Complete Works of Emile Zola (315 page)

‘I did wrong to come this evening,’ the priest murmured.

Félicité bit her lips, then continued with animation:

‘You did wrong to compromise yourself with such a man as that Condamin. I did what I thought was best. When the person whom you know of wrote to me from Paris I thought that I should be doing you a service by inviting you here. I imagined that you would he able to make it an opportunity for gaining friends. But, instead of doing what you could to make yourself popular, you have set everyone against you. Please excuse my freedom, but you really seem to be doing all you can to ensure your failure. You have committed nothing but mistakes: in going to lodge with my son-in-law, in persistently keeping yourself aloof from others, and in walking about in a cassock which makes the street-lads jeer at you.’

Abbé Faujas could not repress a movement of impatience. However, he merely replied:

‘I will profit by your kind advice. Only, don’t try to assist me; that would mar everything.’

‘Yes, what you say is prudent,’ replied the old lady. ‘Only return here in triumph. One last word, my dear sir. The person in Paris is most anxious for your success, and it is for that reason that I am interesting myself in you. Well, then, don’t make people frightened of you — shun you; be pleasant, and make yourself agreeable to the ladies. Remember that particularly. You must make yourself agreeable to the ladies if you want to get Plassans on your side.’

The elder Mademoiselle Rastoil had just finished her song with a final flourish, and the guests were softly applauding her. Madame Rougon left the Abbé to go and congratulate the singer. Then she took up a
position in the middle of the room, and shook hands with the visitors who were beginning to retire. It was eleven o’clock. The Abbé was much vexed to find that the worthy Bourrette had taken advantage of the music to effect his escape. He had thought of leaving with him — a course which would have enabled him to make a respectable exit. Now, however, he would have to go away alone, which would be extremely prejudicial to him. It would be reported through the town in the morning that he had been turned out of the house. So he retired into a window-recess, whence he watched for an opportunity to effect an honourable retreat.

The room was emptying fast, however, and there were only a few ladies left. At last he noticed one who was very simply dressed; it was Madame Mouret, whose slightly waved hair made her look younger than usual. He looked with surprise at her tranquil face and her large, peaceful black eyes. He had not noticed her during the evening; she had quietly remained in the same corner without moving, vexed at wasting her time in this way, with her hands in her lap, doing nothing. While he was looking at her she rose to take leave of her mother.

It was one of Félicité’s greatest delights to see the high society of Plassans leave her with profuse bows and thanks for her punch, her green drawing-room, and the pleasant evening they had spent there; and she thought how, formerly, these same fine folks had trampled her underfoot, whereas now the richest amongst them could not find sweet enough smiles for ‘dear Madame Rougon.’

‘Ah, madame!’ murmured Maffre, the justice of the peace, ‘one quite forgets the passage of time here.’

‘You are the only pleasant hostess in all this uncivilised place,’ whispered pretty Madame de Condamin.

‘We shall expect you to dinner to-morrow,’ said Monsieur Delangre; ‘but you must take pot-luck, for we don’t pretend to do as you do.’

Marthe was obliged to make her way through all this incense-offering crowd in order to reach her mother. She kissed her, and was about to retire, when Félicité detained her and looked around as if to trying to find someone. Then, on catching sight of Abbé Faujas, she inquired, with a smile:

‘Is your reverence a gallant man?’

The Abbé bowed.

‘Well, then, I should be much obliged to you if you would escort my daughter home. You both live in the same house, and so it will not put you to any inconvenience. On the road there is a little bit of dark lane which is not very pleasant for a lady by herself.’

Marthe assured her mother, in her quiet way, that she was not a little girl, and in no wise felt afraid; but as Félicité insisted, saying that she should feel easier if her daughter had someone with her, she at last accepted the Abbé’s escort. As the latter retired with her, Félicité, who accompanied them to the landing, whispered in the priest’s ear, with a smile:

‘Don’t forget what I told you. You must make yourself agreeable to the ladies if you want Plassans to belong to you.’

CHAPTER VII

That same night Mouret, who was still awake when his wife returned home, plied her with questions in his desire to find out what had taken place at Madame Rougon’s. She told him that everything had gone off as usual, and that she had noticed nothing out of the common. She just added that Abbé Faujas had walked home with her, but had merely spoken of commonplace matters. Mouret was very much vexed, at what he called his wife’s indolence.

‘If anyone had committed suicide at your mother’s,’ he growled, as he angrily buried his head in his pillow, ‘you would know nothing about it!’

When he came home to dinner the next day, he called to Marthe as soon as he caught sight of her:

‘I was sure of it! I knew you had never troubled your­self to use your eyes! It’s just like you! Sitting the whole evening in a room and never having the faintest notion of what was being said or done around you! Why, the whole town is talking about it! The whole town, do you hear? I couldn’t go anywhere without somebody speaking to me about it’

‘About what, my dear?’ asked Marthe, in astonishment.

‘About the fine success of Abbé Faujas, forsooth! He was turned out of the green drawing-room!’

‘Indeed he wasn’t! I saw nothing of the kind.’

‘Haven’t I told you that you never see anything? Do
you know what the Abbé did at Besançon? He either murdered a priest or committed forgery! They are not quite certain which it was. However, they seem to have given him a nice reception! He turned quite green. Well, it’s all up with him now!’

Marthe bent her head and allowed her husband to revel in the priest’s discomfiture. Mouret was delighted.

‘I still stick to my first idea,’ he said; ‘your mother and he have got some underhand plot together. I hear that she showed him the greatest civility. It was she, wasn’t it, who asked him to accompany you home? Why didn’t you tell me so?’

Marthe shrugged her shoulders without replying.

‘You are the most provoking woman in the world!’ her husband cried. ‘All these little details are of the greatest importance. Madame Paloque, whom I have just met, told me that she and several other ladies had lingered behind to see how the Abbé would effect his departure, and that your mother availed herself of you to cover the parson’s retreat. Just try to remember, now, what he said to you as he walked home with you.’

He sat down by his wife’s side with his keen, questioning little eyes fixed upon her.

‘Really,’ said she quietly, ‘he only talked to me about the trifling commonplace matters such as anyone might have talked of. He spoke about the cold, which was very sharp, and about the quietness of the town at night-time, and I think he mentioned the pleasant evening he had passed.’

‘Ah, the hypocrite! Didn’t he ask you any questions about your mother or her guests?’

‘No. The Rue de la Banne is only a very short distance, you know, and it didn’t take us three minutes. He walked by my side without offering me his arm, and he took such long strides that I was almost obliged to run. I don’t know why folks should all be so bitter against him. He doesn’t seem very well off, and he was shivering, poor man, in that threadbare old cassock of his.’

Mouret was not without pity and sympathy.

‘Ah! he must have done,’ he said; ‘he can’t feel very warm now that the frost has come.’

‘I’m sure we have nothing to complain of in his conduct,’ Marthe continued. ‘He is very punctual in his payments, and he makes no noise and gives no trouble. Where could you find a more desirable tenant?’

‘Nowhere, I grant you. What I was saying just now was to show you what little attention you pay, wherever you go, to what takes place around you. I know the set your mother receives too well to attach much weight to anything that happens in the green drawing-room: it’s a perpetual source of lies and the most ridiculous stories. I don’t suppose for a moment that the Abbé ever murdered anyone any more than that he was ever a bankrupt; and I told Madame Paloque that people ought to see that their own linen was clean before they found fault with that of others. I hope she took the hint to herself.’

This was a fib on Mouret’s part, for he had said nothing of the kind to Madame Paloque; but Marthe’s pity had made him feel rather ashamed of the delight which he had manifested at the Abbé’s troubles. On the following days he went entirely over to the priest’s side, and whenever he happened to meet any people whom he detested, Monsieur de Bourdeu, Monsieur Delangre, and Doctor Porquier, he launched out into warm praises of the Abbé just for the pleasure of astonishing and annoying them. The Abbé, said he, was a man of great courage and perfect guilelessness, but extremely poor, and some very base-minded person must have originated the calumnies about him. Then he went on to have a rap at the Rougons’ guests, whom he called hypocrites, canting humbugs and stuck-up idiots, who were afraid of a man of real virtue. In a short time he had quite made the Abbé’s quarrel his own, and availed himself of it to attack both the Rastoil gang and the gang of the Sub-Prefecture as well.

‘Isn’t it pitiable?’ he sometimes said to his wife, forget­ting that she had heard him tell a very different story, ‘isn’t it pitiable to see a lot of people who stole their money no one knows where, leaguing so bitterly against a poor man just because he hasn’t got twenty francs to spare to buy a cart-load of firewood? Such conduct quite disgusts me! I’m quite willing to be surety for him. I ought to know what he does and what sort of a man he is, since he lives in my house; and so I’m not slack in telling them the truth, I give them all they deserve when I meet them. And I won’t content myself with that, either. I want the Abbé to be my friend, and I mean to walk out with him arm-in-arm along the promenade to let people know that I’m not afraid of being seen with him, rich and well thought of as I am! I hope, too, that you will show all the kindness and consideration to these poor people that you can.’

Marthe smiled quietly, She was delighted at the friendly disposition her husband was now manifesting towards their lodgers. Rose was ordered to show them every civility; she was even told that she might volunteer to do Madame Faujas’ shopping for her on wet mornings. The latter, however, always declined the cook’s services, though she no longer manifested that silent stiffness of demeanour which she had shown during the earlier days of her residence in the house. One morning, as she met Marthe, who was coming down from an attic which was used as a storeroom for the fruit, she stopped and talked to her for a moment, and even unbent so far as to accept a couple of magnificent pears. Those pears were the beginning of a closer intimacy between them.

Abbé Faujas, too, did not now glide so hurriedly up and down the stairs as he had been wont to do. Almost every day, when Mouret heard the rustling of the priest’s cassock as he came down, he hastened to the foot of the staircase and told the Abbé that it would give him great pleasure to walk part of the way with him. He had also thanked him for the little service he had done his wife, skillfully questioning him at the time to find out if he intended again calling on the Rougons. The Abbé had smiled and freely confessed that he was not fitted for society. This had delighted Mouret, who felt quite certain that he had had some influence in bringing about his lodger’s decision. He even began to dream of pre­venting all future intercourse with the green drawing-room and of keeping him altogether to himself. So, when Marthe told him one evening that Madame Faujas had accepted a couple of pears, he looked upon this as a fortunate circumstance which would facilitate the execution of his designs.

‘Haven’t they really got a fire on the second floor this bitterly cold weather?’ he asked, in Rose’s presence.

‘No, indeed, sir,’ replied the cook, who understood that the question was meant for herself; ‘they couldn’t very well have one, for I’ve never seen the least bit of wood taken upstairs, unless indeed they’re burning their four chairs or Madame Faujas manages to carry up the wood in her basket.’

‘It is not right of you to talk in that way, Rose,’ said Marthe. ‘The poor things must be shivering with cold in those big rooms.’

‘I should think so, indeed,’ exclaimed Mouret; ‘there were several degrees of frost last night and there was con­siderable fear felt about the olive-trees. The water in our jug upstairs was frozen. This room of ours here is a small one, however, and very warm.’

The doors and windows of the dining-room were provided with pads, so that no draught could find its way through any crevice, and a big earthenware stove made the place as warm as a bakehouse. During the winter evenings the young people read or played round the table, while Mouret made his wife play piquet till bed-time, which, by the way, was perfect torture to her. For a long time she had refused to touch the cards, saying that she did not know a single game, but at last he had taught her piquet, and she had then been forced to resign herself to her fate.

‘Don’t you think,’ Mouret continued, ‘that we really ought to ask the Faujases to come and spend the evenings here? They would at any rate be warm for two or three hours; and they would be company for us, too, and make us feel more lively. Ask them, and I don’t think they’ll refuse.’

The next day Marthe met Madame Faujas in the hall and gave the invitation, which the old lady at once accepted, both for herself and her son.

‘I’m surprised she didn’t make some little demur about coming,’ said Mouret. ‘I fancied that they would have required more pressing. But the Abbé is beginning to understand that he does wrong in living like a wild beast.’