L'Assommoir - Émile Zola (best romantic books to read txt) 📗

though she did not exactly know how, to enable her to distribute handfuls of five-franc pieces to her tradespeople. In short, she was sinking, and as she sank lower and lower she talked of extending her business. Instead she went deeper into debt. Clemence left around the middle of the summer because there was no longer enough work for two women and she had not been paid in several weeks.

During this impending ruin, Coupeau and Lantier were, in effect, devouring the shop and growing fat on the ruin of the establishment. At table they would challenge each other to take more helpings and slap their rounded stomachs to make more room for dessert.

The great subject of conversation in the neighborhood was as to whether Lantier had really gone back to his old footing with Gervaise. On this point opinions were divided. According to the Lorilleuxs, Clump-Clump was doing everything she could to hook Lantier again, but he would no longer have anything to do with her because she was getting old and faded and he had plenty of younger girls that were prettier. On the other hand, according to the Boches, Gervaise had gone back to her former mate the very first night, just as soon as poor Coupeau had gone to sleep. The picture was not pretty, but there were a lot of worse things in life, so folks ended by accepting the threesome as altogether natural. In fact, they thought them rather nice since there were never any fights and the outward decencies remained. Certainly if you stuck your nose into some of the other neighborhood households you could smell far worse things. So what if they slept together like a nice little family. It never kept the neighbors awake. Besides, everyone was still very much impressed by Lantier’s good manners. His charm helped greatly to keep tongues from wagging. Indeed, when the fruit dealer insisted to the tripe seller that there had been no intimacies, the latter appeared to feel that this was really too bad, because it made the Coupeaus less interesting.

Gervaise was quite at her ease in this matter, and not much troubled with these thoughts. Things reached the point that she was accused of being heartless. The family did not understand why she continued to bear a grudge against the hatter. Madame Lerat now came over every evening. She considered Lantier as utterly irresistible and said that most ladies would be happy to fall into his arms. Madame Boche declared that her own virtue would not be safe if she were ten years younger. There was a sort of silent conspiracy to push Gervaise into the arms of Lantier, as if all the women around her felt driven to satisfy their own longings by giving her a lover. Gervaise didn’t understand this because she no longer found Lantier seductive. Certainly he had changed for the better. He had gotten a sort of education in the cafes and political meetings but she knew him well. She could pierce to the depths of his soul and she found things there that still gave her the shivers. Well, if the others found him so attractive, why didn’t they try it themselves. In the end she suggested this one day to Virginie who seemed the most eager. Then, to excite Gervaise, Madame Lerat and Virginie told her of the love of Lantier and tall Clemence. Yes, she had not noticed anything herself; but as soon as she went out on an errand, the hatter would bring the workgirl into his room. Now people met them out together; he probably went to see her at her own place.

“Well,” said the laundress, her voice trembling slightly, “what can it matter to me?”

She looked straight into Virginie’s eyes. Did this woman still have it in for her?

Virginie replied with an air of innocence:

“It can’t matter to you, of course. Only, you ought to advise him to break off with that girl, who is sure to cause him some unpleasantness.”

The worst of it was that Lantier, feeling himself supported by public opinion, changed altogether in his behavior towards Gervaise. Now, whenever he shook hands with her, he held her fingers for a minute between his own. He tried her with his glance, fixing a bold look upon her, in which she clearly read that he wanted her. If he passed behind her, he dug his knees into her skirt, or breathed upon her neck. Yet he waited a while before being rough and openly declaring himself. But one evening, finding himself alone with her, he pushed her before him without a word, and viewed her all trembling against the wall at the back of the shop, and tried to kiss her. It so chanced that Goujet entered just at that moment. Then she struggled and escaped. And all three exchanged a few words, as though nothing had happened. Goujet, his face deadly pale, looked on the ground, fancying that he had disturbed them, and that she had merely struggled so as not to be kissed before a third party.

The next day Gervaise moved restlessly about the shop. She was miserable and unable to iron even a single handkerchief. She only wanted to see Goujet and explain to him how Lantier happened to have pinned her against the wall. But since Etienne had gone to Lille, she had hesitated to visit Goujet’s forge where she felt she would be greeted by his fellow workers with secret laughter. This afternoon, however, she yielded to the impulse. She took an empty basket and went out under the pretext of going for the petticoats of her customer on Rue des Portes-Blanches. Then, when she reached Rue Marcadet, she walked very slowly in front of the bolt factory, hoping for a lucky meeting. Goujet must have been hoping to see her, too, for within five minutes he came out as if by chance.

“You have been on an errand,” he said, smiling. “And now you are on your way home.”

Actually Gervaise had her back toward Rue des Poissonniers. He only said that for something to say. They walked together up toward Montmartre, but without her taking his arm. They wanted to get a bit away from the factory so as not to seem to be having a rendezvous in front of it. They turned into a vacant lot between a sawmill and a button factory. It was like a small green meadow. There was even a goat tied to a stake.

“It’s strange,” remarked Gervaise. “You’d think you were in the country.”

The went to sit under a dead tree. Gervaise placed the laundry basket by her feet.

“Yes,” Gervaise said, “I had an errand to do, and so I came out.”

She felt deeply ashamed and was afraid to try to explain. Yet she realized that they had come here to discuss it. It remained a troublesome burden.

Then, all in a rush, with tears in her eyes, she told him of the death that morning of Madame Bijard, her washerwoman. She had suffered horrible agonies.

“Her husband caused it by kicking her in the stomach,” she said in a monotone. “He must have damaged her insides. Mon Dieu! She was in agony for three days with her stomach all swelled up. Plenty of scoundrels have been sent to the galleys for less than that, but the courts won’t concern themselves with a wife-beater. Especially since the woman said she had hurt herself falling. She wanted to save him from the scaffold, but she screamed all night long before she died.”

Goujet clenched his hands and remained silent.

“She weaned her youngest only two weeks ago, little Jules,” Gervaise went on. “That’s lucky for the baby, he won’t have to suffer. Still, there’s the child Lalie and she has two babies to look after. She isn’t eight yet, but she’s already sensible. Her father will beat her now even more than before.”

Goujet gazed at her silently. Then, his lips trembling:

“You hurt me yesterday, yes, you hurt me badly.”

Gervaise turned pale and clasped her hands as he continued.

“I thought it would happen. You should have told me, you should have trusted me enough to confess what was happening, so as not to leave me thinking that—”

Goujet could not finish the sentence. Gervaise stood up, realizing that he thought she had gone back with Lantier as the neighbors asserted. Stretching her arms toward him, she cried:

“No, no, I swear to you. He was pushing against me, trying to kiss me, but his face never even touched mine. It’s true, and that was the first time he tried. Oh, I swear on my life, on the life of my children, oh, believe me!”

Goujet was shaking his head. Gervaise said slowly:

“Monsieur Goujet, you know me well. You know that I do not lie. On my word of honor, it never happened, and it never will, do you understand? Never! I’d be the lowest of the low if it ever happened, and I wouldn’t deserve the friendship of an honest man like you.”

She seemed so sincere that he took her hand and made her sit down again. He could breathe freely; his heart rejoiced. This was the first time he had ever held her hand like this. He pressed it in his own and they both sat quietly for a time.

“I know your mother doesn’t like me,” Gervaise said in a low voice. “Don’t bother to deny it. We owe you so much money.”

He squeezed her hand tightly. He didn’t want to talk of money. Finally he said:

“I’ve been thinking of something for a long time. You are not happy where you are. My mother tells me things are getting worse for you. Well, then, we can go away together.”

She didn’t understand at first and stared at him, startled by this sudden declaration of a love that he had never mentioned.

Finally she asked:

“What do you mean?”

“We’ll get away from here,” he said, looking down at the ground. “We’ll go live somewhere else, in Belgium, if you wish. With both of us working, we would soon be very comfortable.”

Gervaise flushed. She thought she would have felt less shame if he had taken her in his arms and kissed her. Goujet was an odd fellow, proposing to elope, just the way it happens in novels. Well, she had seen plenty of workingmen making up to married women, but they never took them even as far as Saint-Denis.

“Ah, Monsieur Goujet,” she murmured, not knowing what else to say.

“Don’t you see?” he said. “There would only be the two of us. It annoys me having others around.”

Having regained her self-possession, however, she refused his proposal.

“It’s impossible, Monsieur Goujet. It would be very wrong. I’m a married woman and I have children. We’d soon regret it. I know you care for me, and I care for you also, too much to let you do anything foolish. It’s much better to stay just as we are. We have respect for each other and that’s a lot. It’s been a comfort to me many times. When people in our situation stay on the straight, it is better in the end.”

He nodded his head as he listened. He agreed with her and was unable to offer any arguments. Suddenly he pulled her into his arms and kissed her, crushing her. Then he let her go and said nothing more about their love. She wasn’t angry. She felt they had earned that small moment of pleasure.

Goujet now didn’t know what to do with his hands, so he went around picking dandelions and tossing them into her basket. This amused him and gradually soothed him. Gervaise was becoming relaxed and cheerful. When they finally left the vacant lot they walked side by side and talked of how