Outside, she turned to look up at the monumental structure of the hospital and recalled the days when Coupeau was working there, putting on the zinc roof, perched up high and singing in the sun.
He wasn’t drinking in those days.
She used to watch for him from her window in the Hotel Boncoeur and they would both wave their handkerchiefs in greeting.
Now, instead of being on the roof like a cheerful sparrow, he was down below.
He had built his own place in the hospital where he had come to die.
Mon Dieu! It all seemed so far way now, that time of young love.
On the day after the morrow, when Gervaise called to obtain news of him, she found the bed empty.
A Sister of Charity told her that they had been obliged to remove her husband to the Asylum of Sainte-Anne, because the day before he had suddenly gone wild.
Oh! a total leave-taking of his senses; attempts to crack his skull against the wall; howls which prevented the other patients from sleeping.
It all came from drink, it seemed.
Gervaise went home very upset.
Well, her husband had gone crazy.
What would it be like if he came home?
Nana insisted that they should leave him in the hospital because he might end by killing both of them.
Gervaise was not able to go to Sainte-Anne until Sunday.
It was a tremendous journey.
Fortunately, the omnibus from the Boulevard Rochechouart to La Glaciere passed close to the asylum.
She went down the Rue de la Sante, buying two oranges on her way, so as not to arrive empty-handed.
It was another monumental building, with grey courtyards, interminable corridors and a smell of rank medicaments, which did not exactly inspire liveliness.
But when they had admitted her into a cell she was quite surprised to see Coupeau almost jolly.
He was just then seated on the throne, a spotlessly clean wooden case, and they both laughed at her finding him in this position.
Well, one knows what an invalid is.
He squatted there like a pope with his cheek of earlier days.
Oh! he was better, as he could do this.
“And the pneumonia?” inquired the laundress.
“Done for!” replied he.
“They cured it in no time.
I still cough a little, but that’s all that is left of it.”
Then at the moment of leaving the throne to get back into his bed, he joked once more.
“It’s lucky you have a strong nose and are not bothered.”
They laughed louder than ever.
At heart they felt joyful. It was by way of showing their contentment without a host of phrases that they thus joked together.
One must have had to do with patients to know the pleasure one feels at seeing all their functions at work again.
When he was back in bed she gave him the two oranges and this filled him with emotion.
He was becoming quite nice again ever since he had had nothing but tisane to drink.
She ended by venturing to speak to him about his violent attack, surprised at hearing him reason like in the good old times.
“Ah, yes,” said he, joking at his own expense;
“I talked a precious lot of nonsense! Just fancy, I saw rats and ran about on all fours to put a grain of salt under their tails.
And you, you called to me, men were trying to kill you. In short, all sorts of stupid things, ghosts in broad daylight. Oh! I remember it well, my noodle’s still solid. Now it’s over, I dream a bit when I’m asleep.
I have nightmares, but everyone has nightmares.”
Gervaise remained with him until the evening.
When the house surgeon came, at the six o’clock inspection, he made him spread his hands; they hardly trembled at all, scarcely a quiver at the tips of the fingers.
However, as night approached, Coupeau was little by little seized with uneasiness.
He twice sat up in bed looking on the ground and in the dark corners of the room.
Suddenly he thrust out an arm and appeared to crush some vermin against the wall.
“What is it?” asked Gervaise, frightened.
“The rats! The rats!” murmured he.
Then, after a pause, gliding into sleep, he tossed about, uttering disconnected phrases.
“Mon Dieu! they’re tearing my skin!
— Oh! the filthy beasts!