The Fat and the Thin: Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Three days later the necessary formalities were gone through, and
without demur the police authorities at the Prefecture accepted Florent
on Monsieur Verlaque's recommendation as his substitute. Gavard, by the
way, had made it a point to accompany them. When he again found himself
alone with Florent he kept nudging his ribs with his elbow as they
walked along together, and laughed, without saying anything, while
winking his eyes in a jeering way. He seemed to find something very
ridiculous in the appearance of the police officers whom they met on
the Quai de l'Horloge, for, as he passed them, he slightly shrugged his
shoulders and made the grimace of a man seeking to restrain himself from
laughing in people's faces.

On the following morning Monsieur Verlaque began to initiate the new
inspector into the duties of his office. It had been arranged that
during the next few days he should make him acquainted with the
turbulent sphere which he would have to supervise. Poor Verlaque,
as Gavard called him was a pale little man, swathed in flannels,
handkerchiefs, and mufflers. Constantly coughing, he made his way
through the cool, moist atmosphere, and running waters of the fish
market, on a pair of scraggy legs like those of a sickly child.

When Florent made his appearance on the first morning, at seven o'clock,
he felt quite distracted; his eyes were dazed, his head ached with
all the noise and riot. Retail dealers were already prowling about
the auction pavilion; clerks were arriving with their ledgers, and
consigners' agents, with leather bags slung over their shoulders, sat
on overturned chairs by the salesmen's desks, waiting to receive their
cash. Fish was being unloaded and unpacked not only in the enclosure,
but even on the footways. All along the latter were piles of small
baskets, an endless arrival of cases and hampers, and sacks of mussels,
from which streamlets of water trickled. The auctioneers' assistants,
all looking very busy, sprang over the heaps, tore away the straw at
the tops of the baskets, emptied the latter, and tossed them aside.
They then speedily transferred their contents in lots to huge wickerwork
trays, arranging them with a turn of the hand so that they might show
to the best advantage. And when the large tray-like baskets were all
set out, Florent could almost fancy that a whole shoal of fish had got
stranded there, still quivering with life, and gleaming with rosy nacre,
scarlet coral, and milky pearl, all the soft, pale, sheeny hues of the
ocean.

The deep-lying forests of seaweed, in which the mysterious life of the
ocean slumbers, seemed at one haul of the nets to have yielded up all
they contained. There were cod, keeling, whiting, flounders, plaice,
dabs, and other sorts of common fish of a dingy grey with whitish
splotches; there were conger-eels, huge serpent-like creatures, with
small black eyes and muddy, bluish skins, so slimy that they still
seemed to be gliding along, yet alive. There were broad flat skate
with pale undersides edged with a soft red, and superb backs bumpy with
vertebrae, and marbled down to the tautly stretched ribs of their
fins with splotches of cinnabar, intersected by streaks of the tint of
Florentine bronze--a dark medley of colour suggestive of the hues of a
toad or some poisonous flower. Then, too, there were hideous dog-fish,
with round heads, widely-gaping mouths like those of Chinese idols, and
short fins like bats' wings; fit monsters to keep yelping guard over the
treasures of the ocean grottoes. And next came the finer fish, displayed
singly on the osier trays; salmon that gleamed like chased silver, every
scale seemingly outlined by a graving-tool on a polished metal surface;
mullet with larger scales and coarser markings; large turbot and huge
brill with firm flesh white like curdled milk; tunny-fish, smooth and
glossy, like bags of blackish leather; and rounded bass, with widely
gaping mouths which a soul too large for the body seemed to have rent
asunder as it forced its way out amidst the stupefaction of death. And
on all sides there were sole, brown and grey, in pairs; sand-eels, slim
and stiff, like shavings of pewter; herrings, slightly twisted, with
bleeding gills showing on their silver-worked skins; fat dories tinged
with just a suspicion of carmine; burnished mackerel with green-streaked
backs, and sides gleaming with ever-changing iridescence; and rosy
gurnets with white bellies, their head towards the centre of the baskets
and their tails radiating all around, so that they simulated some
strange florescence splotched with pearly white and brilliant vermilion.
There were rock mullet, too, with delicious flesh, flushed with the
pinky tinge peculiar to the Cyprinus family; boxes of whiting with
opaline reflections; and baskets of smelts--neat little baskets, pretty
as those used for strawberries, and exhaling a strong scent of violets.
And meantime the tiny black eyes of the shrimps dotted as with beads
of jet their soft-toned mass of pink and grey; and spiny crawfish and
lobsters striped with black, all still alive, raised a grating sound as
they tried to crawl along with their broken claws.

Florent gave but indifferent attention to Monsieur Verlaque's
explanations. A flood of sunshine suddenly streamed through the lofty
glass roof of the covered way, lighting up all these precious colours,
toned and softened by the waves--the iridescent flesh-tints of the
shell-fish, the opal of the whiting, the pearly nacre of the mackerel,
the ruddy gold of the mullets, the plated skins of the herrings, and
massive silver of the salmon. It was as though the jewel-cases of some
sea-nymph had been emptied there--a mass of fantastical, undreamt-of
ornaments, a streaming and heaping of necklaces, monstrous bracelets,
gigantic brooches, barbaric gems and jewels, the use of which could not
be divined. On the backs of the skate and the dog-fish you saw, as it
were, big dull green and purple stones set in dark metal, while the
slender forms of the sand-eels and the tails and fins of the smelts
displayed all the delicacy of finely wrought silver-work.

And meantime Florent's face was fanned by a fresh breeze, a sharp, salt
breeze redolent of the sea. It reminded him of the coasts of Guiana and
his voyages. He half fancied that he was gazing at some bay left dry by
the receding tide, with the seaweed steaming in the sun, the bare rocks
drying, and the beach smelling strongly of the brine. All around him
the fish in their perfect freshness exhaled a pleasant perfume, that
slightly sharp, irritating perfume which depraves the appetite.

Monsieur Verlaque coughed. The dampness was affecting him, and he
wrapped his muffler more closely about his neck.

"Now," said he, "we will pass on to the fresh water fish."

This was in a pavilion beside the fruit market, the last one, indeed, in
the direction of the Rue Rambuteau. On either side of the space reserved
for the auctions were large circular stone basins, divided into separate
compartments by iron gratings. Slender streams of water flowed from
brass jets shaped like swan's necks; and the compartments were filled
with swarming colonies of crawfish, black-backed carp ever on the
move, and mazy tangles of eels, incessantly knotting and unknotting
themselves. Again was Monsieur Verlaque attacked by an obstinate fit
of coughing. The moisture of the atmosphere was more insipid here
than amongst the sea water fish: there was a riverside scent, as of
sun-warmed water slumbering on a bed of sand.

A great number of crawfishes had arrived from Germany that morning in
cases and hampers, and the market was also crowded with river fish from
Holland and England. Several men were unpacking shiny carp from the
Rhine, lustrous with ruddy metallic hues, their scales resembling
bronzed _cloisonne_ enamel; and others were busy with huge pike, the
cruel iron-grey brigands of the waters, who ravenously protruded their
savage jaws; or with magnificent dark-hued with verdigris. And amidst
these suggestions of copper, iron, and bronze, the gudgeon and perch,
the trout, the bleak, and the flat-fish taken in sweep-nets showed
brightly white, the steel-blue tints of their backs gradually toning
down to the soft transparency of their bellies. However, it was the
fat snowy-white barbel that supplied the liveliest brightness in this
gigantic collection of still life.

Bags of young carp were being gently emptied into the basins. The fish
spun round, then remained motionless for a moment, and at last shot away
and disappeared. Little eels were turned out of their hampers in a mass,
and fell to the bottom of the compartments like tangled knots of snakes;
while the larger ones--those whose bodies were about as thick as a
child's arm--raised their heads and slipped of their own accord into the
water with the supple motion of serpents gliding into the concealment
of a thicket. And meantime the other fish, whose death agony had
been lasting all the morning as they lay on the soiled osiers of the
basket-trays, slowly expired amidst all the uproar of the auctions,
opening their mouths as though to inhale the moisture of the air, with
great silent gasps, renewed every few seconds.

However, Monsieur Verlaque brought Florent back to the salt water fish.
He took him all over the place and gave him the minutest particulars
about everything. Round the nine salesmen's desks ranged along three
sides of the pavilion there was now a dense crowd of surging, swaying
heads, above which appeared the clerks, perched upon high chairs and
making entries in their ledgers.

"Are all these clerks employed by the salesmen?" asked Florent.

By way of reply Monsieur Verlaque made a detour along the outside
footway, led him into the enclosure of one of the auctions, and then
explained the working of the various departments of the big yellow
office, which smelt strongly of fish and was stained all over
by drippings and splashings from the hampers. In a little glazed
compartment up above, the collector of the municipal dues took note of
the prices realised by the different lots of fish. Lower down, seated
upon high chairs and with their wrists resting upon little desks, were
two female clerks, who kept account of the business on behalf of the
salesmen. At each end of the stone table in front of the office was a
crier who brought the basket-trays forward in turn, and in a bawling
voice announced what each lot consisted of; while above him the female
clerk, pen in hand, waited to register the price at which the lots
were knocked down. And outside the enclosure, shut up in another little
office of yellow wood, Monsieur Verlaque showed Florent the cashier, a
fat old woman, who was ranging coppers and five-franc pierces in piles.

"There is a double control, you see," said Monsieur Verlaque; "the
control of the Prefecture of the Seine and that of the Prefecture of
Police. The latter, which licenses the salesmen, claims to have the
right of supervision over them; and the municipality asserts its right
to be represented at the transactions as they are subject to taxation."

He went on expatiating at length in his faint cold voice respecting the
rival claims of the two Prefectures. Florent, however, was paying but
little heed, his attention being concentrated on a female clerk sitting
on one of the high chairs just in front of him. She was a tall, dark
woman of thirty, with big black eyes and an easy calmness of manner, and
she wrote with outstretched fingers like a girl who had been taught the
regulation method of the art.

However, Florent's attention was diverted by the yelping of the crier,
who was just offering a magnificent turbot for sale.

"I've a bid of thirty francs! Thirty francs, now; thirty francs!"

He repeated these words in all sorts of keys, running up and down a
strange scale of notes full of sudden changes. Humpbacked and with his
face twisted askew, and his hair rough and disorderly, he wore a great
blue apron with a bib; and with flaming eyes and outstretched arms he
cried vociferously: "Thirty-one! thirty-two! thirty-three! Thirty-three
francs fifty centimes! thirty-three fifty!"

Then he paused to take breath, turning the basket-tray and pushing it
farther upon the table. The fish-wives bent forward and gently touched
the turbot with their finger-tips. Then the crier began again with
renewed energy, hurling his figures towards the buyers with a wave
of the hand and catching the slightest indication of a fresh bid--the
raising of a finger, a twist of the eyebrows, a pouting of the lips, a
wink, and all with such rapidity and such a ceaseless jumble of words
that Florent, utterly unable to follow him, felt quite disconcerted
when, in a sing-song voice like that of a priest intoning the final
words of a versicle, he chanted: "Forty-two! forty-two! The turbot goes
for forty-two francs."

It was the beautiful Norman who had made the last bid. Florent
recognised her as she stood in the line of fish-wives crowding against
the iron rails which surrounded the enclosure. The morning was fresh
and sharp, and there was a row of tippets above the display of big white
aprons, covering the prominent bosoms and stomachs and sturdy shoulders.
With high-set chignon set off with curls, and white and dainty skin,
the beautiful Norman flaunted her lace bow amidst tangled shocks of
hair covered with dirty kerchiefs, red noses eloquent of drink,
sneering mouths, and battered faces suggestive of old pots. And she also
recognised Madame Quenu's cousin, and was so surprised to see him there
that she began gossiping to her neighbours about him.

The uproar of voices had become so great that Monsieur Verlaque
renounced all further attempt to explain matters to Florent. On the
footway close by, men were calling out the larger fish with
prolonged shouts, which sounded as though they came from gigantic
speaking-trumpets; and there was one individual who roared "Mussels!
Mussels!" in such a hoarse, cracked, clamorous voice that the very roofs
of the market shook. Some sacks of mussels were turned upside down,
and their contents poured into hampers, while others were emptied with
shovels. And there was a ceaseless procession of basket-trays containing
skate, soles, mackerel, conger-eels, and salmon, carried backwards and
forwards amidst the ever-increasing cackle and pushing of the fish-women
as they crowded against the iron rails which creaked with their
pressure. The humpbacked crier, now fairly on the job, waved his skinny
arms in the air and protruded his jaws. Presently, seemingly lashed into
a state of frenzy by the flood of figures that spurted from his lips, he
sprang upon a stool, where, with his mouth twisted spasmodically and
his hair streaming behind him, he could force nothing more than
unintelligible hisses from his parched throat. And in the meantime, up
above, the collector of municipal dues, a little old man, muffled in
a collar of imitation astrachan, remained with nothing but his nose
showing under his black velvet skullcap. And the tall, dark-complexioned
female clerk, with eyes shining calmly in her face, which had been
slightly reddened by the cold, sat on her high wooden chair, quietly
writing, apparently unruffled by the continuous rattle which came from
the hunchback below her.

"That fellow Logre is wonderful," muttered Monsieur Verlaque with a
smile. "He is the best crier in the markets. I believe he could make
people buy boot soles in the belief they were fish!"

Then he and Florent went back into the pavilion. As they again passed
the spot where the fresh water fish was being sold by auction, and where
the bidding seemed much quieter, Monsieur Verlaque explained that French
river fishing was in a bad way.[*] The crier here, a fair, sorry-looking
fellow, who scarcely moved his arms, was disposing of some lots of eels
and crawfish in a monotonous voice, while the assistants fished fresh
supplies out of the stone basins with their short-handled nets.

[*] M. Zola refers, of course, to the earlier years of the
Second Empire. Under the present republican Government,
which has largely fostered fish culture, matters have
considerably improved.--Translator.

However, the crowd round the salesmen's desks was still increasing.
Monsieur Verlaque played his part as Florent's instructor in the most
conscientious manner, clearing the way by means of his elbows, and
guiding his successor through the busiest parts. The upper-class retail
dealers were there, quietly waiting for some of the finer fish, or
loading the porters with their purchases of turbot, tunny, and salmon.
The street-hawkers who had clubbed together to buy lots of herrings and
small flat-fish were dividing them on the pavement. There were also some
people of the smaller middle class, from distant parts of the city, who
had come down at four o'clock in the morning to buy a really fresh fish,
and had ended by allowing some enormous lot, costing from forty to fifty
francs, to be knocked down to them, with the result that they would
be obliged to spend the whole day in getting their friends and
acquaintances to take the surplus off their hands. Every now and then
some violent pushing would force a gap through part of the crowd. A
fish-wife, who had got tightly jammed, freed herself, shaking her fists
and pouring out a torrent of abuse. Then a compact mass of people again
collected, and Florent, almost suffocated, declared that he had seen
quite enough, and understood all that was necessary.

As Monsieur Verlaque was helping him to extricate himself from the
crowd, they found themselves face to face with the handsome Norman.
She remained stock-still in front of them, and with her queenly air
inquired:

"Well, is it quite settled? You are going to desert us, Monsieur
Verlaque?"

"Yes, yes," replied the little man; "I am going to take a rest in the
country, at Clamart. The smell of the fish is bad for me, it seems.
Here, this is the gentleman who is going to take my place."

So speaking he turned round to introduce Florent to her. The handsome
Norman almost choked; however, as Florent went off, he fancied he could
hear her whisper to her neighbours, with a laugh: "Well, we shall have
some fine fun now, see if we don't!"

The fish-wives had begun to set out their stalls. From all the taps at
the corners of the marble slabs water was gushing freely; and there was
a rustling sound all round, like the plashing of rain, a streaming of
stiff jets of water hissing and spurting. And then, from the lower side
of the sloping slabs, great drops fell with a softened murmur, splashing
on the flagstones where a mass of tiny streams flowed along here
and there, turning holes and depressions into miniature lakes, and
afterwards gliding in a thousand rills down the slope towards the Rue
Rambuteau. A moist haze ascended, a sort of rainy dust, bringing fresh
whiffs of air to Florent's face, whiffs of that salt, pungent sea breeze
which he remembered so well; while in such fish as was already laid out
he once more beheld the rosy nacres, gleaming corals, and milky pearls,
all the rippling colour and glaucous pallidity of the ocean world.

That first morning left him much in doubt; indeed, he regretted that he
had yielded to Lisa's insistence. Ever since his escape from the greasy
drowsiness of the kitchen he had been accusing himself of base weakness
with such violence that tears had almost risen in his eyes. But he did
not dare to go back on his word. He was a little afraid of Lisa, and
could see the curl of her lips and the look of mute reproach upon her
handsome face. He felt that she was too serious a woman to be trifled
with. However, Gavard happily inspired him with a consoling thought.
On the evening of the day on which Monsieur Verlaque had conducted him
through the auction sales, Gavard took him aside and told him, with a
good deal of hesitation, that "the poor devil" was not at all well off.
And after various remarks about the scoundrelly Government which ground
the life out of its servants without allowing them even the means to die
in comfort, he ended by hinting that it would be charitable on Florent's
part to surrender a part of his salary to the old inspector. Florent
welcomed the suggestion with delight. It was only right, he considered,
for he looked upon himself simply as Monsieur Verlaque's temporary
substitute; and besides, he himself really required nothing, as he
boarded and lodged with his brother. Gavard added that he thought if
Florent gave up fifty francs out of the hundred and fifty which he
would receive monthly, the arrangement would be everything that could
be desired; and, lowering his voice, he added that it would not be for
long, for the poor fellow was consumptive to his very bones. Finally
it was settled that Florent should see Monsieur Verlaque's wife, and
arrange matters with her, to avoid any possibility of hurting the old
man's feelings.

The thought of this kindly action afforded Florent great relief, and he
now accepted his duties with the object of doing good, thus continuing
to play the part which he had been fulfilling all his life. However, he
made the poultry dealer promise that he would not speak of the matter
to anyone; and as Gavard also felt a vague fear of Lisa, he kept the
secret, which was really very meritorious in him.

And now the whole pork shop seemed happy. Handsome Lisa manifested the
greatest friendliness towards her brother-in-law. She took care that he
went to bed early, so as to be able to rise in good time; she kept his
breakfast hot for him; and she no longer felt ashamed at being seen
talking to him on the footway, now that he wore a laced cap. Quenu,
quite delighted by all these good signs, sat down to table in the
evening between his wife and brother with a lighter heart than ever.
They often lingered over dinner till nine o'clock, leaving the shop in
Augustine's charge, and indulging in a leisurely digestion interspersed
with gossip about the neighbourhood, and the dogmatic opinions of Lisa
on political topics; Florent also had to relate how matters had gone in
the fish market that day. He gradually grew less frigid, and began
to taste the happiness of a well-regulated existence. There was a
well-to-do comfort and trimness about the light yellowish dining room
which had a softening influence upon him as soon as he crossed its
threshold. Handsome Lisa's kindly attentions wrapped him, as it were, in
cotton-wool; and mutual esteem and concord reigned paramount.

Gavard, however, considered the Quenu-Gradelles' home to be too drowsy.
He forgave Lisa her weakness for the Emperor, because, he said, one
ought never to discuss politics with women, and beautiful Madame
Quenu was, after all, a very worthy person, who managed her business
admirably. Nevertheless, he much preferred to spend his evenings at
Monsieur Lebigre's, where he met a group of friends who shared his own
opinions. Thus when Florent was appointed to the inspectorship of the
fish market, Gavard began to lead him astray, taking him off for hours,
and prompting him to lead a bachelor's life now that he had obtained a
berth.

Monsieur Lebigre was the proprietor of a very fine establishment, fitted
up in the modern luxurious style. Occupying the right-hand corner of the
Rue Pirouette, and looking on to the Rue Rambuteau, it formed, with its
four small Norwegian pines in green-painted tubs flanking the doorway, a
worthy pendant to the big pork shop of the Quenu-Gradelles. Through the
clear glass windows you could see the interior, which was decorated with
festoons of foliage, vine branches, and grapes, painted on a soft green
ground. The floor was tiled with large black and white squares. At
the far end was the yawning cellar entrance, above which rose a spiral
staircase hung with red drapery, and leading to the billiard-room on the
first floor. The counter or "bar" on the right looked especially rich,
and glittered like polished silver. Its zinc-work, hanging with a broad
bulging border over the sub-structure of white and red marble, edged it
with a rippling sheet of metal as if it were some high altar laden
with embroidery. At one end, over a gas stove, stood porcelain pots,
decorated with circles of brass, and containing punch and hot wine. At
the other extremity was a tall and richly sculptured marble fountain,
from which a fine stream of water, so steady and continuous that it
looked as though it were motionless, flowed into a basin. In the centre,
edged on three sides by the sloping zinc surface of the counter, was a
second basin for rinsing and cooling purposes, where quart bottles of
draught wine, partially empty, reared their greenish necks. Then on the
counter, to the right and left of this central basin, were batches
of glasses symmetrically arranged: little glasses for brandy, thick
tumblers for draught wine, cup glasses for brandied fruits, glasses for
absinthe, glass mugs for beer, and tall goblets, all turned upside down
and reflecting the glitter of the counter. On the left, moreover, was a
metal urn, serving as a receptacle for gratuities; whilst a similar one
on the right bristled with a fan-like arrangement of coffee spoons.

Monsieur Lebigre was generally to be found enthroned behind his counter
upon a seat covered with buttoned crimson leather. Within easy reach of
his hand were the liqueurs in cut-glass decanters protruding from the
compartments of a stand. His round back rested against a huge mirror
which completely filled the panel behind him; across it ran two glass
shelves supporting an array of jars and bottles. Upon one of them the
glass jars of preserved fruits, cherries, plums, and peaches, stood out
darkly; while on the other, between symmetrically arranged packets of
finger biscuits, were bright flasks of soft green and red and yellow
glass, suggesting strange mysterious liqueurs, or floral extracts of
exquisite limpidity. Standing on the glass shelf in the white glow of
the mirror, these flasks, flashing as if on fire, seemed to be suspended
in the air.

To give his premises the appearance of a cafe, Monsieur Lebigre had
placed two small tables of bronzed iron and four chairs against the
wall, in front of the counter. A chandelier with five lights and
frosted globes hung down from the ceiling. On the left was a round gilt
timepiece, above a _tourniquet_[*] fixed to the wall. Then at the far
end came the private "cabinet," a corner of the shop shut off by a
partition glazed with frosted glass of a small square pattern. In the
daytime this little room received a dim light from a window that looked
on to the Rue Pirouette; and in the evening, a gas jet burnt over the
two tables painted to resemble marble. It was there that Gavard and
his political friends met each evening after dinner. They looked upon
themselves as being quite at home there, and had prevailed on the
landlord to reserve the place for them. When Monsieur Lebigre had closed
the door of the glazed partition, they knew themselves to be so safely
screened from intrusion that they spoke quite unreservedly of the great
"sweep out" which they were fond of discussing. No unprivileged customer
would have dared to enter.

[*] This is a kind of dial turning on a pivot, and usually
enclosed in a brass frame, from which radiate a few small
handles or spokes. Round the face of the dial--usually of
paper--are various numerals, and between the face and its
glass covering is a small marble or wooden ball. The
appliance is used in lieu of dice or coins when two or more
customers are "tossing" for drinks. Each in turn sends the
dial spinning round, and wins or loses according to the
numeral against which the ball rests when the dial stops. As
I can find no English name for the appliance, I have thought
it best to describe it.--Translator.

On the first day that Gavard took Florent off he gave him some
particulars of Monsieur Lebigre. He was a good fellow, he said, who
sometimes came to drink his coffee with them; and, as he had said one
day that he had fought in '48, no one felt the least constraint in his
presence. He spoke but little, and seemed rather thick-headed. As the
gentlemen passed him on their way to the private room they grasped
his hand in silence across the glasses and bottles. By his side on
the crimson leather seat behind the counter there was generally a fair
little woman, whom he had engaged as counter assistant in addition
to the white-aproned waiter who attended to the tables and the
billiard-room. The young woman's name was Rose, and she seemed a very
gentle and submissive being. Gavard, with a wink of his eye, told
Florent that he fancied Lebigre had a weakness for her. It was she, by
the way, who waited upon the friends in the private room, coming and
going, with her happy, humble air, amidst the stormiest political
discussions.

Upon the day on which the poultry dealer took Florent to Lebigre's to
present him to his friends, the only person whom the pair found in the
little room when they entered it was a man of some fifty years of age,
of a mild and thoughtful appearance. He wore a rather shabby-looking hat
and a long chestnut-coloured overcoat, and sat, with his chin resting
on the ivory knob of a thick cane, in front of a glass mug full of beer.
His mouth was so completely concealed by a vigorous growth of beard that
his face had a dumb, lipless appearance.

"How are you, Robine?" exclaimed Gavard.

Robine silently thrust out his hand, without making any reply, though
his eyes softened into a slight smile of welcome. Then he let his chin
drop on to the knob of his cane again, and looked at Florent over his
beer. Florent had made Gavard swear to keep his story a secret for fear
of some dangerous indiscretion; and he was not displeased to observe a
touch of distrust in the discreet demeanour of the gentleman with the
heavy beard. However, he was really mistaken in this, for Robine never
talked more than he did now. He was always the first to arrive, just
as the clock struck eight; and he always sat in the same corner, never
letting go his hold of his cane, and never taking off either his hat or
his overcoat. No one had ever seen him without his hat upon his head. He
remained there listening to the talk of the others till midnight, taking
four hours to empty his mug of beer, and gazing successively at the
different speakers as though he heard them with his eyes. When Florent
afterwards questioned Gavard about Robine, the poultry dealer spoke of
the latter as though he held him in high esteem. Robine, he asserted,
was an extremely clever and able man, and, though he was unable to say
exactly where he had given proof of his hostility to the established
order of things, he declared that he was one of the most dreaded of the
Government's opponents. He lived in the Rue Saint Denis, in rooms
to which no one as a rule could gain admission. The poultry dealer,
however, asserted that he himself had once been in them. The wax floors,
he said, were protected by strips of green linen; and there were covers
over the furniture, and an alabaster timepiece with columns. He had
caught a glimpse of the back of a lady, who was just disappearing
through one doorway as he was entering by another, and had taken her
to be Madame Robine. She appeared to be an old lady of very genteel
appearance, with her hair arranged in corkscrew curls; but of this he
could not be quite certain. No one knew why they had taken up their
abode amidst all the uproar of a business neighbourhood; for the husband
did nothing at all, spending his days no one knew how and living on no
one knew what, though he made his appearance every evening as though he
were tired but delighted with some excursion into the highest regions of
politics.

"Well, have you read the speech from the throne?" asked Gavard, taking
up a newspaper that was lying on the table.

Robine shrugged his shoulders. Just at that moment, however, the door
of the glazed partition clattered noisily, and a hunchback made his
appearance. Florent at once recognised the deformed crier of the fish
market, though his hands were now washed and he was neatly dressed, with
his neck encircled by a great red muffler, one end of which hung down
over his hump like the skirt of a Venetian cloak.

"Ah, here's Logre!" exclaimed the poultry dealer. "Now we shall hear
what he thinks about the speech from the throne."

Logre, however, was apparently furious. To begin with he almost broke
the pegs off in hanging up his hat and muffler. Then he threw himself
violently into a chair, and brought his fist down on the table, while
tossing away the newspaper.

"Do you think I read their fearful lies?" he cried.

Then he gave vent to the anger raging within him. "Did ever anyone
hear," he cried, "of masters making such fools of their people? For two
whole hours I've been waiting for my pay! There were ten of us in the
office kicking our heels there. Then at last Monsieur Manoury arrived
in a cab. Where he had come from I don't know, and don't care, but I'm
quite sure it wasn't any respectable place. Those salesmen are all a
parcel of thieves and libertines! And then, too, the hog actually gave
me all my money in small change!"

Robine expressed his sympathy with Logre by the slight movement of his
eyelids. But suddenly the hunchback bethought him of a victim upon whom
to pour out his wrath. "Rose! Rose!" he cried, stretching his head out
of the little room.

The young woman quickly responded to the call, trembling all over.

"Well," shouted Logre, "what do you stand staring at me like that for?
Much good that'll do! You saw me come in, didn't you? Why haven't you
brought me my glass of black coffee, then?"

Gavard ordered two similar glasses, and Rose made all haste to bring
what was required, while Logre glared sternly at the glasses and little
sugar trays as if studying them. When he had taken a drink he seemed to
grow somewhat calmer.

"But it's Charvet who must be getting bored," he said presently. "He is
waiting outside on the pavement for Clemence."

Charvet, however, now made his appearance, followed by Clemence. He was
a tall, scraggy young man, carefully shaved, with a skinny nose and
thin lips. He lived in the Rue Vavin, behind the Luxembourg, and called
himself a professor. In politics he was a disciple of Hebert.[*] He
wore his hair very long, and the collar and lapels of his threadbare
frock-coat were broadly turned back. Affecting the manner and speech of
a member of the National Convention, he would pour out such a flood of
bitter words and make such a haughty display of pedantic learning that
he generally crushed his adversaries. Gavard was afraid of him, though
he would not confess it; still, in Charvet's absence he would say that
he really went too far. Robine, for his part, expressed approval
of everything with his eyes. Logre sometimes opposed Charvet on the
question of salaries; but the other was really the autocrat of
the coterie, having the greatest fund of information and the most
overbearing manner. For more than ten years he and Clemence had lived
together as man and wife, in accordance with a previously arranged
contract, the terms of which were strictly observed by both parties to
it. Florent looked at the young woman with some little surprise, but at
last he recollected where he had previously seen her. This was at the
fish auction. She was, indeed, none other than the tall dark female
clerk whom he had observed writing with outstretched fingers, after the
manner of one who had been carefully instructed in the art of holding a
pen.

[*] Hebert, as the reader will remember, was the furious
demagogue with the foul tongue and poisoned pen who edited
the _Pere Duchesne_ at the time of the first French
Revolution. We had a revival of his politics and his journal
in Paris during the Commune of 1871.--Translator.

Rose made her appearance at the heels of the two newcomers. Without
saying a word she placed a mug of beer before Charvet and a tray before
Clemence, who in a leisurely way began to compound a glass of "grog,"
pouring some hot water over a slice of lemon, which she crushed with
her spoon, and glancing carefully at the decanter as she poured out
some rum, so as not to add more of it than a small liqueur glass could
contain.

Gavard now presented Florent to the company, but more especially to
Charvet. He introduced them to one another as professors, and very able
men, who would be sure to get on well together. But it was probable that
he had already been guilty of some indiscretion, for all the men at once
shook hands with a tight and somewhat masonic squeeze of each other's
fingers. Charvet, for his part, showed himself almost amiable; and
whether he and the others knew anything of Florent's antecedents, they
at all events indulged in no embarrassing allusions.

"Did Manoury pay you in small change?" Logre asked Clemence.

She answered affirmatively, and produced a roll of francs and another of
two-franc pieces, and unwrapped them. Charvet watched her, and his eyes
followed the rolls as she replaced them in her pocket, after counting
their contents and satisfying herself that they were correct.

"We have our accounts to settle," he said in a low voice.

"Yes, we'll settle up to-night," the young woman replied. "But we
are about even, I should think. I've breakfasted with you four times,
haven't I? But I lent you a hundred sous last week, you know."

Florent, surprised at hearing this, discreetly turned his head away.
Then Clemence slipped the last roll of silver into her pocket, drank a
little of her grog, and, leaning against the glazed partition, quietly
settled herself down to listen to the men talking politics. Gavard had
taken up the newspaper again, and, in tones which he strove to render
comic, was reading out some passages of the speech from the throne which
had been delivered that morning at the opening of the Chambers. Charvet
made fine sport of the official phraseology; there was not a single line
of it which he did not tear to pieces. One sentence afforded especial
amusement to them all. It was this: "We are confident, gentlemen,
that, leaning on your lights[*] and the conservative sentiments of the
country, we shall succeed in increasing the national prosperity day by
day."

[*] In the sense of illumination of mind. It has been
necessary to give a literal translation of this phrase to
enable the reader to realise the point of subsequent
witticisms in which Clemence and Gavard indulge.
--Translator.

Logre rose up and repeated this sentence, and by speaking through his
nose succeeded fairly well in mimicking the Emperor's drawling voice.

"It's lovely, that prosperity of his; why, everyone's dying of hunger!"
said Charvet.

"Trade is shocking," asserted Gavard.

"And what in the name of goodness is the meaning of anybody 'leaning on
lights'?" continued Clemence, who prided herself upon literary culture.

Robine himself even allowed a faint laugh to escape from the depths of
his beard. The discussion began to grow warm. The party fell foul of
the Corps Legislatif, and spoke of it with great severity. Logre did not
cease ranting, and Florent found him the same as when he cried the fish
at the auctions--protruding his jaws and hurling his words forward with
a wave of the arm, whilst retaining the crouching attitude of a snarling
dog. Indeed, he talked politics in just the same furious manner as he
offered a tray full of soles for sale.

Charvet, on the other hand, became quieter and colder amidst the smoke
of the pipes and the fumes of the gas which were now filling the little
den; and his voice assumed a dry incisive tone, sharp like a guillotine
blade, while Robine gently wagged his head without once removing his
chin from the ivory knob of his cane. However, some remark of Gavard's
led the conversation to the subject of women.

"Woman," declared Charvet drily, "is the equal of man; and, that being
so, she ought not to inconvenience him in the management of his life.
Marriage is a partnership, in which everything should be halved. Isn't
that so, Clemence?"

"Clearly so," replied the young woman, leaning back with her head
against the wall and gazing into the air.

However, Florent now saw Lacaille, the costermonger, and Alexandre, the
porter, Claude Lantier's friend, come into the little room. In the past
these two had long remained at the other table in the sanctum; they did
not belong to the same class as the others. By the help of politics,
however, their chairs had drawn nearer, and they had ended by forming
part of the circle. Charvet, in whose eyes they represented "the
people," did his best to indoctrinate them with his advanced political
theories, while Gavard played the part of the shopkeeper free from
all social prejudices by clinking glasses with them. Alexandre was
a cheerful, good-humoured giant, with the manner of a big merry lad.
Lacaille, on the other hand, was embittered; his hair was already
grizzling; and, bent and wearied by his ceaseless perambulations through
the streets of Paris, he would at times glance loweringly at the placid
figure of Robine, and his sound boots and heavy coat.

That evening both Lacaille and Alexandre called for a liqueur glass of
brandy, and then the conversation was renewed with increased warmth and
excitement, the party being now quite complete. A little later,
while the door of the cabinet was left ajar, Florent caught sight of
Mademoiselle Saget standing in front of the counter. She had taken a
bottle from under her apron, and was watching Rose as the latter poured
into it a large measureful of black-currant syrup and a smaller one
of brandy. Then the bottle disappeared under the apron again, and
Mademoiselle Saget, with her hands out of sight, remained talking in the
bright glow of the counter, face to face with the big mirror, in which
the flasks and bottles of liqueurs were reflected like rows of Venetian
lanterns. In the evening all the metal and glass of the establishment
helped to illuminate it with wonderful brilliancy. The old maid,
standing there in her black skirts, looked almost like some big strange
insect amidst all the crude brightness. Florent noticed that she was
trying to inveigle Rose into a conversation, and shrewdly suspected that
she had caught sight of him through the half open doorway. Since he
had been on duty at the markets he had met her at almost every step,
loitering in one or another of the covered ways, and generally in the
company of Madame Lecoeur and La Sarriette. He had noticed also that
the three women stealthily examined him, and seemed lost in amazement
at seeing him installed in the position of inspector. That evening,
however, Rose was no doubt loath to enter into conversation with the old
maid, for the latter at last turned round, apparently with the intention
of approaching Monsieur Lebigre, who was playing piquet with a customer
at one of the bronzed tables. Creeping quietly along, Mademoiselle
Saget had at last managed to install herself beside the partition of the
cabinet, when she was observed by Gavard, who detested her.

"Shut the door, Florent!" he cried unceremoniously. "We can't even be by
ourselves, it seems!"

When midnight came and Lacaille went away he exchanged a few whispered
words with Monsieur Lebigre, and as the latter shook hands with him he
slipped four five-franc pieces into his palm, without anyone noticing
it. "That'll make twenty-two francs that you'll have to pay to-morrow,
remember," he whispered in his ear. "The person who lends the money
won't do it for less in future. Don't forget, too, that you owe three
days' truck hire. You must pay everything off."

Then Monsieur Lebigre wished the friends good night. He was very sleepy
and should sleep well, he said, with a yawn which revealed his big
teeth, while Rose gazed at him with an air of submissive humility.
However, he gave her a push, and told her to go and turn out the gas in
the little room.

On reaching the pavement, Gavard stumbled and nearly fell. And being in
a humorous vein, he thereupon exclaimed: "Confound it all! At any rate,
I don't seem to be leaning on anybody's lights."

This remark seemed to amuse the others, and the party broke up. A little
later Florent returned to Lebigre's, and indeed he became quite attached
to the "cabinet," finding a seductive charm in Robine's contemplative
silence, Logre's fiery outbursts, and Charvet's cool venom. When he went
home, he did not at once retire to bed. He had grown very fond of his
attic, that girlish bedroom, where Augustine had left scraps of ribbons,
souvenirs, and other feminine trifles lying about. There still remained
some hair-pins on the mantelpiece, with gilt cardboard boxes of buttons
and lozenges, cutout pictures, and empty pomade pots that retained an
odour of jasmine. Then there were some reels of thread, needles, and
a missal lying by the side of a soiled Dream-book in the drawer of
the rickety deal table. A white summer dress with yellow spots
hung forgotten from a nail; while upon the board which served as a
toilet-table a big stain behind the water-jug showed where a bottle of
bandoline had been overturned. The little chamber, with its narrow iron
bed, its two rush-bottomed chairs, and its faded grey wallpaper,
was instinct with innocent simplicity. The plain white curtains, the
childishness suggested by the cardboard boxes and the Dream-book, and
the clumsy coquetry which had stained the walls, all charmed Florent and
brought him back to dreams of youth. He would have preferred not to
have known that plain, wiry-haired Augustine, but to have been able to
imagine that he was occupying the room of a sister, some bright sweet
girl of whose budding womanhood every trifle around him spoke.

Yet another pleasure which he took was to lean out of the garret window
at nighttime. In front of it was a narrow ledge of roof, enclosed by
an iron railing, and forming a sort of balcony, on which Augustine had
grown a pomegranate in a box. Since the nights had turned cold, Florent
had brought the pomegranate indoors and kept it by the foot of his bed
till morning. He would linger for a few minutes by the open window,
inhaling deep draughts of the sharp fresh air which was wafted up from
the Seine, over the housetops of the Rue de Rivoli. Below him the roofs
of the markets spread confusedly in a grey expanse, like slumbering
lakes on whose surface the furtive reflection of a pane of glass gleamed
every now and then like a silvery ripple. Farther away the roofs of the
meat and poultry pavilions lay in deeper gloom, and became mere masses
of shadow barring the horizon. Florent delighted in the great stretch of
open sky in front of him, in that spreading expanse of the markets which
amidst all the narrow city streets brought him a dim vision of some
strip of sea coast, of the still grey waters of a bay scarce quivering
from the roll of the distant billows. He used to lose himself in dreams
as he stood there; each night he conjured up the vision of some fresh
coast line. To return in mind to the eight years of despair which he had
spent away from France rendered him both very sad and very happy. Then
at last, shivering all over, he would close the window. Often, as he
stood in front of the fireplace taking off his collar, the photograph of
Auguste and Augustine would fill him with disquietude. They seemed to be
watching him as they stood there, hand in hand, smiling faintly.

Florent's first few weeks at the fish market were very painful to him.
The Mehudins treated him with open hostility, which infected the whole
market with a spirit of opposition. The beautiful Norman intended to
revenge herself on the handsome Lisa, and the latter's cousin seemed a
victim ready to hand.

The Mehudins came from Rouen. Louise's mother still related how she had
first arrived in Paris with a basket of eels. She had ever afterwards
remained in the fish trade. She had married a man employed in the Octroi
service, who had died leaving her with two little girls. It was she who
by her full figure and glowing freshness had won for herself in earlier
days the nickname of "the beautiful Norman," which her eldest daughter
had inherited. Now five and sixty years of age, Madame Mehudin had
become flabby and shapeless, and the damp air of the fish market had
rendered her voice rough and hoarse, and given a bluish tinge to her
skin. Sedentary life had made her extremely bulky, and her head was
thrown backwards by the exuberance of her bosom. She had never been
willing to renounce the fashions of her younger days, but still wore
the flowered gown, the yellow kerchief, and turban-like head-gear of
the classic fish-wife, besides retaining the latter's loud voice and
rapidity of gesture as she stood with her hands on her hips, shouting
out the whole abusive vocabulary of her calling.

She looked back regretfully to the old Marche des Innocents, which the
new central markets had supplanted. She would talk of the ancient rights
of the market "ladies," and mingle stories of fisticuffs exchanged with
the police with reminiscences of the visits she had paid the Court in
the time of Charles X and Louis Philippe, dressed in silk, and carrying
a bouquet of flowers in her hand. Old Mother Mehudin, as she was now
generally called, had for a long time been the banner-bearer of the
Sisterhood of the Virgin at St. Leu. She would relate that in the
processions in the church there she had worn a dress and cap of tulle
trimmed with satin ribbons, whilst holding aloft in her puffy fingers
the gilded staff of the richly-fringed silk standard on which the figure
of the Holy Mother was embroidered.

According to the gossip of the neighbourhood, the old woman had made a
fairly substantial fortune, though the only signs of it were the massive
gold ornaments with which she loaded her neck and arms and bosom on
important occasions. Her two daughters got on badly together as they
grew up. The younger one, Claire, an idle, fair-complexioned girl,
complained of the ill-treatment which she received from her sister
Louise, protesting, in her languid voice, that she could never submit to
be the other's servant. As they would certainly have ended by coming
to blows, their mother separated them. She gave her stall in the fish
market to Louise, while Claire, whom the smell of the skate and the
herrings affected in the lungs, installed herself among the fresh water
fish. And from that time the old mother, although she pretended to
have retired from business altogether, would flit from one stall to the
other, still interfering in the selling of the fish, and causing her
daughters continual annoyance by the foul insolence with which she would
at times speak to customers.

Claire was a fantastical creature, very gentle in her manner, and yet
continually at loggerheads with others. People said that she invariably
followed her own whimsical inclinations. In spite of her dreamy, girlish
face she was imbued with a nature of silent firmness, a spirit of
independence which prompted her to live apart; she never took things
as other people did, but would one day evince perfect fairness, and the
next day arrant injustice. She would sometimes throw the market into
confusion by suddenly increasing or lowering the prices at her stall,
without anyone being able to guess her reason for doing so. She
herself would refuse to explain her motive. By the time she reached her
thirtieth year, her delicate physique and fine skin, which the water
of the tanks seemed to keep continually fresh and soft, her small,
faintly-marked face and lissome limbs would probably become heavy,
coarse, and flabby, till she would look like some faded saint that had
stepped from a stained-glass window into the degrading sphere of the
markets. At twenty-two, however, Claire, in the midst of her carp and
eels, was, to use Claude Lantier's expression, a Murillo. A Murillo,
that is, whose hair was often in disorder, who wore heavy shoes and
clumsily cut dresses, which left her without any figure. But she was
free from all coquetry, and she assumed an air of scornful contempt when
Louise, displaying her bows and ribbons, chaffed her about her clumsily
knotted neckerchiefs. Moreover, she was virtuous; it was said that the
son of a rich shopkeeper in the neighbourhood had gone abroad in despair
at having failed to induce her to listen to his suit.

Louise, the beautiful Norman, was of a different nature. She had been
engaged to be married to a clerk in the corn market; but a sack of flour
falling upon the young man had broken his back and killed him. Not very
long afterwards Louise had given birth to a boy. In the Mehudins' circle
of acquaintance she was looked upon as a widow; and the old fish-wife
in conversation would occasionally refer to the time when her son-in-law
was alive.

The Mehudins were a power in the markets. When Monsieur Verlaque had
finished instructing Florent in his new duties, he advised him to
conciliate certain of the stall-holders, if he wished his life to be
endurable; and he even carried his sympathy so far as to put him in
possession of the little secrets of the office, such as the various
little breaches of rule that it was necessary to wink at, and those
at which he would have to feign stern displeasure; and also the
circumstances under which he might accept a small present. A market
inspector is at once a constable and a magistrate; he has to maintain
proper order and cleanliness, and settle in a conciliatory spirit
all disputes between buyers and sellers. Florent, who was of a weak
disposition put on an artificial sternness when he was obliged to
exercise his authority, and generally over-acted his part. Moreover, his
gloomy, pariah-like face and bitterness of spirit, the result of long
suffering, were against him.

The beautiful Norman's idea was to involve him in some quarrel or other.
She had sworn that he would not keep his berth a fortnight. "That fat
Lisa's much mistaken," said she one morning on meeting Madame Lecoeur,
"if she thinks that she's going to put people over us. We don't want
such ugly wretches here. That sweetheart of hers is a perfect fright!"

After the auctions, when Florent commenced his round of inspection,
strolling slowly through the dripping alleys, he could plainly see the
beautiful Norman watching him with an impudent smile on her face. Her
stall, which was in the second row on the left, near the fresh water
fish department faced the Rue Rambuteau. She would turn round, however,
and never take her eyes off her victim whilst making fun of him with
her neighbours. And when he passed in front of her, slowly examining the
slabs, she feigned hilarious merriment, slapped her fish with her hand,
and turned her jets of water on at full stream, flooding the pathway.
Nevertheless Florent remained perfectly calm.

At last, one morning as was bound to happen, war broke out. As Florent
reached La Normande's stall that day an unbearable stench assailed
his nostrils. On the marble slab, in addition to part of a magnificent
salmon, showing its soft roseate flesh, there lay some turbots of creamy
whiteness, a few conger-eels pierced with black pins to mark their
divisions, several pairs of soles, and some bass and red mullet--in
fact, quite a display of fresh fish. But in the midst of it, amongst
all these fish whose eyes still gleamed and whose gills were of a bright
crimson, there lay a huge skate of a ruddy tinge, splotched with dark
stains--superb, indeed, with all its strange colourings. Unfortunately,
it was rotten; its tail was falling off and the ribs of its fins were
breaking through the skin.

"You must throw that skate away," said Florent as he came up.

The beautiful Norman broke into a slight laugh. Florent raised his eyes
and saw her standing before him, with her back against the bronze lamp
post which lighted the stalls in her division. She had mounted upon
a box to keep her feet out of the damp, and appeared very tall as he
glanced at her. She looked also handsomer than usual, with her
hair arranged in little curls, her sly face slightly bent, her lips
compressed, and her hands showing somewhat too rosily against her big
white apron. Florent had never before seen her decked with so much
jewellery. She had long pendants in her ears, a chain round her neck, a
brooch in her dress body, and quite a collection of rings on two fingers
of her left hand and one of her right.

As she still continued to look slyly at Florent, without making any
reply, the latter continued: "Do you hear? You must remove that skate."

He had not yet noticed the presence of old Madame Mehudin, who sat all
of a heap on a chair in a corner. She now got up, however, and, with her
fists resting on the marble slap, insolently exclaimed: "Dear me! And
why is she to throw her skate away? You won't pay her for it, I'll bet!"

Florent immediately understood the position. The women at the other
stalls began to titter, and he felt that he was surrounded by covert
rebellion, which a word might cause to blaze forth. He therefore
restrained himself, and in person drew the refuse-pail from under the
stall and dropped the skate into it. Old Madame Mehudin had already
stuck her hands on her hips, while the beautiful Norman, who had not
spoken a word, burst into another malicious laugh as Florent strode
sternly away amidst a chorus of jeers, which he pretended not to hear.

Each day now some new trick was played upon him, and he was obliged to
walk through the market alleys as warily as though he were in a hostile
country. He was splashed with water from the sponges employed to
cleanse the slabs; he stumbled and almost fell over slippery refuse
intentionally spread in his way; and even the porters contrived to run
their baskets against the nape of his neck. One day, moreover, when two
of the fish-wives were quarrelling, and he hastened up to prevent them
coming to blows, he was obliged to duck in order to escape being slapped
on either cheek by a shower of little dabs which passed over his head.
There was a general outburst of laughter on this occasion, and Florent
always believed that the two fish-wives were in league with the
Mehudins. However, his old-time experiences as a teacher had endowed
him with angelic patience, and he was able to maintain a magisterial
coolness of manner even when anger was hotly rising within him, and
his whole being quivered with a sense of humiliation. Still, the young
scamps of the Rue de l'Estrapade had never manifested the savagery
of these fish-wives, the cruel tenacity of these huge females, whose
massive figures heaved and shook with a giant-like joy whenever he fell
into any trap. They stared him out of countenance with their red faces;
and in the coarse tones of their voices and the impudent gesture of
their hands he could read volumes of filthy abuse levelled at himself.
Gavard would have been quite in his element amidst all these petticoats,
and would have freely cuffed them all round; but Florent, who had
always been afraid of women, gradually felt overwhelmed as by a sort
of nightmare in which giant women, buxom beyond all imagination,
danced threateningly around him, shouting at him in hoarse voices and
brandishing bare arms, as massive as any prize-fighter's.

Amongst this hoard of females, however, Florent had one friend. Claire
unhesitatingly declared that the new inspector was a very good fellow.
When he passed in front of her, pursued by the coarse abuse of the
others, she gave him a pleasant smile, sitting nonchalantly behind her
stall, with unruly errant locks of pale hair straying over her neck and
her brow, and the bodice of her dress pinned all askew. He also often
saw her dipping her hands into her tanks, transferring the fish from
one compartment to another, and amusing herself by turning on the brass
taps, shaped like little dolphins with open mouths, from which the water
poured in streamlets. Amidst the rustling sound of the water she had
some of the quivering grace of a girl who has just been bathing and has
hurriedly slipped on her clothes.

One morning she was particularly amiable. She called the inspector to
her to show him a huge eel which had been the wonder of the market
when exhibited at the auction. She opened the grating, which she had
previously closed over the basin in whose depths the eel seemed to be
lying sound asleep.

"Wait a moment," she said, "and I'll show it to you."

Then she gently slipped her bare arm into the water; it was not a very
plump arm, and its veins showed softly blue beneath its satiny skin. As
soon as the eel felt her touch, it rapidly twisted round, and seemed to
fill the narrow trough with its glistening greenish coils. And directly
it had settled down to rest again Claire once more stirred it with her
fingertips.

"It is an enormous creature," Florent felt bound to say. "I have rarely
seen such a fine one."

Claire thereupon confessed to him that she had at first been frightened
of eels; but now she had learned how to tighten her grip so that they
could not slip away. From another compartment she took a smaller one,
which began to wriggle both with head and tail, as she held it about
the middle in her closed fist. This made her laugh. She let it go, then
seized another and another, scouring the basin and stirring up the whole
heap of snaky-looking creatures with her slim fingers.

Afterwards she began to speak of the slackness of trade. The hawkers on
the foot-pavement of the covered way did the regular saleswomen a great
deal of injury, she said. Meantime her bare arm, which she had not
wiped, was glistening and dripping with water. Big drops trickled from
each finger.

"Oh," she exclaimed suddenly, "I must show you my carp, too!"

She now removed another grating, and, using both hands, lifted out a
large carp, which began to flap its tail and gasp. It was too big to be
held conveniently, so she sought another one. This was smaller, and she
could hold it with one hand, but the latter was forced slightly open
by the panting of the sides each time that the fish gasped. To amuse
herself it occurred to Claire to pop the tip of her thumb into the
carp's mouth whilst it was dilated. "It won't bite," said she with her
gentle laugh; "it's not spiteful. No more are the crawfishes; I'm not
the least afraid of them."

She plunged her arm into the water again, and from a compartment full
of a confused crawling mass brought up a crawfish that had caught her
little finger in its claws. She gave the creature a shake, but it no
doubt gripped her too tightly, for she turned very red, and snapped off
its claw with a quick, angry gesture, though still continuing to smile.

"By the way," she continued quickly, to conceal her emotion, "I wouldn't
trust myself with a pike; he'd cut off my fingers like a knife."

She thereupon showed him some big pike arranged in order of size upon
clean scoured shelves, beside some bronze-hued tench and little heaps of
gudgeon. Her hands were now quite slimy with handling the carp, and as
she stood there in the dampness rising from the tanks, she held them
outstretched over the dripping fish on the stall. She seemed enveloped
by an odour of spawn, that heavy scent which rises from among the reeds
and water-lilies when the fish, languid in the sunlight, discharge their
eggs. Then she wiped her hands on her apron, still smiling the placid
smile of a girl who knew nothing of passion in that quivering atmosphere
of the frigid loves of the river.

The kindliness which Claire showed to Florent was but a slight
consolation to him. By stopping to talk to the girl he only drew upon
himself still coarser jeers from the other stallkeepers. Claire shrugged
her shoulders, and said that her mother was an old jade, and her sister
a worthless creature. The injustice of the market folk towards the new
inspector filled her with indignation. The war between them, however,
grew more bitter every day. Florent had serious thoughts of resigning
his post; indeed, he would not have retained it for another twenty-four
hours if he had not been afraid that Lisa might imagine him to be a
coward. He was frightened of what she might say and what she might
think. She was naturally well aware of the contest which was going on
between the fish-wives and their inspector; for the whole echoing market
resounded with it, and the entire neighbourhood discussed each fresh
incident with endless comments.

"Ah, well," Lisa would often say in the evening, after dinner, "I'd soon
bring them to reason if I had anything to do with them! Why, they are a
lot of dirty jades that I wouldn't touch with the tip of my finger! That
Normande is the lowest of the low! I'd soon crush her, that I would! You
should really use your authority, Florent. You are wrong to behave as
you do. Put your foot down, and they'll all come to their senses very
quickly, you'll see."

A terrible climax was presently reached. One morning the servant of
Madame Taboureau, the baker, came to the market to buy a brill; and
the beautiful Norman, having noticed her lingering near her stall for
several minutes, began to make overtures to her in a coaxing way: "Come
and see me; I'll suit you," she said. "Would you like a pair of soles,
or a fine turbot?"

Then as the servant at last came up, and sniffed at a brill with that
dissatisfied pout which buyers assume in the hope of getting what they
want at a lower price, La Normande continued:

"Just feel the weight of that, now," and so saying she laid the brill,
wrapped in a sheet of thick yellow paper, on the woman's open palm.

The servant, a mournful little woman from Auvergne, felt the weight of
the brill, and examined its gills, still pouting, and saying not a word.

"And how much do you want for it?" she asked presently, in a reluctant
tone.

"Fifteen francs," replied La Normande.

At this the servant hastily laid the brill on the stall again, and
seemed anxious to hurry away, but the other detained her. "Wait a
moment," said she. "What do you offer?"

"No, no, I can't take it. It is much too dear."

"Come, now, make me an offer."

"Well, will you take eight francs?"

Old Madame Mehudin, who was there, suddenly seemed to wake up, and
broke out into a contemptuous laugh. Did people think that she and her
daughter stole the fish they sold? "Eight francs for a brill that size!"
she exclaimed. "You'll be wanting one for nothing next, to use as a
cooling plaster!"

Meantime La Normande turned her head away, as though greatly offended.
However, the servant came back twice and offered nine francs; and
finally she increased her bid to ten.

"All right, come on, give me your money!" cried the fish-girl, seeing
that the woman was now really going away.

The servant took her stand in front of the stall and entered into a
friendly gossip with old Madame Mehudin. Madame Taboureau, she said, was
so exacting! She had got some people coming to dinner that evening, some
cousins from Blois a notary and his wife. Madame Taboureau's family,
she added, was a very respectable one, and she herself, although only a
baker, had received an excellent education.

"You'll clean it nicely for me, won't you?" added the woman, pausing in
her chatter.

With a jerk of her finger La Normande had removed the fish's entrails
and tossed them into a pail. Then she slipped a corner of her apron
under its gills to wipe away a few grains of sand. "There, my dear," she
said, putting the fish into the servant's basket, "you'll come back to
thank me."

Certainly the servant did come back a quarter of an hour afterwards,
but it was with a flushed, red face. She had been crying, and her little
body was trembling all over with anger. Tossing the brill on to the
marble slab, she pointed to a broad gash in its belly that reached the
bone. Then a flood of broken words burst from her throat, which was
still contracted by sobbing: "Madame Taboureau won't have it. She says
she couldn't put it on her table. She told me, too, that I was an idiot,
and let myself be cheated by anyone. You can see for yourself that the
fish is spoilt. I never thought of turning it round; I quite trusted
you. Give me my ten francs back."

"You should look at what you buy," the handsome Norman calmly observed.

And then, as the servant was just raising her voice again, old Madame
Mehudin got up. "Just you shut up!" she cried. "We're not going to take
back a fish that's been knocking about in other people's houses. How do
we know that you didn't let it fall and damage it yourself?"

"I! I damage it!" The little servant was choking with indignation. "Ah!
you're a couple of thieves!" she cried, sobbing bitterly. "Yes, a couple
of thieves! Madame Taboureau herself told me so!"

Matters then became uproarious. Boiling over with rage and brandishing
their fists, both mother and daughter fairly exploded; while the poor
little servant, quite bewildered by their voices, the one hoarse and
the other shrill, which belaboured her with insults as though they were
battledores and she a shuttlecock, sobbed on more bitterly than ever.

"Be off with you! Your Madame Taboureau would like to be half as fresh
as that fish is! She'd like us to sew it up for her, no doubt!"

"A whole fish for ten francs! What'll she want next!"

Then came coarse words and foul accusations. Had the servant been
the most worthless of her sex she could not have been more bitterly
upbraided.

Florent, whom the market keeper had gone to fetch, made his appearance
when the quarrel was at its hottest. The whole pavilion seemed to be
in a state of insurrection. The fish-wives, who manifest the keenest
jealousy of each other when the sale of a penny herring is in question,
display a united front when a quarrel arises with a buyer. They sang the
popular old ditty, "The baker's wife has heaps of crowns, which cost her
precious little"; they stamped their feet, and goaded the Mehudins
as though the latter were dogs which they were urging on to bite and
devour. And there were even some, having stalls at the other end of
the alley, who rushed up wildly, as though they meant to spring at the
chignon of the poor little woman, she meantime being quite submerged by
the flood of insulting abuse poured upon her.

"Return mademoiselle her ten francs," said Florent sternly, when he had
learned what had taken place.

But old Madame Mehudin had her blood up. "As for you, my little man,"
quoth she, "go to blazes! Here, that's how I'll return the ten francs!"

As she spoke, she flung the brill with all her force at the head of
Madame Taboureau's servant, who received it full in the face. The blood
spurted from her nose, and the brill, after adhering for a moment to
her cheeks, fell to the ground and burst with a flop like that of a wet
clout. This brutal act threw Florent into a fury. The beautiful Norman
felt frightened and recoiled, as he cried out: "I suspend you for a
week, and I will have your licence withdrawn. You hear me?"

Then, as the other fish-wives were still jeering behind him, he turned
round with such a threatening air that they quailed like wild beasts
mastered by the tamer, and tried to assume an expression of innocence.
When the Mehudins had returned the ten francs, Florent peremptorily
ordered them to cease selling at once. The old woman was choking with
rage, while the daughter kept silent, but turned very white. She, the
beautiful Norman, to be driven out of her stall!

Claire said in her quiet voice that it served her mother and sister
right, a remark which nearly resulted in the two girls tearing each
other's hair out that evening when they returned home to the Rue
Pirouette. However, when the Mehudins came back to the market at the
week's end, they remained very quiet, reserved, and curt of speech,
though full of a cold-blooded wrath. Moreover, they found the pavilion
quite calm and restored to order again. From that day forward the
beautiful Norman must have harboured the thought of some terrible
vengeance. She felt that she really had Lisa to thank for what had
happened. She had met her, the day after the battle, carrying her head
so high, that she had sworn she would make her pay dearly for her glance
of triumph. She held interminable confabulations with Madame Saget,
Madame Lecoeur, and La Sarriette, in quiet corners of the market;
however, all their chatter about the shameless conduct which they
slanderously ascribed to Lisa and her cousin, and about the hairs which
they declared were found in Quenu's chitterlings, brought La Normande
little consolation. She was trying to think of some very malicious plan
of vengeance, which would strike her rival to the heart.

Her child was growing up in the fish market in all freedom and neglect.
When but three years old the youngster had been brought there, and day
by day remained squatting on some rag amidst the fish. He would fall
asleep beside the big tunnies as though he were one of them, and awake
among the mackerel and whiting. The little rascal smelt of fish as
strongly as though he were some big fish's offspring. For a long time
his favourite pastime, whenever his mother's back was turned, was to
build walls and houses of herrings; and he would also play at soldiers
on the marble slab, arranging the red gurnets in confronting lines,
pushing them against each other, and battering their heads, while
imitating the sound of drum and trumpet with his lips; after which he
would throw them all into a heap again, and exclaim that they were dead.
When he grew older he would prowl about his aunt Claire's stall to get
hold of the bladders of the carp and pike which she gutted. He placed
them on the ground and made them burst, an amusement which afforded
him vast delight. When he was seven he rushed about the alleys, crawled
under the stalls, ferreted amongst the zinc bound fish boxes, and became
the spoiled pet of all the women. Whenever they showed him something
fresh which pleased him, he would clasp his hands and exclaim in
ecstasy, "Oh, isn't it stunning!" _Muche_ was the exact word which he
used; _muche_ being the equivalent of "stunning" in the lingo of the
markets; and he used the expression so often that it clung to him as a
nickname. He became known all over the place as "Muche." It was Muche
here, there and everywhere; no one called him anything else. He was to
be met with in every nook; in out-of-the-way corners of the offices in
the auction pavilion; among the piles of oyster baskets, and betwixt the
buckets where the refuse was thrown. With a pinky fairness of skin, he
was like a young barbel frisking and gliding about in deep water. He
was as fond of running, streaming water as any young fry. He was
ever dabbling in the pools in the alleys. He wetted himself with the
drippings from the tables, and when no one was looking often slyly
turned on the taps, rejoicing in the bursting gush of water. But it was
especially beside the fountains near the cellar steps that his mother
went to seek him in the evening, and she would bring him thence with his
hands quite blue, and his shoes, and even his pockets, full of water.

At seven years old Muche was as pretty as an angel, and as coarse in his
manners as any carter. He had curly chestnut hair, beautiful eyes,
and an innocent-looking mouth which gave vent to language that even a
gendarme would have hesitated to use. Brought up amidst all the ribaldry
and profanity of the markets, he had the whole vocabulary of the place
on the tip of his tongue. With his hands on his hips he often mimicked
Grandmother Mehudin in her anger, and at these times the coarsest and
vilest expressions would stream from his lips in a voice of crystalline
purity that might have belonged to some little chorister chanting the
_Ave Maria_. He would even try to assume a hoarse roughness of tone,
seek to degrade and taint that exquisite freshness of childhood which
made him resemble a _bambino_ on the Madonna's knees. The fish-wives
laughed at him till they cried; and he, encouraged, could scarcely say a
couple of words without rapping out an oath. But in spite of all this he
still remained charming, understanding nothing of the dirt amidst which
he lived, kept in vigorous health by the fresh breezes and sharp odours
of the fish market, and reciting his vocabulary of coarse indecencies
with as pure a face as though he were saying his prayers.

The winter was approaching, and Muche seemed very sensitive to the cold.
As soon as the chilly weather set in he manifested a strong predilection
for the inspector's office. This was situated in the left-hand corner of
the pavilion, on the side of the Rue Rambuteau. The furniture consisted
of a table, a stack of drawers, an easy-chair, two other chairs, and a
stove. It was this stove which attracted Muche. Florent quite worshipped
children, and when he saw the little fellow, with his dripping legs,
gazing wistfully through the window, he made him come inside. His first
conversation with the lad caused him profound amazement. Muche sat down
in front of the stove, and in his quiet voice exclaimed: "I'll just
toast my toes, do you see? It's d----d cold this morning." Then he broke
into a rippling laugh, and added: "Aunt Claire looks awfully blue this
morning. Is it true, sir, that you are sweet on her?"

Amazed though he was, Florent felt quite interested in the odd little
fellow. The handsome Norman retained her surly bearing, but allowed
her son to frequent the inspector's office without a word of objection.
Florent consequently concluded that he had the mother's permission to
receive the boy, and every afternoon he asked him in; by degrees forming
the idea of turning him into a steady, respectable young fellow. He
could almost fancy that his brother Quenu had grown little again, and
that they were both in the big room in the Rue Royer-Collard once more.
The life which his self-sacrificing nature pictured to him as perfect
happiness was a life spent with some young being who would never grow
up, whom he could go on teaching for ever, and in whose innocence he
might still love his fellow man. On the third day of his acquaintance
with Muche he brought an alphabet to the office, and the lad delighted
him by the intelligence he manifested. He learned his letters with all
the sharp precocity which marks the Parisian street arab, and derived
great amusement from the woodcuts illustrating the alphabet.

He found opportunities, too, for plenty of fine fun in the little
office, where the stove still remained the chief attraction and a source
of endless enjoyment. At first he cooked potatoes and chestnuts at it,
but presently these seemed insipid, and he thereupon stole some gudgeons
from his aunt Claire, roasted them one by one, suspended from a string
in front of the glowing fire, and then devoured them with gusto, though
he had no bread. One day he even brought a carp with him; but it was
impossible to roast it sufficiently, and it made such a smell in the
office that both window and door had to be thrown open. Sometimes, when
the odour of all these culinary operations became too strong, Florent
would throw the fish into the street, but as a rule he only laughed. By
the end of a couple of months Muche was able to read fairly well, and
his copy-books did him credit.

Meantime, every evening the lad wearied his mother with his talk about
his good friend Florent. His good friend Florent had drawn him pictures
of trees and of men in huts, said he. His good friend Florent waved his
arm and said that men would be far better if they all knew how to read.
And at last La Normande heard so much about Florent that she seemed
to be almost intimate with this man against whom she harboured so much
rancour. One day she shut Muche up at home to prevent him from going to
the inspector's, but he cried so bitterly that she gave him his liberty
again on the following morning. There was very little determination
about her, in spite of her broad shoulders and bold looks. When the lad
told her how nice and warm he had been in the office, and came back to
her with his clothes quite dry, she felt a sort of vague gratitude, a
pleasure in knowing that he had found a shelter-place where he could sit
with his feet in front of a fire. Later on, she was quite touched when
he read her some words from a scrap of soiled newspaper wrapped round
a slice of conger-eel. By degrees, indeed, she began to think, though
without admitting it, that Florent could not really be a bad sort of
fellow. She felt respect for his knowledge, mingled with an increasing
curiosity to see more of him and learn something of his life. Then, all
at once, she found an excuse for gratifying this inquisitiveness. She
would use it as a means of vengeance. It would be fine fun to make
friends with Florent and embroil him with that great fat Lisa.

"Does your good friend Florent ever speak to you about me?" she asked
Muche one morning as she was dressing him.

"Oh, no," replied the boy. "We enjoy ourselves."

"Well, you can tell him that I've quite forgiven him, and that I'm much
obliged to him for having taught you to read."

Thenceforward the child was entrusted with some message every day. He
went backwards and forwards from his mother to the inspector, and from
the inspector to his mother, charged with kindly words and questions and
answers, which he repeated mechanically without knowing their meaning.
He might, indeed, have been safely trusted with the most compromising
communications. However, the beautiful Norman felt afraid of appearing
timid, and so one day she herself went to the inspector's office and sat
down on the second chair, while Muche was having his writing lesson.
She proved very suave and complimentary, and Florent was by far the more
embarrassed of the two. They only spoke of the lad; and when Florent
expressed a fear that he might not be able to continue the lessons
in the office, La Normande invited him to come to their home in the
evening. She spoke also of payment; but at this he blushed, and said
that he certainly would not come if any mention were made of money.
Thereupon the young woman determined in her own mind that she would
recompense him with presents of choice fish.

Peace was thus made between them; the beautiful Norman even took Florent
under her protection. Apart from this, however, the whole market was
becoming reconciled to the new inspector, the fish-wives arriving at the
conclusion that he was really a better fellow than Monsieur Verlaque,
notwithstanding his strange eyes. It was only old Madame Mehudin who
still shrugged her shoulders, full of rancour as she was against the
"long lanky-guts," as she contemptuously called him. And then, too, a
strange thing happened. One morning, when Florent stopped with a smile
before Claire's tanks, the girl dropped an eel which she was holding and
angrily turned her back upon him, her cheeks quite swollen and reddened
by temper. The inspector was so much astonished that he spoke to La
Normande about it.

"Oh, never mind her," said the young woman; "she's cracked. She makes
a point of always differing from everybody else. She only behaved like
that to annoy me."

La Normande was now triumphant--she strutted about her stall, and became
more coquettish than ever, arranging her hair in the most elaborate
manner. Meeting the handsome Lisa one day she returned her look of
scorn, and even burst out laughing in her face. The certainty she felt
of driving the mistress of the pork shop to despair by winning her
cousin from her endowed her with a gay, sonorous laugh, which rolled up
from her chest and rippled her white plump neck. She now had the whim
of dressing Muche very showily in a little Highland costume and velvet
bonnet. The lad had never previously worn anything but a tattered
blouse. It unfortunately happened, however, that just about this time he
again became very fond of the water. The ice had melted and the weather
was mild, so he gave his Scotch jacket a bath, turning the fountain tap
on at full flow and letting the water pour down his arm from his elbow
to his hand. He called this "playing at gutters." Then a little later,
when his mother came up and caught him, she found him with two other
young scamps watching a couple of little fishes swimming about in his
velvet cap, which he had filled with water.

For nearly eight months Florent lived in the markets, feeling continual
drowsiness. After his seven years of suffering he had lighted upon such
calm quietude, such unbroken regularity of life, that he was scarcely
conscious of existing. He gave himself up to this jog-trot peacefulness
with a dazed sort of feeling, continually experiencing surprise at
finding himself each morning in the same armchair in the little office.
This office with its bare hut-like appearance had a charm for him. He
here found a quiet and secluded refuge amidst that ceaseless roar of the
markets which made him dream of some surging sea spreading around
him, and isolating him from the world. Gradually, however, a vague
nervousness began to prey upon him; he became discontented, accused
himself of faults which he could not define, and began to rebel against
the emptiness which he experienced more and more acutely in mind and
body. Then, too, the evil smells of the fish market brought him nausea.
By degrees he became unhinged, his vague boredom developing into
restless, nervous excitement.

All his days were precisely alike, spent among the same sounds and the
same odours. In the mornings the noisy buzzing of the auction sales
resounded in his ears like a distant echo of bells; and sometimes, when
there was a delay in the arrival of the fish, the auctions continued
till very late. Upon these occasions he remained in the pavilion till
noon, disturbed at every moment by quarrels and disputes, which he
endeavoured to settle with scrupulous justice. Hours elapsed before he
could get free of some miserable matter or other which was exciting the
market. He paced up and down amidst the crush and uproar of the sales,
slowly perambulating the alleys and occasionally stopping in front of
the stalls which fringed the Rue Rambuteau, and where lay rosy heaps of
prawns and baskets of boiled lobsters with tails tied backwards, while
live ones were gradually dying as they sprawled over the marble
slabs. And then he would watch gentlemen in silk hats and black gloves
bargaining with the fish-wives, and finally going off with boiled
lobsters wrapped in paper in the pockets of their frock-coats.[*]
Farther away, at the temporary stalls, where the commoner sorts of fish
were sold, he would recognise the bareheaded women of the neighbourhood,
who always came at the same hour to make their purchases.

[*] The little fish-basket for the use of customers, so
familiar in London, is not known in Paris.--Translator.

At times he took an interest in some well-dressed lady trailing her lace
petticoats over the damp stones, and escorted by a servant in a white
apron; and he would follow her at a little distance on noticing how the
fish-wives shrugged their shoulders at sight of her air of disgust. The
medley of hampers and baskets and bags, the crowd of skirts flitting
along the damp alleys, occupied his attention until lunchtime. He took a
delight in the dripping water and the fresh breeze as he passed from the
acrid smell of the shell-fish to the pungent odour of the salted fish.
It was always with the latter that he brought his official round of
inspection to a close. The cases of red herrings, the Nantes sardines on
their layers of leaves, and the rolled cod, exposed for sale under
the eyes of stout, faded fish-wives, brought him thoughts of a voyage
necessitating a vast supply of salted provisions.

In the afternoon the markets became quieter, grew drowsy; and Florent
then shut himself up in his office, made out his reports, and enjoyed
the happiest hours of his day. If he happened to go out and cross
the fish market, he found it almost deserted. There was no longer the
crushing and pushing and uproar of ten o'clock in the morning. The
fish-wives, seated behind their stalls, leant back knitting, while a
few belated purchasers prowled about casting sidelong glances at the
remaining fish, with the thoughtful eyes and compressed lips of women
closely calculating the price of their dinner. At last the twilight
fell, there was a noise of boxes being moved, and the fish was laid for
the night on beds of ice; and then, after witnessing the closing of the
gates, Florent went off, seemingly carrying the fish market along with
him in his clothes and his beard and his hair.

For the first few months this penetrating odour caused him no great
discomfort. The winter was a severe one, the frosts converted the alleys
into slippery mirrors, and the fountains and marble slabs were fringed
with a lacework of ice. In the mornings it was necessary to place little
braziers underneath the taps before a drop of water could be drawn. The
frozen fish had twisted tails; and, dull of hue and hard to the touch
like unpolished metal, gave out a ringing sound akin to that of pale
cast-iron when it snaps. Until February the pavilion presented a most
mournful appearance: it was deserted, and wrapped in a bristling shroud
of ice. But with March came a thaw, with mild weather and fogs and rain.
Then the fish became soft again, and unpleasant odours mingled with the
smell of mud wafted from the neighbouring streets. These odours were as
yet vague, tempered by the moisture which clung to the ground. But in
the blazing June afternoons a reeking stench arose, and the atmosphere
became heavy with a pestilential haze. The upper windows were then
opened, and huge blinds of grey canvas were drawn beneath the burning
sky. Nevertheless, a fiery rain seemed to be pouring down, heating the
market as though it were a big stove, and there was not a breath of air
to waft away the noxious emanations from the fish. A visible steam went
up from the stalls.

The masses of food amongst which Florent lived now began to cause him
the greatest discomfort. The disgust with which the pork shop had filled
him came back in a still more intolerable fashion. He almost sickened
as he passed these masses of fish, which, despite all the water lavished
upon them, turned bad under a sudden whiff of hot air. Even when he shut
himself up in his office his discomfort continued, for the abominable
odour forced its way through the chinks in the woodwork of the window
and door. When the sky was grey and leaden, the little room remained
quite dark; and then the day was like a long twilight in the depths of
some fetid march. He was often attacked by fits of nervous excitement,
and felt a craving desire to walk; and he would then descend into the
cellars by the broad staircase opening in the middle of the pavilion. In
the pent-up air down below, in the dim light of the occasional gas jets,
he once more found the refreshing coolness diffused by pure cold water.
He would stand in front of the big tank where the reserve stock of live
fish was kept, and listen to the ceaseless murmur of the four streamlets
of water falling from the four corners of the central urn, and then
spreading into a broad stream and gliding beneath the locked gratings of
the basins with a gentle and continuous flow. This subterranean spring,
this stream murmuring in the gloom, had a tranquillising effect upon
him. Of an evening, too, he delighted in the fine sunsets which threw
the delicate lacework of the market buildings blackly against the red
glow of the heavens. The dancing dust of the last sun rays streamed
through every opening, through every chink of the Venetian shutters,
and the whole was like some luminous transparency on which the slender
shafts of the columns, the elegant curves of the girders, and the
geometrical tracery of the roofs were minutely outlined. Florent
feasted his eyes on this mighty diagram washed in with Indian ink on
phosphorescent vellum, and his mind reverted to his old fancy of a
colossal machine with wheels and levers and beams espied in the crimson
glow of the fires blazing beneath its boilers. At each consecutive hour
of the day the changing play of the light--from the bluish haze of early
morning and the black shadows of noon to the flaring of the sinking sun
and the paling of its fires in the ashy grey of the twilight--revealed
the markets under a new aspect; but on the flaming evenings, when the
foul smells arose and forced their way across the broad yellow beams
like hot puffs of steam, Florent again experienced discomfort, and
his dream changed, and he imagined himself in some gigantic knacker's
boiling-house where the fat of a whole people was being melted down.

The coarseness of the market people, whose words and gestures seemed to
be infected with the evil smell of the place, also made him suffer. He
was very tolerant, and showed no mock modesty; still, these impudent
women often embarrassed him. Madame Francois, whom he had again met,
was the only one with whom he felt at ease. She showed such pleasure
on learning he had found a berth and was quite comfortable and out of
worry, as she put it, that he was quite touched. The laughter of Lisa,
the handsome Norman, and the others disquieted him; but of Madame
Francois he would willingly have made a confidante. She never laughed
mockingly at him; when she did laugh, it was like a woman rejoicing at
another's happiness. She was a brave, plucky creature, too; hers was a
hard business in winter, during the frosts, and the rainy weather was
still more trying. On some mornings Florent saw her arrive in a pouring
deluge which had been slowly, coldly falling ever since the previous
night. Between Nanterre and Paris the wheels of her cart had sunk up to
the axles in mud, and Balthazar was caked with mire to his belly. His
mistress would pity him and sympathise with him as she wiped him down
with some old aprons.

"The poor creatures are very sensitive," said she; "a mere nothing gives
them a cold. Ah, my poor old Balthazar! I really thought that we had
tumbled into the Seine as we crossed the Neuilly bridge, the rain came
down in such a deluge!"

While Balthazar was housed in the inn stable his mistress remained in
the pouring rain to sell her vegetables. The footway was transformed
into a lake of liquid mud. The cabbages, carrots, and turnips were
pelted by the grey water, quite drowned by the muddy torrent that rushed
along the pavement. There was no longer any of that glorious greenery
so apparent on bright mornings. The market gardeners, cowering in their
heavy cloaks beneath the downpour, swore at the municipality which,
after due inquiry, had declared that rain was in no way injurious to
vegetables, and that there was accordingly no necessity to erect any
shelters.

Those rainy mornings greatly worried Florent, who thought about Madame
Francois. He always managed to slip away and get a word with her. But
he never found her at all low-spirited. She shook herself like a poodle,
saying that she was quite used to such weather, and was not made of
sugar, to melt away beneath a few drops of rain. However, he made her
seek refuge for a few minutes in one of the covered ways, and frequently
even took her to Monsieur Lebigre's, where they had some hot wine
together. While she with her peaceful face beamed on him in all
friendliness, he felt quite delighted with the healthy odour of the
fields which she brought into the midst of the foul market atmosphere.
She exhaled a scent of earth, hay, fresh air, and open skies.

"You must come to Nanterre, my lad," she said to him, "and look at my
kitchen garden. I have put borders of thyme everywhere. How bad your
villainous Paris does smell!"

Then she went off, dripping. Florent, on his side, felt quite
re-invigorated when he parted from her. He tried, too the effect of work
upon the nervous depression from which he suffered. He was a man of a
very methodical temperament, and sometimes carried out his plans for the
allotment of his time with a strictness that bordered on mania. He shut
himself up two evenings a week in order to write an exhaustive work on
Cayenne. His modest bedroom was excellently adapted, he thought, to
calm his mind and incline him to work. He lighted his fire, saw that
the pomegranate at the foot of the bed was looking all right, and then
seated himself at the little table, and remained working till midnight.
He had pushed the missal and Dream-book back in the drawer, which was
now filling with notes, memoranda, manuscripts of all kinds. The work
on Cayenne made but slow progress, however, as it was constantly being
interrupted by other projects, plans for enormous undertakings which
he sketched out in a few words. He successively drafted an outline of
a complete reform of the administrative system of the markets, a scheme
for transforming the city dues, levied on produce as it entered Paris,
into taxes levied upon the sales, a new system of victualling the poorer
neighbourhoods, and, lastly, a somewhat vague socialist enactment for
the storing in common warehouses of all the provisions brought to the
markets, and the ensuring of a minimum daily supply to each household in
Paris. As he sat there, with his head bent over his table, and his mind
absorbed in thoughts of all these weighty matters, his gloomy figure
cast a great black shadow on the soft peacefulness of the garret.
Sometimes a chaffinch which he had picked up one snowy day in the market
would mistake the lamplight for the day, and break the silence, which
only the scratching of Florent's pen on his paper disturbed, by a cry.

Florent was fated to revert to politics. He had suffered too much
through them not to make them the dearest occupation of his life. Under
other conditions he might have become a good provincial schoolmaster,
happy in the peaceful life of some little town. But he had been treated
as though he were a wolf, and felt as though he had been marked out
by exile for some great combative task. His nervous discomfort was the
outcome of his long reveries at Cayenne, the brooding bitterness he had
felt at his unmerited sufferings, and the vows he had secretly sworn to
avenge humanity and justice--the former scourged with a whip, and the
latter trodden under foot. Those colossal markets and their teeming
odoriferous masses of food had hastened the crisis. To Florent they
appeared symbolical of some glutted, digesting beast, of Paris,
wallowing in its fat and silently upholding the Empire. He seemed to be
encircled by swelling forms and sleek, fat faces, which ever and
ever protested against his own martyrlike scragginess and sallow,
discontented visage. To him the markets were like the stomach of the
shopkeeping classes, the stomach of all the folks of average rectitude
puffing itself out, rejoicing, glistening in the sunshine, and declaring
that everything was for the best, since peaceable people had never
before grown so beautifully fat. As these thoughts passed through his
mind Florent clenched his fists, and felt ready for a struggle, more
irritated now by the thought of his exile than he had been when he first
returned to France. Hatred resumed entire possession of him. He often
let his pen drop and became absorbed in dreams. The dying fire cast a
bright glow upon his face; the lamp burned smokily, and the chaffinch
fell asleep again on one leg, with its head tucked under its wing.

Sometimes Auguste, on coming upstairs at eleven o'clock and seeing the
light shining under the door, would knock, before going to bed. Florent
admitted him with some impatience. The assistant sat down in front of
the fire, speaking but little, and never saying why he had come. His
eyes would all the time remain fixed upon the photograph of himself and
Augustine in their Sunday finery. Florent came to the conclusion that
the young man took a pleasure in visiting the room for the simple reason
that it had been occupied by his sweetheart; and one evening he asked
him with a smile if he had guessed rightly.

"Well, perhaps it is so," replied Auguste, very much surprised at the
discovery which he himself now made of the reasons which actuated him.
"I'd really never thought of that before. I came to see you without
knowing why. But if I were to tell Augustine, how she'd laugh!"

Whenever he showed himself at all loquacious, his one eternal theme was
the pork shop which he was going to set up with Augustine at Plaisance.
He seemed so perfectly assured of arranging his life in accordance
with his desires, that Florent grew to feel a sort of respect for him,
mingled with irritation. After all, the young fellow was very resolute
and energetic, in spite of his seeming stupidity. He made straight
for the goal he had in view, and would doubtless reach it in perfect
assurance and happiness. On the evenings of these visits from the
apprentice, Florent could not settle down to work again; he went off to
bed in a discontented mood, and did not recover his equilibrium till
the thought passed through his mind, "Why, that Auguste is a perfect
animal!"

Every month he went to Clamart to see Monsieur Verlaque. These visits
were almost a delight to him. The poor man still lingered on, to the
great astonishment of Gavard, who had not expected him to last for more
than six months. Every time that Florent went to see him Verlaque would
declare that he was feeling better, and was most anxious to resume his
work again. But the days glided by, and he had serious relapses. Florent
would sit by his bedside, chat about the fish market, and do what he
could to enliven him. He deposited on the pedestal table the fifty
francs which he surrendered to him each month; and the old inspector,
though the payment had been agreed upon, invariably protested, and
seemed disinclined to take the money. Then they would begin to speak of
something else, and the coins remained lying on the table. When Florent
went away, Madame Verlaque always accompanied him to the street door.
She was a gentle little woman, of a very tearful disposition. Her one
topic of conversation was the expense necessitated by her husband's
illness, the costliness of chicken broth, butcher's meat, Bordeaux
wine, medicine, and doctors' fees. Her doleful conversation greatly
embarrassed Florent, and on the first few occasions he did not
understand the drift of it. But at last, as the poor woman seemed always
in a state of tears, and kept saying how happy and comfortable they had
been when they had enjoyed the full salary of eighteen hundred francs
a year, he timidly offered to make her a private allowance, to be
kept secret from her husband. This offer, however, she declined,
inconsistently declaring that the fifty francs were sufficient. But in
the course of the month she frequently wrote to Florent, calling
him their saviour. Her handwriting was small and fine, yet she would
contrive to fill three pages of letter paper with humble, flowing
sentences entreating the loan of ten francs; and this she at last did so
regularly that wellnigh the whole of Florent's hundred and fifty francs
found its way to the Verlaques. The husband was probably unaware of
it; however, the wife gratefully kissed Florent's hands. This charity
afforded him the greatest pleasure, and he concealed it as though it
were some forbidden selfish indulgence.

"That rascal Verlaque is making a fool of you," Gavard would sometimes
say. "He's coddling himself up finely now that you are doing the work
and paying him an income."

At last one day Florent replied:

"Oh, we've arranged matters together. I'm only to give him twenty-five
francs a month in future."

As a matter of fact, Florent had but little need of money. The Quenus
continued to provide him with board and lodging; and the few francs
which he kept by him sufficed to pay for the refreshment he took in the
evening at Monsieur Lebigre's. His life had gradually assumed all the
regularity of clockwork. He worked in his bedroom, continued to teach
little Muche twice a week from eight to nine o'clock, devoted an evening
to Lisa, to avoid offending her, and spent the rest of his spare time in
the little "cabinet" with Gavard and his friends.

When he went to the Mehudins' there was a touch of tutorial stiffness
in his gentle demeanour. He was pleased with the old house in the
Rue Pirouette. On the ground floor he passed through the faint odours
pervading the premises of the purveyor of cooked vegetables. Big pans of
boiled spinach and sorrel stood cooling in the little backyard. Then he
ascended the winding staircase, greasy and dark, with worn and bulging
steps which sloped in a disquieting manner. The Mehudins occupied the
whole of the second floor. Even when they had attained to comfortable
circumstances the old mother had always declined to move into fresh
quarters, despite all the supplications of her daughters, who dreamt of
living in a new house in a fine broad street. But on this point the old
woman was not to be moved; she had lived there, she said, and meant to
die there. She contented herself, moreover, with a dark little closet,
leaving the largest rooms to Claire and La Normande. The later, with
the authority of the elder born, had taken possession of the room that
overlooked the street; it was the best and largest of the suite. Claire
was so much annoyed at her sister's action in the matter that she
refused to occupy the adjoining room, whose window overlooked the yard,
and obstinately insisted on sleeping on the other side of the landing,
in a sort of garret, which she did not even have whitewashed. However,
she had her own key, and so was independent; directly anything happened
to displease her she locked herself up in her own quarters.

As a rule, when Florent arrived the Mehudins were just finishing
their dinner. Muche sprang to his neck, and for a moment the young man
remained seated with the lad chattering between his legs. Then, when
the oilcloth cover had been wiped, the lesson began on a corner of
the table. The beautiful Norman gave Florent a cordial welcome. She
generally began to knit or mend some linen, and would draw her chair up
to the table and work by the light of the same lamp as the others; and
she frequently put down her needle to listen to the lesson, which filled
her with surprise. She soon began to feel warm esteem for this man who
seemed so clever, who, in speaking to the little one, showed himself as
gentle as a woman, and manifested angelic patience in again and again
repeating the same instructions. She no longer considered him at all
plain, but even felt somewhat jealous of beautiful Lisa. And then she
drew her chair still nearer, and gazed at Florent with an embarrassing
smile.

"But you are jogging my elbow, mother, and I can't write," Muche
exclaimed angrily. "There! see what a blot you've made me make! Get
further away, do!"

La Normande now gradually began to say a good many unpleasant things
about beautiful Lisa. She pretended that the latter concealed her real
age, that she laced her stays so tightly that she nearly suffocated
herself, and that if she came down of a morning looking so trim and
neat, without a single hair out of place, it must be because she looked
perfectly hideous when in dishabille. Then La Normande would raise her
arm a little, and say that there was no need for her to wear any stays
to cramp and deform her figure. At these times the lessons would be
interrupted, and Muche gazed with interest at his mother as she raised
her arms. Florent listened to her, and even laughed, thinking to himself
that women were very odd creatures. The rivalry between the beautiful
Norman and beautiful Lisa amused him.

Muche, however, managed to finish his page of writing. Florent, who was
a good penman, set him copies in large hand and round hand on slips of
paper. The words he chose were very long and took up the whole line, and
he evinced a marked partiality for such expressions as "tyrannically,"
"liberticide," "unconstitutional," and "revolutionary." At times also
he made the boy copy such sentences as these: "The day of justice will
surely come"; "The suffering of the just man is the condemnation of the
oppressor"; "When the hour strikes, the guilty shall fall." In preparing
these copy slips he was, indeed, influenced by the ideas which haunted
his brain; he would for the time become quite oblivious of Muche, the
beautiful Norman, and all his surroundings. The lad would have copied
Rousseau's "Contrat Social" had he been told to do so; and thus,
drawing each letter in turn, he filled page after page with lines of
"tyrannically" and "unconstitutional."

As long as the tutor remained there, old Madame Mehudin kept fidgeting
round the table, muttering to herself. She still harboured terrible
rancour against Florent; and asserted that it was folly to make the lad
work in that way at a time when children should be in bed. She would
certainly have turned that "spindle-shanks" out of the house, if the
beautiful Norman, after a stormy scene, had not bluntly told her that
she would go to live elsewhere if she were not allowed to receive whom
she chose. However, the pair began quarrelling again on the subject
every evening.

"You may say what you like," exclaimed the old woman; "but he's got
treacherous eyes. And, besides, I'm always suspicious of those skinny
people. A skinny man's capable of anything. I've never come across a
decent one yet. That one's as flat as a board. And he's got such an ugly
face, too! Though I'm sixty-five and more, I'd precious soon send him
about his business if he came a-courting of me!"

She said this because she had a shrewd idea of how matters were likely
to turn out. And then she went on to speak in laudatory terms of
Monsieur Lebigre, who, indeed, paid the greatest attention to the
beautiful Norman. Apart from the handsome dowry which he imagined she
would bring with her, he considered that she would be a magnificent
acquisition to his counter. The old woman never missed an opportunity to
sound his praises; there was no lankiness, at any rate, about him, said
she; he was stout and strong, with a pair of calves which would have
done honour even to one of the Emperor's footmen.

However, La Normande shrugged her shoulders and snappishly replied:
"What do I care whether he's stout or not? I don't want him or anybody.
And besides, I shall do as I please."

Then, if the old woman became too pointed in her remarks, the other
added: "It's no business of yours, and besides, it isn't true. Hold
your tongue and don't worry me." And thereupon she would go off into
her room, banging the door behind her. Florent, however, had a yet
more bitter enemy than Madame Mehudin in the house. As soon as ever he
arrived there, Claire would get up without a word, take a candle, and go
off to her own room on the other side of the landing; and she could be
heard locking her door in a burst of sullen anger. One evening when
her sister asked the tutor to dinner, she prepared her own food on
the landing, and ate it in her bedroom; and now and again she secluded
herself so closely that nothing was seen of her for a week at a time.
She usually retained her appearance of soft lissomness, but periodically
had a fit of iron rigidity, when her eyes blazed from under her pale
tawny locks like those of a distrustful wild animal. Old Mother Mehudin,
fancying that she might relieve herself in her company, only made her
furious by speaking to her of Florent; and thereupon the old woman, in
her exasperation, told everyone that she would have gone off and left
her daughters to themselves had she not been afraid of their devouring
each other if they remained alone together.

As Florent went away one evening, he passed in front of Claire's door,
which was standing wide open. He saw the girl look at him, and turn very
red. Her hostile demeanour annoyed him; and it was only the timidity
which he felt in the presence of women that restrained him from seeking
an explanation of her conduct. On this particular evening he would
certainly have addressed her if he had not detected Mademoiselle Saget's
pale face peering over the balustrade of the upper landing. So he went
his way, but had not taken a dozen steps before Claire's door was closed
behind him with such violence as to shake the whole staircase. It was
after this that Mademoiselle Saget, eager to propagate slander, went
about repeating everywhere that Madame Quenu's cousin was "carrying on"
most dreadfully with both the Mehudin girls.

Florent, however, gave very little thought to these two handsome young
women. His usual manner towards them was that of a man who has but
little success with the sex. Certainly he had come to entertain a
feeling of genuine friendship for La Normande, who really displayed a
very good heart when her impetuous temper did not run away with her. But
he never went any further than this. Moreover, the queenly proportions
of her robust figure filled him with a kind of alarm; and of an evening,
whenever she drew her chair up to the lamp and bent forward as though
to look at Muche's copy-book, he drew in his own sharp bony elbows and
shrunken shoulders as if realising what a pitiful specimen of humanity
he was by the side of that buxom, hardy creature so full of the life of
ripe womanhood. Moreover, there was another reason why he recoiled from
her. The smells of the markets distressed him; on finishing his duties
of an evening he would have liked to escape from the fishy odour amidst
which his days were spent; but, alas! beautiful though La Normande was,
this odour seemed to adhere to her silky skin. She had tried every
sort of aromatic oil, and bathed freely; but as soon as the freshening
influence of the bath was over her blood again impregnated her skin with
the faint odour of salmon, the musky perfume of smelts, and the pungent
scent of herrings and skate. Her skirts, too, as she moved about,
exhaled these fishy smells, and she walked as though amidst an
atmosphere redolent of slimy seaweed. With her tall, goddess-like
figure, her purity of form, and transparency of complexion she resembled
some lovely antique marble that had rolled about in the depths of the
sea and had been brought to land in some fisherman's net.

Mademoiselle Saget, however, swore by all her gods that Florent was the
young woman's lover. According to her account, indeed, he courted
both the sisters. She had quarrelled with the beautiful Norman about
a ten-sou dab; and ever since this falling-out she had manifested warm
friendship for handsome Lisa. By this means she hoped the sooner to
arrive at a solution of what she called the Quenus' mystery. Florent
still continued to elude her curiosity, and she told her friends that
she felt like a body without a soul, though she was careful not to
reveal what was troubling her so grievously. A young girl infatuated
with a hopeless passion could not have been in more distress than this
terrible old woman at finding herself unable to solve the mystery of the
Quenus' cousin. She was constantly playing the spy on Florent, following
him about, and watching him, in a burning rage at her failure to satisfy
her rampant curiosity. Now that he had begun to visit the Mehudins she
was for ever haunting the stairs and landings. She soon discovered that
handsome Lisa was much annoyed at Florent visiting "those women," and
accordingly she called at the pork shop every morning with a budget of
information. She went in shrivelled and shrunk by the frosty air, and,
resting her hands on the heating-pan to warm them, remained in front of
the counter buying nothing, but repeating in her shrill voice: "He
was with them again yesterday; he seems to live there now. I heard La
Normande call him 'my dear' on the staircase."

She indulged like this in all sorts of lies in order to remain in the
shop and continue warming her hands for a little longer. On the morning
after the evening when she had heard Claire close her door behind
Florent, she spun out her story for a good half hour, inventing all
sorts of mendacious and abominable particulars.

Lisa, who had assumed a look of contemptuous scorn, said but little,
simply encouraging Mademoiselle Saget's gossip by her silence. At last,
however, she interrupted her. "No, no," she said; "I can't really listen
to all that. Is it possible that there can be such women?"

Thereupon Mademoiselle Saget told Lisa that unfortunately all women were
not so well conducted as herself. And then she pretended to find all
sorts of excuses for Florent: it wasn't his fault; he was no doubt a
bachelor; these women had very likely inveigled him in their snares.
In this way she hinted questions without openly asking them. But Lisa
preserved silence with respect to her cousin, merely shrugging her
shoulders and compressing her lips. When Mademoiselle Saget at last went
away, the mistress of the shop glanced with disgust at the cover of the
heating-pan, the glistening metal of which had been tarnished by the
impression of the old woman's little hands.

"Augustine," she cried, "bring a duster, and wipe the cover of the
heating-pan. It's quite filthy!"

The rivalry between the beautiful Lisa and the beautiful Norman now
became formidable. The beautiful Norman flattered herself that she had
carried a lover off from her enemy; and the beautiful Lisa was indignant
with the hussy who, by luring the sly cousin to her home, would surely
end by compromising them all. The natural temperament of each woman
manifested itself in the hostilities which ensued. The one remained
calm and scornful, like a lady who holds up her skirts to keep them from
being soiled by the mud; while the other, much less subject to shame,
displayed insolent gaiety and swaggered along the footways with the airs
of a duellist seeking a cause of quarrel. Each of their skirmishes would
be the talk of the fish market for the whole day. When the beautiful
Norman saw the beautiful Lisa standing at the door of her shop, she
would go out of her way in order to pass her, and brush against her with
her apron; and then the angry glances of the two rivals crossed like
rapiers, with the rapid flash and thrust of pointed steel. When the
beautiful Lisa, on the other hand, went to the fish market, she assumed
an expression of disgust on approaching the beautiful Norman's stall.
And then she proceeded to purchase some big fish--a turbot or a
salmon--of a neighbouring dealer, spreading her money out on the marble
slab as she did so, for she had noticed that this seemed to have a
painful effect upon the "hussy," who ceased laughing at the sight. To
hear the two rivals speak, anyone would have supposed that the fish
and pork they sold were quite unfit for food. However, their principal
engagements took place when the beautiful Norman was seated at her stall
and the beautiful Lisa at her counter, and they glowered blackly at each
other across the Rue Rambuteau. They sat in state in their big white
aprons, decked out with showy toilets and jewels, and the battle between
them would commence early in the morning.

"Hallo, the fat woman's got up!" the beautiful Norman would exclaim.
"She ties herself up as tightly as her sausages! Ah, she's got
Saturday's collar on again, and she's still wearing that poplin dress!"

At the same moment, on the opposite side of the street, beautiful Lisa
was saying to her shop girl: "Just look at that creature staring at us
over yonder, Augustine! She's getting quite deformed by the life she
leads. Do you see her earrings? She's wearing those big drops of hers,
isn't she? It makes one feel ashamed to see a girl like that with
brilliants."

All complaisance, Augustine echoed her mistress's words.

When either of them was able to display a new ornament it was like
scoring a victory--the other one almost choked with spleen. Every day
they would scrutinise and count each other's customers, and manifest the
greatest annoyance if they thought that the "big thing over the way" was
doing the better business. Then they spied out what each had for lunch.
Each knew what the other ate, and even watched to see how she digested
it. In the afternoon, while the one sat amidst her cooked meats and the
other amidst her fish, they posed and gave themselves airs, as though
they were queens of beauty. It was then that the victory of the day was
decided. The beautiful Norman embroidered, selecting the most delicate
and difficult work, and this aroused Lisa's exasperation.

"Ah!" she said, speaking of her rival, "she had far better mend her
boy's stockings. He's running about quite barefooted. Just look at that
fine lady, with her red hands stinking of fish!"

For her part, Lisa usually knitted.

"She's still at that same sock," La Normande would say, as she watched
her. "She eats so much that she goes to sleep over her work. I pity her
poor husband if he's waiting for those socks to keep his feet warm!"

They would sit glowering at each other with this implacable hostility
until evening, taking note of every customer, and displaying such keen
eyesight that they detected the smallest details of each other's dress
and person when other women declared that they could see nothing at
such a distance. Mademoiselle Saget expressed the highest admiration for
Madame Quenu's wonderful sight when she one day detected a scratch on
the fish-girl's left cheek. With eyes like those, said the old maid,
one might even see through a door. However, the victory often remained
undecided when night fell; sometimes one or other of the rivals was
temporarily crushed, but she took her revenge on the morrow. Several
people of the neighbourhood actually laid wagers on these contests, some
backing the beautiful Lisa and others the beautiful Norman.

At last they ended by forbidding their children to speak to one another.
Pauline and Muche had formerly been good friends, notwithstanding the
girl's stiff petticoats and lady-like demeanour, and the lad's tattered
appearance, coarse language, and rough manners. They had at times played
together at horses on the broad footway in front of the fish market,
Pauline always being the horse and Muche the driver. One day, however,
when the boy came in all simplicity to seek his playmate, Lisa turned
him out of the house, declaring that he was a dirty little street arab.

"One can't tell what may happen with children who have been so
shockingly brought up," she observed.

"Yes, indeed; you are quite right," replied Mademoiselle Saget, who
happened to be present.

When Muche, who was barely seven years old, came in tears to his mother
to tell her of what had happened, La Normande broke out into a terrible
passion. At the first moment she felt a strong inclination to rush
over to the Quenu-Gradelles' and smash everything in their shop. But
eventually she contented herself with giving Muche a whipping.

"If ever I catch you going there again," she cried, boiling over with
anger, "you'll get it hot from me, I can tell you!"

Florent, however, was the real victim of the two women. It was he, in
truth, who had set them by the ears, and it was on his account that
they were fighting each other. Ever since he had appeared upon the scene
things had been going from bad to worse. He compromised and disturbed
and embittered all these people, who had previously lived in such sleek
peace and harmony. The beautiful Norman felt inclined to claw him when
he lingered too long with the Quenus, and it was chiefly from an impulse
of hostile rivalry that she desired to win him to herself. The beautiful
Lisa, on her side, maintained a cold judicial bearing, and although
extremely annoyed, forced herself to silence whenever she saw Florent
leaving the pork shop to go to the Rue Pirouette.

Still, there was now much less cordiality than formerly round the
Quenus' dinner-table in the evening. The clean, prim dining-room seemed
to have assumed an aspect of chilling severity. Florent divined a
reproach, a sort of condemnation in the bright oak, the polished lamp,
and the new matting. He scarcely dared to eat for fear of letting crumbs
fall on the floor or soiling his plate. There was a guileless simplicity
about him which prevented him from seeing how the land really lay.
He still praised Lisa's affectionate kindliness on all sides; and
outwardly, indeed, she did continue to treat him with all gentleness.

"It is very strange," she said to him one day with a smile, as though
she were joking; "although you don't eat at all badly now, you don't get
fatter. Your food doesn't seem to do you any good."

At this Quenu laughed aloud, and tapping his brother's stomach,
protested that the whole contents of the pork shop might pass through it
without depositing a layer of fat as thick as a two-sou piece. However,
Lisa's insistence on this particular subject was instinct with that same
suspicious dislike for fleshless men which Madame Mehudin manifested
more outspokenly; and behind it all there was likewise a veiled allusion
to the disorderly life which she imagined Florent was leading. She
never, however, spoke a word to him about La Normande. Quenu had
attempted a joke on the subject one evening, but Lisa had received it so
icily that the good man had not ventured to refer to the matter again.
They would remain seated at table for a few moments after dessert, and
Florent, who had noticed his sister-in-law's vexation if ever he went
off too soon, tried to find something to talk about. On these occasions
Lisa would be near him, and certainly he did not suffer in her presence
from that fishy smell which assailed him when he was in the company of
La Normande. The mistress of the pork shop, on the contrary, exhaled an
odour of fat and rich meats. Moreover, not a thrill of life stirred her
tight-fitting bodice; she was all massiveness and all sedateness.
Gavard once said to Florent in confidence that Madame Quenu was no doubt
handsome, but that for his part he did not admire such armour-plated
women.

Lisa avoided talking to Quenu of Florent. She habitually prided herself
on her patience, and considered, too, that it would not be proper to
cause any unpleasantness between the brothers, unless some peremptory
reason for her interference should arise. As she said, she could put up
with a good deal, but, of course, she must not be tried too far. She had
now reached the period of courteous tolerance, wearing an expressionless
face, affecting perfect indifference and strict politeness, and
carefully avoiding everything which might seem to hint that Florent was
boarding and lodging with them without their receiving the slightest
payment from him. Not, indeed, that she would have accepted any payment
from him, she was above all that; still he might, at any rate, she
thought, have lunched away from the house.

"We never seem to be alone now," she remarked to Quenu one day. "If
there is anything we want to say to one another we have to wait till we
go upstairs at night."

And then, one night when they were in bed, she said to him: "Your
brother earns a hundred and fifty francs a month, doesn't he? Well, it's
strange he can't put a trifle by to buy himself some more linen. I've
been obliged to give him three more of your old shirts."

"Oh, that doesn't matter," Quenu replied. "Florent's not hard to please;
and we must let him keep his money for himself."

"Oh, yes, of course," said Lisa, without pressing the matter further. "I
didn't mention it for that reason. Whether he spends his money well or
ill, it isn't our business."

In her own mind she felt quite sure that he wasted his salary at the
Mehudins'.

Only on one occasion did she break through her habitual calmness of
demeanour, the quiet reserve which was the result of both natural
temperament and preconceived design. The beautiful Norman had made
Florent a present of a magnificent salmon. Feeling very much embarrassed
with the fish, and not daring to refuse it, he brought it to Lisa.

"You can make a pasty of it," he said ingenuously.

Lisa looked at him sternly with whitening lips. Then, striving to
restrain her anger, she exclaimed: "Do you think that we are short of
food? Thank God, we've got quite enough to eat here! Take it back!"

"Well, at any rate, cook it for me," replied Florent, amazed by her
anger; "I'll eat it myself."

At this she burst out furiously.

"The house isn't an inn! Tell those who gave you the fish to cook it for
you! I won't have my pans tainted and infected! Take it back again! Do
you hear?"

If he had not gone away with it, she would certainly have seized it and
hurled it into the street. Florent took it to Monsieur Lebigre's, where
Rose was ordered to make a pasty of it; and one evening the pasty was
eaten in the little "cabinet," Gavard, who was present, "standing"
some oysters for the occasion. Florent now gradually came more and more
frequently to Monsieur Lebigre's, till at last he was constantly to be
met in the little private room. He there found an atmosphere of heated
excitement in which his political feverishness could pulsate freely.
At times, now, when he shut himself up in his garret to work, the quiet
simplicity of the little room irritated him, his theoretical search
for liberty proved quite insufficient, and it became necessary that he
should go downstairs, sally out, and seek satisfaction in the trenchant
axioms of Charvet and the wild outbursts of Logre. During the first few
evenings the clamour and chatter had made him feel ill at ease; he was
then quite conscious of their utter emptiness, but he felt a need of
drowning his thoughts, of goading himself on to some extreme resolution
which might calm his mental disquietude. The atmosphere of the little
room, reeking with the odour of spirits and warm with tobacco smoke,
intoxicated him and filled him with peculiar beatitude, prompting a kind
of self-surrender which made him willing to acquiesce in the wildest
ideas. He grew attached to those he met there, and looked for them
and awaited their coming with a pleasure which increased with habit.
Robine's mild, bearded countenance, Clemence's serious profile,
Charvet's fleshless pallor, Logre's hump, Gavard, Alexandre, and
Lacaille, all entered into his life, and assumed a larger and larger
place in it. He took quite a sensual enjoyment in these meetings.
When his fingers closed round the brass knob on the door of the little
cabinet it seemed to be animated with life, to warm him, and turn of its
own accord. Had he grasped the supple wrist of a woman he could not have
felt a more thrilling emotion.

To tell the truth, very serious things took place in that little room.
One evening, Logre, after indulging in wilder outbursts than usual,
banged his fist upon the table, declaring that if they were men they
would make a clean sweep of the Government. And he added that it was
necessary they should come to an understanding without further delay, if
they desired to be fully prepared when the time for action arrived. Then
they all bent their heads together, discussed the matter in lower tones,
and decided to form a little "group," which should be ready for whatever
might happen. From that day forward Gavard flattered himself that he
was a member of a secret society, and was engaged in a conspiracy. The
little circle received no new members, but Logre promised to put it into
communication with other associations with which he was acquainted; and
then, as soon as they held all Paris in their grasp, they would rise
and make the Tuileries' people dance. A series of endless discussions,
renewed during several months, then began--discussions on questions of
organisation, on questions of ways and means, on questions of strategy,
and of the form of the future Government. As soon as Rose had brought
Clemence's grog, Charvet's and Robine's beer, the coffee for Logre,
Gavard, and Florent, and the liqueur glasses of brandy for Lacaille
and Alexandre, the door of the cabinet was carefully fastened, and the
debate began.

Charvet and Florent were naturally those whose utterances were listened
to with the greatest attention. Gavard had not been able to keep his
tongue from wagging, but had gradually related the whole story of
Cayenne; and Florent found himself surrounded by a halo of martyrdom.
His words were received as though they were the expression of
indisputable dogmas. One evening, however, the poultry dealer, vexed
at hearing his friend, who happened to be absent, attacked, exclaimed:
"Don't say anything against Florent; he's been to Cayenne!"

Charvet was rather annoyed by the advantage which this circumstance
gave to Florent. "Cayenne, Cayenne," he muttered between his teeth. "Ah,
well, they were not so badly off there, after all."

Then he attempted to prove that exile was a mere nothing, and that real
suffering consisted in remaining in one's oppressed country, gagged in
presence of triumphant despotism. And besides, he urged, it wasn't his
fault that he hadn't been arrested on the Second of December. Next,
however, he hinted that those who had allowed themselves to be captured
were imbeciles. His secret jealousy made him a systematic opponent of
Florent; and the general discussions always ended in a duel between
these two, who, while their companions listened in silence, would speak
against one another for hours at a time, without either of them allowing
that he was beaten.

One of the favourite subjects of discussion was that of the
reorganisation of the country which would have to be effected on the
morrow of their victory.

"We are the conquerors, are we not?" began Gavard.

And, triumph being taken for granted, everyone offered his opinion.
There were two rival parties. Charvet, who was a disciple of Hebert, was
supported by Logre and Robine; while Florent, who was always absorbed
in humanitarian dreams, and called himself a Socialist, was backed by
Alexandre and Lacaille. As for Gavard, he felt no repugnance for violent
action; but, as he was often twitted about his fortune with no end of
sarcastic witticisms which annoyed him, he declared himself a Communist.

"We must make a clean sweep of everything," Charvet would curtly say, as
though he were delivering a blow with a cleaver. "The trunk is rotten,
and it must come down."

"Yes! yes!" cried Logre, standing up that he might look taller,
and making the partition shake with the excited motion of his hump.
"Everything will be levelled to the ground; take my word for it. After
that we shall see what to do."

Robine signified approval by wagging his beard. His silence seemed
instinct with delight whenever violent revolutionary propositions were
made. His eyes assumed a soft ecstatic expression at the mention of the
guillotine. He half closed them, as though he could see the machine, and
was filled with pleasant emotion at the sight; and next he would gently
rub his chin against the knob of his stick, with a subdued purr of
satisfaction.

"All the same," said Florent, in whose voice a vague touch of sadness
lingered, "if you cut down the tree it will be necessary to preserve
some seed. For my part, I think that the tree ought to be preserved, so
that we may graft new life on it. The political revolution, you know,
has already taken place; to-day we have got to think of the labourer,
the working man. Our movement must be altogether a social one. I defy
you to reject the claims of the people. They are weary of waiting, and
are determined to have their share of happiness."

These words aroused Alexandre's enthusiasm. With a beaming, radiant face
he declared that this was true, that the people were weary of waiting.

"And we will have our share," added Lacaille, with a more menacing
expression. "All the revolutions that have taken place have been for
the good of the middle classes. We've had quite enough of that sort of
thing, and the next one shall be for our benefit."

From this moment disagreement set in. Gavard offered to make a division
of his property, but Logre declined, asserting that he cared nothing for
money. Then Charvet gradually overcame the tumult, till at last he alone
was heard speaking.

"The selfishness of the different classes does more than anything else
to uphold tyranny," said he. "It is wrong of the people to display
egotism. If they assist us they shall have their share. But why should
I fight for the working man if the working man won't fight for
me? Moreover, that is not the question at present. Ten years of
revolutionary dictatorship will be necessary to accustom a nation like
France to the fitting enjoyment of liberty."

"All the more so as the working man is not ripe for it, and requires to
be directed," said Clemence bluntly.

She but seldom spoke. This tall, serious looking girl, alone among
so many men, listened to all the political chatter with a learnedly
critical air. She leaned back against the partition, and every now and
then sipped her grog whilst gazing at the speakers with frowning
brows or inflated nostrils, thus silently signifying her approval or
disapproval, and making it quite clear that she held decided opinions
upon the most complicated matters. At times she would roll a cigarette,
and puff slender whiffs of smoke from the corners of her mouth, whilst
lending increased attention to what was being debated. It was as though
she were presiding over the discussion, and would award the prize to
the victor when it was finished. She certainly considered that it became
her, as a woman, to display some reserve in her opinions, and to remain
calm whilst the men grew more and more excited. Now and then, however,
in the heat of the debate, she would let a word or a phrase escape her
and "clench the matter" even for Charvet himself, as Gavard said. In her
heart she believed herself the superior of all these fellows. The only
one of them for whom she felt any respect was Robine, and she would
thoughtfully contemplate his silent bearing.

Neither Florent nor any of the others paid any special attention to
Clemence. They treated her just as though she were a man, shaking hands
with her so roughly as almost to dislocate her arms. One evening Florent
witnessed the periodical settlement of accounts between her and Charvet.
She had just received her pay, and Charvet wanted to borrow ten francs
from her; but she first of all insisted that they must reckon up
how matters stood between them. They lived together in a voluntary
partnership, each having complete control of his or her earnings, and
strictly paying his or her expenses. By so doing, said they, they were
under no obligations to one another, but retained entire freedom. Rent,
food, washing, and amusements, were all noted down and added up. That
evening, when the accounts had been verified, Clemence proved to Charvet
that he already owed her five francs. Then she handed him the other ten
which he wished to borrow, and exclaimed: "Recollect that you now owe me
fifteen. I shall expect you to repay me on the fifth, when you get paid
for teaching little Lehudier."

When Rose was summoned to receive payment for the "drinks," each
produced the few coppers required to discharge his or her liability.
Charvet laughingly called Clemence an aristocrat because she drank grog.
She wanted to humiliate him, said he, and make him feel that he earned
less than she did, which, as it happened, was the fact. Beneath his
laugh, however, there was a feeling of bitterness that the girl should
be better circumstanced than himself, for, in spite of his theory of the
equality of the sexes, this lowered him.

Although the discussions in the little room had virtually no result,
they served to exercise the speakers' lungs. A tremendous hubbub
proceeded from the sanctum, and the panes of frosted glass vibrated
like drum-skins. Sometimes the uproar became so great that Rose, while
languidly serving some blouse-wearing customer in the shop, would turn
her head uneasily.

"Why, they're surely fighting together in there," the customer would
say, as he put his glass down on the zinc-covered counter, and wiped his
mouth with the back of his hand.

"Oh, there's no fear of that," Monsieur Lebigre tranquilly replied.
"It's only some gentlemen talking together."

Monsieur Lebigre, indeed, although very strict with his other customers,
allowed the politicians to shout as loudly as they pleased, and never
made the least remark on the subject. He would sit for hours together on
the bench behind the counter, with his big head lolling drowsily against
the mirror, whilst he watched Rose uncorking the bottles and giving a
wipe here and there with her duster. And in spite of the somniferous
effects of the wine fumes and the warm streaming gaslight, he would keep
his ears open to the sounds proceeding from the little room. At times,
when the voices grew noisier than usual, he got up from his seat and
went to lean against the partition; and occasionally he even pushed the
door open, and went inside and sat down there for a few minutes, giving
Gavard a friendly slap on the thigh. And then he would nod approval
of everything that was said. The poultry dealer asserted that although
friend Lebigre hadn't the stuff of an orator in him, they might safely
reckon on him when the "shindy" came.

One morning, however, at the markets, when a tremendous row broke out
between Rose and one of the fish-wives, through the former accidentally
knocking over a basket of herrings, Florent heard Rose's employer spoken
of as a "dirty spy" in the pay of the police. And after he had succeeded
in restoring peace, all sorts of stories about Monsieur Lebigre were
poured into his ears. Yes, the wine seller was in the pay of the police,
the fish-wives said; all the neighbourhood knew it. Before Mademoiselle
Saget had begun to deal with him she had once met him entering the
Prefecture to make his report. It was asserted, too, that he was a
money-monger, a usurer, and lent petty sums by the day to costermongers,
and let out barrows to them, exacting a scandalous rate of interest in
return. Florent was greatly disturbed by all this, and felt it his
duty to repeat it that evening to his fellow politicians. The latter,
however, only shrugged their shoulders, and laughed at his uneasiness.

"Poor Florent!" Charvet exclaimed sarcastically; "he imagines the whole
police force is on his track, just because he happens to have been sent
to Cayenne!"

Gavard gave his word of honour that Lebigre was perfectly staunch and
true, while Logre, for his part, manifested extreme irritation. He fumed
and declared that it would be quite impossible for them to get on if
everyone was to be accused of being a police spy; for his own part, he
would rather stay at home, and have nothing more to do with politics.
Why, hadn't people even dared to say that he, Logre himself, who had
fought in '48 and '51, and had twice narrowly escaped transportation,
was a spy as well? As he shouted this out, he thrust his jaws forward,
and glared at the others as though he would have liked to ram the
conviction that he had nothing to do with the police down their throats.
At the sight of his furious glances his companions made gestures of
protestation. However, Lacaille, on hearing Monsieur Lebigre accused of
usury, silently lowered his head.

The incident was forgotten in the discussions which ensued. Since Logre
had suggested a conspiracy, Monsieur Lebigre had grasped the hands of
the frequenters of the little room with more vigor than ever. Their
custom, to tell the truth, was of but small value to him, for they never
ordered more than one "drink" apiece. They drained the last drops just
as they rose to leave, having been careful to allow a little to remain
in their glasses, even during their most heated arguments. In this wise
the one "shout" lasted throughout the evening. They shivered as they
turned out into the cold dampness of the night, and for a moment or two
remained standing on the footway with dazzled eyes and buzzing ears,
as though surprised by the dark silence of the street. Rose, meanwhile,
fastened the shutters behind them. Then, quite exhausted, at a loss for
another word they shook hands, separated, and went their different ways,
still mentally continuing the discussion of the evening, and regretting
that they could not ram their particular theories down each other's
throats. Robine walked away, with his bent back bobbing up and down, in
the direction of the Rue Rambuteau; whilst Charvet and Clemence went
off through the markets on their return to the Luxembourg quarter, their
heels sounding on the flag-stones in military fashion, whilst they still
discussed some question of politics or philosophy, walking along side by
side, but never arm-in-arm.

The conspiracy ripened very slowly. At the commencement of the summer
the plotters had got no further than agreeing that it was necessary a
stroke should be attempted. Florent, who had at first looked upon
the whole business with a kind of distrust, had now, however, come to
believe in the possibility of a revolutionary movement. He took up the
matter seriously; making notes, and preparing plans in writing, while
the others still did nothing but talk. For his part, he began to
concentrate his whole life in the one persistent idea which made his
brain throb night after night; and this to such a degree that he at last
took his brother Quenu with him to Monsieur Lebigre's, as though such a
course were quite natural. Certainly he had no thought of doing anything
improper. He still looked upon Quenu as in some degree his pupil, and
may even have considered it his duty to start him on the proper path.
Quenu was an absolute novice in politics, but after spending five or six
evenings in the little room he found himself quite in accord with the
others. When Lisa was not present he manifested much docility, a sort of
respect for his brother's opinions. But the greatest charm of the affair
for him was really the mild dissipation of leaving his shop and shutting
himself up in the little room where the others shouted so loudly, and
where Clemence's presence, in his opinion, gave a tinge of rakishness
and romance to the proceedings. He now made all haste with his
chitterlings in order that he might get away as early as possible,
anxious to lose not a single word of the discussions, which seemed to
him to be very brilliant, though he was not always able to follow them.
The beautiful Lisa did not fail to notice his hurry to be gone, but as
yet she refrained from saying anything. When Florent took him off, she
simply went to the door-step, and watched them enter Monsieur Lebigre's,
her face paling somewhat, and a severe expression coming into her eyes.

One evening, as Mademoiselle Saget was peering out of her garret
casement, she recognised Quenu's shadow on the frosted glass of the
"cabinet" window facing the Rue Pirouette. She had found her casement an
excellent post of observation, as it overlooked that milky transparency,
on which the gaslight threw silhouettes of the politicians, with noses
suddenly appearing and disappearing, gaping jaws abruptly springing into
sight and then vanishing, and huge arms, apparently destitute of bodies,
waving hither and thither. This extraordinary jumble of detached
limbs, these silent but frantic profiles, bore witness to the heated
discussions that went on in the little room, and kept the old maid
peering from behind her muslin curtains until the transparency turned
black. She shrewdly suspected some "bit of trickery," as she phrased it.
By continual watching she had come to recognise the different shadows
by their hands and hair and clothes. As she gazed upon the chaos of
clenched fists, angry heads, and swaying shoulders, which seemed to
have become detached from their trunks and to roll about one atop of the
other, she would exclaim unhesitatingly, "Ah, there's that big booby of
a cousin; there's that miserly old Gavard; and there's the hunchback;
and there's that maypole of a Clemence!" Then, when the action of the
shadow-play became more pronounced, and they all seemed to have
lost control over themselves, she felt an irresistible impulse to go
downstairs to try to find out what was happening. Thus she now made a
point of buying her black-currant syrup at nights, pretending that she
felt out-of-sorts in the morning, and was obliged to take a sip as soon
as ever she was out of bed. On the evening when she noticed Quenu's
massive head shadowed on the transparency in close proximity to
Charvet's fist, she made her appearance at Monsieur Lebigre's in a
breathless condition. To gain more time, she made Rose rinse out her
little bottle for her; however, she was about to return to her room when
she heard the pork butcher exclaim with a sort of childish candour:

"No, indeed, we'll stand for it no longer! We'll make a clean sweep of
all those humbugging Deputies and Ministers! Yes, we'll send the whole
lot packing."

Eight o'clock had scarcely struck on the following morning when
Mademoiselle Saget was already at the pork shop. She found Madame
Lecoeur and La Sarriette there, dipping their noses into the
heating-pan, and buying hot sausages for breakfast. As the old maid had
managed to draw them into her quarrel with La Normande with respect to
the ten-sou dab, they had at once made friends again with Lisa, and they
now had nothing but contempt for the handsome fish-girl, and assailed
her and her sister as good-for-nothing hussies, whose only aim was
to fleece men of their money. This opinion had been inspired by the
assertions of Mademoiselle Saget, who had declared to Madame Lecoeur
that Florent had induced one of the two girls to coquette with Gavard,
and that the four of them had indulged in the wildest dissipation at
Barratte's--of course, at the poultry dealer's expense. From the effects
of this impudent story Madame Lecoeur had not yet recovered; she wore a
doleful appearance, and her eyes were quite yellow with spleen.

That morning, however, it was for Madame Quenu that the old maid had
a shock in store. She looked round the counter, and then in her most
gentle voice remarked:

"I saw Monsieur Quenu last night. They seem to enjoy themselves
immensely in that little room at Lebigre's, if one may judge from the
noise they make."

Lisa had turned her head towards the street, listening very attentively,
but apparently unwilling to show it. The old maid paused, hoping that
one of the others would question her; and then, in a lower tone, she
added: "They had a woman with them. Oh, I don't mean Monsieur Quenu, of
course! I didn't say that; I don't know--"

"It must be Clemence," interrupted La Sarriette; "a big scraggy creature
who gives herself all sorts of airs just because she went to boarding
school. She lives with a threadbare usher. I've seen them together;
they always look as though they were taking each other off to the police
station."

"Oh, yes; I know," replied the old maid, who, indeed, knew everything
about Charvet and Clemence, and whose only purpose was to alarm Lisa.

The mistress of the pork shop, however, never flinched. She seemed to be
absorbed in watching something of great interest in the market yonder.
Accordingly the old maid had recourse to stronger measures. "I think,"
said she, addressing herself to Madame Lecoeur, "that you ought to
advise your brother-in-law to be careful. Last night they were shouting
out the most shocking things in that little room. Men really seem to
lose their heads over politics. If anyone had heard them, it might have
been a very serious matter for them."

"Oh! Gavard will go his own way," sighed Madame Lecoeur. "It only wanted
this to fill my cup. I shall die of anxiety, I am sure, if he ever gets
arrested."

As she spoke, a gleam shot from her dim eyes. La Sarriette, however,
laughed and wagged her little face, bright with the freshness of the
morning air.

"You should hear what Jules says of those who speak against the Empire,"
she remarked. "They ought all to be thrown into the Seine, he told me;
for it seems there isn't a single respectable person amongst them."

"Oh! there's no harm done, of course, so long as only people like myself
hear their foolish talk," resumed Mademoiselle Saget. "I'd rather cut
my hand off, you know, than make mischief. Last night now, for instance,
Monsieur Quenu was saying----"

She again paused. Lisa had started slightly.

"Monsieur Quenu was saying that the Ministers and Deputies and all who
are in power ought to be shot."

At this Lisa turned sharply, her face quite white and her hands clenched
beneath her apron.

"Quenu said that?" she curtly asked.

"Yes, indeed, and several other similar things that I can't recollect
now. I heard him myself. But don't distress yourself like that, Madame
Quenu. You know very well that I sha'n't breathe a word. I'm quite old
enough to know what might harm a man if it came out. Oh, no; it will go
no further."

Lisa had recovered her equanimity. She took a pride in the happy
peacefulness of her home; she would not acknowledge that there had ever
been the slightest difference between herself and her husband. And so
now she shrugged her shoulders and said with a smile: "Oh, it's all a
pack of foolish nonsense."

When the three others were in the street together they agreed that
handsome Lisa had pulled a very doleful face; and they were unanimously
of opinion that the mysterious goings-on of the cousin, the Mehudins,
Gavard, and the Quenus would end in trouble. Madame Lecoeur inquired
what was done to the people who got arrested "for politics," but on this
point Mademoiselle Saget could not enlighten her; she only knew that
they were never seen again--no, never. And this induced La Sarriette to
suggest that perhaps they were thrown into the Seine, as Jules had said
they ought to be.

Lisa avoided all reference to the subject at breakfast and dinner that
day; and even in the evening, when Florent and Quenu went off together
to Monsieur Lebigre's, there was no unwonted severity in her glance. On
that particular evening, however, the question of framing a constitution
for the future came under discussion, and it was one o'clock in the
morning before the politicians could tear themselves away from the
little room. The shutters had already been fastened, and they were
obliged to leave by a small door, passing out one at a time with bent
backs. Quenu returned home with an uneasy conscience. He opened the
three or four doors on his way to bed as gently as possible, walking
on tip-toe and stretching out his hands as he passed through the
sitting-room, to avoid a collision with any of the furniture. The whole
house seemed to be asleep. When he reached the bedroom, he was annoyed
to find that Lisa had not extinguished the candle, which was burning
with a tall, mournful flame in the midst of the deep silence. As Quenu
took off his shoes, and put them down in a corner, the time-piece struck
half past one with such a clear, ringing sound that he turned in alarm,
almost frightened to move, and gazing with an expression of angry
reproach at the shining gilded Gutenberg standing there, with his finger
on a book. Lisa's head was buried in her pillow, and Quenu could only
see her back; but he divined that she was merely feigning sleep, and her
conduct in turning her back upon him was so instinct with reproach that
he felt sorely ill at ease. At last he slipped beneath the bed-clothes,
blew out the candle, and lay perfectly still. He could have sworn that
his wife was awake, though she did not speak to him; and presently he
fell asleep, feeling intensely miserable, and lacking the courage to say
good night.

He slept till late, and when he awoke he found himself sprawling in the
middle of the bed with the eider-down quilt up to his chin, whilst Lisa
sat in front of the secretaire, arranging some papers. His slumber
had been so heavy that he had not heard her rise. However, he now took
courage, and spoke to her from the depths of the alcove: "Why didn't you
wake me? What are you doing there?"

"I'm sorting the papers in these drawers," she replied in her usual tone
of voice.

Quenu felt relieved. But Lisa added: "One never knows what may happen.
If the police were to come--"

"What! the police?"

"Yes, indeed, the police; for you're mixing yourself up with politics
now."

At this Quenu sat up in bed, quite dazed and confounded by such a
violent and unexpected attack.

"I mix myself up with politics! I mix myself up with politics!" he
repeated. "It's no concern of the police. I've nothing to do with any
compromising matters."

"No," replied Lisa, shrugging her shoulders; "you merely talk about
shooting everybody."

"I! I!"

"Yes. And you bawl it out in a public-house! Mademoiselle Saget heard
you. All the neighbourhood knows by this time that you are a Red
Republican!"

Quenu fell back in bed again. He was not perfectly awake as yet. Lisa's
words resounded in his ears as though he already heard the heavy tramp
of gendarmes at the bedroom door. He looked at her as she sat there,
with her hair already arranged, her figure tightly imprisoned in her
stays, her whole appearance the same as it was on any other morning; and
he felt more astonished than ever that she should be so neat and prim
under such extraordinary circumstances.

"I leave you absolutely free, you know," she continued, as she went on
arranging the papers. "I don't want to wear the breeches, as the saying
goes. You are the master, and you are at liberty to endanger your
position, compromise our credit, and ruin our business."

Then, as Quenu tried to protest, she silenced him with a gesture. "No,
no; don't say anything," she continued. "This is no quarrel, and I am
not even asking an explanation from you. But if you had consulted me,
and we had talked the matter over together, I might have intervened.
Ah! it's a great mistake to imagine that women understand nothing about
politics. Shall I tell you what my politics are?"

She had risen from her seat whilst speaking, and was now walking to and
fro between the bed and the window, wiping as she went some specks
of dust from the bright mahogany of the mirrored wardrobe and the
dressing-table.

"My politics are the politics of honest folks," said she. "I'm grateful
to the Government when business is prosperous, when I can eat my meals
in peace and comfort, and can sleep at nights without being awakened by
the firing of guns. There were pretty times in '48, were there not? You
remember our uncle Gradelle, the worthy man, showing us his books for
that year? He lost more than six thousand francs. Now that we have got
the Empire, however, everything prospers. We sell our goods readily
enough. You can't deny it. Well, then, what is it that you want? How
will you be better off when you have shot everybody?"

She took her stand in front of the little night-table, crossed her arms
over her breast, and fixed her eyes upon Quenu, who had shuffled himself
beneath the bed-clothes, almost out of sight. He attempted to explain
what it was that his friends wanted, but he got quite confused in his
endeavours to summarise Florent's and Charvet's political and social
systems; and could only talk about the disregard shown to principles,
the accession of the democracy to power, and the regeneration of
society, in such a strange tangled way that Lisa shrugged her shoulders,
quite unable to understand him. At last, however, he extricated himself
from his difficulties by declaring that the Empire was the reign of
licentiousness, swindling finance, and highway robbery. And, recalling
an expression of Logre's he added: "We are the prey of a band of
adventurers, who are pillaging, violating, and assassinating France.
We'll have no more of them."

Lisa, however, still shrugged her shoulders.

"Well, and is that all you have got to say?" she asked with perfect
coolness. "What has all that got to do with me? Even supposing it were
true, what then? Have I ever advised you to practise dishonest courses?
Have I ever prompted you to dishonour your acceptances, or cheat your
customers, or pile up money by fraudulent practices? Really, you'll end
by making me quite angry! We are honest folks, and we don't pillage or
assassinate anybody. That's quite sufficient. What other folks do is no
concern of ours. If they choose to be rogues it's their affair."

She looked quite majestic and triumphant; and again pacing the room,
drawing herself up to her full height, she resumed: "A pretty notion
it is that people are to let their business go to rack and ruin just to
please those who are penniless. For my part, I'm in favour of making hay
while the sun shines, and supporting a Government which promotes trade.
If it does do dishonourable things, I prefer to know nothing about them.
I know that I myself commit none, and that no one in the neighbourhood
can point a finger at me. It's only fools who go tilting at windmills.
At the time of the last elections, you remember, Gavard said that the
Emperor's candidate had been bankrupt, and was mixed up in all sorts of
scandalous matters. Well, perhaps that was true, I don't deny it; but
all the same, you acted wisely in voting for him, for all that was not
in question; you were not asked to lend the man any money or to transact
any business with him, but merely to show the Government that you were
pleased with the prosperity of the pork trade."

At this moment Quenu called to mind a sentence of Charvet's, asserting
that "the bloated bourgeois, the sleek shopkeepers, who backed up that
Government of universal gormandising, ought to be hurled into the sewers
before all others, for it was owing to them and their gluttonous egotism
that tyranny had succeeded in mastering and preying upon the nation." He
was trying to complete this piece of eloquence when Lisa, carried off by
her indignation, cut him short.

"Don't talk such stuff! My conscience doesn't reproach me with anything.
I don't owe a copper to anybody; I'm not mixed up in any dishonest
business; I buy and sell good sound stuff; and I charge no more than
others do. What you say may perhaps apply to people like our cousins,
the Saccards. They pretend to be even ignorant that I am in Paris; but
I am prouder than they are, and I don't care a rap for their millions.
It's said that Saccard speculates in condemned buildings, and cheats and
robs everybody. I'm not surprised to hear it, for he was always that way
inclined. He loves money just for the sake of wallowing in it, and then
tossing it out of his windows, like the imbecile he is. I can understand
people attacking men of his stamp, who pile up excessive fortunes. For
my part, if you care to know it, I have but a bad opinion of Saccard.
But we--we who live so quietly and peaceably, who will need at least
fifteen years to put by sufficient money to make ourselves comfortably
independent, we who have no reason to meddle in politics, and whose
only aim is to bring up our daughter respectably, and to see that our
business prospers--why you must be joking to talk such stuff about us.
We are honest folks!"

She came and sat down on the edge of the bed. Quenu was already much
shaken in his opinions.

"Listen to me, now," she resumed in a more serious voice. "You surely
don't want to see your own shop pillaged, your cellar emptied, and your
money taken from you? If these men who meet at Monsieur Lebigre's should
prove triumphant, do you think that you would then lie as comfortably
in your bed as you do now? And on going down into the kitchen, do you
imagine that you would set about making your galantines as peacefully
as you will presently? No, no, indeed! So why do you talk about
overthrowing a Government which protects you, and enables you to put
money by? You have a wife and a daughter, and your first duty is towards
them. You would be in fault if you imperilled their happiness. It is
only those who have neither home nor hearth, who have nothing to lose,
who want to be shooting people. Surely you don't want to pull the
chestnuts out of the fire for _them_! So stay quietly at home, you
foolish fellow, sleep comfortably, eat well, make money, keep an easy
conscience, and leave France to free herself of the Empire if the Empire
annoys her. France can get on very well without _you_."

She laughed her bright melodious laugh as she finished; and Quenu was
now altogether convinced. Yes, she was right, after all; and she looked
so charming, he thought, as she sat there on the edge of the bed, so
trim, although it was so early, so bright, and so fresh in the dazzling
whiteness of her linen. As he listened to her his eyes fell on their
portraits hanging on either side of the fireplace. Yes, they were
certainly honest folks; they had such a respectable, well-to-do air in
their black clothes and their gilded frames! The bedroom, too, looked
as though it belonged to people of some account in the world. The lace
squares seemed to give a dignified appearance to the chairs; and
the carpet, the curtains, and the vases decorated with painted
landscapes--all spoke of their exertions to get on in the world and
their taste for comfort. Thereupon he plunged yet further beneath the
eider-down quilt, which kept him in a state of pleasant warmth. He
began to feel that he had risked losing all these things at Monsieur
Lebigre's--his huge bed, his cosy room, and his business, on which
his thoughts now dwelt with tender remorse. And from Lisa, from the
furniture, from all his cosy surroundings, he derived a sense of comfort
which thrilled him with a delightful, overpowering charm.

"You foolish fellow!" said his wife, seeing that he was now quite
conquered. "A pretty business it was that you'd embarked upon; but you'd
have had to reckon with Pauline and me, I can tell you! And now don't
bother your head any more about the Government. To begin with, all
Governments are alike, and if we didn't have this one, we should have
another. A Government is necessary. But the one thing is to be able to
live on, to spend one's savings in peace and comfort when one grows old,
and to know that one has gained one's means honestly."

Quenu nodded his head in acquiescence, and tried to commence a
justification of his conduct.

"It was Gavard--," he began.

But Lisa's face again assumed a serious expression, and she interrupted
him sharply.

"No, it was not Gavard. I know very well who it was; and it would be
a great deal better if he would look after his own safety before
compromising that of others."

"Is it Florent you mean?" Quenu timidly inquired after a pause.

Lisa did not immediately reply. She got up and went back to the
secretaire, as if trying to restrain herself.

"Yes, it is Florent," she said presently, in incisive tones. "You know
how patient I am. I would bear almost anything rather than come between
you and your brother. The tie of relationship is a sacred thing. But the
cup is filled to overflowing now. Since your brother came here things
have been constantly getting worse and worse. But now, I won't say
anything more; it is better that I shouldn't."

There was another pause. Then, as her husband gazed up at the ceiling
with an air of embarrassment, she continued, with increased violence:

"Really, he seems to ignore all that we have done for him. We have
put ourselves to great inconvenience for his sake; we have given him
Augustine's bedroom, and the poor girl sleeps without a murmur in a
stuffy little closet where she can scarcely breathe. We board and lodge
him and give him every attention--but no, he takes it all quite as a
matter of course. He is earning money, but what he does with it nobody
knows; or, rather, one knows only too well."

"But there's his share of the inheritance, you know," Quenu ventured to
say, pained at hearing his brother attacked.

Lisa suddenly stiffened herself as though she were stunned, and her
anger vanished.

"Yes, you are right; there is his share of the inheritance. Here is
the statement of it, in this drawer. But he refused to take it; you
remember, you were present, and heard him. That only proves that he is a
brainless, worthless fellow. If he had had an idea in his head, he would
have made something out of that money by now. For my own part, I should
be very glad to get rid of it; it would be a relief to us. I have told
him so twice, but he won't listen to me. You ought to persuade him to
take it. Talk to him about it, will you?"

Quenu growled something in reply; and Lisa refrained from pressing the
point further, being of opinion that she had done all that could be
expected of her.

"He is not like other men," she resumed. "He's not a comfortable sort of
person to have in the house. I shouldn't have said this if we hadn't got
talking on the subject. I don't busy myself about his conduct, though
it's setting the whole neighbourhood gossiping about us. Let him eat
and sleep here, and put us about, if he likes; we can get over that; but
what I won't tolerate is that he should involve us in his politics. If
he tries to lead you off again, or compromises us in the least degree,
I shall turn him out of the house without the least hesitation. I warn
you, and now you understand!"

Florent was doomed. Lisa was making a great effort to restrain herself,
to prevent the animosity which had long been rankling in her heart
from flowing forth. But Florent and his ways jarred against her every
instinct; he wounded her, frightened her, and made her quite miserable.

"A man who has made such a discreditable career," she murmured, "who has
never been able to get a roof of his own over his head! I can very well
understand his partiality for bullets! He can go and stand in their way
if he chooses; but let him leave honest folks to their families! And
then, he isn't pleasant to have about one! He reeks of fish in the
evening at dinner! It prevents me from eating. He himself never lets a
mouthful go past him, though it's little better he seems to be for it
all! He can't even grow decently stout, the wretched fellow, to such a
degree do his bad instincts prey on him!"

She had stepped up to the window whilst speaking, and now saw Florent
crossing the Rue Rambuteau on his way to the fish market. There was
a very large arrival of fish that morning; the tray-like baskets were
covered with rippling silver, and the auction rooms roared with the
hubbub of their sales. Lisa kept her eyes on the bony shoulders of her
brother-in-law as he made his way into the pungent smells of the market,
stooping beneath the sickening sensation which they brought him; and
the glance with which she followed his steps was that of a woman bent on
combat and resolved to be victorious.

When she turned round again, Quenu was getting up. As he sat on the edge
of the bed in his night-shirt, still warm from the pleasant heat of the
eider-down quilt and with his feet resting on the soft fluffy rug below
him, he looked quite pale, quite distressed at the misunderstanding
between his wife and his brother. Lisa, however, gave him one of her
sweetest smiles, and he felt deeply touched when she handed him his
socks.

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