed the burial certificate at once, his only thought being to get away again as soon as possible. He came, looked at the body, and then angrily railed at the stupidity of country-folks in leaving an addle-pated old man with a lighted candle. If he felt any suspicions, he wisely kept them to himself. This father had been so obstinate in living on, that maybe be had deserved to be roasted a bit. Besides, he (Finet) had seen so many strange things that a matter like this seemed of no great account. In his callous indifference, born of mingled contempt and bitterness, he merely shrugged his shoulders — a scampish, bad lot those peasants! thought he.

Believed upon this point, the Buteaus then had to prepare themselves to meet their relatives and allay any possible suspi­cions. As soon as La Grande presented herself they burst into tears, thinking that this would have a good effect. The old woman looked at them with surprise, and thought to herself that they were really over-acting their part in crying so much. However, she had merely come for the sake of something to do, for she had no claim upon any of the old man’s property. The real danger began when Fanny and Delhomme arrived. The latter had just been nominated mayor in place of Macqueron, and his wife was almost bursting with pride. She had kept her oath, and her father had died without any reconciliation on her part. Indeed, with her extreme susceptibility, she even yet felt hurt by his conduct, and she showed this by standing with dry eyes in front of the corpse. However, if she shed no tears, there was withal a sound of loud sobbing. This arose when Hyacinthe arrived, very drunk, and overflowing with the tender emotion which he found at the bottom of his bottle. He quite saturated the corpse with his tears, and bellowed out that he had received a blow from which he would never recover.

In the kitchen Lise had set out a row of glasses and bottles of wine; and a general discussion ensued. It was at once agreed that the hundred and fifty francs a year arising from the sale of the house were outside the debate, for it had always been understood that this sum should be retained by those who looked after the old man during his last days. But then there was the secret hoard, the three hundred francs a year that were derived from the scrip of which they had all now heard. Buteau thereupon related his story, stating how his father had discovered the papers underneath the marble slab on the top of the chest of drawers, and how, while examining them at night, he must have set his hair on fire. The ashes of the papers had been found lying on the floor, as La Frimat and La Bécu could testify. As he told his story the others scrutinised him keenly, but this in no way confused him. and he smote his breast with his hands and swore by the light of day that he was speaking the truth. He could see that the family had their suspicions, but he cared nothing about that so long as they did not worry him, and he kept the money. Fanny, however, with her impetuous outspokenness, unbosomed herself of her surmises, and angrily assailed Buteau and Lise as thieves and murderers. Yes, they had burned her father and robbed him! That was plain to everybody’s eyes! The Buteaus replied with a flood of abuse and equally abominable accusations against herself. She and her husband, they cried, had plotted to destroy the old man, who had nearly perished from taking some poisoned soup that had been given him in his daughter’s house. They, the Buteaus, would be able to tell a great deal if anything was said about them!

Hyacinthe had again begun to cry and bellow lugubriously on hearing that such awful crimes were possible. God in heaven! his poor father! Could it be possible that there were sons wicked enough to roast their father? La Grande, whose eyes were glistening brightly, let a few words drop whenever the contending parties seemed getting out of breath, and her remarks at once set them going at each other again. Delhomme, feeling uneasy at the aspect of affairs, at last went and closed the doors and windows. He had his official position to think of; and, besides, he was always in favour of settling matters quietly. He now protested that such accusations were most unseemly. A pretty reputation the family would get if the neighbours should hear what was going on! The law would poke its nose into the matter, and possibly the good ones would lose more than the bad ones. No, when there were scamps in a family, the best plan was to leave them to their villany, in the hope that it would end by destroying them. All the others sat in silence. Delhomme was right. There was nothing to be got by washing their dirty linen before the magistrates. Moreover, Buteau terrified the others. This scoundrel was quite capable of ruining them. At the bottom of their silent acquiescence in the murder and robbery there lay that feeling which makes the peasantry the accomplices of poachers, of the men who kill gamekeepers; in fact, of all that class of lawless rustics who are saved from being given up to justice by the fear they inspire in those who are fully cognisant of their crimes.

La Grande remained to have some coffee and to spend the evening with the Buteaus, while the others trooped off in a blunt, unceremonious fashion, expressive of their contempt.

The Buteaus, however, did not care a straw about that, so long as they kept the money and had the certainty of not being worried any further. Lise raised her voice again to its wonted pitch, and Buteau, resolving to do things properly, ordered the coffin, and went to the churchyard to examine the place where the grave was to be dug.

The peasants of Rognes felt a great dislike to resting after their death by the side of those whom they had hated while alive; but, as the graves were dug in regular rows, it was altogether a matter of luck where each one was buried; and whenever, as chance had it, two enemies died immediately one after the other, the authorities experienced great embarrassment, for the family of the one who had died the latest often talked quite seriously of keeping his body above ground rather than let it lie by the side of a person whom he had detested. Now, it happened that when Macqueron was mayor he had abused his official position to purchase for his grave a plot of ground which would certainly not have been assigned to him in the regular course of affairs. Unfortunately, too, this strip of ground adjoined the grave in which Lengaigne’s father was buried, and in which Lengaigne had reserved room for himself. Ever since Macqueron had purchased his plot, his rival’s indignation had known no end, his long-standing enmity becoming more rancorous than ever. The thought that his body would lie rotting beside that scoundrel’s would embitter the rest of his existence.

Buteau was filled with the same angry feeling when he went to inspect the grave which chance had allotted to his father. Françoise would lie on old Fouan’s left-hand, which was right and proper enough; but, as ill-luck would have it, in the adjoining row of graves, and just in front of the one where Fouan was to be buried, there was the grave of old Saucisse’s deceased wife, in which Saucisse had reserved room for himself also. The result was that, whenever the old scamp died, he would lie with his feet close to Fouan’s skull. Could this idea be tolerated for a moment? Here were two old men, who had detested each other ever since that dishonourable business about the daily payments of fifteen sous for the rever­sion of an acre of ground, and the greater rascal of the two — the one who had tricked the other — was to go dancing on his head through all eternity! Why, if the family were so un­feeling as to submit to such an arrangement, old Fouan’s bones would turn in their coffin and struggle with those of old Saucisse! Boiling over with rebellious indignation, Buteau how angrily rushed off to the municipal offices and attacked Delhomme, trying to force him to take advantage of his official position to assign another grave to old Fouan. But his brother-in-law refused to depart from the established usage, dwelling upon the deplorable example of Macqueron and Lengaigne. Buteau then called him a coward, accused him of being bribed, and finally roared out in the middle of the road that he himself was the only dutiful and affectionate son, since the rest of the family didn’t care a straw whether the old man rested peacefully in his grave or not. Drawing the whole village to the door-steps in his progress, he went off home in a state of furious indignation. Another matter, and one of more importance than this question of the grave, had just been causing Delhomme great embarrassment. The Abbé Madeline had gone away a couple of days previously, and Rognes was once more without a priest. The experiment of keeping one of their own within the village had, on the whole, turned out so unsatisfactorily that the municipal council had voted in favour of withdrawing the grant, and returning to the previous state of affairs, the ser­vices being performed by the priest of Bazoches-le-Doyen. The Abbé Godard, however, despite the bishop’s remonstrances, had sworn that he would never celebrate the blessed sacrament in the place, and, in his exasperation at the departure of his colleague, he accused the villagers of having half-murdered the poor fellow for the sole purpose of forcing him — Godard — to return among them. He had already declared that, although Bécu might ring the bell for mass from morning till night, he would not come, when Fouan’s sudden death compli­cated matters, and brought the situation to a crisis. A funeral is not like a mass, and cannot be indefinitely postponed. With some little mischievous satisfaction at the turn affairs had taken, Delhomme now went to see the priest at Bazoches. As soon as the Abbé Godard perceived him his face assumed a wrathful expression, and, without giving the mayor time to open his mouth, he cried out that nothing would make him come, he would rather lose his place! When he learnt that his presence was required for a funeral, he lost the power of arti­culation through very rage. Those pagans died on purpose. They fancied that by doing so they would force him to come to them! Well, they might bury themselves, for he didn’t mean to help them up to heaven!