by Emile Zola
‘Like a family vault,’ added Gueulin.
They entered. Duveyrier went first, holding the candle aloft.
The anteroom was empty; even the hat-pegs had vanished. The drawing-room was empty; so, too, was the parlour; not a single piece of furniture, not a curtain at any of the windows; not even a curtain-rail. Petrified, Duveyrier glanced down at his feet and then looked up at the ceiling, and then went round examining the walls as if to discover the hole through which everything had disappeared.
‘A clean sweep!’ said Trublot, despite himself.
‘Perhaps the place is going to be done up,’ remarked Gueulin gravely. ‘Let’s look in the bedroom, the furniture might have been moved in there.’
But the bedroom was equally bare, hideous and stark in its nudity, like plaster walls from which the paper has been stripped. Where the bed had stood, the iron supports of the canopy, also removed, had left gaping holes; one of the windows was half open, and the air from the street gave the room the damp, stale smell of a public square.
‘My God! My God!’ stammered Duveyrier, finally breaking into tears, overcome by the sight of the place where the mattresses had rubbed the paper off the wall.
Bachelard became quite paternal, as he repeated:
‘Courage, sir! The same thing happened to me, and I’m still alive. Damn it all, your honour is safe!’
Duveyrier shook his head and moved on to the dressing-room, and then to the kitchen. Yet more disastrous revelations! The oilcloth in the dressing-room had been removed, as well as all the hooks in the kitchen.
‘No, really, that’s too much!’ said Gueulin. ‘How awful! She might have left the hooks!’
Tired out by the dinner and the walk, Trublot began to find this desolation far from amusing. But Duveyrier, still clutching his candle, walked round and round, as if determined to sink into the uttermost depths of his abandonment. The others were forced to follow him. He went once more through every room, wishing to reinspect drawing-room, parlour, and bedroom, looking carefully into each corner, light in hand, while his companions trailed behind him, their huge shadows dancing fantastically on the barren walls. In this melancholy atmosphere their footsteps echoed grimly on the wooden floorboards, and, to put the finishing touch to the general desolation, the whole apartment was scrupulously clean, without a single scrap of paper or straw lying about, as spotless as a well-scrubbed bowl, for the concierge had been cruel enough to sweep the whole place thoroughly.
‘I can’t stand any more of this,’ exclaimed Trublot at last, as they were inspecting the drawing-room for the third time. ‘I’d give ten sous for a chair to sit in—I really would!’
All four of them stood still.
‘When did you see her last?’ asked Bachelard.
‘Yesterday, sir!’ exclaimed Duveyrier.
Gueulin shook his head. Well, it hadn’t taken her long; she’d made a neat job of it. Trublot suddenly uttered a cry. He had just spotted on the mantelpiece a dirty collar and a damaged cigar.
‘You mustn’t complain,’ he said, laughing, ‘she’s left you a keepsake. That’s something.’
Duveyrier, suddenly touched, looked at the collar. Then he murmured:
‘Twenty-five thousand francs’ worth of furniture; there was twenty-five thousand francs’ worth! Oh, well, it’s not that that I regret—no, not that!’
‘Won’t you have the cigar?’ asked Trublot, interrupting. ‘I will, then, if you don’t mind. It’s got a hole in it, but I can stick some cigarette-paper round it.’
He lit it with the candle Duveyrier was still holding; then, sliding into a sitting posture against the wall, he said:
‘I’ve just got to sit on the floor for a bit; I’m ready to drop!’
‘Well,’ asked Duveyrier, ‘can any of you tell me where she might have gone?’
Bachelard and Gueulin looked at each other. It was a delicate matter. However, the uncle manfully decided to tell the poor fellow everything—all about Clarisse’s goings-on, her endless affairs, and the lovers that at every one of their parties she used to pick up behind his back. No doubt she had gone off with her latest, that big fellow, Payan the mason, whom his townsfolk in the South wanted to turn into an artist. Duveyrier listened to these abominable revelations with a look of horror on his face. At last he exclaimed in despair:
‘There’s no honesty left in this world!’
Then, opening his heart, he told them everything he had done for her. He spoke of his kind-heartedness, accused her of having shaken his belief in all that was best in human life, ingenuously hiding beneath these sentimental protestations all the disorder of his carnal appetites. Clarisse had become a necessity to him. But he would find her again, just to make her blush at her treachery, so he said, and to see if her heart was devoid of all noble feeling.
‘Don’t bother!’ cried Bachelard, secretly delighted at the judge’s misfortune; ‘she’ll only make a fool of you again. There’s nothing like virtue, you know. Get yourself some little girl who wouldn’t dream of playing tricks, and innocent as a newborn child; then there’s no danger, you can sleep in peace.’
Trublot, meanwhile, went on smoking with his back against the wall and his legs stretched out, gravely taking his ease. The others had forgotten him.
‘If you really want, I can get the address for you,’ he said. ‘I know the maid.’
Duveyrier turned round, astonished at hearing this voice that seemed to come out of the floor, and when he saw Trublot smoking all that remained of Clarisse, blowing great clouds of smoke in which he fancied he saw his twenty-five thousand francs’ worth of furniture evaporating, he cried angrily:
‘No; she’s unworthy of me! She must beg my forgiveness on her knees!’
‘Hullo! here she is, coming back!’ said Gueulin, listening.
Someone, indeed, was walking in the hall; and a voice cried: ‘Hullo, what’s going on? Is everybody dead?’ And then Octave appeared. The empty rooms and open doors astonished him. But his amazement increased when he saw the four men, in the middle of the bare drawing-room, one on the floor and the other three standing up, and lighted only by a single dim candle which the magistrate was holding like a church taper. A few words sufficed to explain to him what had occurred.
‘Impossible!’ he exclaimed.
‘Didn’t they tell you anything downstairs?’ asked Gueulin.
‘No, nothing at all; the concierge just watched me come upstairs. So she’s gone, has she? I’m not surprised. She had such funny eyes and hair!’
He asked for details, and stood talking for a little while, forgetting the sad news of which he was the bearer. Then suddenly he turned towards Duveyrier.
‘By the way, your wife sent me to fetch you. Your father-in-law’s dying.’
‘Oh, is he?’ said Duveyrier simply.
‘What, old Vabre?’ muttered Bachelard. ‘I’m not surprised.’
‘Well, when you get to the end of the line!’ remarked Gueulin philosophically.
‘Yes, it’s best to kick the bucket,’ added Trublot, busy sticking another cigarette-paper round his cigar.
The four gentlemen decided at length to quit the deserted apartment. Octave kept saying that he had given his word of honour that he would bring Duveyrier back with him at once, no matter what state he was in. The latter carefully closed the door, as if he were leaving behind all his dead affections; but downstairs he was suddenly overcome with shame, and Trublot had to return the key to the concierge. Then, in the street, there was a silent exchange of vigorous handshakes; and, as soon as Duveyrier and Octave had driven off in a cab, Bachelard said to Gueulin and to Trublot, as they stood there in the deserted street:
‘Damn it all! I must show her to you!’
He had been growing impatient, greatly excited at the despair of that idiot Duveyrier, and bursting with pleasure at his own happiness, due, so he thought, to his own deep cunning. He could no longer contain his joy.
‘You know uncle,’ said Gueulin, �
�if you’re only going to take us as far as the door again and then send us away …’
‘No, damn it all! You shall see her! I’d like you to. It’s nearly midnight, but never mind; she can get up if she’s gone to bed. You know, she’s the daughter of a captain—Captain Menu—and she’s got a most respectable aunt, born at Villeneuve, near Lille. You can get references at Mardiennes Brothers’, in the Rue Saint-Sulpice. Ah, damn it all! It’ll do us good! You’ll see what virtue is like!’
He took their arms, Gueulin on the right and Trublot on the left, as he hurried along in search of a cab so as to get there quicker.
Meanwhile, as they drove along Octave briefly described Monsieur Vabre’s seizure to his companion, without concealing the fact that Madame Duveyrier knew the address in the Rue de la Cerisaie. After a while the magistrate asked in a doleful voice:
‘Do you think she’ll forgive me?’
Octave said nothing. The cab rolled along in the darkness, lit up every now and then by a ray from a gas-lamp. Just as they were reaching their destination Duveyrier, consumed with anguish, asked another question.
‘The best thing I can do at present is to make it up with my wife; don’t you think so?’
‘Perhaps that would be wise,’ said Octave, obliged to make some sort of reply.
Then Duveyrier felt that he ought to show regret for his father-in-law. A man of great intelligence, he said, with an incredible capacity for work. However, very likely they would be able to pull him through. In the Rue de Choiseul they found the street-door open and a small crowd gathered in front of Monsieur Gourd’s lodge. Julie, on her way to the chemist’s, was denouncing the middle classes who let one another die when ill; it was only working-folk, she said, who took each other soup or warm towels when there was sickness. The old fellow might have swallowed his tongue twenty times over, during the two hours he had spent agonizing on his bed, without his children once taking the trouble to shove a bit of sugar into his mouth. A hard-hearted lot, said Monsieur Gourd—folk that could not be stirred for anything, and who would have thought themselves disgraced if they had had to give their father an enema. Hippolyte, to cap everything, told them about madame upstairs, and how silly she looked not knowing what to do with herself, while the servants ran about doing all they could. But they all fell silent as soon as they saw Duveyrier.
‘Well?’ he enquired.
‘The doctor’s just putting some mustard-poultices on him,’ said Hippolyte. ‘Oh, I had such a job to find him!’
Upstairs, in the drawing-room, Madame Duveyrier came forward to meet them. She had been crying a great deal; her eyes shone beneath their reddened lids. The judge, greatly embarrassed, held out his arms and embraced her, murmuring:
‘My poor Clotilde!’
Surprised at this unusual display of affection, she shrank back. Octave had kept behind; but he heard the husband say in a low voice:
‘Forgive me! Let’s forget our quarrels on this sad occasion. You see, I’ve come back to you for good. Oh, I’ve been well punished!’
She made no reply, but disengaged herself. Then, resuming before Octave her attitude of a woman who wishes to ignore everything, she said:
‘I shouldn’t have bothered you, darling: I know how urgent that report about the Rue de Provence scandal is. But I was all alone, and I felt you should come. My poor father’s dying. Go in and see him; the doctor’s there.’
When Duveyrier had gone into the next room she walked up to Octave who, so as to appear not to be listening, was standing by the piano. It was still open, and the air from Zémire et Azor lay there as they had left it on the desk. He pretended to be studying it. The soft light from the lamp still illuminated only a part of the large room.
Madame Duveyrier looked at the young man for a moment without speaking, tormented by an anxiety which led her to throw off her usual reserve.
‘Was he there?’ she asked briefly.
‘Yes, madam.’
‘Then, what is it? What’s the matter with him?’
‘That person has left him, madam, taking all the furniture with her. I found him in the empty apartment with only a candle!’
Clotilde made a gesture of despair. She understood. A look of disgust and discouragement appeared on her handsome face. It was not enough that she had lost her father, it seemed that this misfortune was also to serve as a pretext for a reconciliation with her husband! She knew him only too well; he would always be pestering her, now that there was nothing elsewhere to protect her, and, with her respect for all duties, she trembled at the thought that she could not refuse to submit to the abominable task. For a moment she looked at the piano. Great tears filled her eyes as she said simply:
‘Thank you, sir.’
Then, in their turn, they both went into Monsieur Vabre’s bedroom. Duveyrier, looking very pale, was listening to Doctor Juillerat who was explaining something in a low voice. It was a very bad attack of apoplexy. The patient might possibly linger until the next day, but there was no hope whatever. Clotilde entered just at that moment; she overheard this last statement and sank down into a chair, wiping her eyes with her tear-drenched handkerchief, which she had nervously twisted into a ball. However, she had strength enough to ask the doctor if her poor father would regain consciousness. The doctor had his doubts; and, as if he had divined the motive for the question, he expressed his hope that Monsieur Vabre had long since put his affairs in order. Duveyrier, whose mental faculties had apparently remained behind in the Rue de la Cerisaie, now seemed to wake up. He looked at his wife and then observed that Monsieur Vabre never confided in anyone; so he knew nothing, except that certain promises had been made in favour of their son Gustave, whom his grandfather often spoke of helping as a reward for their having taken him to live with them. At any rate, if there was a will it would be found.
‘Does the family know what’s happened?’ asked Doctor Juillerat.
‘No,’ murmured Clotilde. ‘It was so sudden. My first thought was to send Monsieur Mouret for my husband.’
Duveyrier gave her another look; now they understood each other. Slowly approaching the bed, he examined Monsieur Vabre, straight and stiff as a corpse, his rigid features covered in yellow blotches. One o’clock struck. The doctor spoke of leaving, as he had tried all the usual remedies and could do nothing more. He would call again early in the morning. He was going off with Octave when Madame Duveyrier called the latter back.
‘Let’s wait until tomorrow,’ she said. ‘You can make some excuse to send Berthe to me, I’ll call Valérie, and they can break the news to my brothers. Poor things! Let them sleep in peace tonight! There’s no need for any more of us to stay awake.’
She and her husband remained alone with the old man, whose death-rattle echoed through the room.
XI
When Octave went downstairs the next morning at eight o’clock, he was surprised to find that the whole building knew about Monsieur Vabre’s seizure of the previous night and of the landlord’s desperate condition. No one, however, was concerned about the patient; their sole interest was knowing what he was going to leave behind.
In their little dining-room the Pichons sat before their cups of chocolate. Jules called Octave in.
‘I say! What a mess there’ll be if he dies like that! There’ll be some fun and games. Do you know if he made a will?’
Octave, without answering, asked them how they had heard the news. Marie had brought it back from the baker’s; in fact it had spread from floor to floor, even to the end of the street, through the servants.
Then, after slapping Lilitte for putting her fingers in the chocolate, Marie said:
‘And all that money too! If he had only thought of leaving us as many sous as there are five-franc pieces! Not much chance of that, though.’
And, as Octave was going, she added:
‘I’ve finished your books, Monsieur Mouret. Do come and fetch them, won’t you?’
He hurried downstairs, remembering that he had promi
sed Madame Duveyrier that he would send Berthe to her before there was any gossip, when on the third floor he bumped into Campardon.
‘Well,’ said the latter, ‘so your employer is coming into a fortune. I hear the old boy has got nearly six hundred thousand francs, besides this place. You see, he spent nothing at the Duveyriers’, and he had a good bit left out of his Versailles property, without counting the twenty-odd thousand francs from the rents here. It’s a big cake when there are only three to share it.’
Still chatting away, he walked downstairs behind Octave. On the second floor they met Madame Juzeur, who had come down to see what her little servant girl, Louise, could be doing all morning, taking over an hour to fetch four sous’ worth of milk. She had no difficulty in joining in the conversation, being very well informed.
‘Nobody seems to know how he arranged his affairs,’ she said in her quiet way. ‘There may be some bother about it.’
‘Ah, well,’ said the architect, gaily, ‘I wouldn’t mind being in their shoes. It shouldn’t take long. Divide it all into three equal parts; each takes his share, and it’s all done.’
Madame Juzeur leant over the banisters, and then looked up to make sure that no one was on the stairs. Then, lowering her voice, she said:
‘And what if they don’t find what they expect? There are rumours …’
Campardon opened his eyes wide. Then he shrugged his shoulders. Bah! That was all nonsense. Old Vabre was a miser, who hid his savings in worsted stockings. And so saying he went off, having an appointment at Saint-Roch with Father Mauduit.
‘My wife was complaining about you,’ he said to Octave, looking back after going down three steps. ‘Call in and have a chat with her some time.’
Madame Juzeur kept the young man talking for a moment.
‘And me, too! How you neglect me! I thought you liked me a little bit. When you come, I’ll let you taste a liqueur from the West Indies—something quite delicious!’
He promised to call in to see her, and then hurried down into the hall. Before reaching the little shop-door under the arch he had to pass a whole group of servants. They were engaged in distributing the dying man’s fortune. There was so much for Madame Clotilde, so much for Monsieur Auguste, and so much for Monsieur Théophile. Clémence stated the figures boldly; she knew well enough what they were for she had them from Hippolyte, who had seen the money in a drawer. Julie, however, disputed them. Lisa told how her first master, an old gentleman, had done her out of her wages by dying without even leaving her his dirty linen. Adèle, meanwhile, her arms dangling and mouth agape, listened to these tales of inheritance until she imagined huge piles of five-franc pieces toppling over into her lap. And in the street Monsieur Gourd, pompous as ever, was talking to the stationer over the way. For him the landlord was already dead.
