Complete Works of Emile Zola (1780 page)

Then, mad with pain, they fell upon the big sous, plunging right into them, endeavouring to get the best of the miracle by the rapidity of their movements. But the big sous were not to be taken by surprise. Hardly were they touched than they flew away in the form of locusts, wriggled as serpents, ran along as boiling water, were dispersed in smoke; any form seemed suitable to them, and they did not leave without having slightly burnt or bitten the thieves.

The fecundity was frightful, so rapid, giving birth to so many different kinds of creatures that unutterable terror reigned there. Flying-toads, owls, vampires, night-moths, rushed to the dormer-window, flapping their wings, and escaping in great flights. Scorpions, spiders, all the hideous denizens of damp places reached the corners in long affrighted columns. Although the loft was full of chinks and crevices, there were not sufficient holes for them, and they were there, hustling one another, and crushing themselves in the cracks.

Guillaume and Guillaumette, mad with fright, began to run, borne along in the giddy movement of this strange creation. To the right and left, everywhere, they hastened the bursting into existence of new creatures. Life streamed from their fingers. The living flood rose. This treasure, on which the moon a moment before had been casting its rays, was nothing more than a blackish mass which swayed heavily to and fro, rising, sinking upon itself, as wine in the vat.

There was soon not a big sou left The entire heap had become alive. Then Guillaume and Guillaumette, unable to take anything but reptiles, fled, casting two handfuls of snakes in their own faces.

And, as they had removed all the monsters in these two last handfuls, the loft was empty. Sister-of-the-poor had heard nothing, and was slumbering, calm and smiling.

VI

When Sister-of-the-poor awoke, she was troubled with a feeling of remorse. She said to herself that she had been searching out the poverty of the neighbourhood far and wide, without thinking of relieving that of her uncle and aunt The dear child had compassion for all suffering. With her, the fact that the poor were poor, came before the question as to whether they were good or bad. She made no distinction among those who wept. She did not consider she had the task of meting out punishments and rewards, but the mission to dry tears. No grand idea of justice found a place in her small mind of ten summers; she was all charity, all alms. When she thought of the damned in hell, a feeling of pity gained her heart, which she never experienced in so great a measure for souls in purgatory.

When somebody, one day, told her that a certain poor person did not deserve the bread she gave him, she failed to understand. She refused to believe that it was not sufficient to be hungry, to eat.

So, Sister-of-the-poor, to make amends for her forgetfulness, took her little bag again, and ran and bought, in beautiful new money, a piece of land adjoining her relatives’ hut She also purchased a pair of white and brown oxen, with coats as glossy as silk. She took care not to forget the plough. Then she hired a farm-labourer, who drove the yoke of cattle to the edge of the field, at the door of the cottage. While this was being done, she purchased in the town a quantity of stores of all sorts; old vine roots, which make a bright fire, the best flour, salt provisions, dry vegetables. She made three large carts follow her, and went from shop to shop, loading them with what she thought necessary for a home. And it was marvellous to see how she spent God’s money like a grown-up girl, not purchasing any useless things, as might have been expected of a child so young, but strong furniture, pieces of linen, copper cooking pots, all that a housewife of thirty could dream of.

When the three carts were full, she came and stood them beside the bullocks and plough. Then it struck her that the cottage was very wretched, very small, to hold all this wealth, and she was grieved that she could not buy a farm, not because she had not the money, but because there was no farm in that part of the country. She resolved to send for the masons and make them build a large house on the same site as the humble dwelling. But, in the meanwhile, as she was in a great hurry, she merely poured a few heaps of big sous on the ground, in front of the carts, to meet the expense of building.

She set about her work so briskly that it took her less than an hour to arrange everything. Guillaume and Guillaumette were still asleep, having heard neither the sound of the wheels nor the labourer’s whip.

Then Sister-of-the-poor went to the door, with an artful smile on her lips, for she sometimes had a roguish way of doing good. She had hurried a little, out of archness, and was pleased that she had everything ready before her relatives awoke.

She cast a last look at her purchases, and then began to cry out, as she clapped her hands with all her might:

“Uncle Guillaume! Aunt Guillaumette!”

And as the two old people did not move, she struck the badly-adjusted planks of the shutters with her fist, repeating several times in a louder tone:

“Uncle Guillaume, Aunt Guillaumette, open quickly, fortune wants to come in!”

Now, Guillaume and Guillaumette heard this as they slept, and they jumped out of bed, without troubling to wake up. Sister-of-the-poor was still shouting, when they appeared on the threshold, pushing against each other, rubbing their eyes, to see better; and they had been in such a hurry, that Guillaume had on the petticoats and Guillaumette the breeches. They had no idea of this, having so many other subjects for amazement. The heaps of big sous rose as high as hay-ricks in front of the three carts which had a magnificent aspect, the caldron and oak furniture standing out against the snow. The bullocks were breathing loudly in the morning breeze. The ploughshare looked so white, in the rays of the early sun, that it seemed as if made of silver. The labourer advanced and said to Guillaume:

“Master, where shall I take the yoke of oxen? This is not the time of year for ploughing. Have no anxiety: your fields are sown and you will have an ample harvest.”

And, during this time, the carters had gone up to Guillaumette.

“Good lady,” they said to her, “here is your furniture and winter stores. Be quick and tell us where we are to unload our carts. One day is hardly enough to get all these things into the house.” — , The two old people, with gaping mouths, knew not what to answer. They looked timidly at these goods which they had never seen before, and thought of those horrid sous that had made such dreadful fun of them on the previous night. Sister-of-the-poor, hidden in a corner, was laughing at their bewildered looks; she did not want to take any other revenge for the slight friendship they had shown her in days of misfortune. The poor little girl had never laughed so much in her life. I assure you, you would have been as merry as she was, to have seen Guillaume in petticoats and Guillaumette in breeches, undecided as to whether they ought to laugh or cry, and pulling the most amusing faces in the world.

At last, as she saw they were on the point of going in and closing the door and window, she showed herself.

“My friends,” she said to the labourer and carters, “put all this into the cottage; don’t be afraid of cramming the rooms up to the ceilings. I never thought of the smallness of the place, I have purchased so much that we shall now require a country-house. But there lies the money for the masons.”

She spoke thus so as to be heard by her relatives, for she thought with reason, to set their minds at ease, by making them understand that she was the good fairy who brought them these presents. Now Guillaume and Guillaumette had resolved, since the previous night, to flog her, as a punishment for having left them a whole day; but, when they heard her speaking thus, when they saw the men putting down their furniture and stores at their door, they looked at her and burst out sobbing, without knowing why. It seemed to them that a hand was clutching them at their throats. They remained there, standing, ready to choke, not knowing what to do amidst this feeling of emotion which was so strange to them. And, all of a sudden, they discovered that they loved Sister-of-the-poor. Then, laughing amidst their tears, they ran and kissed her, and that relieved their feelings.

VII

A year afterwards, Guillaume and Guillaumette were the richest farmers in the district. They owned a large new farmhouse; their fields stretched so many leagues around, that they went beyond the horizon.

For a poor person to become rich, is not a rare occurrence; no one nowadays thinks of being surprised at it. But, when Guillaume and Guillaumette from unkind became good, there were people who refused to believe it. It was the truth notwithstanding. Sister-of-the-poor’s relations, having ceased to suffer from cold and hunger, recovered their former good nature. As they had shed many tears, they felt themselves akin to the unfortunate, and relieved them without egoism.

Tears, I know, are good advisers. However, if Guillaumette was not over fond of lace, if Guillaume gave up drinking and preferred work, it is my opinion that the big sous possessed some secret virtue which assisted the miracle; for they were not like ordinary sous which consent to be spent improperly; they would not allow evildoers to make use of them, but when in the possession of worthy souls, they caused them to be charitable by guiding their hands. Ah! the honest big sous, they had none of the gloomy stupidity of our ugly gold and silver coins!

Guillaume and Guillaumette kissed Sister-of-the-poor from morning till night. At first they spared her all fatigue, and got angry when she spoke of working. It was easy to see they hoped to make a fine young lady of her, with delicate white hands, suitable for tying ribbons. “Carry your head high,” they said to her every morning; “don’t bother yourself about the rest.” But the young girl was not of that mind; she would have died of sadness if she had remained all day long without any other occupation than that of watching the clouds sail by; her wealth gave her less distraction than polishing her oak furniture and carefully folding up her fine linen sheets. She therefore amused herself in her own way, saying to her relations: “Let me be, I am warmly clothed and have no use for lace j I prefer household cares to those of dress.”

And she spoke so seriously, that Guillaume and Guillaumette understood that she possessed great intelligence, and ceased interfering with her inclinations. That gave her great pleasure. She rose, as formerly, at five o’clock, and went about her household duties; not that she swept or washed as in the days of misfortune, for she was not strong enough to keep such a large house clean; but she looked after the servants, and was not prevented by any feeling of false pride from assisting them in the dairy and poultry yard. She was assuredly the wealthiest and most active young girl in the neighbourhood. Every one marvelled that she did not alter on becoming the owner of a large farm, apart from having more rosy cheeks, and working more merrily. “Dear poverty,” she often said, “you taught me how to behave when rich.”

She was very thoughtful for her age, and that sometimes made her sad. I do not know how it was she perceived her big sous had become of little use to her. The fields gave her bread, wine, oil, vegetables, fruit; the flocks supplied her with wool for clothing and meat for meals; she had everything within arms’ reach, and the produce of the farm was ample for her requirements, as well as for those of her people The share of the poor was also large, for she no longer distributed alms in money, but in meat, flour, wood for firing, lengths of linen and cloth, and she showed her wisdom in doing so, giving away what she knew the indigent stood in need of, and thus sparing them the temptation of turning the sous of charity to bad account.

And so, amidst this abundance of riches, several large heaps of big sous remained in the loft, where Sister-of-the-poor was grieved to see them occupying the place of twenty or thirty trusses of straw. She would have much preferred the straw, the reward of labour, to this money which she amassed without much merit. And so, little by little, she began to feel great disdain for this sort of wealth, which was good to remain idle in the chests of misers, or to be worn smooth in the hands of dealers in the towns.

She was so weary of this inconvenient fortune, that one morning she determined to make it disappear. She had kept the little bag that devoured the big sous so easily; it did its duty in a conscientious way, and soon cleaned out the loft. Sister-of-the-poor had had recourse to a cunning artifice, for she took care not to place the beggar-woman’s sou at the bottom of the bag and the money went away for good, without having the temptation to return.

Thus, she was careful not to become too rich, feeling there would be danger for her heart if she were so. Little by little she gave away a part of her property, which was too extensive for the support of only one family. She arranged her revenue according to her requirements. Then, as there was no need of more hands on the farm, when, in spite of all she did, the sous accumulated in the loft, she went up there, on the sly, and took pleasure in diminishing her wealth. To assure contentment she all her life retained possession of the enchanted purse, which gave so generously in times of distress, and in the hour of fortune knew only how to receive.

Sister-of-the-poor had another care. The poor woman’s present embarrassed her. She was alarmed at the power it gave her; for, even when one has no mistrust of oneself, there is more pleasure in feeling one is humble than powerful. She would willingly have cast it in the river; but then some wicked person might find it in the sand and make use of it to the disadvantage of all; and, in truth, if that party expended half the money in doing harm that she had laid out in doing good, there could be no doubt that he would be the ruin of the neighbourhood. And she then understood that the beggar-woman must have sought for a long time, before giving away her alms. It was a present that would cause people joy or despair, according to the hand that received it.

She kept the sou. As it had a hole in it, she hung it on a ribbon round her neck, so she could not lose it. But it grieved her to feel it on her bosom. She would have done anything in the world to have found the poor woman again. She would have begged her to take back the deposit, which was too heavy to be retained for long, and to let her live the life of a good girl, performing no miracles but those of work and merry humour.