When she looked him full in the face, she stood aghast.
Mon Dieu! was it possible he had a countenance like that, his eyes full of blood and his lips covered with scabs?
She would certainly never have known him.
To begin with, he was making too many grimaces, without saying why, his mouth suddenly out of all shape, his nose curled up, his cheeks drawn in, a perfect animal’s muzzle.
His skin was so hot the air steamed around him; and his hide was as though varnished, covered with a heavy sweat which trickled off him.
In his mad dance, one could see all the same that he was not at his ease, his head was heavy and his limbs ached.
Gervaise drew near to the house surgeon, who was strumming a tune with the tips of his fingers on the back of his chair.
“Tell me, sir, it’s serious then this time?”
The house surgeon nodded his head without answering.
“Isn’t he jabbering to himself?
Eh! don’t you hear? What’s it about?
“About things he sees,” murmured the young man.
“Keep quiet, let me listen.”
Coupeau was speaking in a jerky voice.
A glimmer of amusement lit up his eyes.
He looked on the floor, to the right, to the left, and turned about as though he had been strolling in the Bois de Vincennes, conversing with himself.
“Ah! that’s nice, that’s grand!
There’re cottages, a regular fair.
And some jolly fine music!
What a Balthazar’s feast!
They’re smashing the crockery in there. Awfully swell!
Now it’s being lit up; red balls in the air, and it jumps, and it flies!
Oh! oh! what a lot of lanterns in the trees!
It’s confoundedly pleasant!
There’s water flowing everywhere, fountains, cascades, water which sings, oh! with the voice of a chorister.
The cascades are grand!”
And he drew himself up, as though the better to hear the delicious song of the water; he sucked in forcibly, fancying he was drinking the fresh spray blown from the fountains.
But, little by little, his face resumed an agonized expression.
Then he crouched down and flew quicker than ever around the walls of the cell, uttering vague threats.
“More traps, all that!
I thought as much. Silence, you set of swindlers!
Yes, you’re making a fool of me.
It’s for that that you’re drinking and bawling inside there with your viragoes. I’ll demolish you, you and your cottage!
Damnation! Will you leave me in peace?”
He clinched his fists; then he uttered a hoarse cry, stooping as he ran.
And he stuttered, his teeth chattering with fright.
“It’s so that I may kill myself.
No, I won’t throw myself in!
All that water means that I’ve no heart.
No, I won’t throw myself in!”
The cascades, which fled at his approach, advanced when he retired.
And all of a sudden, he looked stupidly around him, mumbling, in a voice which was scarcely audible:
“It isn’t possible, they set conjurers against me!”
“I’m off, sir. I’ve got to go. Good-night!” said Gervaise to the house surgeon.
“It upsets me too much; I’ll come again.”
She was quite white.
Coupeau was continuing his breakdown from the window to the mattress and from the mattress to the window, perspiring, toiling, always beating the same rhythm.
Then she hurried away.
But though she scrambled down the stairs, she still heard her husband’s confounded jig until she reached the bottom.
Ah! Mon Dieu! how pleasant it was out of doors, one could breathe there!