Oxford World’s Classics

by Emile Zola

  ‘By the way,’ he said, ‘you’re on good terms with de Marsy, aren’t you?’

  Their voices became inaudible as they exchanged whispers. Meanwhile, after paying her respects to the Countess, pretty Madame Bouchard had sat down at the bedside and took Clorinde’s hand in hers. She was so sorry Clorinde was not feeling well, she said, in her flute-like voice. All at once, Monsieur Bouchard, dignified and correct, interrupted the hushed conversations to say:

  ‘I don’t think I told you… You know, the big man can be so obnoxious.’

  And before saying exactly what he meant, he went on to speak bitterly of Rougon, just as the others had done. You couldn’t ask him for anything now. He wasn’t even polite (and good manners, for Monsieur Bouchard, were the most important quality a man could have). Then, asked what Rougon had done to upset him, he said at last:

  ‘Well, I hate it when people don’t play by the rules… It’s about one of the clerks in my department, Georges Duchesne. You must know him, you’ve seen him at my place. An excellent young man! He’s almost like a son to us. My wife thinks a lot of him, because he comes from her part of the country… Well, recently, we’ve been plotting to get him appointed deputy chief clerk. It was my idea, but you were all for it too, weren’t you, Adèle?’

  Madame Bouchard, looking embarrassed, leaned further over towards Clorinde to avoid Monsieur d’Escorailles’s eyes, which she felt boring into her.

  ‘Well,’ continued the divisional head, ‘you can’t imagine how the big man reacted to my request. He looked at me for quite a while without saying a word, in that offensive way of his. Then, he simply said no, point blank. And when I asked again, he just grinned and said: “Please don’t insist, Monsieur Bouchard. I have my reasons…” And that was all I could get out of him. He could see how furious I was, because he asked to be remembered to my wife… Didn’t he, Adèle?’

  It so happened that that very evening Madame Bouchard had had a violent quarrel with Monsieur d’Escorailles about Georges Duchesne. She thus felt it necessary to say, sounding quite irritated:

  ‘Good heavens, Monsieur Duchesne can wait!… He’s not worth all this trouble.’

  Her husband, however, would not let the matter drop.

  ‘I don’t agree,’ he said. ‘He deserves to be promoted, and he will be, too. Or my name’s not Bouchard… No, no, I want justice!’

  The others had to calm him down. But Clorinde’s mind was elsewhere: she was trying to hear what Monsieur Kahn and Monsieur La Rouquette were saying, huddled together at the foot of the bed. In coded language, Monsieur Kahn was explaining his situation. His great Niort–Angers railway enterprise had run into serious difficulties. At the beginning, the shares had fetched eighty francs on the stock market, and that before a single pickaxe had been raised. Then, sheltering behind his much-vaunted English company, Monsieur Kahn had embarked on some very risky speculative dealings; and now, unless a saviour appeared, he would go into bankruptcy.

  ‘A little while ago,’ he murmured, ‘de Marsy offered to have it sold to the Compagnie de l’Ouest. Now I’d be quite prepared to enter into talks. It would just need a law to be passed…’

  Clorinde discreetly beckoned to them. Bending down over the bed, they had quite a long talk with her. The Count, she said, was not the sort to bear grudges. She would have a word with him. She would offer him the million he had asked, the previous year, to back the concession. As president of the legislative body, he was in a good position to get the necessary law passed.

  ‘I tell you,’ she said with a smile, ‘de Marsy’s the man to talk to, if you want to get anywhere with that sort of business. If you start off without him, you’re bound to call him in later, to beg him to put all the pieces together.’

  Now everybody in the bedroom was talking at the top of their voices, and all at the same time. Madame Correur was explaining to Madame Bouchard that her final wish was to go to Coulonges to die in the family house. She became very sentimental about the place of her birth, and she said she was certainly going to force Madame Martineau to let her have that house, so full of memories of her childhood. Inevitably, the conversation came back to Rougon. Monsieur d’Escorailles told of the anger of his parents, who had written to tell him he should go back to the Council of State and break with the Minister. They had told him all about Rougon’s abuse of power. The Colonel’s story concerned the big man’s categorical refusal to ask the Emperor, on his behalf, for a post in one of the Imperial palaces. Monsieur Béjuin’s lament was that His Majesty had not gone to see his glassworks at Saint-Florent when he was recently down in Bourges, despite Rougon’s assurance that he would obtain that favour for him. And amid the storm of angry words, Countess Balbi, on the chaise longue, continued to wear her eternal smile, as she examined her hands, which were still quite chubby, and once more gently called:

  ‘Flaminio!’

  The valet had taken a tortoise-shell box of menthol pastilles from his waistcoat pocket, and the Countess was sucking one with all the relish of an old pussycat fond of its food.

  Delestang did not get home till nearly midnight. When they saw him draw aside the boudoir door-curtain, there was a profound silence, and they all leaned forward expectantly. But the curtain fell back. He was alone. Then, after a few moments of silence, there was a series of exclamations:

  ‘So you haven’t brought him?’

  ‘So, you lost the big man on the way?’

  They were relieved, however, when Delestang explained that Rougon had been very tired and had left him at the corner of the Rue Marbeuf.

  ‘It’s a good thing he didn’t come,’ said Clorinde, letting her head fall back on her pillows. ‘He’s so dull.’

  This was the signal for a further flood of complaints and charges. Delestang objected, crying: ‘No, please! Please!’ He usually took it upon himself to defend Rougon. When at last he was able to get a word in, he said, choosing his words carefully:

  ‘No doubt he could have done more for some of his friends. But all the same, he has great intelligence… I for one will always be grateful to him…’

  ‘Grateful for what?’ cried Monsieur Kahn angrily.

  ‘For everything he has done…’

  They immediately cut him short. Rougon had never done anything for him. What on earth made him think so?

  ‘You’re amazing,’ the Colonel said. ‘You’re carrying modesty too far… My dear chap, you didn’t need anybody’s help. Goodness me, you got where you are on your own merits.’

  They now began to sing Delestang’s praises. His model farm at La Chamade was an outstanding achievement, which showed long ago what a good administrator and what a gifted statesman he was. He had a keen eye, a fine mind, and a firm hand (but not excessively so). Indeed, had not the Emperor marked him out from the beginning? He and the Emperor thought alike on nearly every issue.

  ‘Stop talking nonsense!’ declared Monsieur Kahn finally. ‘You’re the one holding Rougon up. If you hadn’t been his friend and you hadn’t given him your backing in the Council of Ministers, he would have been out of office two weeks ago.’

  Delestang, however, continued to defend Rougon. Yes, he had certain qualities; but they should be prepared to admit any man’s good points. For example, that very evening, at the office of the Minister of Justice, they had examined a very complex case of financial sustainability, and Rougon had shown a quite extraordinary degree of perspicacity.

  ‘Ha! You mean the craftiness of a crooked lawyer,’ muttered Monsieur La Rouquette contemptuously.

  So far, Clorinde had not said a word. Now everybody turned to her, expecting a decisive pronouncement. Slowly, she rolled her head on the pillow, as if her neck itched. Then, referring to her husband without naming him, she said:

  ‘Yes, scold him… You’d have to beat him to get him where he really deserves to be.’

  ‘Quite. The Agriculture and Commerce portfolio is quite second-rank, isn’t it?’ observed Monsieur Kahn provocatively.

&nb
sp; This touched a raw nerve with Clorinde. It pained her to see her husband stuck in what she called his ‘little ministry’. She sat up suddenly, and out came the words they were waiting for.

  ‘Don’t worry! He’ll be minister of the interior when we think the time is right!’

  Delestang tried to say something, but they cut him off with their cries of delight and support. Slowly, his cheeks took on a rosy tint and his handsome face beamed with delight. In a whisper, Madame Correur and Madame Bouchard remarked on how majestic he looked. Madame Bouchard, in particular, with that perverse taste women have for bald-headed men, stared rapturously at his hairless pate, while with knowing glances and gestures and little comments Monsieur Kahn, the Colonel, and the others indicated their admiration for his forceful character. So there they were, grovelling before the biggest ninny of them all, admiring themselves in him. At least in him they had a leader who would be docile and unthreatening. They could deify him without having to fear any form of divine wrath.

  ‘You’re tiring him out,’ pretty Madame Bouchard suddenly observed, in her sweet little voice.

  They were indeed tiring him. Now they all voiced their concern. It was quite true; he was now quite pale, and his eyelids were drooping. But just think, he had been at work since five o’clock. Nothing was more tiring than brain work. Firmly but gently, everybody insisted that he should go to bed. He meekly obeyed, after planting a goodnight kiss on his wife’s forehead.

  ‘Flaminio!’ murmured the Countess.

  She too wanted to go to bed. With a little wave to each of them, she made her way across the room on her valet’s arm. As they entered the dressing room, Flaminio could be heard cursing on finding that the lamp had gone out.

  It was one o’clock. They all now spoke of going to bed, but Clorinde assured them that she was not sleepy, and they could stay. Nobody, however, sat down again. The boudoir lamp too had burned itself out. There was a strong smell of paraffin, and they had some trouble finding various little things — a fan, the Colonel’s cane, Madame Bouchard’s hat. Clorinde lay there, totally relaxed, and would not let Madame Correur ring for Antonia. Her maid, she said, always went to bed at eleven. At last they took their leave, at which point the Colonel realized that Auguste was missing. They found him sound asleep on the boudoir sofa, his head resting on a frock he had rolled into a pillow. They scolded him for not having turned the lamp up in time. In the darkness of the stairs, where a low-turned gas jet was in its death throes, Madame Bouchard let out a faint cry. She had twisted her ankle, she said. And as they all crept gingerly down, holding on to the banisters, they heard great bursts of laughter from Clorinde’s bedroom, where Pozzo had stayed behind. No doubt she was blowing down his neck again.

  There were similar gatherings every Thursday and every Sunday. Paris was now saying that Madame Delestang had a political salon, that it was very liberal and was strongly opposed to Rougon’s authoritarian rule. The whole gang had begun to dream of a humanitarian Empire, in which men’s freedoms would be steadily, and infinitely, extended. The Colonel, in his spare time, drafted statutes for trade unions; Monsieur Béjuin spoke of creating a workers’ city round his glassworks at Saint-Florent; for hours on end, Monsieur Kahn held forth to Delestang about the democratic role of the Bonapartes in modern society. And at every new act of Rougon’s there were howls of outrage and cries of patriotic disquiet at the damage being done to France by such a man. One day Delestang maintained that the Emperor was the only true republican of the age. The gang began to seem like a religious sect offering salvation. It was now openly plotting the overthrow of the big man, for the greater good of the country.

  Clorinde, however, was in no hurry. They would find her stretched out on one of her sofas, staring dreamily at the mouldings of the ceiling. While they circled impatiently round her, jabbering away, she said nothing, doing no more than suggest by subtle eye movements that they should not get too carried away. She went out less. She amused herself by dressing like a man with her maid. No doubt this was a way of killing time. She suddenly began to show great affection for her husband. She would kiss him in front of everybody, speak to him in baby talk, and express great concern for his health, which was excellent. Perhaps this was her way of hiding her total control over him. She supervised everything he did and lectured him every morning, as if he was a recalcitrant schoolboy. Delestang, for his part, was utterly obedient. He bowed, he smiled, he became angry, he said one thing, then something quite different, according to which string she pulled. As soon as he had done her bidding, he came straight back to her, of his own accord, for fresh instructions. And he continued to appear very superior.

  Clorinde was waiting. Monsieur Beulin-d’Orchère, who avoided her soirées, often saw her during the day. He complained bitterly about his brother-in-law, accusing him of working for a crowd of strangers; but it had always been thus, one could never count on one’s own family. Rougon must be the one preventing the Emperor from making him Minister of Justice, not wishing to share with him his influence in the Council of Ministers. Clorinde fanned the flames of his resentment, and dropped a few hints about her husband’s coming triumph, giving Beulin-d’Orchère the vague hope of being included in the coming ministerial reshuffle. In short, she used him to find out what activities Rougon was engaged in. Out of female spite she would have liked to see Rougon unhappy in his home life too, and encouraged the judge to try to get his sister to take up his cause. He did try, openly regretting a marriage he was getting so little out of; but he must have failed, in the face of Madame Rougon’s utter placidity. He said, however, that recently his brother-in-law had been showing signs of strain, and suggested he was ripe for a fall. Looking Clorinde straight in the face, he described characteristic incidents, all in the amiable manner of someone dispassionately reporting common gossip. Why, he asked, did she not do something, if she was so powerful? But her only response was to stretch out more languorously than ever, just like somebody who had decided to stay nice and snug indoors because it was so rainy outside, but fully expected the sun to break through in the end.

  Meanwhile, Clorinde’s influence at the Tuileries was steadily growing. People whispered discreetly about His Majesty’s being much taken with her. At balls and official receptions, wherever the Emperor met her, he was always at her heels, sidling up to her in his peculiar fashion, peering down at her neckline, standing very close to her, giving her meaningful smiles. It was thought, however, that she had still not granted him her favours, not even the tips of her fingers. She was playing her old game of the provocative marriageable young lady without inhibitions, who would say anything or show anything, yet was forever on her guard and always slipped out of a man’s grasp at the last minute. It looked as if she was making the Emperor’s passion grow, waiting for the right conditions and the right moment, when he would no longer be able to refuse her anything, so that the success of her carefully nurtured scheme would be guaranteed.

  It was at about this time that she suddenly showed great affection for Monsieur de Plouguern. They had not been on good terms for several months. One fine day the senator, who had always been in attendance on her, and called every morning when she was getting up, had been annoyed to be told not to enter her dressing room while she was at her toilet. She was all blushes, capriciously shy all of a sudden. She was not going to be teased or embarrassed any longer, she said, by the old man’s lascivious gaze. He, in protest, stopped coming like anybody else when she was receiving all and sundry in her bedroom. Was he not her father? Had he not held her on his knee when she was little? And with a snigger he would remind her of the occasions when he had lifted up her petticoats to smack her bottom. In the end she broke off with him altogether one day when, despite Antonia’s shouting at him and using her fists, he came in while she was in the bath. When Monsieur Kahn and Colonel Jobelin asked her for news of Monsieur de Plouguern, she replied primly:

  ‘Monsieur de Plouguern has become a child again… I don’t see him any more.’<
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  Then, all of a sudden, it was impossible to go and see her without finding the old man there. Whatever the hour, there he was, tucked away in some corner of her dressing room or bedroom. He knew where she kept her underwear and would hand her a slip or a pair of stockings, and he had even been found lacing up her corsets for her. Clorinde now treated him as despotically as a young bride.

  ‘Godfather, go and fetch my nail file, you know where it is, in the drawer… Godfather, pass me my sponge…’

  ‘Godfathering’ him thus was a kind of caress. And now he would often speak of the late Count and go into details about Clorinde’s birth, falsely claiming that he had come to know her mother when she was three months’ pregnant. And when the Countess herself, with that perpetual smile on her worn-out face, was present in the bedroom when Clorinde was getting up, he would shoot knowing glances at her and with a wink draw her attention to a bare shoulder or a knee half revealed.

  ‘Look, Leonora,’ he would whisper, ‘she’s the spitting image of you!’

  The daughter reminded him of the mother. His bony face would light up. Monsieur de Plouguern would often reach out with his withered hands and take hold of her, pressing her to him and whispering some dirty story in her ear. This gave him pleasure. He was quite Voltairean, indulging his libertine ideas, trying to break down her last scruples, cackling like a badly greased pulley and saying:

  ‘You silly thing, there’s nothing wrong with it… Pleasure is all that matters.’

  Nobody ever knew how far things went between them. Clorinde needed Monsieur de Plouguern during this period, having reserved for him a role in the drama she was preparing. She was wont to buy such friendships with her own favours, but later not to make use of them if she changed her plans. As she saw it, such behaviour was no more than an inconsequential handshake. Bestowing her favours meant nothing to her; she had no sense of ordinary decency but invested her pride in other things.

  She continued to bide her time. When she talked to Monsieur de Plouguern, she hinted at some dramatic future event, but it was all very vague. The senator seemed to be trying to work out what she was scheming, with the intense air of a chess player; and he would just nod, no doubt because he had no idea what to say. As for Clorinde, on the rare occasions when Rougon came to see her, she said she was feeling tired, that she might go to Italy for three months, and then, her eyes half-closed, she studied him intently, her lips pursed with a cruel smirk. She might have liked to try and strangle him with those slender fingers of hers, but she wanted to do it properly; and the patience with which she waited for her claws to grow was itself a form of enjoyment. Rougon was now forever lost in thought. He would shake hands absent-mindedly, never noticing how feverish her hands were. He thought she was more sensible now, and complimented her on her obedience to her husband.