The gendarme made a little joke:
“He takes the shepherd’s blankets.”
Madame Lecacheur, who was seized by a fresh access of rage, of rage increased by a married woman’s anger against debauchery, exclaimed:
“It is she, I am sure. Go there. Ah, the blackguard thieves!”
But the brigadier was quite unmoved.
“One minute,” he said. “Let us wait until twelve o’clock, as he goes and dines there every day. I shall catch them with it under their noses.”
The gendarme smiled, pleased at his chief’s idea, and Lecacheur also smiled now, for the affair of the shepherd struck him as very funny; deceived husbands are always a joke.
Twelve o’clock had just struck when the brigadier, followed by his man, knocked gently three times at the door of a little lonely house, situated at the corner of a wood, five hundred yards from the village.
They had been standing close against the wall, so as not to be seen from within, and they waited. As nobody answered, the brigadier knocked again in a minute or two. It was so quiet that the house seemed uninhabited; but Lenient, the gendarme, who had very quick ears, said that he heard somebody moving about inside, and then Senateur got angry. He would not allow any one to resist the authority of the law for a moment, and, knocking at the door with the hilt of his sword, he cried out:
“Open the door, in the name of the law.”
As this order had no effect, he roared out:
“If you do not obey, I shall smash the lock. I am the brigadier of the gendarmerie, by G—! Here, Lenient.”
He had not finished speaking when the door opened and Senateur saw before him a fat girl, with a very red, blowzy face, with drooping breasts, a big stomach and broad hips, a sort of animal, the wife of the shepherd Severin, and he went into the cottage.
“I have come to pay you a visit, as I want to make a little search,” he said, and he looked about him. On the table there was a plate, a jug of cider and a glass half full, which proved that a meal was in progress. Two knives were lying side by side, and the shrewd gendarme winked at his superior officer.
“It smells good,” the latter said.
“One might swear that it was stewed rabbit,” Lenient added, much amused.
“Will you have a glass of brandy?” the peasant woman asked.
“No, thank you; I only want the skin of the rabbit that you are eating.”
She pretended not to understand, but she was trembling.
“What rabbit?”
The brigadier had taken a seat, and was calmly wiping his forehead.
“Come, come, you are not going to try and make us believe that you live on couch grass. What were you eating there all by yourself for your dinner?”
“I? Nothing whatever, I swear to you. A mite of butter on my bread.”
“You are a novice, my good woman. A mite of butter on your bread. You are mistaken; you ought to have said: a mite of butter on the rabbit. By G—, your butter smells good! It is special butter, extra good butter, butter fit for a wedding; certainly, not household butter!”
The gendarme was shaking with laughter, and repeated:
“Not household butter certainly.”
As Brigadier Senateur was a joker, all the gendarmes had grown facetious, and the officer continued:
“Where is your butter?”
“My butter?”
“Yes, your butter.”
“In the jar.”
“Then where is the butter jar?”
“Here it is.”
She brought out an old cup, at the bottom of which there was a layer of rancid salt butter, and the brigadier smelled of it, and said, with a shake of his head:
“It is not the same. I want the butter that smells of the rabbit. Come, Lenient, open your eyes; look under the sideboard, my good fellow, and I will look under the bed.”
Having shut the door, he went up to the bed and tried to move it; but it was fixed to the wall, and had not been moved for more than half a century, apparently. Then the brigadier stooped, and made his uniform crack. A button had flown off.
“Lenient,” he said.
“Yes, brigadier?”
“Come here, my lad, and look under the bed; I am too tall. I will look after the sideboard.”
He got up and waited while his man executed his orders.
Lenient, who was short and stout, took off his kepi, laid himself on his stomach, and, putting his face on the floor, looked at the black cavity under the bed, and then, suddenly, he exclaimed:
“All right, here we are!”
“What have you got? The rabbit?”
“No, the thief.”
“The thief! Pull him out, pull him out!”
The gendarme had put his arms under the bed and laid hold of something, and he was pulling with all his might, and at last a foot, shod in a thick boot, appeared, which he was holding in his right hand. The brigadier took it, crying:
“Pull! Pull!”
And Lenient, who was on his knees by that time, was pulling at the other leg. But it was a hard job, for the prisoner kicked out hard, and arched up his back under the bed.
“Courage! courage! pull! pull!” Senateur cried, and they pulled him with all their strength, so that the wooden slat gave way, and he came out as far as his head; but at last they got that out also, and they saw the terrified and furious face of Polyte, whose arms remained stretched out under the bed.
“Pull away!” the brigadier kept on exclaiming. Then they heard a strange noise, and as the arms followed the shoulders, and the hands the arms, they saw in the hands the handle of a saucepan, and at the end of the handle the saucepan itself, which contained stewed rabbit.
“Good Lord! good Lord!” the brigadier shouted in his delight, while Lenient took charge of the man; the rabbit’s skin, an overwhelming proof, was discovered under the mattress, and then the gendarmes returned in triumph to the village with their prisoner and their booty.
A week later, as the affair had made much stir, Lecacheur, on going into the mairie to consult the schoolmaster, was told that the shepherd Severin had been waiting for him for more than an hour, and he found him sitting on a chair in a corner, with his stick between his legs. When he saw the mayor, he got up, took off his cap, and said:
“Good-morning, Maitre Cacheux”; and then he remained standing, timid and embarrassed.
“What do you want?” the former said.
“This is it, monsieur. Is it true that somebody stole one of your rabbits last week?”
“Yes, it is quite true, Severin.”
“Who stole the rabbit?”
“Polyte Ancas, the laborer.”
“Right! right! And is it also true that it was found under my bed?”
“What do you mean, the rabbit?”
“The rabbit and then Polyte.”
“Yes, my poor Severin, quite true, but who told you?”
“Pretty well everybody. I understand! And I suppose you know all about marriages, as you marry people?”
“What about marriage?”
“With regard to one’s rights.”
“What rights?”
“The husband’s rights and then the wife’s rights.”
“Of course I do.”
“Oh! Then just tell me, M’sieu Cacheux, has my wife the right to go to bed with Polyte?”
“What, to go to bed with Polyte?”
“Yes, has she any right before the law, and, seeing that she is my wife, to go to bed with Polyte?”
“Why, of course not, of course not.”
“If I catch him there again, shall I have the right to thrash him and her also?”
“Why—why—why, yes.”
“Very well, then; I will tell you why I want to know. One night last week, as I had my suspicions, I came in suddenly, and they were not behaving properly. I chucked Polyte out, to go and sleep somewhere else; but that was all, as I did not know what my rights were. This time I did not see them; I only h
eard of it from others. That is over, and we will not say any more about it; but if I catch them again—by G—, if I catch them again, I will make them lose all taste for such nonsense, Maitre Cacheux, as sure as my name is Severin.”
HIS AVENGER
When M. Antoine Leuillet married the widow, Madame Mathilde Souris, he had already been in love with her for ten years.
M. Souris has been his friend, his old college chum. Leuillet was very much attached to him, but thought he was somewhat of a simpleton. He would often remark: “That poor Souris who will never set the world on fire.”
When Souris married Miss Mathilde Duval, Leuillet was astonished and somewhat annoyed, as he was slightly devoted to her, himself. She was the daughter of a neighbor, a former proprietor of a draper’s establishment who had retired with quite a small fortune. She married Souris for his money.
Then Leuillet thought he would start a flirtation with his friend’s wife. He was a good-looking man, intelligent and also rich. He thought it would be all plain sailing, but he was mistaken. Then he really began to admire her with an admiration that his friendship for the husband obliged him to keep within the bounds of discretion, making him timid and embarrassed. Madame Souris believing that his presumptions had received a wholesome check now treated him as a good friend. This went on for nine years.
One morning a messenger brought Leuillet a distracted note from the poor woman. Souris had just died suddenly from the rupture of an aneurism. He was dreadfully shocked, for they were just the same age. But almost immediately a feeling of profound joy, of intense relief, of emancipation filled his being. Madame Souris was free.
He managed, however, to assume the sad, sympathetic expression that was appropriate, waited the required time, observed all social appearances. At the end of fifteen months he married the widow.
This was considered to be a very natural, and even a generous action. It was the act of a good friend of an upright man.
He was happy at last, perfectly happy.
They lived in the most cordial intimacy, having understood and appreciated each other from the first. They had no secrets from one another and even confided to each other their most secret thoughts. Leuillet loved his wife now with a quiet and trustful affection; he loved her as a tender, devoted companion who is an equal and a confidante. But there lingered in his mind a strange and inexplicable bitterness towards the defunct Souris, who had first been the husband of this woman, who had had the flower of her youth and of her soul, and had even robbed her of some of her poetry. The memory of the dead husband marred the happiness of the living husband, and this posthumous jealousy tormented his heart by day and by night.
The consequence was he talked incessantly of Souris, asked about a thousand personal and secret minutia, wanted to know all about his habits and his person. And he sneered at him even in his grave, recalling with self-satisfaction his whims, ridiculing his absurdities, dwelling on his faults.
He would call to his wife all over the house:
“Hallo, Mathilde!”
“Here I am, dear.”
“Come here a moment.”
She would come, always smiling, knowing well that he would say something about Souris and ready to flatter her new husband’s inoffensive mania.
“Tell me, do you remember one day how Souris insisted on explaining to me that little men always commanded more affection than big men?”
And he made some remarks that were disparaging to the deceased, who was a small man, and decidedly flattering to himself, Leuillet, who was a tall man.
Mme. Leuillet allowed him to think he was right, quite right, and she laughed heartily, gently ridiculing her former husband for the sake of pleasing the present one, who always ended by saying:
“All the same, what a ninny that Souris was!”
They were happy, quite happy, and Leuillet never ceased to show his devotion to his wife.
One night, however, as they lay awake, Leuillet said as he kissed his wife:
“See here, dearie.”
“Well?”
“Was Souris—I don’t exactly know how to say it—was Souris very loving?”
She gave him a kiss for reply and murmured “Not as loving as you are, mon chat.”
He was flattered in his self-love and continued:
“He must have been—a ninny—was he not?”
She did not reply. She only smiled slyly and hid her face in her husband’s neck.
“He must have been a ninny and not—not—not smart?”
She shook her head slightly to imply, “No—not at all smart.”
He continued:
“He must have been an awful nuisance, eh?”
This time she was frank and replied:
“Oh yes!”
He kissed her again for this avowal and said:
“What a brute he was! You were not happy with him?”
“No,” she replied. “It was not always pleasant.”
Leuillet was delighted, forming in his mind a comparison, much in his own favor, between his wife’s former and present position. He was silent for a time, and then with a burst of laughter he asked:
“Tell me?”
“What?”
“Will you be frank, very frank with me?”
“Why yes, my dear.”
“Well then, tell me truly did you never feel tempted to—to—to deceive that imbecile Souris?”
Mme. Leuillet said: “Oh!” pretending to be shocked and hid her face again on her husband’s shoulder. But he saw that she was laughing.
“Come now, own up,” he persisted. “He looked like a ninny, that creature! It would be funny, so funny! Good old Souris! Come, come, dearie, you do not mind telling me, me, of all people.”
He insisted on the “me” thinking that if she had wished to deceive Souris she would have chosen him, and he was trembling in anticipation of her avowal, sure that if she had not been a virtuous woman she would have encouraged his own attentions.
But she did not answer, laughing still, as at the recollection of something exceedingly comical.
Leuillet, in his turn began to laugh, thinking he might have been the lucky man, and he muttered amid his mirth: “That poor Souris, that poor Souris, oh, yes, he looked like a fool!”
Mme. Leuillet was almost in spasms of laughter.
“Come, confess, be frank. You know I will not mind.”
Then she stammered out, almost choking with laughter: “Yes, yes.”
“Yes, what?” insisted her husband. “Come, tell all.”
She was quieter now and putting her mouth to her husband’s ear, she whispered: “Yes, I did deceive him.”
He felt a chill run down his back and to his very bones, and he stammered out, dumfounded: “You—you—deceived him—criminally?”
She still thought he was amused and replied: “Yes—yes, absolutely.”
He was obliged to sit up to recover his breath, he was so shocked and upset at what he had heard.
She had become serious, understanding too late what she had done.
“With whom?” said Leuillet at length.
She was silent seeking some excuse.
“A young man,” she replied at length.
He turned suddenly toward her and said drily:
“I did not suppose it was the cook. I want to know what young man, do you hear?”
She did not answer.
He snatched the covers from her face, repeating:
“I want to know what young man, do you hear?”
Then she said sorrowfully: “I was only in fun.” But he was trembling with rage. “What? How? You were only in fun? You were making fun of me, then? But I am not satisfied, do you hear? I want the name of the young man!”
She did not reply, but lay there motionless.
He took her by the arm and squeezed it, saying: “Do you understand me, finally? I wish you to reply when I speak to you.”
“I think you are going crazy,” she said nervously, “l
et me alone!”
He was wild with rage, not knowing what to say, exasperated, and he shook her with all his might, repeating:
“Do you hear me, do you hear me?”
She made an abrupt effort to disengage herself and the tips of her fingers touched her husband’s nose. He was furious, thinking she had tried to hit him, and he sprang upon her holding her down; and boxing her ears with all his might, he cried: “Take that, and that, there, there, wretch!”
When he was out of breath and exhausted, he rose and went toward the dressing table to prepare a glass of eau sucree with orange flower, for he felt as if he should faint.
She was weeping in bed, sobbing bitterly, for she felt as if her happiness was over, through her own fault.
Then, amidst her tears, she stammered out:
“Listen, Antoine, come here, I told you a lie, you will understand, listen.”
And prepared to defend herself now, armed with excuses and artifice, she raised her disheveled head with its nightcap all awry.
Turning toward her, he approached, ashamed of having struck her, but feeling in the bottom of his heart as a husband, a relentless hatred toward this woman who had deceived the former husband, Souris.
MY UNCLE JULES
A white-haired old man begged us for alms. My companion, Joseph Davranche, gave him five francs. Noticing my surprised look, he said:
“That poor unfortunate reminds me of a story which I shall tell you, the memory of which continually pursues me. Here it is:
“My family, which came originally from Havre, was not rich. We just managed to make both ends meet. My father worked hard, came home late from the office, and earned very little. I had two sisters.
“My mother suffered a good deal from our reduced circumstances, and she often had harsh words for her husband, veiled and sly reproaches. The poor man then made a gesture which used to distress me. He would pass his open hand over his forehead, as if to wipe away perspiration which did not exist, and he would answer nothing. I felt his helpless suffering. We economized on everything, and never would accept an invitation to dinner, so as not to have to return the courtesy. All our provisions were bought at bargain sales. My sisters made their own gowns, and long discussions would arise on the price of a piece of braid worth fifteen centimes a yard. Our meals usually consisted of soup and beef, prepared with every kind of sauce.
The Guy De Maupassant Megapack: 144 Novels and Short Stories Page 91
