Then at night she sleeps so soundly that she never wakes up to ask me if I’m in pain. I’m just a nuisance to them. They’re waiting for me to die.
That will happen soon enough.
I don’t even have a son any more; that laundress has taken him from me.
She’d beat me to death if she wasn’t afraid of the law.”
Gervaise was indeed rather hasty at times.
The place was going to the dogs, everyone’s temper was getting spoilt and they sent each other to the right about for the least word.
Coupeau, one morning that he had a hangover, exclaimed:
“The old thing’s always saying she’s going to die, and yet she never does!”
The words struck mother Coupeau to the heart.
They frequently complained of how much she cost them, observing that they would save a lot of money when she was gone.
When at her worst that winter, one afternoon, when Madame Lorilleux and Madame Lerat had met at her bedside, mother Coupeau winked her eye as a signal to them to lean over her.
She could scarcely speak. She rather hissed than said in a low voice:
“It’s becoming indecent.
I heard them last night.
Yes, Clump-clump and the hatter.
And they were kicking up such a row together! Coupeau’s too decent for her.”
And she related in short sentences, coughing and choking between each, that her son had come home dead drunk the night before.
Then, as she was not asleep, she was easily able to account for all the noises, of Clump-clump’s bare feet tripping over the tiled floor, the hissing voice of the hatter calling her, the door between the two rooms gently closed, and the rest.
It must have lasted till daylight. She could not tell the exact time, because, in spite of her efforts, she had ended by falling into a dose.
“What’s most disgusting is that Nana might have heard everything,” continued she.
“She was indeed restless all the night, she who usually sleeps so sound.
She tossed about and kept turning over as though there had been some lighted charcoal in her bed.”
The other two women did not seem at all surprised.
“Of course!” murmured Madame Lorilleux, “it probably began the very first night. But as it pleases Coupeau, we’ve no business to interfere.
All the same, it’s not very respectable.”
“As for me,” declared Madame Lerat through clenched teeth, “if I’d been there, I’d have thrown a fright into them. I’d have shouted something, anything.
A doctor’s maid told me once that the doctor had told her that a surprise like that, at a certain moment, could strike a woman dead.
If she had died right there, that would have been well, wouldn’t it?
She would have been punished right where she had sinned.”
It wasn’t long until the entire neighborhood knew that Gervaise visited Lantier’s room every night.
Madame Lorilleux was loudly indignant, calling her brother a poor fool whose wife had shamed him.
And her poor mother, forced to live in the midst of such horrors.
As a result, the neighbors blamed Gervaise.
Yes, she must have led Lantier astray; you could see it in her eyes.
In spite of the nasty gossip, Lantier was still liked because he was always so polite. He always had candy or flowers to give the ladies.
Mon Dieu! Men shouldn’t be expected to push away women who threw themselves at them.
There was no excuse for Gervaise. She was a disgrace.
The Lorilleuxs used to bring Nana up to their apartment in order to find out more details from her, their godchild.
But Nana would put on her expression of innocent stupidity and lower her long silky eyelashes to hide the fire in her eyes as she replied.
In the midst of this general indignation, Gervaise lived quietly on, feeling tired out and half asleep.
At first she considered herself very sinful and felt a disgust for herself.
When she left Lantier’s room she would wash her hands and scrub herself as if trying to get rid of an evil stain.
If Coupeau then tried to joke with her, she would fly into a passion, and run and shiveringly dress herself in the farthest corner of the shop; neither would she allow Lantier near her soon after her husband had kissed her.
She would have liked to have changed her skin as she changed men.
But she gradually became accustomed to it.
Soon it was too much trouble to scrub herself each time.
Her thirst for happiness led her to enjoy as much as she could the difficult situation.
She had always been disposed to make allowances for herself, so why not for others? She only wanted to avoid causing trouble.
As long as the household went along as usual, there was nothing to complain about.
Then, after all, she could not be doing anything to make Coupeau stop drinking; matters were arranged so easily to the general satisfaction.