Complete Works of Emile Zola (757 page)

Thereupon she had insisted upon having, at any rate, a hand in the sale. The profits were about ten thousand francs a year, on which the family made a considerable show, for Madame Chanteau was fond of giving parties. Having dis­covered a certain Davoine, she had worked out the following scheme. Davoine was to buy the timber business for a hundred thousand francs, but he was only to pay fifty thousand in money; in consideration of the other fifty thousand remaining unpaid, the Chanteaus were to become his partners in the business and share the profits. This man Davoine appeared to be a very bold fellow, and, even if he did not extend the business of the firm, they would still be sure of five thousand francs a year, which, added to the interest of the fifty thousand invested in stock, would give them altogether an income of eight thousand francs. And on this they would get on as well as they could, pending the time when their son should achieve some brilliant success and be able to extricate them from a life of mediocrity.

It was upon these principles that the business was sold. Two years previously Chanteau had bought a seaside house at Bonneville, which he had been able to get as a bargain through the bankruptcy of an insolvent debtor. Instead of selling it again at a profit, as for a time she had thought of doing, Madame Chanteau determined that the family should go and live there, at any rate until Lazare had achieved his first successes. To give up her parties and bury herself in such an out-of-the-way place was for her, indeed, almost suicide; but as she had agreed to surrender their entire house to Davoine, she would have had to rent another, and so she sum­moned up all her resolution to go in for a life of economy, with the firm hope of one day making a triumphal return to Caen, when her son should have gained a high position. Chanteau gave his consent to everything. His gout would have to accommodate itself to the sea air, and, besides, of three doctors whom he had consulted, two had been good enough to declare that the fresh breezes from the open would act as a splendid tonic on his system generally. So, one morning in May, the Chanteaus departed to settle at Bonne­ville, leaving Lazare, then fourteen years old, at the college at Caen.

Since this heroic exile, five years had passed, and the affairs of the family had gone from bad to worse. As Davoine was constantly launching out into fresh speculations, he was ever telling them that it was necessary he should have further advances; and the consequence was that all the profits were risked again and again, and the balance-sheet generally showed a loss. The Chanteaus were reduced to living at Bonneville on the three thousand francs a year derived from the money they had invested in stock, and they were so hardly pressed that they had been obliged to sell their horse, and get Véronique to undertake the management of the kitchen garden.

‘At any rate, Eugénie,’ said Chanteau, a little timorously, ‘if I have been let in, it is partly your fault.’

But she repudiated the responsibility altogether. She always conveniently forgot that the partnership with Davoine was her own work.

‘My fault indeed!’ she replied drily. ‘How can that be? Am I laid up? If you were not such an invalid, we might perhaps be millionaires.’

Whenever his wife attacked him in this bitter fashion, he always lowered his head with pain and shame at the thought that it was his illness that was ruining the family.

‘We must wait and be patient,’ he murmured. ‘Davoine appears to be very confident of the success of his new scheme. If the price of deal goes up, we shall make a fortune.’

‘And what good will that be?’ interrupted Lazare, who was still copying out his music. ‘We have enough to eat as it is. It is very foolish of you worrying yourselves in this way. I don’t care a bit about money.’

Madame Chanteau shrugged her shoulders again.

‘It would be a great deal better if you cared about it a little more, and didn’t waste your time in foolish nonsense.’

It was she herself who had taught him to play the piano, though the mere sight of a score now sufficed to make her angry. Her last hope had fled. This son of hers, whom she had dreamed of seeing a prefect or a judge, talked of writing operas; and she foresaw that in the future he would be reduced to running about the streets giving lessons, as she herself had once done.

‘Here is the balance-sheet for the last three months, which Davoine gave me,’ she said. ‘If things continue in this way, it will be we who shall owe him money by next July.’

She had put her bag upon the table, and she took out of it a paper, which she handed to Chanteau. He just turned it round, and then laid it down in front of him without opening it. At that moment Véronique brought in the tea. No one spoke for some time, and the cups remained empty. Minouche was dozing placidly beside the sugar-basin, and Matthew was snoring like a man before the fire. The roar of the sea con­tinued outside like a mighty bass accompaniment to the peaceful echoes of the drowsy room.

‘Won’t you awaken her, mother?’ said Lazare, at last. It can’t be good for her to go on sleeping there.’

‘Yes! yes!’ murmured Madame Chanteau, who seemed buried in deep thought, with her eyes fixed upon Pauline.

They all three looked at the sleeping girl. Her breathing was very calm, and there was a flowery softness about her pale cheeks and rosy lips beneath the glow of the lamp-light. Her chestnut curls, which the wind had disarranged, cast a slight shadow over her delicate brow. Then Madame Chanteau’s thoughts reverted to her visit to Paris, and all the bother she had met with there, and she felt quite aston­ished at the enthusiasm with which she had undertaken the child’s guardianship, inspired with instinctive regard for a wealthy ward, though her intentions of course were scrupu­lously honourable, and quite without thought of benefiting by the fortune of which she would be trustee.

‘When I alighted at the shop,’ she began slowly, ‘she was wearing a little black frock, and she came to kiss me, sobbing and crying. It is a very fine shop indeed; beautifully fitted up with marble and plate-glass, and just in front of the markets. There was such a servant there, about as big as a jackboot, with a fresh red face. It was she who had given information to the notary, and had brought him to put every­thing under seal. When I got there she was going on quietly selling sausages and black puddings. It was Adèle who told me about our poor cousin Quenu’s death. Ever since he had lost his wife, six months previously, his blood seemed to be suffocating him. He was constantly fidgeting about his neck with his hand to loosen his neckerchief; and at last they found him one evening lying with his face all purple in a bowl of dripping. His uncle Gradelle died in just the same way.’

She said no more, and silence fell again. Over Pauline’s face, as she lay asleep, there played a passing smile, suggest­ing some pleasant dream.

‘And the law business, was that all transacted satisfac­torily?’ asked Chanteau.

‘Oh! quite so. But your lawyer was very right in leaving a blank for the name in the power-of-attorney; for it appears that I could not have acted in your stead, as women are not eligible in such matters. But, as I wrote and told you, on my arrival I went to consult the parish lawyer who sent us the extract from the will in which you were appointed guardian. He at once inserted his chief clerk’s name in the power-of-attorney, which is quite a common course, he tells me. Then we were able to get along, I went before a justice of the peace and nominated as members of the family council three relations on Lisa’s side: two young cousins, Octave Mouret and Claude Lantier, and a cousin by marriage, Monsieur Rambaud, who lives at Marseilles; then, on our side, that is Quenu’s side, I chose his nephews, Naudet, Liardin, and Delorme. It is a very proper council, you see, and one which we can easily manage as we think best for the child’s benefit. At their first meeting they nominated as surrogate-guardian Monsieur Saccard,
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whom I had chosen, out of necessity, from among Lisa’s relations.’

‘Hush! hush! She is waking up,’ interrupted Lazare.

Pauline had just opened her eyes widely. Without moving, she gazed with some astonishment at the people talking around her, and then, with a smile full of sleepiness, closed her eyes once more, being worn out with fatigue. Again did her motionless little face show a milky camellia-like transparency.

‘Isn’t that Saccard the speculator?’ asked Chanteau.

‘Yes,’ answered his wife. ‘I saw him, and we had a talk together. He is a charming man. He has so many things to look after, he told me, that I must not reckon much on his assistance. But, you know, we really don’t want anybody’s help. From the moment we take the child — well, we do take her; and we don’t want anybody coming and interfering with us. All the other business was got through quickly. Your power-of-attorney conferred all the necessary authority. The seals were removed, an inventory of the property was made, and the business was sold by auction. The sale went off splendidly, for there were two parties bidding hotly one against the other, and so we got ninety thousand francs, cash down. The notary had previously discovered scrip for sixty thousand francs in a desk. I begged him to buy more scrip, and so now we have a hundred and fifty thousand francs securely invested. I have brought the scrip along with me, having first given the chief clerk the full discharge and receipt, which I asked you to send me by return of post. See! here it is!’

She had thrust her hand into her bag and brought out a bulky packet. It was the scrip, tied up between two pieces of thick cardboard which had formed the binding of one of the shop account-books. The green marbled surface was speckled with grease-spots. Both father and son looked attentively at the fortune which lay upon the shabby tablecloth.

‘The tea is getting cold, mother,’ said Lazare, putting his pen down at last. ‘Hadn’t I better pour it out?’

He got up from his seat and filled the cups. His mother had returned no answer to his question. Her eyes were still fixed on the scrip.

‘Of course,’ she continued slowly, ‘at a subsequent meeting of the family council which I summoned, I asked to have my travelling expenses reimbursed, and the sum that we are to receive for the child’s maintenance was fixed at eight hundred francs a year. We are not so rich as she is, and we cannot afford to take her for nothing. None of us would desire to make a farthing profit out of the girl, but it would have pressed us too much to have kept her out of our own income. The interest of her fortune will be banked and invested, and her capital will be almost doubled by the time she comes of age. Well, it is only our duty that we are doing. We are bound to obey the wishes of the dead. And if it costs us something to do it, perhaps the sacrifice may bring us better fortune, of which, I am sure, we stand in great need — The poor little dear was so cut up, and sobbed so bitterly at leaving her nurse! I trust she will be happy with us here.’

The two men were quite affected.

‘Most certainly I shall never be unkind to her,’ said Chanteau.

‘She is a charming little thing,’ added Lazare. ‘I love her already.’

Just then Matthew appeared to have smelt the tea in his dreams, for he gave himself a shake, and again came and thrust his big head upon the edge of the table. Minouche, too, got up and stretched herself and yawned, and, when she was quite awake, she craned out her neck to sniff at the packet of papers in the greasy covers. As the Chanteaus glanced at Pauline, they saw that her eyes were also open and fixed upon the scrip and the old ledger binding.

‘Ah! she knows very well what is inside there,’ said Madame Chanteau. ‘Don’t you, my dear? I showed them all to you in Paris. That is what your poor father and mother have left you.’

Tears trickled down the child’s face. Her grief often recurred in April-like showers. But she soon smiled again through her tears, feeling amused at Minouche, who had for a long time smelt at the papers and was doubtless attracted by their odour, for she began to purr and rub her head against the corners of the ledger.

‘Come away, Minouche!’ cried Madame Chanteau. ‘Money isn’t to be made a plaything of!’

Chanteau laughed, and so did Lazare. With his head resting on the edge of the table, Matthew was becoming quite excited. Looking eagerly with his flaming eyes at the packet of papers which he must have taken for some great delicacy, he began to bark at the cat. Then all the family grew lively. Pauline caught up Minouche and fondled her in her arms as though she were a doll.

For fear the girl should drop off to sleep again, Madame Chanteau made her drink her tea at once. Then she called Véronique.

‘Bring us our candles. Here we are sitting and talking and never going to bed. Why! it is actually ten o’clock, and I am so tired that I half fell asleep at dinner!’

But a man’s voice sounded from the kitchen, and when the cook returned with four lighted candles her mistress asked her:

‘Whom were you talking to?’

‘It is Prouane, Madame. He came up to tell the master that things are in a very bad way down yonder. The sea is breaking everything to pieces apparently.’

Chanteau had been prevailed upon to accept office as mayor of Bonneville, and Prouane, the tipsy scamp, who acted as Abbé Horteur’s beadle, likewise discharged the duties of mayor’s clerk. He had been a non-commissioned officer in the navy, and wrote a copybook hand. When they called to him to come into the room, he made his appearance with his woollen cap in his hand and his jacket and boots streaming with water.

‘Well! what’s the matter, Prouane?’

‘Sure, sir, the Cuches’ house is completely flooded. And if it goes on like this much longer it will be the same with the Gonins’. We have all been down there, Tourmal, Houtelard, myself, and the others. But it is no use; we can’t do anything against that thievish sea. It’s written that it will carry off a slice of the land every year.’

Then they all became silent. The four candles burned with tall flames, and the rush of the devouring sea against the cliffs broke through the night air. It was now high tide, and the house shook as every wave dashed against the rocky barrier. It was like the roaring of giant artillery; thunderous consecutive reports arose amidst the rolling of shingle, which, as it swept over the rocks, sounded like the continuous crack­ling of a fusillade. And amidst all this uproar the wind raised its howling plaint, and the rain, every now and then increasing in violence, seemed to pelt the walls of the house with a hail of bullets.