The Conquest of Plassans (Les Rougon-Macquart Book 4) (38 page)

‘I knocked myself,’ said Monsieur Péqueur des Saulaies. ‘Nobody answered. When the firemen arrived I had them break down the door and I ordered them to place the ladders against the windows… All in vain. One of our brave policemen who ventured into the hall was almost overcome by the smoke.’

‘So… Abbé Faujas?… Oh, what a terrible death!’ Octavie said again, with a shudder.

The ladies and gentlemen looked at one another, their faces pallid in the flickering light of the fire. Doctor Porquier explained that death by fire was perhaps not as painful as one imagined.

‘One is incinerated,’ he concluded. ‘It must only take a few seconds. It should be said however that it depends how violent the fire is.’

Monsieur de Condamin counted on his fingers.

‘If Madame Mouret is at her parents, as they are saying, that still makes four. Abbé Faujas, his mother, sister, and brother-in-law… Oh, my goodness!’

At that moment Madame Rastoil leaned towards her husband’s ear.

‘Give me my watch,’ she whispered. ‘I am worried about it. You are moving around, you will sit on it.’

Someone shouted that the wind was sending the sparks flying towards the sub-prefecture; Monsieur Péqueur des Saulaies apologized, and rushed to ward off this new danger. Meanwhile Monsieur Delangre suggested they should make one last effort to help the victims. The chief fireman told him roughly to go up the ladders himself if he thought it was possible. He said he had never seen such a fire. It was the devil himself who must have lit that fire for the house to be burning like tinder, on all sides at once. The mayor, followed
by some volunteers, went round the back of the house through the Impasse des Chevillottes. Perhaps they could reach it from the garden side.

‘It would be so beautiful if it were not so sad,’ remarked Madame de Condamin, collecting herself.

And indeed, it was a superb conflagration. Sparks rocketed into the night in great blue flames; every window gaped, with depths of blazing red. And the smoke billowed gently, disappeared in a huge purplish cloud, like the smoke from Bengal fireworks in a display of pyrotechnics. The ladies and gentlemen were wrapped up in blankets; they sat back, stretched their legs, gazed up at the spectacle; then there were silences, broken by comments when the brilliance became suddenly more intense. Further off, in the dancing flames which suddenly illumined a deep swell of heads in the darkness, the noise of the crowd grew louder, there was the sound of pouring water, of something drowning. And the fire engine, ten feet away, kept pumping out its breaths at regular intervals, spitting water from its scorched metal throat.

‘Just look at the third window on the top floor,’ Monsieur Maffre suddenly cried out in amazement. ‘You can clearly see a bed burning. The curtains are yellow; they are burning like paper.’

Monsieur Péqueur des Saulaies came back at a jog to calm everyone down. Panic had broken out.

‘The sparks are certainly being carried by the wind in the direction of the sub-prefecture,’ he said, ‘but they are extinguished in the air. There is no danger at all, we are in control of the fire.’

‘But’, asked Madame de Condamin, ‘does anyone know how the fire was started?’

Monsieur de Bourdeu assured them that he had first seen a tall plume of smoke coming from the kitchen. Monsieur Maffre claimed the opposite: the flames had first appeared in a room on the first floor. The sub-prefect nodded with an air of official reserve. He finally said quietly:

‘I believe malice may well be implicated in this fire. I’ve already called for an enquiry.’

And he recounted that he had seen a man light the fire with a vine branch.

‘Yes, I saw him as well,’ interrupted Aurélie Rastoil. ‘It was Monsieur Mouret.’

Everybody was flabbergasted. Such a thing was impossible. Monsieur Mouret escaping and burning his house down, what a frightful crime! Aurélie was bombarded with questions. She blushed, while her mother looked at her sternly. It wasn’t proper for a young girl to be at her window every night.

‘I assure you I recognized Monsieur Mouret easily,’ she went on. ‘I couldn’t sleep, so I got up when I saw a bright light… Monsieur Mouret was dancing around in the middle of the fire.’

The sub-prefect said decisively:

‘Exactly, Mademoiselle is right… I realize who the poor fellow was now. He was so terrifying that I was confused, although his face was not unknown to me… Excuse me… This is very serious; I must go and give some orders.’

He left again, while everyone remarked on this terrible occurrence, a landlord who incinerated his tenants. Monsieur de Bourdeu got angry with the asylum; the supervision was wholly inadequate. In truth Monsieur de Bourdeu was terrified he might see the prefecture promised him by Abbé Faujas go up in smoke.

‘The mad are full of acrimony,’ Monsieur de Condamin said simply.

This comment embarrassed everyone. Conversation stopped dead. The ladies shivered slightly while the gentlemen exchanged meaningful glances. The blazing house had become still more fascinating since people had learned the name of the perpetrator. Thrilled and horrified by the conflagration, they closed their eyes, imagining the drama which must have taken place there.

‘If old Mouret is in there that makes five,’ Monsieur de Condamin said. The ladies hushed him up, accusing him of being a terrible man.

Since the beginning of the fire the Paloques had been leaning on the windowsill of their dining room, staring. They were just above the improvised salon on the pavement. The justice’s wife eventually came down to offer her gracious hospitality to the Rastoil ladies, as well as to those around them.

‘You can see really well from our window, I assure you,’ she said.

And as the ladies refused:

‘But you will catch cold,’ she insisted. ‘It’s a cold night.’

Madame de Condamin smiled, extending her tiny feet from beneath her skirts out on to the pavement.

‘Oh, we are not cold!’ she replied. ‘My feet are burning. I feel fine… Are you cold, Mademoiselle?’

‘I’m too hot,’ asserted Aurélie. ‘You would think it was a summer’s night. That fire keeps us nice and warm.’

Everybody declared that they were comfortable and Madame Paloque decided to go and sit in an armchair as well. Monsieur Maffre had just departed. He had caught sight of his two sons in the company of Guillaume Porquier in the middle of the crowd; all three had come running to see the fire, without ties on, from a house on the ramparts. The judge, who was certain he had locked and bolted them into their bedroom, led Alphonse and Ambroise away by their ears.

‘Shall we go to bed?’ said Monsieur de Bourdeu, growing ever more glum.

Monsieur Péqueur des Saulaies had reappeared, tireless, still mindful of the ladies, in spite of being overwhelmed by all the cares of the world. He went eagerly over to meet Monsieur Delangre, who was returning from the Impasse des Chevillottes. They conversed quietly. The mayor must have witnessed some frightful scene; he passed his hand across his face as if to erase from his eyes the terrible image haunting him. The ladies only heard him muttering: ‘We got there too late! It’s horrible, horrible!…’ He would not answer any questions.

‘The only ones sorry for the abbé are Bourdeu and Delangre,’ Monsieur de Condamin whispered to Madame Paloque.

‘They were doing business with him,’ she replied calmly. ‘Look at Abbé Bourrette, though. He’s really upset.’

Abbé Bourrette, who had been in the chain, was weeping copiously. The poor man wouldn’t be comforted. He refused to sit down in an armchair. He remained standing, blurry-eyed, watching the last beams burn. Abbé Surin had also been seen, but had vanished after he had gone from group to group and heard the information being passed around.

‘Let’s go to bed,’ repeated Monsieur de Bourdeu. ‘After all, it’s stupid staying here.’

Everyone got up. It was decided that Monsieur Rastoil, his wife and daughter, would spend the night at the Paloques. Madame de Condamin patted her skirts which were slightly crumpled. They pushed back the armchairs, stood for a moment, saying goodnight to one another. The pumps were still roaring, the fire was fading in the black smoke. All you could hear was the waning sound of footsteps
in the crowd and the belated axe of a fireman hacking down some framework.

‘It’s the end,’ thought Macquart, who had remained on the pavement opposite.

But he stayed a moment longer to listen to the last words Monsieur de Condamin was exchanging in an undertone with Madame Paloque.

‘Huh,’ said the justice’s wife. ‘No one is going to weep for him, except perhaps that fat fool of a Bourrette. He had become unbearable, we were all his slaves. Monsignor must be laughing now… At last Plassans is freed!’

‘And the Rougons,’ remarked Monsieur de Condamin, ‘they must be delighted.’

‘My goodness, yes. The Rougons are over the moon! They will be the inheritors of the abbé’s conquest… You can bet they will have paid a good price to anyone prepared to risk setting fire to the house.’

Macquart went away, very annoyed. He feared he might have been tricked after all. The Rougons’ delight made him feel most uneasy. The Rougons were cunning individuals forever double-crossing you, and whatever you did, they always ended up getting the better of you. As he crossed the Place de la Préfecture he swore he would no longer carry on like that with his eyes shut.

As he went up to the bedroom where Marthe was in her death throes, he found Rose sitting on a step of the stairs. She was purple with rage. She grumbled:

‘No, I shan’t stay in the room. I don’t want to see such things. She can die without me! She can die like a dog! I hate her, I hate everybody. Fancy going to get the boy so that he could be there! And I did it! I shall regret it all my days… The little darling was white as his shirt. I had to hold him up on the way from the seminary. He was crying so much, I thought he would give up the ghost on the way. It’s a disgrace!… And he’s there now, kissing her. It gives me the goosebumps. I wish the house would fall down on us all so it would all be over, just like that!… I shall crawl into a hole and live all by myself and never see another soul, never, never. Life is nothing but a vale of rage and tears.’

Macquart entered the room. Madame Rougon, on her knees, was hiding her face in her hands, while Serge, standing by the bed with tears pouring down his cheeks, held the head of his dying mother.
She had not yet regained consciousness. The last reflected gleams of the fire lit up the room in a red glow.

Marthe made a sudden gulping. She opened her eyes in surprise and sat up, looking around. Then she joined her hands together in a gesture of inexpressible terror, and died, seeing in the red light Serge’s soutane.