Complete Works of Emile Zola (1841 page)

The handsome Naïs, as they call her at L’Estaque, was by no means happy. At the age of sixteen, Micoulin, on the slightest provocation, would strike her so roughly in the face as to make the blood fly from her nose; and even now, in spite ‘of her twenty years, her bruised shoulders bore the marks of her father’s brutality for weeks together. Not that he was cruel; he simply exercised a rigorous rule, insisting on implicit obedience, having in his blood the old Roman feeling of authority over his own family — the authority of life and death. One day Naïs, on being unmercifully thrashed, dared to raise her hand to defend herself, and her father came near killing her. After a correction of this kind, the girl would throw herself trembling into a dark corner, and, with dry eyes, brood over the insult. Black rage would hold her there mute for hours together, gloating over revenge, which lay beyond her power. It was her father’s blood which rose within her — his blind passion, his furious determination to be the master. When she saw her trembling and submissive mother humble herself before Micoulin, she looked at her with scorn. She would often say, ‘If I’d a husband like that, I’d kill him.’

And yet Naïs preferred those days when she was beaten, for this violence was a diversion. At other times she led such a dreary, monotonous life that it almost killed her. Her father forbade her to go down to L’Estaque, keeping her constantly at work at home; even when she had nothing to do, it was his will that she should stay there beneath his eye. Accordingly, she looked forward impatiently to September; for as soon as the family took up their quarters at La Blancarde Micoulin’s surveillance necessarily became less strict, and Naïs, who was wont to run errands for Madame Rostand, was only too glad to make up for all her imprisonment.

One day the idea struck old Micoulin that this big girl might bring him in a franc or two a day. So he emancipated her, and sent her to work at a tile manufactory. Although the labour was severe, Naïs felt delighted. She left home early, proceeded to the other side of L’Estaque, and remained until evening in the hot sun, turning over the tiles set out to dry. Sad work it made with her hands, but she was freed from her father, and she used to joke with the boys. Here it was, in the midst of this rough toil, that she filled out and became a handsome woman. The blazing sun tinted her face and decked her neck with a ring of amber; her black hair grew and enveloped her, as if to protect her with its flying tresses; her body, continually on the move during the progress of her work, acquired the supple vigour of a young warrior’s frame. When she stood up on the beaten ground at her full height amid the ruddy tiles, she looked like some Amazon, like a statue suddenly imbued with life by the rain of fire falling from the sky. Micoulin glowered at her with his little eyes on seeing her so fair. She laughed too much; it did not seem to him natural that a girl should be so happy. And he swore to himself he would throttle all lovers, should any ever venture to dangle around her!

Lovers! Naïs might have had them by the dozen, but she gave them no encouragement. She tossed her head at all the youths. Her only friend was a hunchback who was employed at the same manufactory as herself — a little fellow called Toine, whom the Foundling Hospital of Aix had sent to L’Estaque, and who had remained there, adopted, so to say, by the district. This hunchback had a ringing laugh and a comical profile. Naïs found an attraction in his gentleness. She did what she liked with him, and often tormented him when she felt inclined to take vengeance on someone for her father’s violence towards herself. All this, however, had no further consequences. People used to make sport of Toine, and Micoulin himself said: ‘She’s welcome to Toine; I know her, she’s too proud.’

That year, when Madame Rostand came to La Blancarde, she asked Micoulin to lend her Naïs, one of her servants being ill. Work was slack just then at the manufactory, and, moreover, Micoulin, although brutal towards his own family, was politeness itself with his masters; he would not have refused, even if the request had been against his wishes. But that very day Monsieur Rostand was forced to go to Paris on sudden and important business, and Frédéric was thus left alone with his mother.

As a rule, on his arrival the young man was mad after outdoor exercise, and, intoxicated by the seaside air, he would go with Micoulin to set or draw up the nets; or take long walks with Naïs in the gorges which abound in the neighbourhood of L’Estaque. Then his ardour cooled down, and he remained for whole days lying under the pines on the edge of the terrace, half asleep and gazing at the sea, of which the monotonous azure finally palled upon him. As a rule, he had had enough of La Blancarde at the end of a fortnight, and was wont to invent some excuse in order to slip off to Marseilles.

That year, on the day after their arrival, Micoulin called Frédéric at sunrise. He was going to take up the traps, the long baskets with a narrow opening, in which deep-water fish are caught. But the young man turned a deaf ear to him. Fishing appeared to have lost its attraction, for when he got up he threw himself on his back under the pines, and fixed his eyes on the sky. His mother was astonished not to see him set off for one of the long walks from which he usually returned as hungry as a wolf.

‘You are not going out?’ she asked.

‘No, mother,’ he replied. ‘I shall stop with you, as father is not here.’

Micoulin, who heard this, muttered in his dialect: ‘It won’t be long before Monsieur Frédéric’s off to Marseilles.’

But Frédéric did not go to Marseilles. The week passed by and found him still stretched on his back, simply changing his position, whenever the sun rays fell on him. For appearance’ sake he had taken a book, but it was little he read; the greater part of the time the book remained lying on the dry pine-spikes. The young man did not even look at the sea; with his face turned towards the house, he appeared to be interested in the domestic arrangements, in watching the servants go backwards and forwards, crossing the terrace at every moment; and whenever it was Naïs who happened to pass him, a flash shot from his eyes. But Naïs, although she would slacken her pace, and move off with the rhythmical sway of her body, never cast a look behind her.

For several days this comedy went on. In his mother’s presence Frédéric treated Naïs almost roughly, as if she had been some awkward servant. Then the young girl would cast her eyes down in pleased bashfulness, as if enjoying the harsh words.

One morning at breakfast she broke a salad bowl, and Frédéric flew into a rage.

‘How clumsy she is!’ he cried. ‘Wherever is her head?’

And he jumped up furiously, saying that his trousers were spoiled. A drop of oil had stained his knee, and it sufficed to make him raise the house.

‘What are you staring at? Give’ me a napkin and some water. Come and help me,’ he said to the girl.

Naïs dipped the corner of a napkin in some water, and went down on her knees in front of Frédéric to rub the spot.

‘Don’t bother,’ said Madame Rostand. ‘That will do no good.’

But the girl did not let go of her young master’s trousers, which she went on rubbing with all the strength of her shapely arms, whilst he continued scolding her.

‘I never saw such clumsiness. She must have brought it close to me on purpose to smash it. If she waited on us at Aix our china would soon be all in pieces,’ he grumbled.

These reproaches were so out of proportion to the gravity of the offence that Madame Rostand thought proper to try and appease her son as soon as Naïs had gone.

‘What have you against the poor girl? One would think that you could not endure her. Be more gentle with her. She is an old playmate of yours, and she is not in the position of an ordinary servant here.’

‘Oh, she’s a nuisance!’ replied Frédéric, affecting a rough manner.

That evening at dusk, however, Naïs and Frédéric met in a shady spot at the end of the terrace. They had not yet spoken to one another alone. No one could hear them from the house. The pines filled the still air with a warm resinous odour. Then Naïs asked in a whisper, in the familiar way of their childhood:

‘Why did you scold me so, Frédéric? You were unkind.’

Without replying he caught hold of her hands, drew her towards him, and kissed her. She made no resistance, but afterwards went off, whilst he sat down on the parapet, in order not to appear before his mother in his then excited state. Ten minutes afterwards the girl was waiting at table with perfect and somewhat proud calmness.

Frédéric and Naïs made no appointments. Late one evening they found themselves together under an olive-tree, near the edge of the cliff. During dinner their eyes had several times exchanged glances. Then Naïs had gone home, and Frédéric had begun to roam about, possessed by a strange feeling. And indeed, when after a while he came to the old olive-tree, he found her there as if waiting for him. He sat down by her side and put his arm round her waist whilst she let her head fall upon his shoulder. For a moment they remained silent. The old olive-tree, with its gnarled limbs, covered them with a roof of grey leaves. Before them stretched the sea, motionless beneath the twinkling stars. Marseilles, on the far side of the bay, was hidden by a cloud; on the left the revolving Planier light shone out every minute, piercing the gloom with a yellow ray which suddenly disappeared; and nothing could be softer or more tender than this light, constantly vanishing on the horizon, and constantly returning.

‘Is your father away?’ asked Frédéric.

‘I got out of the window,’ she said, in her quiet voice.

They spoke no word of their love. That love came from afar, from the days of their infancy. The dawn was almost rising when they sought their rooms again.

III

WHAT a glorious month it was! Not one day of rain. The sky, invariably blue, displayed a satiny sheen unflecked by any cloud. The sun rose a ruddy crystal and sank in a cloud of golden dust. Yet it was not hot, for the sea breeze came with the sun, and though it died away when he set, the nights were deliciously cool, and balmy with the scent of aromatic plants diffusing the sweetness gathered during the day. The country is splendid. From both sides of the bay rocky arms jut out, whilst in the distance the islands seem to bound the horizon. In fine weather the sea appears to be nothing but a vast basin, a lake of an intense blue. In the distance, at the foot of the mountains, the houses of Marseilles climb up the low hills. When the atmosphere is clear one can see from L’Estaque the grey Joliette pier and the slender masts of the vessels in the port; beyond, houses peep out from amongst clumps of trees, and the chapel of Notre-Dame-de-la-Garde glitters white against the sky. The coastline winds about and takes broad sweeps before reaching L’Estaque, where manufactories throw out intermittent clouds of smoke. When the sun sinks below the horizon, the sea, almost black, looks as if it were slumbering between the two rocky promontories, whose whiteness is relieved by tinges of yellow and brown; pines, too, showing the dark green foliage against the reddish soil beyond. It is a vast panorama, a glimpse of the East, which departs, however, with the dazzling heat of day.

But L’Estaque has other sights besides the sea. The village, clinging to the mountain-side, is traversed by roads which wind through a chaos of shattered rocks. The railway line between Marseilles and Lyons passes amid those masses, crosses bridges thrown over ravines, and plunges under the cliffs themselves, remaining there for a distance of some four miles in what is called the tunnel of La Nerthe, the longest tunnel in France. Nothing can equal the savage grandeur of those gorges hollowed out amongst the hills, those narrow paths winding along at the foot of precipices, those barren mountains, planted with pines, uprearing ramparts tinged as with rust and blood. Now and then a pass widens, a field of struggling olive-trees fills the hollow of a valley, a lonely house shows its white frontage and closed shutters. Then come other rugged paths, impenetrable thickets, overturned rocks, dried-up torrents — all the surprises of a desert march. Over all, above the black fringe of pines, the sky stretches its expanse of silky blue.

Then there is the narrow line of coast between the rocks and the sea, the red soil pitted with immense holes, from which is taken the clay for tile-making, the chief industry of the district. Everywhere the ground is cracked and sundered, supporting with difficulty a few sickly trees, and seemingly parched by a breath of burning passion. The roads are like beds of plaster, in which the traveller sinks to the ankles at every step; and flying clouds of dust powder the hedges at the least puff of wind. Little grey lizards sleep along side the hot walls, which reverberate like ovens, whilst from the scorched grass rise whirring clouds of locusts. In the still and heavy air of the sleepy South there is no other sign of life than the grasshopper’s monotonous song.

It was in this land of fire that Naïs and Frédéric loved one another for a month. It was as if all the heat of the sky had entered their veins. For the first week they were satisfied with their nightly meetings under the same olivetree on the edge of the cliff. There they tasted untold bliss. The cool night soothed their fever; they offered their burning cheeks and hands to the passing breeze, refreshing as a mountain spring. The sea broke with its slow voluptuous dirge over the rocks at their feet; the penetrating odour of seaweed intoxicated them with passion.

Then, leaning on one another’s arms, they would watch across the bay the lights of Marseilles, tinging the water at the mouth of the port with a reflection as of blood; the twinkling gaslights, outlining the streets in many a graceful curve; while in the midst of all, above the town, it seemed as if there were a mass of sparkling flame. The garden on the Colline Bonaparte was plainly distinguishable by a double row of lights mounting heavenwards. Those innumerable lights above the slumbering bay appeared to be illuminating some fairy town which the dawn would presently sweep away. And the sky, stretching over the black chaos of the horizon, also had its charm for them, a charm which alarmed and made them cling closer to one another. A rain of stars fell. On those clear Provençal nights the constellations resemble living flames. Shuddering beneath the vast space, they bowed their heads, turning their gaze on the solitary flicker of the Planier lighthouse, whose dancing scintillations stirred them, whilst their lips met again in a kiss.