Complete Works of Emile Zola (335 page)

‘Yes, indeed,’ said Marthe, who was cutting a pear.

Mouret was almost choking. He rose and left the dining-room without paying any attention to Rose, who cried out to him that the coffee would be ready directly. Marthe, now left alone in the room, quietly finished her pear.

Just as the cook was bringing the coffee, Madame Faujas came downstairs.

‘Go in,’ Rose said to her; ‘you will be company for madame, and you can have the master’s coffee, for he has just rushed off like a madman.’

The old lady sat down in Mouret’s place.

‘I thought you did not take coffee,’ she remarked as she put some sugar into her cup.

‘No, indeed, she didn’t do so when the master kept the purse,’ interposed Rose. ‘But madame would be very silly now to deny herself what she likes.’

They talked for a good hour together, and Marthe ended by relating all her troubles to Madame Faujas, telling her how her husband had just inflicted a most painful scene upon her on account of her daughter, whom he had removed to her nurse’s in a sudden pet. She defended herself, and told Madame Faujas that she was really very fond of the girl, and should go to fetch her back before long.

‘Well, she was rather noisy,’ Madame Faujas remarked. ‘I have often pitied you. My son was thinking about giving up going into the garden to read his breviary. She almost distracted him with the noise she made.’

From that day forward Marthe and Mouret took their meals in silence. The autumn was very damp, and the dining-room looked intensely melancholy with only two covers laid, one at each end of the big table. The corners were dark, and a chill seemed to fall from the ceiling. As Rose would say, it looked as though a funeral were going on.

‘Well, indeed,’ she often exclaimed, as she brought the plates into the room, ‘you couldn’t make much less noise, sir, however you tried! There isn’t much danger of your wearing the skin of your tongue off! Do try to be a little livelier, sir! You look as though you were following a corpse to the grave! You will end by making madame quite ill. It is bad for the health to eat without speaking.’

When the first frosts came, Rose, who sought in every way to oblige Madame Faujas, offered her the use of her cooking-stove. The old lady had begun by bringing down kettles to get her water boiled, as she had no fire, she said, and the Abbé was in a hurry to shave. Then she borrowed some flat-irons, begged the use of some sauce­pans, asked for the loan of the dutch-oven to cook some mutton, and finally, in the end, as she had no conveniently arranged fireplace upstairs, she accepted Rose’s repeated offers, and the cook lighted her a fire of vine branches, big enough to roast a whole sheep, in the kitchen.

‘Don’t show any diffidence about it,’ she said, as she herself turned the leg of mutton round; ‘the kitchener is a large one, isn’t it? and big enough for us both. I don’t know how you’ve been able to do your cooking upstairs as long as you have, with only that wretched iron stove there. I should have been afraid of falling down in an apoplectic fit myself. Monsieur Mouret ought to know better than to let a set of rooms without any kitchen. You must be very enduring kind of people, and very easily satisfied.’

Thus Madame Faujas gradually began to cook her lunch and dinner in the Mourets’ kitchen. On the first few occasions she provided her own coal and oil and spices. But afterwards, when she forgot to bring any article with her, Rose would not allow her to go upstairs for it, but insisted upon supplying the deficiency from the house stores.

‘Oh, there’s some butter there! The little bit which you will take with the tip of your knife won’t ruin us. You know very well that everything here is at your service. Madame would be quite angry with me if I didn’t make you at home here.’

A close intimacy now sprang up between Rose and Madame Faujas. The cook was delighted to have some one always at hand who was willing to listen to her while she stirred her sauces. She got on extremely well with the priest’s mother, whose print dresses and rough face and unpolished demeanour put her almost on a footing of equality. They sat chatting together for hours before the fireplace, and Madame Faujas soon gained complete sway in the kitchen, though she still maintained her impenetrable attitude, and only said what she chose to say, while contriving to worm out all that she wanted to know. She settled the Mourets’ dinner, tasted the dishes which she had arranged they should have, and Rose herself often made savoury little luxuries for the Abbé’s delectation, such as sugared apples or rice-cakes or fritters. The provisions of the two establishments often got mixed together, mistakes were made with the different pans, the two dinners being so intermingled that Rose would cry out with a laugh:

‘Tell me, madame, are these poached eggs yours? Really, I don’t know. Upon my word, it would be much better if you were all to dine together!’

It was on All Saints Day that Abbé Faujas lunched for the first time in the Mourets’ dining-room. He was in a great hurry, as he had to return to Saint-Saturnin’s at once, and so, to give him as much time as possible, Marthe asked him to sit down at their table, saying that it would save his mother from climbing a couple of flights of stairs. A week later it had become a regular thing; the Faujases came downstairs at every meal and took their seats at table, just as if they were entering a restaurant. For the first few days their provisions were cooked and served separately, but Rose declared this was a very silly arrangement, that she could easily cook for four persons, and that she would arrange it all with Madame Faujas.

‘Pray don’t thank me,’ she said to the Abbé and his mother; ‘it is a kindness on your part to come down and keep madame company. You will cheer her up a little. I scarcely dare go into the dining-room now; it is just like going into the chamber of death. It quite frightens me, it feels so desolate. If the master chooses to go on sulking, he will have to do so all by himself.’

They kept up a roaring fire, the room was very warm, and the winter proved a delightful one. Rose had never before taken such pains to lay the tablecloth nicely. She placed his reverence’s chair near the stove, so that he might have his back to the fire. She paid particular attention to his glass and his knife and fork, she took care that whenever the slightest stain made its appearance upon the cloth it should not be put on his side, and she paid him numberless other delicate little attentions.

When she had prepared any dish of which he was parti­cularly fond, she gave him notice so that he might reserve himself for it; though sometimes, on the other hand, she made a surprise of it for him, and brought it into the room under a cover, smiling at the inquisitive glances directed towards it, and exclaiming with an air of triumph:

‘This is for his reverence! It is a wild-duck stuffed with olives, just what he is so fond of. Give his reverence the breast, madame. I cooked it specially for him.’

Marthe carved the duck, and with beseeching looks pressed the choicest morsels upon the Abbé. She always helped him the first, and searched the dish for him, while Rose bent over her and pointed out what she thought the best parts. They occasionally even had little disputes as to the superiority of this or that part of a fowl or rabbit. Then, too, Rose used to push an embroidered hassock under the priest’s feet, while Marthe insisted that he should always have his bottle of Bordeaux and his roll, specially ordering one of the latter for him from the baker every day.

‘We can never do too much for you,’ said Rose, when the Abbé expressed his thanks. ‘Who should be well looked after, if it isn’t good kind hearts like yours? Don’t you trouble about it, the Lord will pay your debt for you.’

Madame Faujas smiled at all these flattering civilities as she sat at table opposite her son. She was beginning to feel quite fond of Marthe and Rose. She considered their adora­tion only natural, and thought it a great happiness for them to be allowed to cast themselves in this way at the feet of her idol. It was really she with her square head and peasant manner who presided over the table, eating slowly but plenti­fully, noticing everything that happened without once setting down her fork, and taking care that Marthe should play the part of servant to her son, at whom she was constantly gazing with an expression of content. She never opened her lips except to make known in as few words as possible the Abbé’s various tastes or to over-rule the polite refusals in which he still occasionally indulged. Sometimes she shrugged her shoulders and pushed him with her foot. Wasn’t everything on the table at his service? He might eat the whole contents of the dish, if he liked, and the others would be quite happy to nibble their dry bread and look at him.

Abbé Faujas himself, however, seemed quite indifferent to all the tender care which was lavished upon him. Of a very frugal disposition and a quick eater, his mind always occu­pied with other matters, he was frequently quite unconscious of the dainties which were specially reserved for him. He had yielded to his mother’s entreaties in consenting to join the Mourets, but the only satisfaction he experienced in the dining-room on the ground-floor was the pleasure of being set entirely free from the everyday cares of life. He manifested unruffled serenity, gradually grew accustomed to seeing his least wish anticipated and fulfilled, and ceased to manifest any surprise or express any thanks, lording it haughtily between the mistress of the house and the cook, who kept anxious watch over the slightest motions of his stern face.

Mouret sat opposite his wife, quite forgotten and unnoticed. He let his hands rest upon the edge of the table, and waited, like a child, till Marthe should be willing to attend to him. She helped him the last, scantily, and to whatever might happen to be left. Rose stood behind her and warned her whenever by mistake she was going to give her husband some of the more delicate morsels in the dish.

‘No, no; not that. The master likes the head, you know. He enjoys sucking the little bones.’

Mouret, snubbed and slighted, ate his food with a sort of shame, as though he was subsisting unworthily on other people’s bounty. He could see Madame Faujas watching him keenly as he cut his bread. He kept his eyes fixed on the bottle for a whole minute, full of doubtful hesitation, before he dare venture to help himself to wine. Once he made a mistake and took a little of the priest’s choice Bordeaux. There was a tremendous fuss made about it, and for a whole month afterwards Rose reproached him for those few drops of wine. Whenever she made any sweet dish, she would say:

‘I don’t want the master to have any of that. He never thinks anything I make nice. He once told me that an omelet I had made was burnt, and then I said, “They shall be burnt altogether for you.” Don’t give any of it to the master, I beg you, madame.’

She also did all she could to worry and upset him. She gave him cracked plates, contrived that one of the table legs should come between his own, left shreds of the glass-cloth clinging to his glass, and placed the bread and wine and salt as far from him as possible. Mouret was the only one in the family who liked mustard, and he used to go himself to the grocers and buy canisters of it, which the cook promptly caused to disappear, saying that they ‘stank so.’ The depri­vation of mustard spoilt his enjoyment of his meals. But what made him still more miserable, and robbed him of all appetite, was his expulsion from his own seat, which he had always previously occupied, in front of the window, which was now given to the priest, as being the pleasantest in the room. Mouret had to sit with his face towards the door, and he felt as though he were eating amongst strangers, now that he could not at each mouthful cast a glance at his fruit-trees.

Marthe was not so bitter against him as Rose was. She treated him at first like a poor relation, whose presence is just tolerated, and then gradually grew to ignore him, scarcely ever addressing a remark to him, and acting as though Abbé Faujas alone had the right to give orders in the house. Mouret, however, showed no inclination to rebel. He occa­sionally exchanged a few polite phrases with the priest, though he generally ate in perfect silence, and only replied to the cook’s attacks by looking at her. He always finished before any of the others, folded up his napkin tidily, and then left the room, frequently before the dessert was placed upon the table.

Rose alleged that he was bursting with anger, and when she gossiped in the kitchen with Madame Faujas she discussed his conduct freely.

‘I know him very well; I’ve never been afraid of him. Before you came madame used to tremble before him, for he was always scolding and blustering and trying to appear very terrible. He used to worry our lives out of us, always poking about, never finding anything right, and trying to show us that he was master. Now he is as docile as a lamb, isn’t he? It’s just because madame has asserted herself. Ah! if he weren’t a coward, and weren’t afraid of what might happen, you would hear a pretty row. But he is afraid of your son; yes, he is afraid of his reverence the Curé. Anyone would say, to look at him, that he lost his senses every now and then. But after all, as long as he doesn’t bother us any longer, he is welcome to act as he pleases; isn’t he, madame?’

Madame Faujas replied that Monsieur Mouret seemed to her to be a very worthy man, and that his only fault was his lack of religion. But he would certainly adopt a better mode of life in time, she said. The old lady was gradually making herself mistress of the whole of the ground floor, going from kitchen to dining-room as she pleased, and ever bustling about in the hall and passages. When Mouret met her he used to recall the day when the Faujases first arrived; when, wearing that shabby black dress of hers, she had tenaciously clung to her basket with both hands and poked her head in­quisitively into each room, with all the unruffled serenity of a person inspecting some property for sale.

Since the Faujases had begun to take their meals down­stairs the Trouches were left in possession of the second floor. They made a great deal of noise, and the constant moving of furniture, the stamping of feet and the violent banging of doors, were heard by those downstairs. Madame Faujas would then uneasily raise her head in the midst of her gossiping in the kitchen. Rose, for the sake of putting her at her ease, used to say that poor Madame Trouche suffered a great deal of pain. One night the Abbé, who had not yet gone to bed, heard a strange commotion on the stairs. He left his room with his candle in his hand, and saw Trouche, disgracefully drunk, climbing up the stairs on his knees. He seized the sot in his strong arms and threw him into his room. Olympe was in bed there, quietly reading a novel and sipping a glass of spirits and water that stood on a little table at the bedside.