Complete Works of Emile Zola (974 page)

“Look sharp here, Buteau!” called the old man. “Here’s this donkey of yours up to fine tricks!”

Buteau appeared at the kitchen door.

“What’s the matter?” he asked.

“Gédéon’s swilled all the wine up!”

Amid this shouting, the donkey quietly finished sucking up the liquor. He had probably been at work for the last quarter of an hour, for the bucket held some four or five gallons. Every drop of the wine had been drunk, and Gédéon’s belly was as round as a bottle, and seemed on the point of bursting. When at last he raised his head, his tipsy nose was dripping with wine, and there was a red line across it, just under his eyes, showing how far he had dipped his phiz into the liquor.

“Oh, the brute!” roared Buteau, rushing up; “it’s just like his tricks. There never was a creature so full of vice.”

Generally, when Gédéon heard himself reproached for his vices, he assumed an air of contemptuous indifference, and leisurely spread out his broad ears; but to-day he seemed completely intoxicated, and lost to all sense of respect, for he positively sniggered as he wagged his head about, thus shame­lessly expressing the enjoyment he had derived from his de­bauchery. He stumbled when his master gave him a violent shove, and would have fallen if Fouan had not propped him up with his shoulder. “The damned pig is dead drunk!” cried Buteau.

“‘Drunk as an ass!’ This is the moment to apply the proverb,” remarked Hyacinthe, who grinned merrily as he gazed at the animal with sympathetic admiration. “A bucketful at a draught! What a magnificent swallow!”

Buteau, however, saw nothing to laugh about; neither did Lise nor Françoise, who had now hurried up, attracted by the noise. To begin with, there was the loss of the wine; and more than that, there was the confusion into which the dis­graceful conduct of the donkey threw them in presence of Monsieur and Madame Charles. These latter were already biting their lips on account of Elodie. To make matters worse, chance would have it that Suzanne and Berthe, who had been taking a stroll together, had met the Abbé Madeline just by the door, and the three of them had stopped there, and were looking on waiting for the finish. A pretty business this, under the eyes of all these fine folks!

“Shove him along, father!” whispered Buteau. “We must get him back into the stable as quickly as possible!”

Fouan shoved, but Gédéon, finding himself very happy and comfortable where he was, declined to stir. He showed no malice, only a good-humoured tipsy perversity. There was a merry jocular glance in his eye, and his dripping mouth seemed twisted into a smile. He made himself as heavy as he could, and reeled about on his outstretched legs, pulling him­self together again after every shove, as though he looked upon the whole business as some merry game. Buteau, how­ever, intervened, and shoved the donkey in his turn, where­upon Gédéon turned a summersault, with his four feet in the air; rolling about on his back and braying so loudly that he seemed not to care a curse for all the people looking at him.

“Ah, you foul, good-for-nothing brute!” roared Buteau, assailing the animal with a shower of kicks. “I’ll teach you to put yourself into this condition!”

Hyacinthe, full of indulgence for the intoxicated donkey, now interposed.

“Come, come,” he exclaimed, “since the brute is drunk, it’s no use lecturing him, for he can’t understand you. You had much better help him back to his stable.”

Monsieur and Madame Charles had drawn on one side, quite shocked by the shameless conduct of the donkey; while Elodie, blushing as deeply as though she had been forced to look upon some indecent spectacle, turned her head away. The group at the door, the priest, Suzanne, and Berthe assumed an attitude of silent protestation. Several neighbours now came up and began to sneer noisily. Lise and Françoise almost wept from shame.

Buteau, however, screwing down his rage, endeavoured, with the help of Fouan and Hyacinthe, to get Gédéon on his legs again. This was no easy matter, for the tipsy brute, with the bucketful of wine in his belly, seemed to weigh as much as five hundred thousand devils. As soon as they had raised him on one side he fell down again on the other; and at last the three men got quite exhausted by trying to shove him up, and supporting him with their knees and elbows. Finally they had managed to get him on to his feet again, and even succeeded in forcing him a few steps forward, when he suddenly stumbled and fell over backwards. The whole yard had to be crossed to reach the stable. What was to be done?

“Ten thousand devils take him!” cried the three men, as they examined him from every point of view, quite at a loss as to how they should next proceed.

It then occurred to Hyacinthe to prop the animal up against the side of the shed, and then push him along, keeping him propped up against the wall of the house, till the stable was reached. This plan succeeded very well at first, although the animal got sadly scratched and grazed by the rough wall plaster. The misfortune was that presently this scratching and grazing became more than the brute could bear, and, sud­denly wrenching himself free from the hands that were holding him to the wall, he reared up and pranced about.

Old Fouan was almost knocked down.

“Stop him! stop him!” yelled the two brothers.

Then in the dazzling brightness of the moonlight Gédéon was to be seen gallopping about the yard in frantic zig-zags, with his two huge ears swaying wildly. The men had shaken his belly too violently, and the poor brute now felt very ill. A tremendous preliminary retch brought him to a standstill, and he almost toppled over. Then he tried to set off again, but his legs stiffened and he stood rooted to the ground. He stretched out his neck, and his flanks were shaken by violent spasms. Finally, reeling about like a drunken man striving to relieve himself, and reaching his head forward at every effort, he vomited a perfect river of red fluid, a furious torrent that flowed on as far as the pond.

A ringing chorus of laughter resounded from the door, where some peasants were clustering together; while the Abbé Madeline, who had a weak stomach, turned very pale between Suzanne and Berthe, who led him away with indignant protestations. The offended demeanour of Monsieur and Madame Charles plainly proclaimed that the exhibition of a donkey in such a condition as this was a breach of all decorum, and even of the simple politeness due to passers-by. Elodie, in weeping consternation, threw her arms round her grand­mother’s neck, asking if the animal were going to die. It was in vain that Monsieur Charles cried out: “Stop! stop!” in the old imperious tone of a master accustomed to be obeyed, the wretched brute went on bringing up this ruddy stream till the whole yard was full of it. Then he slipped down and began to wallow about in the mess, with his legs widely separated, and in such an indecent posture that no tipsy man, lying across a footway, could ever have presented a more dis­gusting sight to passing spectators. It really seemed as though the brute were purposely doing all he could to disgrace his master. The spectacle was really too dreadful, and Lise and Françoise, covering their eyes with their hands, fled for refuge into the house.

“There! there! we’ve had enough of this! Carry him away!”

Indeed, nothing else could be done, for Gédéon, who had become as limp as a wet rag, and very drowsy, was fast falling asleep. Buteau went off to get a stretcher, and six men helped him to lift the ass on to it. Then they carried the animal away; his legs hanging down, his head dangling about, and already snoring so noisily that it seemed as though he were braying, and still jeering contemptuously at everybody.

This adventure naturally threw a cloud over the commence­ment of the feast; but the party quickly recovered their spirits, and they ended by partaking so freely of the new wine that, towards eleven o’clock, they were all in much the same con­dition as the donkey. Every moment or so one of them found it necessary to retire into the yard.

Old Fouan was very merry; and he reflected that it might really be advisable for him to come and reside again with his younger son, for the wine promised to be excellent that year. He was obliged to leave the room in his turn, and was thinking the matter over, outside in the dark night, when he was startled to hear Buteau and Lise, who had come out immediately after him, quarrelling as they squatted down, side by side, against the wall. The husband was reproaching his wife for not showing herself sufficiently affectionate towards his father.

The fool she was, said he, why she ought to wheedle and coax the old chap so as to get him back into the house again; and then they could lay their hands on his hoard. The old man, suddenly sobered and quite cold, felt at his pockets to make sure that he had not been robbed of his bonds; and when, after the parting embraces all round he again reached the Château, he had firmly resolved not to change his quarters.

That very night, however, he beheld a sight which froze his blood. He saw La Trouille in her chemise steal into his room, which was lighted up by the bright moon, and prowl about, carefully searching his blouse and his trousers, and even looking under his chamber-vase. It was evident that Hyacinthe, having missed the papers which had been removed from their hiding-place under the lentils, had sent his daughter to try and find them.

After that Fouan felt unable to remain any longer in bed; his brain was too excited. So he got up and opened the window. The night was now dark, and an odour of wine streamed up from Rognes, mingled with the stench of all the filth beside the walls, over which folks had stridden for a week past. What should he do? Where should he go? As for his bonds, he would never again let them leave his own possession. He would sew them to his skin. Then, as the wind swept the strong odour into his face, he thought of Gédéon. A donkey had a splendid constitution and no mistake, he said to himself; it could get ten times as drunk as a man without coming to any great harm. But what was he to do himself? Robbed in his younger son’s house, robbed in his elder son’s house; there really seemed no choice. The best thing seemed to be to remain at the Château, and keep his eyes open, and wait. Every bone in his old body was shaking.

CHAPTER V

The months glided along; winter passed away, and then the spring. At Rognes matters went on in the same old way; whole years were necessary for the accomplishment of any really perceptible change in that weary, dull life of work and toil, which began afresh with every returning day. In July, amid the burning heat of the blazing sun, the approaching elections threw the village into a state of excitement. This time they were invested with a peculiar interest, and the canvassing visits of the candidates were eagerly discussed and anxiously awaited.

On the morning of the Sunday for which the arrival of Monsieur Rochefontaine, the contractor of Châteaudun, had been promised, there was a terrible scene at the Buteaus’ between Lise and Françoise, showing that hostility can go on smouldering invisibly beneath an outward appearance of calm­ness till it breaks out with unquenchable violence. The last slender bond of union between the sisters, which had always been strained almost to breaking, though constantly knotted again, had at last become so slight, worn away by perpetual quarrelling, that this time it snapped atwain, beyond all hope of repair. And the immediate cause of this final rupture was the merest trifle in the world.

As Françoise was bringing her cows home that morning she stopped to have a moment’s chat with Jean, whom she met in front of the church. It must be confessed that she did so purposely, stopping just in front of the Buteaus’ house, with the express intention of irritating them.

“When you want to see your men,” Lise cried angrily to her as she returned into the house, “be good enough to choose some other place than just under our windows!”

Buteau was standing by mending a bill-hook and listening.

“My men!” retorted Françoise. “I see too many men here. And there’s one fellow, let me tell you, whom I could see if I wanted, not under the window, but in this very house, the swine that he is!”

This allusion to Buteau made Lise wild with anger. For a long time past she had been consumed with an absorbing desire to turn her sister out of doors, so that the house might become peaceful; and this even at the risk of a law-suit, and having to surrender half the land. It was her persistence in this respect that led her husband to beat her, for he was quite opposed to her scheme, hoping to trick the girl out of her land somehow, and also to succeed in getting possession of her person. The wife was exasperated at no longer being mistress in her own house, and showed a peculiar kind of jealousy. While she was quite ready to let her husband forcibly possess himself of the girl for the sake of making an end of the matter, yet, at the same time, it enraged her to see him lusting so hotly after this chit, whom she hated for her youth, her firm-fleshed bosom, and the roundness of her arms, that showed so plumply whenever her sleeves were rolled up. She would have liked to stand by and see her husband foul and wreck all these alluring charms, and she would gladly have helped him. Indeed, the mere fact of sharing her husband with her sister would not have caused her any trouble. Her anguish of mind arose from their rivalry, which was growing even more bitter and rancorous, and the consciousness that her sister was prettier than herself, and thus capable of stimulating her husband’s hot desires.

“You drab!” she screamed, “it is you who lead him on! If you weren’t always leering at him he wouldn’t be for ever running after you. You nasty slut!”

Françoise turned quite pale. This slander was more than she could bear. And quietly, but with deliberate animosity, she replied:

“We’ve had quite enough of this. It is time there was an end of it. Wait another fortnight, and I’ll no longer annoy you with my presence. Yes, in another fortnight I shall be twenty-one, and then I’ll take myself off.”

“Ah, you’re longing to be of age, are you, so that you can worry us, eh? Well, you hussy, there’s no fortnight about the matter; off you go this very moment.”

“Very well, I’m quite agreeable. Macqueron wants a girl, and I’m sure he’ll take me. Good day.”