Эмиль Золя
The Ladies' Paradise
Both then began talking of the Rambouillet excursion. They did not wish it to be rainy for the others, because they themselves might suffer as well; still, if a cloud could only burst over there without a drop falling at Joinville, it would be funny all the same. Then they attacked Clara, who hardly knew how to spend the money she made by her vices. Hadn't she bought three pairs of boots all at the same time, and thrown them away the next day, after slashing them with her scissors, on account of her feet, which were covered with corns? In fact, the young ladies were just as bad as the young men, they squandered everything, never saving a sou, but wasting two or three hundred francs a month on dress and dainties.
"But he's only got one arm," all of a sudden said Baugé, who had kept his eyes on Lhomme. "How does he manage to play the French horn?"
Pauline, who sometimes amused herself by playing on her lover's stupidity, thereupon told him that the cashier kept the instrument up by leaning it against a wall. He thoroughly believed her, and thought it very ingenious. And when, stricken with remorse, she explained to him that Lhomme had adapted to his stump a system of claws which he made use of as fingers, he shook his head, full of doubt and declaring that they wouldn't make him swallow that.
"You are really too stupid!" she retorted, laughing. "Never mind, I love you all the same."
They reached the station of the Vincennes line just in time for a train. Baugé paid; but Denise had previously declared that she wished to defray 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. Then, at last they arrived at Joinville, and went straight to the island to order lunch; and afterwards lingered there, strolling along, under the tall poplars beside the Marne. It was rather cold in the shade, a sharp breeze was blowing in the sunshine, gathering strength as it swept from the distance over a plain dotted with cultivated fields, on the other side of the river. Denise lingered behind Pauline and her lover, who walked along with their arms round each other's waists. She had picked a handful of buttercups, and was watching the flow of the river, happy, but her heart beating and her head drooping, each time that Baugé leant over to kiss his sweetheart. Her eyes filled with tears. And yet she was not suffering. What could be the matter with her that she experienced this feeling of suffocation? Why did this vast landscape, amidst which she had looked forward to so much enjoyment, fill her with a vague regret that she could not explain? However, at lunch, Pauline's noisy laughter bewildered her. That young woman, who loved the suburbs with the passion of an actress living in the gas-light, in the heavy atmosphere of a crowd, wanted to lunch in an arbour, notwithstanding the sharp wind. She made merry over the sudden gusts which blew up the table-cloth, and thought the arbour very funny in its bareness, with its freshly-painted trellis-work which cast a reflection on the cloth. She ate ravenously, devouring everything with the voracity of one who, being badly fed at the shop, made up for it out of doors by giving herself an indigestion of all the things she liked. This was indeed her vice, she spent most of her money on cakes and indigestible dainties, tit-bits of all kinds, which she hastily nibbled in leisure moments. Now, however, as Denise seemed to have had enough with the eggs, fried fish, and stewed chicken, she restrained herself, not daring to order any strawberries which were 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 outing in some theatre. But at Denise's request, they decided to remain at Joinville all day: it would be droll, they would take a fill of the country. So they wandered about the fields all the afternoon. They spoke for a moment of going for a row, but abandoned the idea as Baugé was not a good waterman. However, their strolls along the pathways ended by bringing them back to the banks of the Marne, all the same, and they became interested in all the river life, the squadrons of yawls and skiffs, and the young men who formed the crews. The sun was setting and they were returning towards Joinville, when they saw two boats coming down stream at a racing speed, their crews meantime exchanging volleys of insults, in which the repeated cries of "Sawbones!" and "Counter-jumpers!" predominated.
"Hallo!" said Pauline, "it's Monsieur Hutin."
"Yes," replied Baugé, shading his face with his hand, "I recognise his mahogany boat. The other one is manned by students, no doubt."
Thereupon he explained the deadly hatred existing between the students and the shopmen. Denise, on hearing Hutin's name mentioned, had suddenly stopped, and with fixed eyes followed the frail skiff. 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. Then the voices of the disputants died away amidst the loud 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 very chilly and they were obliged to dine in one of the closed rooms, where the table-cloths were still damp from the humidity of winter. At six o'clock the tables were already crowded, yet the excursionists still hurried in, looking for vacant corners; and the waiters continued bringing in more chairs and forms, putting the plates closer and closer together and crowding the people up. Cold as it had been before, the atmosphere now became stifling and they had to open the windows. Out of doors, the day was waning, a greenish twilight fell from the poplars so quickly that the landlord, unprepared for these repasts under cover, and having no lamps, was obliged to put a candle on each table. What with the laughter, the calls and the clatter of plates and dishes the uproar became deafening; the candles flared and guttered in the draught from the open windows, whilst moths fluttered about in the air warmed by the odour of the food, and traversed by sudden cold gusts of wind.
"What fun they're having, eh?" said Pauline, very busy with a plate of stewed eels, which she declared extraordinary. And she leant over to add: "Didn't you see Monsieur Albert over there?"
It was really young Lhomme, in the midst of three questionable women. Already intoxicated, he 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 for you! the mother is at Rambouillet, the father in Paris, and the son at Joinville; they won't tread on one another's toes to-day!"
Denise, though she detested noise, was smiling and tasting the delight of being unable to think, amid such uproar. But all at once they heard a commotion in the other room, a burst of voices which drowned all others. Men were yelling, and must have come to blows, for one could hear a scuffle, chairs falling, quite a struggle indeed, amid which the river-cries again resounded:
"Duck 'em, the counter-jumpers!"
"Pitch 'em in, the sawbones!"
And when the landlord's loud voice had calmed this tempest, Hutin, wearing a red jersey, and with a little cap at the back of his head, suddenly made his appearance, having on his arm the tall, fair girl, who had been steering his boat and who by way of wearing the crew's colours, had planted a bunch of poppies behind her ear. Clamorous applause greeted their entry; and Hutin, his face beaming with pride at thus being remarked, threw his chest forward and assumed a nautical rolling gait, displaying the while a bruised cheek, quite blue from a blow he had received. Behind him and his companion followed the crew. They took a table by storm, and the uproar became deafening.
"It appears," explained Baugé, after listening to the conversation behind him, "it appears that the students recognised the woman with Hutin as an old friend from their neighbourhood, who now sings in a music-hall at Montmartre. So they were kicking up a row about her."
"In any case," said Pauline, stiffly, "she's precious 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. Already, on seeing the boats from the bank she had felt a shiver; but now she no longer had any doubt at seeing that girl with Hutin. With trembling hands, and a choking sensation in her throat, she suddenly ceased to eat.
"What's the matter?" asked her friend.
"Nothing," she stammered, "but it's rather warm here."
However Hutin's table was close to theirs, and when Hutin perceived Baugé, whom he knew, he commenced a conversation in a shrill voice, in order to attract further attention.
"I say," he cried, "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 there's a confessional box at your place for the salesmen who venture to look at the young ladies there. No, no! A house where they insist on their employees marrying, that won't do for me!"
The other fellows began to laugh, and Liénard who was one of Hutin's crew added some jocular remark about the Louvre establishment at which Pauline herself burst into a merry peal.
Baugé, however, was annoyed by the joke about the staid propriety and innocence of his establishment, and all at once he retorted: "Oh, you needn't talk, you are not so well off at The Ladies' Paradise. Sacked for the slightest thing! And a governor too who is always smirking round his lady customers."
Hutin no longer listened to him, but began to praise the Place Clichy establishment. He knew a girl there who was so inexpressibly dignified that 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 had been left behind with merely fifty-two francs, in fact the whole lot had been floored. And it could be seen that he was telling the truth. He was squandering his cash as fast as possible and did not mean to go to bed till he had rid himself of the hundred and fifteen francs. Then, as he gradually became intoxicated, he fell foul of Robineau, that fool of a second-hand who affected to keep himself apart, to such a point that he refused to walk down the street with one of his salesmen.
"Shut up," said Liénard; "you talk too much, old man."
The heat had yet increased, the candles were guttering down on to the wine-stained table-cloths; and through the open windows, whenever the noise within ceased for an instant, there came a distant prolonged murmur, the voice of the river, and of the lofty poplars falling asleep in the calm night. Baugé had just called for the bill, seeing that Denise was no better; indeed she was now quite white, choking from the tears she withheld; however, the waiter did not appear, and she had to submit to more of Hutin's loud talk. He was now boasting of being much superior to Liénard, because Liénard simply squandered his father's money, whereas he, Hutin, spent his own earnings, the fruit of his intelligence. At last Baugé paid, and the two girls went out.
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 want of air. At present she could breathe freely in the freshness of the starry night.
As the two young women 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 had been dining alone, after coming from Paris on foot, for the pleasure of the walk. On recognising his friendly voice, Denise, suffering as she was, yielded mechanically to the need of some support.
"Monsieur Deloche," said she, "are you coming back with us? Give me your arm."
Pauline and Baugé had already gone on in front. They were astonished, never thinking it would turn out like that, and with that 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 have they got to? Ah, there they are. It's rather funny, all the same."
At first Denise and Deloche remained silent. The uproar from the restaurant was slowly dying away, changing into a musical sweetness in the calmness of the night; and still feverish from that furnace, whose lights were disappearing one by one behind the foliage, they went further in amidst the coolness of the trees. Opposite them there was a sort of shadowy wall, a mass of shadow so dense 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 hand the trunks of the poplar trees, resembling sombre columns upholding the domes of their branches, between which gleamed the stars; whilst the water occasionally shone like a mirror. The wind was falling and they no longer heard anything but the loud flow of the stream.
"I am very pleased to have met you," stammered Deloche at last, making up his mind to speak first. "You can't think how happy you render me in consenting to walk with me."
And, aided by the darkness, after many awkward attempts, he ventured to tell her that he loved her. He had long wanted to write to her and tell her so; but perhaps she would never have known it had it not been for that lovely night coming to his assistance, that water which murmured so softly, and those trees which screened them with their shade. However, she did not reply; she continued to walk by his side with the same suffering air. And he was trying to gaze into her face, when all at once he heard a sob.
"Oh! good heavens!" he exclaimed, "you are crying, mademoiselle, you are crying! Have I offended you?"
"No, no," she murmured.
She strove to keep back her tears, but could not do so. Even whilst she was at table, she had thought that her heart was about to burst. And now in the darkness she surrendered herself to her sensibility, stifled by her sobs and thinking that if Hutin had been in Deloche's place and had said such tender things to her, she would have been unable to say nay. But this self-confession suddenly filled her with confusion, and a burning flush of shame suffused her face.
"I didn't mean to offend you," continued Deloche, almost crying also.
"No, but listen," she replied, her voice still trembling; "I am not at all angry with you. But never speak to me again as you have just done. Oh! you're a good fellow, and I'm quite willing to be your friend, but nothing more. You understand – your friend."
He quivered, and after a few steps taken in silence, he stammered: "In fact, you don't love me?"
And then as she spared him the pain of a brutal "no," he resumed in a soft, heart-broken voice: "Oh, I was prepared for it. I have never had any luck, I know I can never be happy. At home, they used to beat me. In Paris, I've always been a drudge. You see, when a chap doesn't know how to rob other fellows of their sweethearts, and is too awkward to earn as much as the others, why the best thing he can do is to go into some corner and die. Never fear, I shan't torment you any more. As for loving you, you can't prevent me, can you? I shall love you like a dog. There, everything escapes me, that's my luck in life."
And then he, too, burst into tears. She tried to console him, and in their friendly effusion they found they belonged to the same part of the country – she to Valognes, he to Briquebec, eight miles from each other, and this proved a fresh tie. His father, a poor, needy process-server, sickly jealous, had been wont to drub him, exasperated by his long pale face and tow-like hair, which, said he, did not belong to the family. Then they got to talking of the vast Cotentin pastures, surrounded with quick-set hedges, of the shady paths and lanes winding beneath elm trees, and of the grass grown roads, like alleys in a park. Around them the night was yet paling and they could distinguish the rushes on the banks, and the lacework of the foliage, black against the twinkling stars; and a peacefulness came over them, they forgot their troubles, brought closer together, to a cordial feeling of friendship, by their ill-luck.
"Well?" asked Pauline of Denise, taking her aside when they reached the station.
The young girl, who understood her friend's meaning by her smile and stare of tender curiosity, turned very red and answered: "Oh! no, my dear. Remember what I told you. But he belongs to my part of the country. We were talking about Valognes."
Pauline and Baugé were perplexed, put out in their ideas, not knowing what to think. Deloche left them on the Place de la Bastille; like all young probationers, he slept in the house, and had to be back by eleven o'clock. Not wishing to go in with him, Denise, who had obtained what was called "theatre leave" which allowed her to remain out till past midnight, accepted Baugé's invitation to accompany Pauline to his home in the Rue Saint-Roch. They took a cab, and on the way Denise was stupefied to learn that her friend would not return to The Paradise till the morrow, having squared matters with Madame Cabin by giving her a five-franc piece. Baugé, who did the honours of his room, which was furnished with some old Empire furniture, given him by his father, got angry when Denise spoke of settling up, but at last accepted the fifteen francs twelve sous which she had laid on the chest of drawers; however, he insisted on making her a cup of tea, and after struggling with a spirit-lamp and saucepan, was obliged to go and fetch some sugar. Midnight struck as he was pouring out the tea.
"I must be off," said Denise.
"Presently," replied Pauline. "The theatres don't close so early."
Denise however felt uncomfortable in that bachelor's room and a quarter of an hour later she contrived to slip away.
The private door which conducted to Mouret's apartments and to the assistants' bedrooms was in the Rue Neuve-Saint-Augustin. Madame Cabin opened it by pulling a string and then gave a glance in order to see who was returning. A night-light was burning dimly in the hall, and Denise on finding herself in this uncertain glimmer, hesitated, and was seized with fear, for a moment previously, on turning the corner of the street, she had seen the door close on the shadowy figure of a man. It must have been the governor coming home from a party; and the idea that he was there in the dark possibly waiting for her, caused her one of those strange fears with which he still inspired her, without any reasonable cause. Some one was certainly moving about on the first-floor, for she heard a creaking of boots, whereupon quite losing her head, she opened a door which led into the shop, and which was always left unlocked for the night-watch to make his rounds. On entering she found herself in the printed cotton department.
"Good heavens! what shall I do?" she stammered, in her emotion.
Then the idea occurred to her that there was another door upstairs leading to the bedrooms; but to reach it she would have to go right across the shop. She preferred this, however, notwithstanding the darkness reigning in the galleries. Not a gas-jet was burning there; only a few lighted oil-lamps hung here and there from the branches of the chandeliers; and these scattered lights, like yellow specks fading away in the gloom, resembled the lanterns hung up in mines. Big shadows loomed before her; she could hardly distinguish the piles of goods, which assumed all sorts of threatening aspects – now they looked like fallen columns, now like squatting beasts, and now like lurking thieves. The heavy silence, broken by distant breathing, moreover increased the darkness. However, she found her way. From the linen department on her left came a paler gleam, bluey, like a house front under a summer sky at night; then she wished to cross the central hall, but on running up against some piles of printed calico, she thought it safer to traverse the hosiery department, and then the woollen one. There she was frightened by a loud noise of snoring. It was Joseph, the messenger, sleeping behind some mourning articles. She then quickly ran into the hall where the skylight cast a sort of crepuscular light, which made it appear larger, and, with its motionless shelves, and the shadows of its yard-measures describing reversed crosses, lent it the awe-inspiring aspect of a church at night. And she, indeed full of fear, now fairly fled. In the mercery and glove departments she nearly trod on some more assistants, and only felt safe when she at last found herself on the staircase. But up above, just outside the mantle department, she was again seized with terror on perceiving a lantern twinkling in the darkness and moving forward. It was the patrol of two firemen, marking their passage on the faces of the indicators. She stood still for a moment failing to understand their business, and watched them passing from among the shawls to the furniture, and then on to the under-linen department, terrified the while by their strange manœuvres, by the grating of their keys and the closing of the iron doors which shut with a resounding clang. When they approached, she took refuge in the lace department, but suddenly heard herself called by name and thereupon ran off to the door conducting to the private stairs. She had recognised Deloche's voice. He slept in his department, on a little iron bedstead which he set up himself every evening; and he was not asleep yet, but with open eyes was rememorating aloud the pleasant hours he had spent that evening.
"What! it's you, mademoiselle?" said Mouret, whom Denise despite all her manœuvring found before her on the staircase, a small pocket-candleholder in his hand.
She stammered, and tried to explain that she had been to look for something. But he was not angry. He gazed at her with his paternal, and at the same time inquisitive, air.
"You had permission to go to the theatre, then?"
"Yes, sir."
"And have you enjoyed yourself? What theatre did you go to?"
"I have been in the country, sir."
This made him laugh. Then laying a certain stress on his words, he added: "All alone?"
"No, sir; with a lady friend," she replied, her cheeks burning, shocked as she was by the suspicion which his words implied.
He said no more; but he was still looking at her in her simple black dress and bonnet trimmed with a strip of blue ribbon. Was this little savage going to turn out a pretty girl? She looked all the better for her day in the open air, quite charming indeed with her splendid hair waving over her forehead. And he, who during the last six months had treated her like a child, sometimes giving her advice, yielding to a desire to inform himself, to a wicked wish to know how a woman grew up and became lost in Paris, no longer laughed, but experienced a feeling of surprise and fear mingled with tenderness. No doubt it was a lover who was improving her like this. At this thought he felt as if pecked to the heart by a favourite bird, with which he had been playing.
"Good night, sir," murmured Denise, continuing on her way without waiting.
He did not answer, but remained watching her till she had disappeared. And then he entered his own apartments.
