“And you’ve got two children, madame?
Now, I must admit I said to my brother:
‘I can’t understand how you can want to marry a woman who’s got two children.’ You mustn’t be offended if I consult his interests; its only natural. You don’t look strong either. Don’t you think, Lorilleux, that madame doesn’t look very strong?”
“No, no, she’s not strong.”
They did not mention her leg; but Gervaise understood by their side glances, and the curling of their lips, that they were alluding to it.
She stood before them, wrapped in her thin shawl with the yellow palms, replying in monosyllables, as though in the presence of her judges.
Coupeau, seeing she was suffering, ended by exclaiming:
“All that’s nothing to do with it. What you are talking about isn’t important.
The wedding will take place on Saturday, July 29.
I calculated by the almanac.
Is it settled?
Does it suit you?”
“Oh, it’s all the same to us,” said his sister.
“There was no necessity to consult us. I shan’t prevent Lorilleux being witness.
I only want peace and quiet.”
Gervaise, hanging her head, not knowing what to do with herself had put the toe of her boot through one of the openings in the wooden screen which covered the tiled floor of the work-room; then afraid of having disturbed something when she had withdrawn it, she stooped down and felt about with her hand.
Lorilleux hastily brought the lamp, and he examined her fingers suspiciously.
“You must be careful,” said he, “the tiny bits of gold stick to the shoes, and get carried away without one knowing it.”
It was all to do with business.
The employers didn’t allow a single speck for waste.
He showed her the rabbit’s foot he used to brush off any flecks of gold left on the cheville and the leather he kept on his lap to catch any gold that fell.
Twice weekly the shop was swept out carefully, the sweepings collected and burned and the ashes sifted.
This recovered up to twenty-five or thirty francs’ worth of gold a month.
Madame Lorilleux could not take her eyes from Gervaise’s shoes.
“There’s no reason to get angry,” murmured she with an amiable smile.
“But, perhaps madame would not mind looking at the soles of her shoes.”
And Gervaise, turning very red, sat down again, and holding up her feet showed that there was nothing clinging to them.
Coupeau had opened the door, exclaiming: “Good-night!” in an abrupt tone of voice. He called to her from the corridor.
Then she in her turn went off, after stammering a few polite words: she hoped to see them again, and that they would all agree well together.
Both of the Lorilleux had already gone back to their work at the far end of their dark hole of a work-room.
Madame Lorilleux, her skin reflecting the red glow from the bed of coals, was drawing on another wire. Each effort swelling her neck and making the strained muscles stand out like taut cords.
Her husband, hunched over beneath the greenish gleam of the globe was starting another length of chain, twisting each link with his pliers, pressing it on one side, inserting it into the next link above, opening it again with the pointed tool, continuously, mechanically, not wasting a motion, even to wipe the sweat from his face.
When Gervaise emerged from the corridor on to the landing, she could not help saying, with tears in her eyes:
“That doesn’t promise much happiness.”
Coupeau shook his head furiously.
He would get even with Lorilleux for that evening. Had anyone ever seen such a miserly fellow?
To think that they were going to walk off with two or three grains of his gold dust!
All the fuss they made was from pure avarice.
His sister thought perhaps that he would never marry, so as to enable her to economize four sous on her dinner every day.
However, it would take place all the same on July 29.
He did not care a hang for them!
Nevertheless, Gervaise still felt depressed.
Tormented by a foolish fearfulness, she peered anxiously into every dark shadow along the stair-rail as she descended.
It was dark and deserted at this hour, lit only by a single gas jet on the second floor.
In the shadowy depths of the dark pit, it gave a spot of brightness, even with its flamed turned so low.
It was now silent behind the closed doors; the weary laborers had gone to sleep after eating.
However, there was a soft laugh from Mademoiselle Clemence’s room and a ray of light shone through the keyhole of Mademoiselle Remanjou’s door. She was still busy cutting out dresses for the dolls.
Downstairs at Madame Gaudron’s, a child was crying.
The sinks on the landings smelled more offensive than ever in the midst of the darkness and stillness.
In the courtyard, Gervaise turned back for a last look at the tenement as Coupeau called out to the concierge.