Fruitfulness - Emile Zola
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That same day, then, before returning to Chantebled, he repaired to the
factory, where he was lucky enough to find Beauchene, whom Blaise's
absence on business had detained there by force. Thus he was in a very
bad humor, puffing and yawning and half asleep. It was nearly three
o'clock, and he declared that he could never digest his lunch properly
unless he went out afterwards. The truth was that since his rupture with
his wife he had been devoting his afternoons to paying attentions to a
girl serving at a beer-house.
"Ah! my good fellow," he muttered as he stretched himself. "My blood is
evidently thickening. I must bestir myself, or else I shall be in a bad
way."
However, he woke up when Mathieu had explained the motive of his visit.
At first he could scarcely understand it, for the affair seemed to him so
extraordinary, so idiotic.
"Eh? What do you say? It was my wife who spoke to you about that child?
It is she who has taken it into her head to collect information and start
a search?"
His fat apoplectical face became distorted, his anger was so violent that
he could scarcely stutter. When he heard, however, of the mission with
which his wife had intrusted Mathieu, he at last exploded: "She is mad! I
tell you that she is raving mad! Were such fancies ever seen? Every
morning she invents something fresh to distract me!"
Without heeding this interruption, Mathieu quietly finished his
narrative: "And so I have just come back from the Foundling Hospital,
where I learnt that the boy is alive. I have his address--and now what am
I to do?"
This was the final blow. Beauchene clenched his fists and raised his arms
in exasperation. "Ah! well, here's a nice state of things! But why on
earth does she want to trouble me about that boy? He isn't hers! Why
can't she leave us alone, the boy and me? It's my affair. And I ask you
if it is at all proper for my wife to send you running about after him?
Besides, I hope that you are not going to bring him to her. What on earth
could we do with that little peasant, who may have every vice? Just
picture him coming between us. I tell you that she is mad, mad, mad!"
He had begun to walk angrily to and fro. All at once he stopped: "My dear
fellow, you will just oblige me by telling her that he is dead."
But he turned pale and recoiled. Constance stood on the threshold and had
heard him. For some time past she had been in the habit of stealthily
prowling around the offices, like one on the watch for something. For a
moment, at the sight of the embarrassment which both men displayed, she
remained silent. Then, without even addressing her husband, she asked:
"He is alive, is he not?"
Mathieu could but tell her the truth. He answered with a nod. Then
Beauchene, in despair, made a final effort: "Come, be reasonable, my
dear. As I was saying only just now, we don't even know what this
youngster's character is. You surely don't want to upset our life for the
mere pleasure of doing so?"
Standing there, lean and frigid, she gave him a harsh glance; then,
turning her back on him, she demanded the child's name, and the names of
the wheelwright and the locality. "Good, you say Alexandre-Honore, with
Montoir the wheelwright, at Saint-Pierre, near Rougemont, in Calvados.
Well, my friend, oblige me by continuing your researches; endeavor to
procure me some precise information about this boy's habits and
disposition. Be prudent, too; don't give anybody's name. And thanks for
what you have done already; thanks for all you are doing for me."
Thereupon she took herself off without giving any further explanation,
without even telling her husband of the vague plans she was forming.
Beneath her crushing contempt he had grown calm again. Why should he
spoil his life of egotistical pleasure by resisting that mad creature?
All that he need do was to put on his hat and betake himself to his usual
diversions. And so he ended by shrugging his shoulders.
"After all, let her pick him up if she chooses, it won't be my doing. Act
as she asks you, my dear fellow; continue your researches and try to
content her. Perhaps she will then leave me in peace. But I've had quite
enough of it for to-day; good-by, I'm going out."
With the view of obtaining some information of Rougemont, Mathieu at
first thought of applying to La Couteau, if he could find her again; for
which purpose it occurred to him that he might call on Madame Bourdieu in
the Rue de Miromesnil. But another and more certain means suggested
itself. He had been led to renew his intercourse with the Seguins, of
whom he had for a time lost sight; and, much to his surprise, he had
found Valentine's former maid, Celeste, in the Avenue d'Antin once more.
Through this woman, he thought, he might reach La Couteau direct.
The renewal of the intercourse between the Froments and the Seguins was
due to a very happy chance. Mathieu's son Ambroise, on leaving college,
had entered the employment of an uncle of Seguin's, Thomas du Hordel, one
of the wealthiest commission merchants in Paris; and this old man, who,
despite his years, remained very sturdy, and still directed his business
with all the fire of youth, had conceived a growing fondness for
Ambroise, who had great mental endowments and a real genius for commerce.
Du Hordel's own children had consisted of two daughters, one of whom had
died young, while the other had married a madman, who had lodged a bullet
in his head and had left her childless and crazy like himself. This
partially explained the deep grandfatherly interest which Du Hordel took
in young Ambroise, who was the handsomest of all the Froments, with a
clear complexion, large black eyes, brown hair that curled naturally, and
manners of much refinement and elegance. But the old man was further
captivated by the young fellow's spirit of enterprise, the four modern
languages which he spoke so readily, and the evident mastery which he
would some day show in the management of a business which extended over
the five parts of the world. In his childhood, among his brothers and
sisters, Ambroise had always been the boldest, most captivating and
self-assertive. The others might be better than he, but he reigned over
them like a handsome, ambitious, greedy boy, a future man of gayety and
conquest. And this indeed he proved to be; by the charm of his victorious
intellect he conquered old Du Hordel in a few months, even as later on he
was destined to vanquish everybody and everything much as he pleased. His
strength lay in his power of pleasing and his power of action, a blending
of grace with the most assiduous industry.
About this time Seguin and his uncle, who had never set foot in the house
of the Avenue d'Antin since insanity had reigned there, drew together
again. Their apparent reconciliation was the outcome of a drama shrouded
in secrecy. Seguin, hard up and in debt, cast off by Nora, who divined
his approaching ruin, and preyed upon by other voracious creatures, had
ended by committing, on the turf, one of those indelicate actions which
honest people call thefts. Du Hordel, on being apprised of the matter,
had hastened forward and had paid what was due in order to avoid a
frightful scandal. And he was so upset by the extraordinary muddle in
which he found his nephew's home, once all prosperity, that remorse came
upon him as if he were in some degree responsible for what had happened,
since he had egotistically kept away from his relatives for his own
peace's sake. But he was more particularly won over by his grandniece
Andree, now a delicious young girl well-nigh eighteen years of age, and
therefore marriageable. She alone sufficed to attract him to the house,
and he was greatly distressed by the dangerous state of abandonment in
which he found her.
Her father continued dragging out his worthless life away from home. Her
mother, Valentine, had just emerged from a frightful crisis, her final
rupture with Santerre, who had made up his mind to marry a very wealthy
old lady, which, after all, was the logical destiny of such a crafty
exploiter of women, one who behind his affectation of cultured pessimism
had the vilest and greediest of natures. Valentine, distracted by this
rupture, had now thrown herself into religion, and, like her husband,
disappeared from the house for whole days. She was said to be an active
helpmate of old Count de Navarede, the president of a society of Catholic
propaganda. Gaston, her son, having left Saint-Cyr three months
previously, was now at the Cavalry School of Saumur, so fired with
passion for a military career that he already spoke of remaining a
bachelor, since a soldier's sword should be his only love, his only
spouse. Then Lucie, now nineteen years old, and full of mystical
exaltation, had already entered an Ursuline convent for her novitiate.
And in the big empty home, whence father, mother, brother and sister
fled, there remained but the gentle and adorable Andree, exposed to all
the blasts of insanity which even now swept through the household, and so
distressed by loneliness, that her uncle, Du Hordel, full of
compassionate affection, conceived the idea of giving her a husband in
the person of young Ambroise, the future conqueror.
This plan was helped on by the renewed presence of Celeste the maid.
Eight years had elapsed since Valentine had been obliged to dismiss this
woman for immorality; and during those eight years Celeste, weary of
service, had tried a number of equivocal callings of which she did not
speak. She had ended by turning up at Rougemont, her native place, in bad
health and such a state of wretchedness, that for the sake of a living
she went out as a charwoman there. Then she gradually recovered her
health, and accumulated a little stock of clothes, thanks to the
protection of the village priest, whom she won over by an affectation of
extreme piety. It was at Rougemont, no doubt, that she planned her return
to the Seguins, of whose vicissitudes she was informed by La Couteau, the
latter having kept up her intercourse with Madame Menoux, the little
haberdasher of the neighborhood.
Valentine, shortly after her rupture with Santerre, one day of furious
despair, when she had again dismissed all her servants, was surprised by
the arrival of Celeste, who showed herself so repentant, so devoted, and
so serious-minded, that her former mistress felt touched. She made her
weep on reminding her of her faults, and asking her to swear before God
that she would never repeat them; for Celeste now went to confession and
partook of the holy communion, and carried with her a certificate from
the Cure of Rougemont vouching for her deep piety and high morality. This
certificate acted decisively on Valentine, who, unwilling to remain at
home, and weary of the troubles of housekeeping, understood what precious
help she might derive from this woman. On her side Celeste certainly
relied upon power being surrendered to her. Two months later, by favoring
Lucie's excessive partiality to religious practices, she had helped her
into a convent. Gaston showed himself only when he secured a few days'
leave. And so Andree alone remained at home, impeding by her presence the
great general pillage that Celeste dreamt of. The maid therefore became a
most active worker on behalf of her young mistress's marriage.
Andree, it should be said, was comprised in Ambroise's universal
conquest. She had met him at her uncle Du Hordel's house for a year
before it occurred to the latter to marry them. She was a very gentle
girl, a little golden-haired sheep, as her mother sometimes said. And
that handsome, smiling young man, who evinced so much kindness towards
her, became the subject of her thoughts and hopes whenever she suffered
from loneliness and abandonment. Thus, when her uncle prudently
questioned her, she flung herself into his arms, weeping big tears of
gratitude and confession. Valentine, on being approached, at first
manifested some surprise. What, a son of the Froments! Those Froments had
already taken Chantebled from them, and did they now want to take one of
their daughters? Then, amid the collapse of fortune and household, she
could find no reasonable objection to urge. She had never been attached
to Andree. She accused La Catiche, the nurse, of having made the child
her own. That gentle, docile, emotional little sheep was not a Seguin,
she often remarked. Then, while feigning to defend the girl, Celeste
embittered her mother against her, and inspired her with a desire to see
the marriage promptly concluded, in order that she might free herself
from her last cares and live as she wished. Thus, after a long chat with
Mathieu, who promised his consent, it remained only for Du Hordel to
assure himself of Seguin's approval before an application in due form was
made. It was difficult, however, to find Seguin in a suitable frame of
mind. So weeks were lost, and it became necessary to pacify Ambroise, who
was very much in love, and was doubtless warned by his all-invading
genius that this loving and simple girl would bring him a kingdom in her
apron.
One day when Mathieu was passing along the Avenue d'Antin, it occurred to
him to call at the house to ascertain if Seguin had re-appeared there,
for he had suddenly taken himself off without warning, and had gone, so
it was believed, to Italy. Then, as Mathieu found himself alone with
Celeste, the opportunity seemed to him an excellent one to discover La
Couteau's whereabouts. He asked for news of her, saying that a friend of
his was in need of a good nurse.
"Well, monsieur, you are in luck's way," the maid replied; "La Couteau is
to bring a child home to our neighbor, Madame Menoux, this very day. It
is nearly four o'clock now, and that is the time when she promised to
come. You know Madame Menoux's place, do you not? It is the third shop in
the first street on the left." Then she apologized for being unable to
conduct him thither: "I am alone," she said; "we still have no news of
the master. On Wednesdays Madame presides at the meeting of her society,
and Mademoiselle Andree has just gone out walking with her uncle."
Mathieu hastily repaired to Madame Menoux's shop. From a distance he saw
her standing on the threshold; age had made her thinner than ever; at
forty she was as slim as a young girl, with a long and pointed face.
Silent labor consumed her; for twenty years she had been desperately
selling bits of cotton and packages of needles without ever making a
fortune, but pleased, nevertheless, at being able to add her modest gains
to her husband's monthly salary in order to provide him with sundry
little comforts. His rheumatism would no doubt soon compel him to
relinquish his post as a museum attendant, and how would they be able to
manage with his pension of a few hundred francs per annum if she did not
keep up her business? Moreover, they had met with no luck. Their first
child had died, and some years had elapsed before the birth of a second
boy, whom they had greeted with delight, no doubt, though he would prove
a heavy burden to them, especially as they had now decided to take him
back from the country. Thus Mathieu found the worthy woman in a state of
great emotion, waiting for the child on the threshold of her shop, and
watching the corner of the avenue.
"Oh! it was Celeste who sent you, monsieur! No, La Couteau hasn't come
yet. I'm quite astonished at it; I expect her every moment. Will you
kindly step inside, monsieur, and sit down?"
He refused the only chair which blocked up the narrow passage where
scarcely three customers could have stood in a row. Behind a glass
partition one perceived the dim back shop, which served as kitchen and
dining-room and bedchamber, and which received only a little air from a
damp inner yard which suggested a sewer shaft.
"As you see, monsieur, we have scarcely any room," continued Madame
Menoux; "but then we pay only eight hundred francs rent, and where else
could we find a shop at that price? And besides, I have been here for
nearly twenty years, and have worked up a little regular custom in the
neighborhood. Oh! I don't complain of the place myself, I'm not big,
there is always sufficient room for me. And as my husband comes home only
in the evening, and then sits down in his armchair to smoke his pipe, he
isn't so much inconvenienced. I do all I can for him, and he is
reasonable enough not to ask me to do more. But with a child I fear that
it will be impossible to get on here."
The recollection of her first boy, her little Pierre, returned to her,
and her eyes filled with tears. "Ah! monsieur, that was ten years ago,
and I can still see La Couteau bringing him back to me, just as she'll be
bringing the other by and by. I was told so many tales; there was such
good air at Rougemont, and the children led such healthy lives, and my
boy had such rosy cheeks, that I ended by leaving him there till he was
five years old, regretting that I had no room for him here. And no, you
can't have an idea of all the presents that the nurse wheedled out of me,
of all the money that I paid! It was ruination! And then, all at once, I
had just time to send for the boy, and he was brought back to me as thin
and pale and weak, as if he had never tasted good bread in his life. Two
months later he died in my arms. His father fell ill over it, and if we
hadn't been attached to one another, I think we should both have gone and
drowned ourselves."
Scarce wiping her eyes she feverishly returned to the threshold, and
again cast a passionate expectant glance towards the avenue. And when she
came back, having seen nothing, she resumed: "So you will understand our
emotion when, two years ago, though I was thirty-seven, I again had a
little boy. We were wild with delight, like a young married couple. But
what a lot of trouble and worry! We had to put the little fellow out to
nurse as we let the other one, since we could not possibly keep him here.
And even after swearing that he should not go to Rougemont we ended by
saying that we at least knew the place, and that he would not be worse
off there than elsewhere. Only we sent him to La Vimeux, for we wouldn't
hear any more of La Loiseau since she sent Pierre back in such a fearful
state. And this time, as the little fellow is now two years old, I was
determined to have him home again, though I don't even know where I shall
put him. I've been waiting for an hour now, and I can't help trembling,
for I always fear some catastrophe."
She could not remain in the shop, but remained standing by the doorway,
with her neck outstretched and her eyes fixed on the street corner. All
at once a deep cry came from her: "Ah! here they are!"
Leisurely, and with a sour, harassed air, La Couteau came in and placed
the sleeping child in Madame Menoux's arms, saying as she did so: "Well,
your George is a tidy weight, I can tell you. You won't say that I've
brought you this one back like a skeleton."
Quivering, her legs sinking beneath her for very joy, the mother had been
obliged to sit down, keeping her child on her knees, kissing him,
examining him, all haste to see if he were in good health and likely to
live. He had a fat and rather pale face, and seemed big, though puffy.
When she had unfastened his wraps, her hands trembling the while with
nervousness, she found that he was pot-bellied, with small legs and arms.
"He is very big about the body," she murmured, ceasing to smile, and
turning gloomy with renewed fears.
"Ah, yes! complain away!" said La Couteau. "The other was too thin; this
one will be too fat. Mothers are never satisfied!"
At the first glance Mathieu had detected that the child was one of those
who are fed on pap, stuffed for economy's sake with bread and water, and
fated to all the stomachic complaints of early childhood. And at the
sight of the poor little fellow, Rougemont, the frightful
slaughter-place, with its daily massacre of the innocents, arose in his
memory, such as it had been described to him in years long past. There
was La Loiseau, whose habits were so abominably filthy that her nurslings
rotted as on a manure heap; there was La Vimeux, who never purchased a
drop of milk, but picked up all the village crusts and made bran porridge
for her charges as if they had been pigs; there was La Gavette too, who,
being always in the fields, left her nurslings in the charge of a
paralytic old man, who sometimes let them fall into the fire; and there
was La Cauchois, who, having nobody to watch the babes, contented herself
with tying them in their cradles, leaving them in the company of fowls
which came in bands to peck at their eyes. And the scythe of death swept
by; there was wholesale assassination; doors were left wide open before
rows of cradles, in order to make room for fresh bundles despatched from
Paris. Yet all did not die; here, for instance, was one brought home
again. But even when they came back alive they carried with them the
germs of death, and another hecatomb ensued, another sacrifice to the
monstrous god of social egotism.
"I'm tired out; I must sit down," resumed La Couteau, seating herself on
the narrow bench behind the counter. "Ah! what a trade! And to think that
we are always received as if we were heartless criminals and thieves!"
She also had become withered, her sunburnt, tanned face suggesting more
than ever the beak of a bird of prey. But her eyes remained very keen,
sharpened as it were by ferocity. She no doubt failed to get rich fast
enough, for she continued wailing, complaining of her calling, of the
increasing avarice of parents, of the demands of the authorities, of the
warfare which was being declared against nurse-agents on all sides. Yes,
it was a lost calling, said she, and really God must have abandoned her
that she should still be compelled to carry it on at forty-five years of
age. "It will end by killing me," she added; "I shall always get more
kicks than money at it. How unjust it is! Here have I brought you back a
superb child, and yet you look anything but pleased--it's enough to
disgust one of doing one's best!"
In thus complaining her object perhaps was to extract from the
haberdasher as large a present as possible. Madame Menoux was certainly
disturbed by it all. Her boy woke up and began to wail loudly, and it
became necessary to give him a little lukewarm milk. At last, when the
accounts were settled, the nurse-agent, seeing that she would have ten
francs for herself, grew calmer. She was about to take her leave when
Madame Menoux, pointing to Mathieu, exclaimed: "This gentleman wished to
speak to you on business."
Although La Couteau had not seen the gentleman for several years past,
she had recognized him perfectly well. Still she had not even turned
towards him, for she knew him to be mixed up in so many matters that his
discretion was a certainty. And so she contented herself with saying: "If
monsieur will kindly explain to me what it is I shall be quite at his
service."
"I will accompany you," replied Mathieu; "we can speak together as we
walk along."
"Very good, that will suit me well, for I am rather in a hurry."
Once outside, Mathieu resolved that he would try no ruses with her. The
best course was to tell her plainly what he wanted, and then to buy her
silence. At the first words he spoke she understood him. She well
remembered Norine's child, although in her time she had carried dozens of
children to the Foundling Hospital. The particular circumstances of that
case, however, the conversation which had taken place, her drive with
Mathieu in a cab, had all remained engraved on her memory. Moreover, she
had found that child again, at Rougemont, five days later; and she even
remembered that her friend the hospital-attendant had left it with La
Loiseau. But she had occupied herself no more about it afterwards; and
she believed that it was now dead, like so many others. When she heard
Mathieu speak of the hamlet of Saint-Pierre, of Montoir the wheelwright,
and of Alexandre-Honore, now fifteen, who must be in apprenticeship
there, she evinced great surprise.
"Oh, you must be mistaken, monsieur," she said; "I know Montoir at
Saint-Pierre very well. And he certainly has a lad from the Foundling, of
the age you mention, at his place. But that lad came from La Cauchois; he
is a big carroty fellow named Richard, who arrived at our village some
days before the other. I know who his mother was; she was an English
woman called Amy, who stopped more than once at Madame Bourdieu's. That
ginger-haired lad is certainly not your Norine's boy. Alexandre-Honore
was dark."
"Well, then," replied Mathieu, "there must be another apprentice at the
wheelwright's. My information is precise, it was given me officially."
After a moment's perplexity La Couteau made a gesture of ignorance, and
admitted that Mathieu might be right. "It's possible," said she; "perhaps
Montoir has two apprentices. He does a good business, and as I haven't
been to Saint-Pierre for some months now I can say nothing certain. Well,
and what do you desire of me, monsieur?"