Complete Works of Emile Zola (712 page)

“Oh, look!” said she, her head still at the window, “there’s Monsieur Lhomme. How he does walk!”

“He’s got his French horn,” added Pauline, leaning out. “What an old stupid! One would think he was running to meet his girl!”

Lhomme, with his instrument under his arm, was spinning along past the Gymnase Theatre, his nose in the air, laughing with delight at the thought of the treat in store for him. He was going to spend the day at a friend’s, a flautist at a small theatre, where a few amateurs indulged in a little chamber music on Sundays as soon as breakfast was over.

“At eight o’clock! what a madman!” resumed Pauline. “And you know that Madame Aurélie and all her clique must have taken the Rambouillet train that left at half-past six. It’s very certain the husband and wife won’t come across each other.”

Both then commenced talking of the Rambouillet excursion. They did not wish it to be rainy for the others, because they themselves would be obliged to suffer as well; but if a cloud could burst over there without extending to Joinville, it would be funny all the same. Then they attacked Clara, a dirty slut, who hardly knew how to spend the money her men gave her: hadn’t she bought three pairs of boots all at the same time, which she threw away the next day, after having cut them with her scissors, on account of her feet, which were covered with bunions. In fact, the young ladies were just as bad as the fellows, they squandered everything, never saving a sou, wasting two or three hundred francs a month on dress and dainties.

“But he’s only got one arm,” said Baugé all of a sudden. “How does he manage to play the French horn?”

He had kept his eyes on Lhomme. Pauline, who sometimes amused herself by playing on his stupidity, told him the cashier kept the instrument up by placing it against a wall. He thoroughly believed her, and thought it very ingenious. Then, when stricken with remorse, she explained to him in what way Lhomme had adapted to his stump a system of keys which he made use of as a hand, he shook his head, full of suspicion, declaring that they wouldn’t make him swallow that.

“You are really too stupid!” she retorted, laughingly. “Never mind, I love you all the same.”

They reached the Vincennes Station just in time for a train. Baugé paid; but Denise had previously declared that she wished to pay her share of the expenses; they would settle up in the evening. They took second-class tickets, and found the train full of a gay, noisy throng. At Nogent, a wedding party got out, amidst a storm of laughter. At last they arrived at Joinville, and went straight to the island to order lunch; and they stopped there, lingering on the banks of the Marne, under the tall poplars. It was rather cold in the shade, a sharp breeze was blowing in the sunshine, extending far into the distance, on the other side of the river, the limpid purity of a plain dotted with cultivated fields. Denise lingered behind Pauline and her lover, who were walking with their arms round each other’s waists. She had picked a handful of buttercups, and was watching the flow of the river, happy, her heart beating, her head drooping’, each time Baugé leant over to kiss his mistress. Her eyes filled with tears. And yet she was not suffering. What was the matter with her that she had this feeling of suffocation? and why did this vast landscape, where she had looked forward to having so much enjoyment, fill her with a vague regret she could not explain? Then, at lunch, Pauline’s noisy laugh bewildered her. That young lady, who loved the suburbs with the passion of an actress living in the gas-light, in the thick air of a crowd, wanted to lunch in an arbor, notwithstanding the sharp wind. She was delighted with the sudden gusts which blew up the table-cloth, she thought the arbor very funny in its nudity, with the freshly-painted trelliswork, the lozenges of which cast a reflection on the cloth. She ate ravenously, devouring everything with the voracity of a girl badly fed at the shop, making up for it outside by giving herself an indigestion with the things she liked; this was her vice, she spent most of her money in cakes and indigestible dainties of all kinds, favorite dishes stowed away in her leisure moments. As Denise seemed to have had enough of the eggs, fried fish, and stewed chicken, she restrained herself, not daring to order any strawberries, a luxury still very dear, for fear of running the bill up too high.

“Now, what are we going to do?” asked Baugé when the coffee was served.

As a rule Pauline and he returned to Paris to dine, and finish their day in some theatre. But at Denise’s request, they decided to stay at Joinville all day; they would be able to have their fill of the country. So they stopped and wandered about the fields all the afternoon. They spoke for a moment of going for a row, but abandoned the idea; Baugé was not a good waterman. But they found themselves walking along the banks of the Marne, all the same, and were greatly interested by the life on the river, the squadrons of yawls and other boats, and the young men who formed the crews. The sun was going down, they were returning to Joinville, when they saw two boats coming down stream at a racing speed, exchanging volleys of insults, in which the repeated cries of “Sawbones!” and “Counter-jumpers!” dominated.

“Hallo!” said Pauline, “it’s Monsieur Hutin.”

“Yes,” said Baugé, shading his face with his hand, “I recognize his mahogany boat. The other one is manned by students, no doubt.”

And he explained the deadly hatred existing between the young students and the shopmen. Denise, on hearing Hutin’s name mentioned, suddenly stopped, and followed, with fixed eyes, the frail skiff spinning along like an arrow. She tried to distinguish the young man among the rowers, but could only manage to make out the white dresses of two women, one of whom, who was steering, wore a red hat. Their voices were drowned by the rapid flow of the river.

“Pitch ‘em in, the sawbones!”

“Duck ‘em, the counter-jumpers!”

In the evening they returned to the restaurant on the island. But it had turned too chilly, they were obliged to dine in one of the closed rooms, where the table-cloths were still damp from the humidity of the winter. After six o’clock the tables were all occupied, yet the excursionists still hurried in, looking for a corner; and the waiters continued to bring in more chairs and forms, putting the plates closer together, and crowding the people up. It was stifling, they had to open the windows. Outdoors, the day was waning, a greenish twilight fell from the poplars so quickly that the proprietor, unprepared for these meals under cover, and having no lamps, was obliged to put a wax candle on each table. The uproar became deafening with laughing, calling out, and the clacking of the table utensils; the candles flared and melted in the draught from the windows, whilst moths fluttered about in the air, warmed by the odor of the food, and traversed by sudden gusts of cold wind.

“What fun they’re having, eh?” said Pauline, very busy with a plate of matelote, which she declared extraordinary. She leant over to add: “Didn’t you see Monsieur Albert over there?”

It was really young Lhomme, in the middle of three questionable women, a vulgar-looking old lady in a yellow bonnet, suspiciously like a procuress, and two young girls of thirteen or fourteen, forward and painfully impudent creatures. He, already intoxicated, was knocking his glass on the table, and talking of drubbing the waiter if he did not bring some “liqueurs” immediately.

“Well!” resumed Pauline, “there’s a family, if you like! the mother at Rambouillet, the father in Paris; and the son at Joinville; they won’t tread on one another’s toes!”

Denise, who detested noise, smiled, however, and tasted the joy of ceasing to think, amid such uproar. But all at once they heard a noise in the other room, a burst of voices which drowned the others. They were yelling, and must have come to blows, for one could hear a scuffle, chairs falling down, quite a struggle, amid which the river-cries again resounded:

“Duck ‘em, the counter-jumpers!”

“Pitch ‘em in, the sawbones!”

And when the hotel-keeper’s loud voice had calmed this tempest, Hutin suddenly made his appearance, wearing a red jersey, and a little cap at the back of his head; he had on his arm the tall, fair girl, who had been steering, and who, in order to wear the boat’s colors, had planted a bunch of poppies behind her ear. They were greeted on entering by a storm of applause; and his face beamed with pride, he swelled out his chest, assuming a nautical rolling gait, showing off a blow which had blackened his cheek, puffed up with joy at being noticed. Behind them followed the crew. They took a table by storm, and the uproar became something fearful.

“It appears,” explained Baugé, after having listened to the conversation behind him, “it appears that the students have recognized the woman with Hutin as an old friend from their neighborhood, who now sings in a music-hall at Montmartre. So they were kicking up a row for her. These students never pay their women.”

“In any case,” said Pauline, stiffly, “she’s jolly ugly, with her carroty hair. Really, I don’t know where Monsieur Hutin picks them up, but they’re an ugly, dirty lot.”

Denise had turned pale, and felt an icy coldness, as if her heart’s blood were flowing away, drop by drop. She had already, on seeing the boats from the bank, felt a shiver; but now she no longer had any doubt, this girl was certainly with Hutin. With trembling hands, and a choking sensation in her throat, she ceased eating.

“What’s the matter” asked her friend.

“Nothing,” stammered she; “it’s rather warm here.”

But Hutin’s table was close to theirs, and when he perceived Baugé, whom he knew, he commenced a conversation in a shrill voice, in order to attract further attention.

“I say,” cried he, “are you as virtuous as ever at the Bon Marché?”

“Not so much as all that,” replied Baugé, turning very red.

“That won’t do! You know they only take virgins there, and there’s a confessional box permanently fixed for the salesmen who venture to look at them. A house where they marry you — no, thanks!”

The other fellows began to laugh. Liénard, who belonged to the crew, added: “It isn’t like the Louvre. There they have a midwife attached to the ready-made department. My word of honor!”

The gaiety increased; Pauline herself burst out, the idea of the midwife seemed so funny. But Baugé was annoyed by the jokes about the innocence of his house. He launched out all at once: “Oh, you’re not too well off at The Ladies’ Paradise. Sacked for the slightest thing! And a governor who seems to tout for his lady customers.”

Hutin no longer listened to him, but commenced to praise the house in the Place Clichy. He knew a young girl there so excessively aristocratic that the customers dared not speak to her for fear of humiliating her. Then, drawing up closer, he related that he had made a hundred and fifteen francs that week; oh! a capital week. Favier left behind with fifty-two francs, the whole lot floored. And it was visible he was bursting with money, he would not go to bed till he had liquidated the hundred and fifteen francs. Then, as he gradually became intoxicated, he attacked Robineau, that fool of a second-hand who affected to keep himself apart, going so far as to refuse to walk in the street with one of his salesmen.

“Shut up,” said Liénard; “you talk too much, old man.”

The heat had increased, the candles were guttering down on to the table-cloths stained with wine; and through the open windows, when the noise within ceased for an instant, there entered a distant prolonged voice, the voice of the river, and of the tall poplars sleeping in the calm night. Baugé had just called for the bill, seeing that Denise was now quite white, her throat choked by the tears she withheld; but the waiter did not appear, and she had to submit to Hutin’s loud talk. He was now boasting of being more superior to Liénard, because Liénard cared for nothing, simply squandering his father’s money, whilst he, Hutin, was spending his own earnings, the fruit of his intelligence. At last Baugé paid, and the two girls went out.

“There’s one from the Louvre,” murmured Pauline in the outer room, looking at a tall thin girl putting on her mantle.

“You don’t know her. You can’t tell,” said the young man.

“Oh, can’t I? They’ve got a way of draping themselves. She belongs to the midwife’s department! If she heard, she must be pleased.”

They got outside at last, and Denise heaved a sigh of relief. For a moment she had thought she was going to die in that suffocating heat, amidst all those cries; and she still attributed her faintness to the want of air. Now she breathed freely in the freshness of the starry night. As the two young girls were leaving the garden of the restaurant, a timid voice murmured in the shade: “Good evening, ladies.”

It was Deloche. They had not seen him at the further end of the front room, where he was dining alone, after having come from Paris on foot, for the pleasure of the walk. On recognizing this friendly voice, Denise, suffering, yielded mechanically to the want of some support.

“Monsieur Deloche, come back with us,” said she. “Give me your arm.”

Pauline and Baugé had already gone on in front. They were astonished, never thinking it would turn out like this, and with this fellow above all. However, as there was still an hour before the train started, they went to the end of the island, following the bank, under the tall poplars; and, from time to time, they turned round, murmuring: “But where are they? Ah, there they are. It’s rather funny, all the same.”

At first Denise and Deloche remained silent. The noise from the restaurant was slowly dying away, changing into a musical sweetness in the calmness of the night; and they went further in amongst the cool of the trees, still feverish from that furnace, the lights of which were disappearing one by one behind the foliage. Opposite them there was a sort of shadowy wall, a mass of shade in which the trunks and branches buried themselves so compact that they could not even distinguish any trace of the path. However, they went forward quietly, without fear. Then, their eyes getting more accustomed to the darkness, they saw on the right the trunks of the poplars, resembling somber columns upholding the domes of their branches, pierced with stars; whilst on the right the water assumed occasionally in the darkness the brightness of a mirror. The wind was subsiding, they no longer heard anything but the flowing of the river.