Complete Works of Emile Zola (1566 page)

But he turned pale and recoiled. Constance stood on the threshold and had heard him. For some time past she had been in the habit of stealthily prowling around the offices, like one on the watch for something. For a moment, at the sight of the embarrassment which both men displayed, she remained silent. Then, without even addressing her husband, she asked: “He is alive, is he not?”

Mathieu could but tell her the truth. He answered with a nod. Then Beauchene, in despair, made a final effort: “Come, be reasonable, my dear. As I was saying only just now, we don’t even know what this youngster’s character is. You surely don’t want to upset our life for the mere pleasure of doing so?”

Standing there, lean and frigid, she gave him a harsh glance; then, turning her back on him, she demanded the child’s name, and the names of the wheelwright and the locality. “Good, you say Alexandre-Honore, with Montoir the wheelwright, at Saint-Pierre, near Rougemont, in Calvados. Well, my friend, oblige me by continuing your researches; endeavor to procure me some precise information about this boy’s habits and disposition. Be prudent, too; don’t give anybody’s name. And thanks for what you have done already; thanks for all you are doing for me.”

Thereupon she took herself off without giving any further explanation, without even telling her husband of the vague plans she was forming. Beneath her crushing contempt he had grown calm again. Why should he spoil his life of egotistical pleasure by resisting that mad creature? All that he need do was to put on his hat and betake himself to his usual diversions. And so he ended by shrugging his shoulders.

“After all, let her pick him up if she chooses, it won’t be my doing. Act as she asks you, my dear fellow; continue your researches and try to content her. Perhaps she will then leave me in peace. But I’ve had quite enough of it for to-day; good-by, I’m going out.”

With the view of obtaining some information of Rougemont, Mathieu at first thought of applying to La Couteau, if he could find her again; for which purpose it occurred to him that he might call on Madame Bourdieu in the Rue de Miromesnil. But another and more certain means suggested itself. He had been led to renew his intercourse with the Seguins, of whom he had for a time lost sight; and, much to his surprise, he had found Valentine’s former maid, Celeste, in the Avenue d’Antin once more. Through this woman, he thought, he might reach La Couteau direct.

The renewal of the intercourse between the Froments and the Seguins was due to a very happy chance. Mathieu’s son Ambroise, on leaving college, had entered the employment of an uncle of Seguin’s, Thomas du Hordel, one of the wealthiest commission merchants in Paris; and this old man, who, despite his years, remained very sturdy, and still directed his business with all the fire of youth, had conceived a growing fondness for Ambroise, who had great mental endowments and a real genius for commerce. Du Hordel’s own children had consisted of two daughters, one of whom had died young, while the other had married a madman, who had lodged a bullet in his head and had left her childless and crazy like himself. This partially explained the deep grandfatherly interest which Du Hordel took in young Ambroise, who was the handsomest of all the Froments, with a clear complexion, large black eyes, brown hair that curled naturally, and manners of much refinement and elegance. But the old man was further captivated by the young fellow’s spirit of enterprise, the four modern languages which he spoke so readily, and the evident mastery which he would some day show in the management of a business which extended over the five parts of the world. In his childhood, among his brothers and sisters, Ambroise had always been the boldest, most captivating and self-assertive. The others might be better than he, but he reigned over them like a handsome, ambitious, greedy boy, a future man of gayety and conquest. And this indeed he proved to be; by the charm of his victorious intellect he conquered old Du Hordel in a few months, even as later on he was destined to vanquish everybody and everything much as he pleased. His strength lay in his power of pleasing and his power of action, a blending of grace with the most assiduous industry.

About this time Seguin and his uncle, who had never set foot in the house of the Avenue d’Antin since insanity had reigned there, drew together again. Their apparent reconciliation was the outcome of a drama shrouded in secrecy. Seguin, hard up and in debt, cast off by Nora, who divined his approaching ruin, and preyed upon by other voracious creatures, had ended by committing, on the turf, one of those indelicate actions which honest people call thefts. Du Hordel, on being apprised of the matter, had hastened forward and had paid what was due in order to avoid a frightful scandal. And he was so upset by the extraordinary muddle in which he found his nephew’s home, once all prosperity, that remorse came upon him as if he were in some degree responsible for what had happened, since he had egotistically kept away from his relatives for his own peace’s sake. But he was more particularly won over by his grandniece Andree, now a delicious young girl well-nigh eighteen years of age, and therefore marriageable. She alone sufficed to attract him to the house, and he was greatly distressed by the dangerous state of abandonment in which he found her.

Her father continued dragging out his worthless life away from home. Her mother, Valentine, had just emerged from a frightful crisis, her final rupture with Santerre, who had made up his mind to marry a very wealthy old lady, which, after all, was the logical destiny of such a crafty exploiter of women, one who behind his affectation of cultured pessimism had the vilest and greediest of natures. Valentine, distracted by this rupture, had now thrown herself into religion, and, like her husband, disappeared from the house for whole days. She was said to be an active helpmate of old Count de Navarede, the president of a society of Catholic propaganda. Gaston, her son, having left Saint-Cyr three months previously, was now at the Cavalry School of Saumur, so fired with passion for a military career that he already spoke of remaining a bachelor, since a soldier’s sword should be his only love, his only spouse. Then Lucie, now nineteen years old, and full of mystical exaltation, had already entered an Ursuline convent for her novitiate. And in the big empty home, whence father, mother, brother and sister fled, there remained but the gentle and adorable Andree, exposed to all the blasts of insanity which even now swept through the household, and so distressed by loneliness, that her uncle, Du Hordel, full of compassionate affection, conceived the idea of giving her a husband in the person of young Ambroise, the future conqueror.

This plan was helped on by the renewed presence of Celeste the maid. Eight years had elapsed since Valentine had been obliged to dismiss this woman for immorality; and during those eight years Celeste, weary of service, had tried a number of equivocal callings of which she did not speak. She had ended by turning up at Rougemont, her native place, in bad health and such a state of wretchedness, that for the sake of a living she went out as a charwoman there. Then she gradually recovered her health, and accumulated a little stock of clothes, thanks to the protection of the village priest, whom she won over by an affectation of extreme piety. It was at Rougemont, no doubt, that she planned her return to the Seguins, of whose vicissitudes she was informed by La Couteau, the latter having kept up her intercourse with Madame Menoux, the little haberdasher of the neighborhood.

Valentine, shortly after her rupture with Santerre, one day of furious despair, when she had again dismissed all her servants, was surprised by the arrival of Celeste, who showed herself so repentant, so devoted, and so serious-minded, that her former mistress felt touched. She made her weep on reminding her of her faults, and asking her to swear before God that she would never repeat them; for Celeste now went to confession and partook of the holy communion, and carried with her a certificate from the Cure of Rougemont vouching for her deep piety and high morality. This certificate acted decisively on Valentine, who, unwilling to remain at home, and weary of the troubles of housekeeping, understood what precious help she might derive from this woman. On her side Celeste certainly relied upon power being surrendered to her. Two months later, by favoring Lucie’s excessive partiality to religious practices, she had helped her into a convent. Gaston showed himself only when he secured a few days’ leave. And so Andree alone remained at home, impeding by her presence the great general pillage that Celeste dreamt of. The maid therefore became a most active worker on behalf of her young mistress’s marriage.

Andree, it should be said, was comprised in Ambroise’s universal conquest. She had met him at her uncle Du Hordel’s house for a year before it occurred to the latter to marry them. She was a very gentle girl, a little golden-haired sheep, as her mother sometimes said. And that handsome, smiling young man, who evinced so much kindness towards her, became the subject of her thoughts and hopes whenever she suffered from loneliness and abandonment. Thus, when her uncle prudently questioned her, she flung herself into his arms, weeping big tears of gratitude and confession. Valentine, on being approached, at first manifested some surprise. What, a son of the Froments! Those Froments had already taken Chantebled from them, and did they now want to take one of their daughters? Then, amid the collapse of fortune and household, she could find no reasonable objection to urge. She had never been attached to Andree. She accused La Catiche, the nurse, of having made the child her own. That gentle, docile, emotional little sheep was not a Seguin, she often remarked. Then, while feigning to defend the girl, Celeste embittered her mother against her, and inspired her with a desire to see the marriage promptly concluded, in order that she might free herself from her last cares and live as she wished. Thus, after a long chat with Mathieu, who promised his consent, it remained only for Du Hordel to assure himself of Seguin’s approval before an application in due form was made. It was difficult, however, to find Seguin in a suitable frame of mind. So weeks were lost, and it became necessary to pacify Ambroise, who was very much in love, and was doubtless warned by his all-invading genius that this loving and simple girl would bring him a kingdom in her apron.

One day when Mathieu was passing along the Avenue d’Antin, it occurred to him to call at the house to ascertain if Seguin had re-appeared there, for he had suddenly taken himself off without warning, and had gone, so it was believed, to Italy. Then, as Mathieu found himself alone with Celeste, the opportunity seemed to him an excellent one to discover La Couteau’s whereabouts. He asked for news of her, saying that a friend of his was in need of a good nurse.

“Well, monsieur, you are in luck’s way,” the maid replied; “La Couteau is to bring a child home to our neighbor, Madame Menoux, this very day. It is nearly four o’clock now, and that is the time when she promised to come. You know Madame Menoux’s place, do you not? It is the third shop in the first street on the left.” Then she apologized for being unable to conduct him thither: “I am alone,” she said; “we still have no news of the master. On Wednesdays Madame presides at the meeting of her society, and Mademoiselle Andree has just gone out walking with her uncle.”

Mathieu hastily repaired to Madame Menoux’s shop. From a distance he saw her standing on the threshold; age had made her thinner than ever; at forty she was as slim as a young girl, with a long and pointed face. Silent labor consumed her; for twenty years she had been desperately selling bits of cotton and packages of needles without ever making a fortune, but pleased, nevertheless, at being able to add her modest gains to her husband’s monthly salary in order to provide him with sundry little comforts. His rheumatism would no doubt soon compel him to relinquish his post as a museum attendant, and how would they be able to manage with his pension of a few hundred francs per annum if she did not keep up her business? Moreover, they had met with no luck. Their first child had died, and some years had elapsed before the birth of a second boy, whom they had greeted with delight, no doubt, though he would prove a heavy burden to them, especially as they had now decided to take him back from the country. Thus Mathieu found the worthy woman in a state of great emotion, waiting for the child on the threshold of her shop, and watching the corner of the avenue.

“Oh! it was Celeste who sent you, monsieur! No, La Couteau hasn’t come yet. I’m quite astonished at it; I expect her every moment. Will you kindly step inside, monsieur, and sit down?”

He refused the only chair which blocked up the narrow passage where scarcely three customers could have stood in a row. Behind a glass partition one perceived the dim back shop, which served as kitchen and dining-room and bedchamber, and which received only a little air from a damp inner yard which suggested a sewer shaft.

“As you see, monsieur, we have scarcely any room,” continued Madame Menoux; “but then we pay only eight hundred francs rent, and where else could we find a shop at that price? And besides, I have been here for nearly twenty years, and have worked up a little regular custom in the neighborhood. Oh! I don’t complain of the place myself, I’m not big, there is always sufficient room for me. And as my husband comes home only in the evening, and then sits down in his armchair to smoke his pipe, he isn’t so much inconvenienced. I do all I can for him, and he is reasonable enough not to ask me to do more. But with a child I fear that it will be impossible to get on here.”

The recollection of her first boy, her little Pierre, returned to her, and her eyes filled with tears. “Ah! monsieur, that was ten years ago, and I can still see La Couteau bringing him back to me, just as she’ll be bringing the other by and by. I was told so many tales; there was such good air at Rougemont, and the children led such healthy lives, and my boy had such rosy cheeks, that I ended by leaving him there till he was five years old, regretting that I had no room for him here. And no, you can’t have an idea of all the presents that the nurse wheedled out of me, of all the money that I paid! It was ruination! And then, all at once, I had just time to send for the boy, and he was brought back to me as thin and pale and weak, as if he had never tasted good bread in his life. Two months later he died in my arms. His father fell ill over it, and if we hadn’t been attached to one another, I think we should both have gone and drowned ourselves.”