The grave-digger walked on in front of him.
Fauchelevent passed the unexpected Gribier once more in review.
He was one of those men who, though very young, have the air of age, and who, though slender, are extremely strong.
“Comrade!” cried Fauchelevent.
The man turned round.
“I am the convent grave-digger.”
“My colleague,” said the man.
Fauchelevent, who was illiterate but very sharp, understood that he had to deal with a formidable species of man, with a fine talker.
He muttered: “So Father Mestienne is dead.”
The man replied:— “Completely.
The good God consulted his note-book which shows when the time is up.
It was Father Mestienne’s turn.
Father Mestienne died.”
Fauchelevent repeated mechanically: “The good God—”
“The good God,” said the man authoritatively.
“According to the philosophers, the Eternal Father; according to the Jacobins, the Supreme Being.”
“Shall we not make each other’s acquaintance?” stammered Fauchelevent.
“It is made.
You are a peasant, I am a Parisian.”
“People do not know each other until they have drunk together.
He who empties his glass empties his heart.
You must come and have a drink with me.
Such a thing cannot be refused.”
“Business first.”
Fauchelevent thought: “I am lost.”
They were only a few turns of the wheel distant from the small alley leading to the nuns’ corner.
The grave-digger resumed:— “Peasant, I have seven small children who must be fed.
As they must eat, I cannot drink.”
And he added, with the satisfaction of a serious man who is turning a phrase well:—
“Their hunger is the enemy of my thirst.”
The hearse skirted a clump of cypress-trees, quitted the grand alley, turned into a narrow one, entered the waste land, and plunged into a thicket.
This indicated the immediate proximity of the place of sepulture.
Fauchelevent slackened his pace, but he could not detain the hearse.
Fortunately, the soil, which was light and wet with the winter rains, clogged the wheels and retarded its speed.
He approached the grave-digger.
“They have such a nice little Argenteuil wine,” murmured Fauchelevent.
“Villager,” retorted the man,
“I ought not be a grave-digger.
My father was a porter at the Prytaneum [Town-Hall].
He destined me for literature.
But he had reverses.
He had losses on ‘change.
I was obliged to renounce the profession of author.
But I am still a public writer.”
“So you are not a grave-digger, then?” returned Fauchelevent, clutching at this branch, feeble as it was.
“The one does not hinder the other.
I cumulate.”
Fauchelevent did not understand this last word.
“Come have a drink,” said he.
Here a remark becomes necessary.