And yet stories were circulating, there was quite a current of abominable tittle-tattle running beneath the flattery and respect which Denise felt arising around her. The whole house now declared that she had formerly had Hutin for a sweetheart; and they were suspected of still meeting from time to time. Deloche also was said to keep company with her; they were continually meeting in dark corners and talking for hours together. It was quite a scandal!
"So, there's nothing about the first-hand in the silk department, or about the young man in the lace one?" asked Bourdoncle.
"No, sir, nothing yet," replied the inspector.
It was with Deloche especially that Bourdoncle expected to surprise Denise, for one morning he himself had caught them laughing together downstairs. In the meantime, he treated her on a footing of perfect equality, for he no longer disdained her, feeling that she was strong enough to overthrow even himself notwithstanding his ten years' service, should he lose the game.
"Keep your eye on the young man in the lace department," he concluded each time. "They are always together. If you catch them, call me, and I'll manage the rest."
Mouret, meanwhile, was living in anguish. Was it possible that such a child could torture him in this manner? He could always recall her arrival at The Ladies' Paradise, with her heavy shoes, thin black dress, and wild look. She stammered, they all used to laugh at her, he himself had thought her ugly at first. Ugly! and now she could have brought him to his knees by a look, for he thought her nothing less than an angel! Then she had remained the last in the house, repulsed, joked at, treated by him as a curious specimen of humanity. For months he had wanted to see how a girl sprung up, and had amused himself with this experiment, not understanding that he was risking his heart. She, little by little had grown and become redoubtable. Perhaps he had loved her from the very first, even at the time when he had thought that he felt nothing but pity for her. And yet, he had only really begun to feel this love on the evening of their walk under the chestnut trees of the Tuileries. His life dated from then; he could still hear the laughter of a group of little girls, the distant fall of a jet of water, whilst in the warm shade she walked on beside him in silence. After that, he knew no more, his fever had increased hour by hour; all his blood, his whole being, in fact, had been given to her. And she, such a child—was it possible? When she passed by now, the slight gust from her dress seemed to him so powerful that he staggered.
For a long time he had struggled, and even now he frequently became indignant and endeavoured to free himself from this idiotic possession. What power was it she possessed that she should be able to bind him in this way? Had he not seen her without boots to her feet? Had she not been received almost out of charity? He could have understood had it been a question of one of those superb creatures who charm the multitude! but this little girl; this nobody! She had, in short, one of those insignificant faces which excite no remark. She could not even be very intelligent, for he remembered her bad beginning as a saleswoman. But, after every explosion of anger, he experienced a relapse of passion, a kind of sacred terror at having insulted his idol. She possessed everything a woman can have that is good—courage, gaiety, simplicity; and from her gentleness a charm of penetrating, perfume-like subtlety was exhaled. One might at first ignore her, or elbow her like any other girl; but the charm soon began to act with invincible force; and one belonged to her for ever, if she deigned to smile. Everything then beamed in her white face, her soft eyes, her cheeks and chin full of dimples; whilst her heavy blonde hair also seemed to light up with a royal and conquering beauty. He acknowledged himself vanquished; she was as intelligent as she was beautiful, her intelligence came from the best part of her being. Whilst in his eyes the other saleswomen only possessed a superficial education, the varnish which scales off from girls of that class, she, without any false elegance, retained her native grace, the savour of her origin. The broadest commercial ideas sprang up from her experience, behind her narrow forehead, whose pure lines clearly announced the presence of a firm will and love of order. And he could have clasped his hands to ask her pardon for blaspheming in his hours of revolt.
Why did she still refuse with such obstinacy? Twenty times had he entreated her, increasing his offers, offering money and more money. Then, thinking that she must be ambitious, he had promised to appoint her first-hand, as soon as there should be a vacancy. And she had refused, and still refused! For him it was a stupor, a struggle in which his desire became rageful.
All his days were now spent amidst the same grievous obsession. Denise's image rose with him. After he had dreamed of her all night, she followed him to the desk in his office, where he signed the bills and orders from nine to ten o'clock: a work which he accomplished mechanically, never ceasing to feel her present, still saying "no," with her quiet air. Then, at ten o'clock, came the board-meeting, quite a cabinet council composed of the twelve directors, at which he had to preside; they discussed matters affecting the in-door arrangements, examined the purchases, settled the window displays; and yet she was still there, he heard her soft voice amidst the figures, he saw her bright smile amidst the most complicated financial situations. After the board-meeting, she accompanied him on the daily inspection of the departments, and returning with him to his office in the afternoon, she remained close to his chair from two till four o'clock, whilst he received a crowd of important business men, the principal manufacturers of France, bankers and inventors: a continual coming-and-going of the wealth and intelligence of the land, a mad dance of millions, rapid interviews during which the biggest affairs of the Paris market were concluded. If he forgot her for a moment whilst he was deciding to ruin or support an industry, he found her again at a sudden twitch of his heart; his voice died away, and he asked himself what could be the use of this princely fortune since she still refused. At last, when five o'clock struck, he had to sign the day's correspondence, and the mechanical working of his hand began again, whilst she rose up before him more domineering than ever, seizing him entirely, to hold possession of him throughout the solitary and ardent hours of the night. And the morrows were the same days over again, days which were so active, so full of colossal labour but which the slight shadow of a child sufficed to ravage with anguish.
However, it was particularly during his daily inspection of the departments that he felt his misery. To have built up this giant machine, to reign over such a world of people, and yet to be dying of grief because a little girl would not accept him! He scorned himself, dragging the fever and shame of his pain about with him everywhere. On certain days he became disgusted with his power; from one end to the other of the galleries he felt nothing but nausea. At other times he would have wished to extend his empire, and make it so vast that she would perhaps have yielded out of sheer admiration and fear.
He would begin by stopping in the basement opposite the shoot. This was still in the Rue Neuve-Saint-Augustin; but it had been necessary to enlarge it, and it was now as wide as the bed of a river, down which the continual flood of goods rolled with the loud noise of rushing water. There was a succession of arrivals from all parts of the world, rows of waggons from every railway, a ceaseless unloading, a stream of packing-cases and bales flowing underground and absorbed by the insatiable establishment. He gazed at this torrent pouring into his house, he felt that he was one of the masters of the public fortune, that he held in his hands the fate of French manufactures, and yet was unable to buy a kiss from one of his saleswomen.
Then he passed on to the receiving department, which now occupied that part of the basement skirting the Rue Monsigny. Twenty tables were ranged there, in the pale light from the air-holes; quite a crowd of assistants was bustling about, emptying cases, checking goods, and marking them in plain figures, amidst the neighbouring roar of the shoot, which almost drowned their voices. Various managers of departments stopped him, he had to solve difficulties and confirm orders. The cellar filled with the soft glimmer of satin and the whiteness of linen, a prodigious unpacking in which furs were mingled with lace, French fancy goods with Eastern hangings. With a slow step he wended his way amidst all these riches thrown about in disorder, heaped up in their rough state. Up above, they would shine in the window displays, set money galloping through the departments, no sooner shown than carried off, in the furious rush of business which traversed the place. But he kept on thinking that he had offered Denise silks and velvets, anything she might like to take in no matter what quantity, from among these enormous heaps, and that she had refused his offer by a slight shake of her fair head.
After that, he went to the other end of the basement, to pay his usual visit to the delivery department. Interminable corridors ran along, lighted by gas; to the right and the left, the reserves, closed in with gratings, seemed like so many subterranean stores, a complete commercial district, with its haberdashery, underclothing, glove, toy and other shops, all sleeping in the gloom. Further on stood one of the three hot-air stoves; further still, was a post of firemen guarding the main gas-meter, enclosed in its iron cage. He found, in the delivery department, the sorting tables already littered with heaps of parcels, band-boxes, and cases which were continually arriving in large hampers; and Campion, the superintendent, gave him particulars about the current work, whilst the twenty men placed under his orders distributed the parcels among large compartments, each of which bore the name of a district of Paris, and whence the messengers took them up to the vans waiting beside the foot pavement. There was a succession of cries, names of streets and other instructions were shouted out, quite an uproar arose, all the bustle of a mail-boat about to leave her moorings. And he stood there for a moment, motionless, watching this emission of goods which he had just seen the house absorb at the opposite end of the basement: the huge current ended here; it was here that it discharged itself into the street again after filling the tills with gold. But his eyes became dim, this colossal business no longer had any importance for him; he had but one idea, that of going away to some distant land, and abandoning everything, should she persist in saying no.
Then he went upstairs, continuing his inspection, talking and bestirring himself more and more, but without finding any respite. On the second floor, he entered the forwarding department, seeking quarrels and secretly exasperated with the perfect regularity of the machine which he had himself built up. This department was the one that was daily assuming a more considerable importance: it now occupied two hundred employees—some of whom opened, read, and classified the letters coming from the provinces and abroad, whilst others collected in compartments the goods ordered by customers. And the number of letters was increasing to such an extent that they no longer counted them; they weighed them, receiving as much as a hundredweight a day. He feverishly went through the three offices, questioning Levasseur, the chief, as to the weight of the correspondence; now it was eighty, now ninety, sometimes, on a Monday, a hundred pounds. The figure increased daily, he ought to have been delighted. But he stood quivering amid the noise made by a neighbouring squad of packers nailing down the cases. It was in vain that he roamed about the building: his fixed idea remained fast in his mind, and as his power unfolded itself before him, as the mechanism of the business and the army of employees passed before his gaze, he felt more deeply than ever the taunt of his powerlessness. Orders from all Europe were flowing in, a special post-office van was required for his correspondence; and yet she said no, always no.
He returned downstairs and visited the central cashier's office, where four clerks guarded the two giant safes, through which eighty-eight million francs had passed during the previous year. He glanced at the clearing-house office which now occupied thirty-five clerks, chosen from amongst the most trustworthy. He went into the checking office, where twenty-five young men, junior clerks, checked the debit-notes and calculated the salesmen's commissions. He returned to the chief cashier's office, grew exasperated by the sight of the safes, wandered about amidst these millions, the uselessness of which was driving him mad. She said no, always no.
And it was always and ever no, in all the departments, in the galleries, the saloons, in every part of the establishment! He went from the silk to the drapery department, from the linen to the lace; he ascended to the upper floors, pausing on the hanging bridges, prolonging his inspection with a maniacal, grievous minuteness. The house had grown and spread beyond all bounds, he had created this department, then that other; he governed that fresh domain, he extended his empire into that industry, the last one conquered; and it was no, always no, in spite of everything. His staff would now have sufficed to people a small town: there were fifteen hundred salesmen, and a thousand other employees of every sort, including forty inspectors and seventy cashiers; the kitchens alone gave occupation to thirty-two men; ten clerks were set apart for the advertising service; there were three hundred and fifty shop messengers, all wearing livery, and twenty-four firemen living on the premises. And the stables, royal buildings situated in the Rue Monsigny, opposite the warehouses, accommodated one hundred and forty-five horses, a splendid set of animals already celebrated. The first four conveyances which had stirred up the whole neighbourhood formerly when the house occupied only the corner of the Place Gaillon, had gradually increased to sixty-two: small hand-trucks, one-horse vans, and heavy two-horse ones. They were continually scouring Paris, skilfully driven by coachmen clad in black, and bearing hither and thither the gold and purple sign of The Ladies' Paradise. They even went beyond the fortifications, and sped through the suburbs; they were to be met in the hollow roads of Bicêtre and along the banks of the Marne, along even the shady drives of the Forest of Saint-Germain. Sometimes one would emerge from the depths of some sunny avenue, where all was silent and deserted, the superb animals which drew it passing by at a trot, whilst it cast the glaring advertisement of its varnished panels upon the mysterious peacefulness of nature. Mouret was actually thinking of sending these vehicles further still, even into the neighbouring departments; he would have liked to hear them rolling along every road in France, from one frontier to the other. But he no longer even crossed the street to visit his horses, though he was passionately fond of them. Of what good was this conquest of the world, since it was no, always no?
Nowadays of an evening, when he arrived at Lhomme's desk, he still from force of habit glanced at the amount of the takings written on a card, which the cashier stuck up on an iron file beside him; this figure rarely fell below a hundred thousand francs, sometimes on big sale days it ran up to eight and nine hundred thousand; but the amount no longer sounded in Mouret's ears like a trumpet-blast, he regretted having looked at it, and bitterly went his way, full of hatred and scorn of money.
But his sufferings were destined to increase, for he became jealous. One morning, in the office, before the board-meeting began, Bourdoncle ventured to hint that the little girl in the mantle department was playing with him.
"How so?" he asked, turning very pale.
"Why yes! she has sweethearts in this very building."
Mouret found strength to smile. "I don't think any more about her, my dear fellow. You can speak freely. Who are they?"
"Hutin, they say, and then a salesman in the lace department—Deloche, that tall awkward fellow. I can't speak with certainty, never having seen them together. But it appears that it's notorious."
There was a silence. Mouret affected to arrange the papers on his table in order to conceal the trembling of his hands. At last, he observed, without raising his head: "One must have proofs, try and bring me some proofs. As for myself, I assure you I don't care in the least, for I'm quite sick of her. But we can't allow such things to go on here."
"Never fear," replied Bouthemont, "you shall have proofs one of these days. I'm keeping a good look-out."
This news deprived Mouret of all rest. He had not the courage to revert to the conversation, but lived in continual expectation of a catastrophe, in which his heart would be crushed. And this torment rendered him terrible; he made the whole house tremble. He now disdained to conceal himself behind Bourdoncle, and performed the executions in person, feeling a nervous desire for revenge, solacing himself by abuse of his power, that power which could do nothing for the contentment of his sole desire. Each of his inspections became a massacre; as soon as he was seen a shudder of panic sped from counter to counter. The dead winter season was just then approaching, and he made a clean sweep in each department, piling up victims and hustling them into the street. His first idea had been to dismiss Hutin and Deloche; but he had reflected that if he did not keep them, he would never discover anything; and the others suffered for them: the whole staff trembled. In the evening, when he found himself alone again, tears made his eyelids swell.
One day especially terror reigned supreme. An inspector had the idea that Mignot was stealing. There was always a number of strange-looking girls prowling around his counter; and one of them had lately been arrested, her hips and bosom padded with sixty pairs of gloves. From that moment a watch was kept, and the inspector caught Mignot in the act of facilitating the sleight of hand of a tall fair girl who had formerly been a saleswoman at the Louvre. His plan was very simple, he pretended to be trying some gloves on her, waited till she had padded herself, and then conducted her to the pay-desk, where she paid for a single pair only. Mouret happened to be there, just at that moment. As a rule, he preferred not to mix himself up in affairs of this sort, which were fairly frequent; for notwithstanding the regular machine-like working, great disorder reigned in certain departments of The Ladies' Paradise, and scarcely a week passed by without some employee being dismissed for theft. The management preferred to hush up such matters as far as possible, considering it undesirable to set the police at work, and thus expose one of the fatal plague-spots of these great bazaars. But, that day, Mouret felt a real need of venting his anger on some one, and treated handsome Mignot with such violence, that the latter stood there trembling with fear, his face pale and distorted.
"I ought to call a policeman," cried Mouret, before all the other salesmen. "But answer me! who is this woman? I swear I'll send for the police commissary, if you don't tell me the truth."
The woman had been taken away, and two saleswomen were searching her. "I don't know her, sir," Mignot stammered out: "She's the one who came——"
"Don't tell lies!" interrupted Mouret, more violently still. "And there's nobody here to warn us! You are all in the plot, on my word! We are robbed, pillaged, plundered. It's enough to make us have the pockets of each one searched before he leaves!"
Murmurs were heard. The three or four customers buying gloves stood looking on, frightened.
"Silence!" he resumed, furiously, "or I'll clear the whole place!"
However, Bourdoncle came running up, all anxiety at the idea of the scandal. He whispered a few words in Mouret's ear, the affair was assuming exceptional gravity; and he prevailed on him to take Mignot into the inspectors office, a room on the ground-floor near the entrance in the Rue Gaillon. The woman was there, quietly putting on her things again. She had just mentioned Albert Lhomme's name. Mignot, on again being questioned, lost his head, and began to sob; he wasn't in fault, it was Albert who sent him these girls; he had at first merely afforded them certain advantages, enabling them to profit by the bargains; and at last when they took to stealing, he was already too far compromised to report the matter. The principals now discovered a series of extraordinary robberies; goods taken away by girls who went into the luxurious lavatories, situated near the refreshment bar and surrounded by evergreen plants, to hide them under their skirts; purchases which a salesman neglected to call out at a pay-desk, when he accompanied a customer there and the price of which he divided with the cashier; and even false "returns," articles which employees said had been brought back in order that they might pocket the refunded money; without mentioning the common robberies of things which the salesmen took away under their coats in the evening, sometimes rolled round their bodies, and sometimes even hung down their legs. For the last fourteen months, thanks to Mignot and other salesmen, no doubt, whom they refused to name, this pilfering had been going on at Albert's desk—quite an impudent trafficking in articles representing a large amount of money which was never correctly ascertained.
Meanwhile the news had spread through the various departments, causing guilty consciences to tremble, whilst the most honest quaked at thought of the general sweep that seemed imminent. Albert had disappeared into the inspector's office. Next his father had passed by, half choking, his face red and showing signs of apoplexy. Then Madame Aurélie herself was called; and came down bearing the affront with head erect, her fat puffy countenance having the appearance of a wax mask. The explanation lasted for some time; no one knew the exact details, but it was said that the first-hand had slapped her son's face, whilst the worthy old father wept, and the governor, contrary to all his elegant habits, swore like a trooper, absolutely wanting to hand the offenders over to justice. However, the scandal was hushed up. Mignot was the only one dismissed there and then. Albert did not disappear till two days later; his mother had doubtless begged that the family might not be dishonoured by an immediate execution. Still the panic lasted several days longer, for after this scene Mouret wandered from one end of the establishment to the other, with a terrible expression, venting his anger on all those who dared even to raise their eyes.
"What are you doing there, sir, looking at the flies? Go and get paid!"
At last, the storm burst one day on the head of Hutin himself. Favier, now appointed second, was undermining the first-hand, in order to dislodge him from his position. This was always the way; he addressed crafty reports to the directors, taking advantage of every opportunity to have the first-hand caught doing something wrong. Thus, one morning, as Mouret was going through the silk department, he stopped short quite surprised to see Favier altering the price tickets of a stock of black velvet.
"Why are you lowering the prices?" he asked. "Who gave you the order to do so?"
The second-hand, who was making a great fuss over this work, as if he wished to attract the governor's attention and foresaw the result, replied with an innocent, astonished air: "Why, Monsieur Hutin told me, sir."
"Monsieur Hutin! Where is Monsieur Hutin?"
And when the latter came up from the receiving department where a salesman had been sent to fetch him, an animated explanation ensued. What! he undertook to lower the prices of his own accord now! What did that mean? But in his turn he appeared greatly astonished, having merely talked the matter over with Favier, without giving any positive orders. The latter then assumed the sorrowful air of an employee who finds himself obliged to contradict his superior. Yet he was quite willing to accept the blame, if it would get the latter out of a scrape. Things began to look very bad.
"Understand, Monsieur Hutin!" cried Mouret, "I have never tolerated these attempts at independence. We alone decide about the prices."
He went on speaking in a sharp voice, and with wounding intentions, which surprised the salesmen, for as a rule these discussions were carried on quietly, and the affair might really have been the result of a misunderstanding. One could divine, however, that he had some unavowed spite to satisfy. He had at last caught that Hutin in fault, that Hutin who was said to be Denise's sweetheart. He could now relieve himself, by making the other feel that he, Mouret, was the master! And he exaggerated matters, even insinuating that this reduction of price appeared to conceal very questionable intentions.
"Sir," repeated Hutin, "I meant to consult you about it. It is really necessary, as you know, for there has been no demand for these velvets."
Mouret cut him short with a final harsh remark. "Very good, sir; we will look into the matter. But don't do such a thing again, if you value your situation."
And then he walked off. Hutin, bewildered, furious, finding no one but Favier to confide in, swore that he would go and throw his resignation at the brute's head. But he soon left off talking of leaving, and began to stir up all the abominable accusations which were current amongst the salesmen against their chiefs. And Favier, his eyes sparkling, defended himself with a great show of sympathy. He was obliged to reply, wasn't he? Besides, could any one have foreseen such a row over so trifling a matter? What had come on the governor lately, that he should be so unbearable?
"We all know what's the matter with him," replied Hutin. "Is it my fault if that little jade in the mantle department is turning his head? My dear follow, you can see that the blow comes from there. He's aware that she fancied me, and he doesn't like it; or perhaps it's she herself who wants to get me dismissed because I'm in her way. But I swear she shall hear from me, if ever she crosses my path."
Two days later, as Hutin was going into the work-rooms upstairs, under the leads, to recommend a girl of his acquaintance, he started on perceiving Denise and Deloche leaning against a window at the end of a passage and plunged so deeply in private conversation that they did not even turn round. The idea of having them caught there suddenly occurred to him, when he perceived with astonishment that Deloche was weeping. He at once went off without making any noise; and meeting Bourdoncle and Jouve on the stairs, told them some story about one of the fire-extinguishers, the door of which seemed to have been torn away; in this manner they would go upstairs and drop on to the two others. Bourdoncle discovered them first. He stopped short, and told Jouve to go and fetch the governor, whilst he remained there. The inspector had to obey, though greatly annoyed at being forced to mix himself up in such a matter.
This was a lost corner of the vast world where the people of The Ladies' Paradise bestirred themselves. You reached it by an intricate network of stairs and passages. The work-rooms, situated in the attics, were low sloping chambers, lighted by large windows cut in the zinc roofing, and furnished solely with long tables and large cast-iron stoves; and all along was a crowd of work-girls engaged on the under-clothing, the lace, the upholstery and the dressmaking, and living winter and summer in a stifling heat, amidst the odour peculiar to the business. You had to skirt all these rooms, and turn to the right after passing the dressmakers, before coming to the solitary end of the corridor. The few customers, whom a salesman occasionally brought here for an order, gasped for breath, tired out and frightened, with the sensation of having turned round and round for hours, and of being a hundred leagues above the street.
Denise had often found Deloche waiting for her. As second-hand she had charge of the arrangements between her department and the work-room where only the models and alterations were attended to, and was always going up and down to give the necessary orders. The young man would watch for her and invent any pretext to run after her; and then affected to be surprised when he met her at the work-room door. She got to laugh about the matter and it became quite an understood thing. The corridor ran alongside one of the cisterns, an enormous iron tank containing twelve thousand gallons of water; and on the roof there was another one of equal size, reached by an iron ladder. For an instant, Deloche would stand talking, leaning one shoulder against the cistern in the continual abandonment of his long body, bent by fatigue. A sing-song noise of water was heard, a mysterious noise, the musical vibration of which the iron tank ever retained. Despite the solitude, Denise would at times turn round anxiously, thinking, she had seen a shadow pass on the bare, pale yellow walls. But the window would soon attract them, they would lean against it, and forget themselves in a pleasant gossip, in endless souvenirs of their native place. Below them extended the immense glass roof of the central gallery, a lake of glass bounded by the distant housetops, as by a rocky coast. Beyond, they saw nothing but the sky, a sheet of sky, which cast in the sleeping water of the glass work a reflection of the flight of its clouds and its soft azure.
It so happened that Deloche was that day speaking of Valognes. "I was six years old; my mother used to take me to Valognes market in a cart," he said. "You know it's ten miles away; we had to leave Briquebec at five o'clock. It's a fine country down our way. Do you know it?"
"Yes, yes," replied Denise, slowly, her glances wandering far away. "I was there once, but was very little then. Roads with grass on each side, eh? and now and again sheep browsing in couples, dragging their clog along by the rope." She stopped, then resumed with a vague smile: "Our roads run for miles as straight as arrows between rows of trees which afford some shade. We have meadows surrounded by hedges taller than I am, where there are horses and cows grazing. We have a little river too, and the water is very cold, under the brushwood, in a spot I well know."
"It is the same with us, exactly!" cried Deloche, delighted.
"There's grass everywhere, each one encloses his plot with thorns and elms, and is at once at home; and it's quite green, a green far different to what we see in Paris. Dear me! how I've played in the hollow road, on the left, coming down from the mill!"
Their voices died away, they remained with their eyes fixed, lost on the sunny lake of the glass work. A mirage rose up before them from that blinding water, they beheld an endless succession of meadows, the Cotentin country steeped in the breath of the ocean, bathed in a luminous vapour, which blurred the horizon with the delicate grey of a water-colour. Below them, beneath the colossal iron framework, in the silk hall, was the roar of business, the trepidation of the machine at work; the entire house vibrated with the tramping of the crowd, the bustle of the salesmen, the life of the thirty thousand persons hurtling there; and they, carried away by their dreams, thought they could hear the wind passing over the grass and shaking the tall trees, as they detected this deep dull clamour with which the roofs were resounding.
"Ah! Mademoiselle Denise," stammered Deloche, "why aren't you kinder to me? I love you so much!" Tears had come into his eyes, and as she signed to him to stop, he continued quickly: "No—let me tell you these things once more. We should get on so well together! People always find something to talk about when they come from the same part."
He was choking, and she was at last able to say kindly: "You're not reasonable; you promised me never to speak of that again. It's impossible. I have great friendship for you, because you're a nice fellow; but I wish to remain free."
"Yes, yes. I know," he replied in a broken voice, "you don't love me. Oh! you may say so, I quite understand it. There's nothing in me to make you love me. Listen, I've only had one sweet moment in my life, and that was when I met you at Joinville, do you remember? For a moment, under the trees, when it was so dark, I thought your arm trembled, and was stupid enough to imagine——"
But she again interrupted him. Her quick ear had just detected the sound of Bourdoncle's and Jouve's steps at the end of the corridor.
"Hark, there's some one coming."
"No," said he, preventing her from leaving the window, "it's in the cistern: all sorts of extraordinary noises come from it, as if there were some one inside."
And then he continued his timid caressing complaints. She was no longer listening to him, however. Rocked into a dreamy mood by his declaration of love, her eyes wandering over the roofs of The Ladies' Paradise. To the right and the left of the large glazed gallery, other galleries and other halls were glistening in the sunshine, between the housetops, pierced with garret windows and running along symmetrically, like the wings of a barracks. Metal ladders and bridges rose on all sides, describing a lacework of iron in the air; whilst the kitchen chimney belched forth as much smoke as a factory, and the great square cistern, supported aloft by cast-iron pillars, assumed the strange silhouette of some barbarous structure erected at this height by the pride of one man. In the distance, Paris roared.
When Denise awoke from this dreamy contemplation of space and the summits of The Ladies' Paradise, where her thoughts floated as in a vast solitude, she found that Deloche had caught hold of her hand. And as he appeared so woe-begone she did not draw it away.
"Forgive me," he murmured. "It's all over now; I should be too miserable if you punished me by withdrawing your friendship. I assure you I intended to say something else. Yes, I had determined to understand the situation and be very good." Then his tears again began to flow and he tried to steady his voice. "For I know my lot in life. It is too late for my luck to turn. Beaten at home, beaten in Paris, beaten everywhere! I've now been here four years and am still the last in the department. So I wanted to tell you not to trouble on my account. I won't annoy you any more. Try to be happy, love some one else; yes, that would really be a pleasure for me. If you are happy, I shall be happy too. That will be my happiness."
He could say no more. As if to seal his promise he raised the young girl's hand to his lips—kissing it with the humble kiss of a slave. She was deeply affected, and said simply, in a tender, sisterly tone, which softened somewhat the pity of the words: "My poor lad!"
But they started, and turned round; Mouret was standing before them.
For the last ten minutes, Jouve had been searching all over the place for the governor; the latter, however, was looking at the building of the new façade in the Rue du Dix-Décembre. He spent long hours there every day, trying to interest himself in this work, of which he had so long dreamed. There, amidst masons laying the huge corner-stones, and engineers setting up the great iron framework, he found a refuge against his torments. The façade already appeared above the level of the street; and indications of the spacious porch, and the windows of the first storey, a palace-like development in a crude state could be seen. Mouret scaled the ladders, discussing with the architect the ornamentation which was to be something quite new, scrambled over the heaps of brick and iron, and even went down into the cellars; and the roar of the steam-engine, the tic-tac of the trowels, the loud noise of the hammers and the clamour of the army of workmen in this immense cage surrounded by sound-reëchoing planks, really diverted him for an instant. He would come out white with plaster, black with iron-filings, his feet splashed by the water from the pumps but nevertheless so far from being cured that his anguish returned and his heart beat more loudly than ever, as the uproar of the works died away behind him. It so happened, on the day in question, that a slight diversion had brought back his gaiety: he had become deeply interested in an album of drawings of the mosaics and enamelled terra-cotta which were to decorate the friezes, when Jouve, out of breath, annoyed at being obliged to soil his frock coat amongst all the building materials came up to fetch him. At first Mouret cried out that they must wait; but, at a word spoken in an undertone by the inspector, he immediately followed him, trembling and again mastered by his passion. Nothing else existed, the façade crumbled away before being built: what was the use of that supreme triumph of his pride, if the mere name of a woman whispered in his ear tortured him to this extent!
Upstairs, Bourdoncle and Jouve thought it prudent to vanish. Deloche had hastened away; Denise, paler than usual, alone remained face to face with Mouret, looking straight into his eyes.
"Have the goodness to follow me, mademoiselle," he said in a harsh voice.
She followed him, they descended the two storeys, and crossed the furniture and carpet departments without saying a word. When he arrived at his office, he opened the door wide, saying, "Walk in, mademoiselle."
And, closing the door, he went to his table. The director's new office was fitted up more luxuriously than the old one; the rep hangings had been replaced by velvet ones, and a book-case, inlaid with ivory, occupied one whole side; but on the walls there was still no other picture than the portrait of Madame Hédouin, a young woman with a calm handsome face, smiling in a gilded frame.
"Mademoiselle," he said at last, trying to maintain a cold severe air, "there are certain things that we cannot tolerate. Good conduct is absolutely necessary here."
He stopped, choosing his words, in order not to yield to the furious anger which was rising within him. What! it was that fellow she loved, that wretched salesman, the laughing-stock of his counter! It was the humblest, the most awkward of all that she preferred to him, the master! for he had seen them, she leaving her hand in his, and he covering that hand with kisses.
"I've been very good to you, mademoiselle," continued he, making a fresh effort. "I little expected to be rewarded in this way."
Denise, immediately on entering, had been attracted by Madame Hédouin's portrait; and, notwithstanding her great trouble, was still pre-occupied by it. Every time she came into the director's office her eyes were sure to meet those of that painted lady. As a rule she was almost afraid of her, although she knew her to have been very good. This time, however, she felt her to be a kind of protection.
"You are right, sir," she said, softly, "I was wrong to stop and talk, and I beg your pardon for doing so. This young man comes from my own part of the country."
"I'll dismiss him!" cried Mouret, putting all his suffering into this furious cry.
And, completely overcome, entirely forgetting his position of director lecturing a saleswoman guilty of an infraction of the regulations, he broke into a torrent of violent words. Had she no shame in her? a young girl like her to fall in love with such a being! and he even made most atrocious accusations, introducing Hutin's name and the names of others into the affair, with such a flood of words, that she could not even defend herself. But he would make a clean sweep, and kick them all out! The explanation he had resolved on, when following Jouve, had degenerated into a violent scene of jealousy.
"Yes, your lovers! They told me about it, and I was stupid enough to doubt it. But I was the only one who did! I was the only one!"
Choking and bewildered, Denise stood listening to these frightful charges, which she had not at first understood. Did he really suppose her to be as bad as that? At another remark, harsher than all the rest, she silently turned towards the door. And, as he made a movement to stop her, she said:
"Let me alone, sir, I'm going away. If you think me what you say, I will not remain in the house another second."
But he rushed in front of the door, exclaiming: "Why don't you defend yourself? Say something!"
She stood there very stiff, maintaining an icy silence. For a long time he pressed her with questions, with a growing anxiety; and the mute dignity of this innocent girl once more seemed to be the artful calculation of a woman learned in all the tactics of passion. Had she desired it, which she did not, she could not have played a game better calculated to bring him to her feet, tortured by doubt, desirous of being convinced.
"Come, you say he is from your part of the country? Perhaps you've met there formerly. Swear that there has been nothing between you and this fellow."
And as she obstinately remained silent, as if still wishing to open the door and go away, he completely lost his head, and gave way to a supreme explosion of grief.
"Good heavens! I love you! I love you! Why do you delight in tormenting me like this? You can see that nothing else exists for me, that the people I speak about only touch me through you, that you alone can occupy my thoughts. Thinking you were jealous, I gave up all my pleasures. You were told I had mistresses; well! I have them no longer; I hardly set foot outside. Did I not prefer you at that lady's house? have I not quarrelled with her in order to belong solely to you? And I am still waiting for a word of thanks, a little gratitude. And if you fear that I should return to her, you may feel quite easy: she is avenging herself by helping one of our former salesmen to found a rival establishment. Tell me, must I go on my knees to touch your heart?"
He had come to this. He, who did not tolerate the slightest peccadillo among the shopwomen, who turned them out for the least caprice, found himself reduced to imploring one of them not to go away, not to abandon him in his misery! He held the door against her, ready to forgive her everything, to shut his eyes, if she merely deigned to lie. And he spoke the truth, he had quite reformed; he had long since given up Clara and had ceased to visit at Madame Desforges's house, where Bouthemont now reigned supreme, pending the opening of the new establishment, The Four Seasons, which was already filling the newspapers with its advertisements.
"Tell me, must I go on my knees?" he repeated, almost choked by suppressed tears.
She signed to him to cease speaking, herself quite unable to conceal her emotion, deeply affected by his suffering passion. "You are wrong, sir, to agitate yourself in this way," she at last replied. "I assure you that all these wicked reports are untrue. That poor fellow you saw just now is no more guilty than I am."
She said this with her brave, frank air, looking with her bright eyes straight into his face.
"Very good, I believe you," he murmured. "I'll not dismiss any of your comrades, since you take all these people under your protection. But why, then, do you repulse me, if you love no one else?"
A sudden constraint, an anxious bashfulness came upon the young girl.
"You love some one, do you not?" he resumed, in a trembling voice. "Oh! you may speak out; I have no claim on your affections. Do you love any one?"
She turned very red, her heart was in her mouth, and she felt all falsehood impossible in the presence of the emotion which was betraying her, the repugnance for lying which made the truth appear in her face in spite of all.
"Yes," she at last confessed, feebly. "But I beg you to let me go, sir, you are torturing me."
She was now suffering in her turn. Was it not enough to have to defend herself against him? Must she even fight against herself, against the gust of tenderness which sometimes took away all her courage? When he spoke to her like this, when she saw him such a prey to emotion, so overcome, she hardly knew why she still refused; and it was only afterwards that, in the depths of her healthy, girlish nature, she found the pride and prudence which maintained her intact in her virtuous resolutions.
Mouret gave way to a gesture of gloomy discouragement. He could not understand her. He turned towards his table, took up some papers and then at once laid them down again, saying: "I will detain you no longer, mademoiselle; I cannot keep you against your will."
"But I don't wish to go away," replied she, smiling. "If you believe me to be innocent, I will remain. One ought always to believe a woman to be virtuous, sir. There are numbers who are so, I assure you."
Denise had involuntarily raised her eyes towards Madame Hédouin's portrait; that lady so sensible and so beautiful, whose blood, they said, had brought good fortune to the house. Mouret followed the glance with a start, for he thought he could hear his dead wife pronounce that phrase, one of her own sayings which he recognised. And it was like a resurrection, he discovered in Denise the good sense, the mental equilibrium of her whom he had lost, even down to her gentle voice, sparing of useless words. He was struck by the resemblance, and it rendered him sadder still.
"You know I am yours," he murmured in conclusion. "Do what you like with me."
Then she resumed gaily: "That is right, sir. The advice of a woman, however humble she may be, is always worth listening to when she has a little intelligence. If you put yourself in my hands, you may be sure I'll make nothing but a good man of you!"
She smiled, with that simple unassuming air which possessed such a charm. He also smiled in a feeble way, and escorted her as far as the door, as he might have done with a lady.
The next day Denise was appointed first-hand. The dress and costume department was divided; the management creating especially for her benefit a children's costume department, which was installed near that of the cloaks and mantles. Ever since her son's dismissal, Madame Aurélie had been trembling, for she found the directors cooling towards her, and also observed the young woman's power increasing daily. Would they not shortly take advantage of some pretext or other and sacrifice her in favour of Denise? Her imperial countenance, puffed up with fat, seemed to have grown thinner from the shame which now stained the Lhomme dynasty; and she made a show of going away every evening on her husband's arm, for they had been brought nearer together by misfortune, and vaguely felt that the evil came from the disorder of their home; whilst the poor old man, more affected than her, a prey as he was to a sickly fear that he might himself be suspected of robbery, would count the receipts twice over with a great deal of noise, performing miracles the while with his injured arm. Accordingly when Madame Aurélie saw Denise appointed first-hand of the children's costume department, she experienced such delight that she paraded the most affectionate feeling towards her, being indeed really grateful to her for not having taken her own place. And so she overwhelmed her with attentions, treating her as an equal, often going to talk to her in the neighbouring department, with a stately air, like a queen-mother paying a visit to a young queen.
In fact, Denise was now at the summit. Her appointment as first-hand had destroyed the last resistance. If some still babbled, from that itching of the tongue which infects every assemblage of men and women, all nevertheless bowed very low before her face. Marguerite, now second-hand, was full of praise for her. Clara, herself, inspired with a secret respect for this good fortune, which she felt herself incapable of achieving, bowed her head. But Denise's victory was still more complete over the gentlemen; over Jouve, who now almost bent double whenever he addressed her; over Hutin, seized with anxiety on feeling his position giving way under him; and over Bourdoncle, at last reduced to powerlessness. When the latter saw her come out of the director's office, smiling, with her quiet air; and when on the morrow Mouret had insisted on the board creating the new department, he had yielded, vanquished by his terror of woman. He had always thus given in to Mouret, recognising him to be the master, notwithstanding his escapades and idiotic love affairs. This time the woman had proved the stronger, and he was expecting to be swept away by the disaster.
Yet Denise bore her triumph in a quiet, charming manner, touched by these marks of consideration, and desirous of interpreting them as sympathy for the miseries of her débuts and the final success of her patient courage. Thus it was with laughing joy that she received the slightest tokens of friendship, and this caused her to be really loved by some: she was so kind, sympathetic, and full of affection. The only person for whom she still showed an invincible repugnance was Clara, for she had learned that this girl had amused herself by leading Colomban astray, even as she had said she would do, for a joke; and he, carried away by his passion, was now becoming more dissipated every day, whilst poor Geneviève was slowly dying. The affair was talked of at The Ladies' Paradise, and thought very droll there.
But this trouble, the only one she had outside, did not in any way change Denise's equable temper. It was especially in her department that she was seen at her best, in the midst of her little world of babies of all ages. She was passionately fond of children, and could not have been placed in a better position. Sometimes there were fully fifty little girls and as many boys there, quite a turbulent school, all agog with the desires of budding coquetry. The mothers completely lost their heads. She, conciliatory and smiling, had the little ones placed in a row, on chairs; and when among the number there happened to be a rosy-cheeked little angel, whose pretty face tempted her, she would insist on serving her herself, bringing the dress and trying it on the child's dimpled shoulders, with the tender precaution of an elder sister. Bursts of clear laughter rang out, faint cries of ecstasy were raised amidst the scolding voices of the mothers. Sometimes a little girl, nine or ten years old, already a grand lady in her own estimation, would when trying on a cloth jacket stand studying it before a glass, now and again turning round with an absorbed air, while her eyes sparkled with the desire to please. The counters were littered with unpacked goods, dresses in pink and blue Eastern cotton for children of from one to five years old; sailor costumes in blue "zephyr" with plaited skirts and blouses trimmed with cambric; Louis XV. costumes, mantles, jackets; a medley of little garments, stiff in their infantile grace, something like the contents of the cloak-room of a band of big dolls, taken out of the wardrobes and given over to pillage. Denise always had a few sweets in her pockets to appease the tears of some youngster in despair at not being able to carry off a pair of red breeches; and she lived there amongst these little ones as in her own family, feeling quite young again herself from the contact of all the innocence and freshness incessantly renewed around her skirts.
She now at times had long friendly talks with Mouret. Whenever she went to the office to take orders or furnish information, he would keep her chatting, enjoying the sound of her voice. It was what she laughingly called "making a good man of him." In her prudent, cautious Norman brain there sprang up all sorts of projects, ideas about the new style of business at which she had already ventured to hint when at Robineau's, and some of which she had expressed on the evening of their charming walk in the Tuileries gardens. She could not be occupied in any matter or see any work going on, without being moved by a desire to introduce some improvement into the mechanism. Thus, since her entry into The Ladies' Paradise, she had been particularly pained by the precarious position of the employees; the sudden dismissals shocked her, she thought them iniquitous and stupid, hurtful to all, to the house as much as the staff. Her former sufferings were still fresh in her mind, and her heart filled with pity every time she saw a new-comer with feet bruised and eyes dim with tears, dragging her misery along in her silk dress, amidst the spiteful persecution of the older hands. This dog's life made the best of them bad; and the sad work of destruction commenced: they were all devoured by the business before the age of forty, often disappearing, falling into unknown depths, a great many dying in harness, some of consumption and exhaustion, others of fatigue and bad air, whilst a few were thrown on the street, and the happiest married and buried themselves in some little provincial shop. Was this frightful consumption of human life for which the big shops were responsible every year, right and just? And she pleaded the cause of the colossal machine's gearing not from sentimental reasons, but by arguments appealing to the very interests of the employers. To make a machine solid and strong, it is necessary to use good iron; if the iron breaks or is broken, a stoppage of work, repeated expenses of restarting, quite a loss of power, ensue.
Sometimes she would become quite animated, and picture an immense ideal bazaar, the phalansterium of modern commerce, in which each would secure his exact share of profits, according to his merits, with a certainty of the future, assured to him by contract. Mouret would make merry over this, notwithstanding his fever. He accused her of socialism, embarrassed her by pointing out the difficulties of carrying out these schemes; for she spoke in the simplicity of her soul, bravely trusting in the future, whenever she perceived a dangerous gap underlying her tender-hearted plans. Nevertheless he was shaken, captivated by her young voice which still quivered at the thought of the hardships she had undergone, and was so instinct with earnestness as she pointed out reforms which would tend to consolidate the house; and even while joking with her he listened. Thus the salesmen's positions were gradually improved, the wholesale dismissals were replaced by a system of holidays granted during the dead seasons, and it was decided to found a sort of benefit club which would protect the employees against slack times and ensure them a pension. It was the embryo of the vast trades' unions of the twentieth century.
Moreover Denise did not confine her attention solely to the healing of the wounds from which she had herself bled; she conceived various delicate feminine ideas with which she prompted Mouret and which delighted the customers. She also made Lhomme happy by supporting a scheme he had long entertained, that of creating a band of musicians, of which all the members should be chosen from amongst the staff. Three months later Lhomme had a hundred and twenty musicians under his direction, and the dream of his whole life was realized. And a grand fête was then given on the premises, a concert and a ball, to introduce the band of The Ladies' Paradise to the customers and the whole world. The newspapers took the matter up, Bourdoncle himself, though staggered by these innovations, was obliged to bow before the immense advertisement. Afterwards came the establishment of a recreation room for the men, with two billiard tables and backgammon and chess boards. Then classes were held in the house of an evening; lessons were given in English and German, in grammar, arithmetic, and geography; at last too there were even riding and fencing lessons. A library was also formed, ten thousand volumes were placed at the disposal of the employees. And afterwards came a resident doctor, giving consultations gratis; together with baths, and hair-dressing and refreshment saloons. Every want of life was provided for, everything—board, lodging, clothing and education—was to be obtained without going out of doors. There, in the very heart of Paris, now all agog with the clatter of this working city which was springing up so vigorously amidst the ruins of the olden streets, at last opened to the sunshine, The Ladies' Paradise sufficed entirely for all its own wants and pleasures.
Then a further change of opinion took place in Denise's favour. As Bourdoncle, vanquished, repeated with despair to his friends that he would himself give a great deal to prevail upon Denise to accept Mouret, it was concluded that she still refused to do so, and that her all-powerfulness resulted from her refusal. From that moment she became popular. They knew for what indulgences they were indebted to her, and they admired her for the strength of her will. There, at all events, was one who could master the governor, who avenged all the others, and knew how to get something more than promises out of him! So she had come at last, she who caused him to treat the poor and humble with a little consideration! When she passed through the departments, with her delicate, self-willed head, her gentle, invincible air, the salesmen smiled at her, felt proud of her, and would willingly have exhibited her to the crowd. She, in her happiness, allowed herself to be carried along by this increasing sympathy. But was it all possible? She again saw herself arriving in a shabby dress, frightened, lost amidst the mechanism of the terrible machine; for a long time she had felt she was nothing, barely a grain of millet beneath the millstones which were crushing a whole world; and now to-day she was the very soul of this world, she alone was of any consequence, able at a word to increase or slacken the pace of the colossus lying at her feet. And yet she had not wished for these things, she had simply presented herself, without calculation, possessed of naught but the charm of her sweetness. Her sovereignty sometimes caused her an uneasy surprise: why did they all obey her? she was not pretty, she did nothing wrong. Then she smiled, her heart at rest, feeling within herself naught but goodness and prudence, a love of truth and logic which constituted all her strength.
One of Denise's greatest joys at this time was to be able to assist Pauline. The latter, now about to become a mother, was trembling, for she knew that two other saleswomen similarly circumstanced had been sent away. The principals did not tolerate maternity; they occasionally allowed marriage, but would admit of no children. Pauline, it was true, had her husband in the house; but still she felt anxious, and in order to postpone a probable dismissal, sought to conceal her state as long as she could. But Bourdoncle had observed that her complexion was getting very pale and one morning while he was standing near her, in the under-linen department, a messenger, taking away a bundle, ran against her with such force that she cried out with pain. Bourdoncle immediately took her on one side, made her confess, and submitted the question of her dismissal to the board, under the pretext that she was in need of country air. Mouret, who was not at the meeting, could only give his opinion in the evening. But Denise having had time to interpose, he closed Bourdoncle's mouth, in the interests of the establishment itself. Did they wish to wound the feelings of all the mothers and young married women amongst their customers? And so it was decided, with great solemnity, that every married saleswoman should, whenever necessary, be sent to a special midwife's at the Paradise's expense.
The next day when Denise went up to the infirmary to see Pauline, who had been obliged to take to her bed on account of the blow she had received, the latter kissed her heartily on both cheeks. "How kind you are! Had it not been for you I should have been turned away. Pray don't be anxious about me, the doctor says it's nothing."
Baugé, who had slipped away from his department, was also there, on the other side of the bed. He likewise stammered his thanks, disturbed in the presence of Denise, whom he now treated as an important person of a superior class. Ah! if he heard any more unkind remarks about her, he would soon close the mouths of the jealous ones! But Pauline sent him away with a good-natured shrug of the shoulders.
"My poor dear, you're always saying something stupid. Leave us to talk together."
The infirmary was a long, light room, containing twelve beds with white curtains. Those who did not wish to go home to their families were nursed there. However, on the day in question, Pauline was the only occupant. Her bed was near one of the large windows which looked on to the Rue Neuve-Saint-Augustin. And amidst the white hangings, in the calm atmosphere perfumed with a faint odour of lavender, they immediately began to exchange confidences in soft, affectionate whispers.
"So he does just what you wish him to, all the same," said Pauline. "How cruel you are, to make him suffer so! Come, just explain it to me, now that I've ventured to approach the subject. Do you detest him?"
Pauline had retained hold of Denise's hand, as the latter sat near the bed, with her elbow resting on the bolster; and Denise was overcome by sudden emotion. Her cheeks flushed red and, in a momentary weakness, her secret escaped her at this direct and unexpected question.
"I love him!" she murmured, burying her head in the pillow.
Pauline was astonished. "What! you love him?" And, after a pause, she asked: "So it's all to make him marry you?"
But at this, the young girl sprang up, quite confused: "Marry me! Oh, no! Oh! I assure you that I have never wished for anything of the kind! No, never has such an idea entered my head; and you know what a horror I have of all falsehood!"
"Well, dear," resumed Pauline, kindly, "you couldn't have acted otherwise, if such had been your intention. All this must come to an end, and it is very certain that it can only finish by a marriage so far as you are concerned. I must tell you that everybody here has the same idea: yes, they are convinced that you are riding the high horse, in order to make him take you to church. Dear me! what a funny girl you are!"
And then she had to console Denise, who had again sunk down with her head on the bolster, sobbing and declaring that she would certainly go away, since they attributed to her all sorts of things that had never even crossed her mind. No doubt, when a man loved a woman he ought to marry her. But she asked for nothing, she had made no calculations, she simply begged that she might be allowed to live quietly, with her joys and sorrows, like other people. Yes, she would go away.
At the same moment Mouret was crossing the premises below, seeking to forget his thoughts by visiting the works once more. Several months had elapsed, the façade now reared its monumental proportions behind the vast hoarding which concealed it from the public. Quite an army of decorators, marble-cutters, mosaic-workers, and others, were at work. The central group above the door was being gilded, whilst the pedestals destined to support statues of the manufacturing cities of France, were being fixed on the acroteria. Along the Rue du Dix-Décembre, lately opened to the public, a crowd of idlers now stood from morning till night, looking up, seeing nothing, but nevertheless interested in the marvels related of this façade, the inauguration of which was expected to revolutionize Paris. And it was beside this new building full of the fever of work, amidst the artists putting the finishing touches to the realization of his dream as commenced by the masons, that Mouret more bitterly than ever realized the vanity of his fortune. The thought of Denise suddenly came upon him, that thought which incessantly pierced him with a flame, like the shooting of an incurable pain. And then he ran away, unable to find a word of satisfaction, fearful lest he should display his tears, and leaving behind him the disgust of triumph. That façade, which was at last erected, seemed but trifling in his eyes, very much like one of those walls of sand that children build, and it might have been prolonged from one end of the city to the other, elevated to the starry sky and yet would not have filled the void of his heart, which only the "yes" of a mere child could satisfy.
When Mouret returned to his office he was almost choking with sobs. What did she want? He dared not offer her money now; but the confused idea of marriage presented itself amidst his revolts. And, in the debility of his powerlessness, his tears began to flow. He was indeed very unhappy.
CHAPTER XIII.
One morning in November, Denise was giving her first orders in the department when the Baudus' servant came to tell her that Mademoiselle Geneviève had passed a very bad night, and wished to see her immediately. For some time the poor girl had been getting weaker and weaker, and had been obliged to take to her bed two days before.
"Say I am coming at once," replied Denise, feeling very anxious.
The blow which was finishing Geneviève was Colomban's sudden disappearance. At first, chaffed by Clara, he had grown very dissipated; then, yielding to the wild desires which at times master sly, chaste men, he had become her obedient slave; and one Monday instead of returning to the shop had sent a farewell letter to Baudu, written in the studied terms of one who is about to commit suicide. Perhaps, at the bottom of this freak, there was also the calculating craft of a man delighted at escaping from a disastrous marriage. The business was in as bad a way as his betrothed, so the moment was a propitious one for breaking with them both. And every one cited Colomban as an unfortunate victim of love.
When Denise reached The Old Elbeuf, Madame Baudu, with her small white face consumed by anæmia, was there alone, sitting motionless behind the pay-desk, and watching over the silence and emptiness of the shop. There was no assistant now. The servant dusted the shelves; and it was even a question of replacing her by a charwoman. A dreary cold hung about the ceiling; hours passed by without a customer coming to disturb the gloom, and the goods, no longer handled, became more and more musty every day.
"What's the matter?" asked Denise, anxiously. "Is Geneviève in danger?"
Madame Baudu did not at first reply. Her eyes filled with tears. Then suddenly she stammered: "I don't know; they don't tell me anything. Ah, it's all over, it's all over."
And she cast a dim glance round the dark shop, as if she felt that her daughter and The Old Elbeuf were disappearing together. The seventy thousand francs, produced by the sale of their Rambouillet property, had in less than two years melted away in the abyss of competition. In order to struggle against The Ladies' Paradise, which now kept men's cloths, even materials for hunting, shooting, and livery suits, the draper had made considerable sacrifices. But at last he had been altogether crushed by the swan-skin cloths and the flannels sold by his rival, an assortment that had not its equal in the market. Little by little his debts had increased, and, as a last resource, he had resolved to mortgage the old building in the Rue de la Michodière, where Finet, their ancestor, had founded the business. And it was now only a question of days, the crumbling away had nearly finished, the very ceilings seemed to be falling and turning into dust, even an old worm-eaten structure is carried away by the wind.
"Your uncle is upstairs," resumed Madame Baudu in her broken voice. "We each stay with her in turn for a couple of hours. Some one must stay here; oh! but only as a precaution, for to tell the truth——"
Her gesture finished the phrase. They would have put the shutters up had it not been for their old commercial pride, which still kept them erect in the presence of the neighbours.
"Well, I'll go up, aunt," said Denise, whose heart ached amidst the resigned despair that even the pieces of cloth themselves exhaled.
"Yes, go upstairs quick, my girl. She's expecting you, she's been asking for you all night. She had something to tell you."
But just at that moment Baudu came down. Bile had now given his yellow face a greenish hue, and his eyes were bloodshot. He was still walking with the muffled tread with which he had quitted the sick room, and murmured, as though he might be overheard upstairs, "She's asleep."
Then, thoroughly worn out, he sat down on a chair, mopping his forehead with a mechanical gesture and puffing like a man who has just finished some hard work. A pause ensued, but at last he said to Denise: "You'll see her presently. When she is sleeping, she seems to us to be all right again."
Again did silence fall. Face to face, the father and mother stood looking at one another. Then, in a low voice he went over his grief again, though without naming any one or addressing any one directly: "With my head on the block, I wouldn't have believed it! He was the last one, I had brought him up as a son. If any one had come and said to me, 'They'll take him away from you as well; you'll see him fall,' I should have replied, 'It's impossible, that can't happen as long as there's a God on high.' But he has fallen all the same! Ah! the poor fellow, he who was so well up in the business, who had all my ideas! And all through a young she-ape, a mere dummy fit for a window! No! really, it's enough to drive one mad!"
He shook his head, with his half-closed eyes cast upon the damp floor which the tread of generations of customers had worn. Then he continued in a lower voice, "Shall I tell you? Well, there are moments when I feel myself the most culpable of all in our misfortune. Yes, it's my fault if our poor girl is lying upstairs devoured by fever. Ought I not to have married them at once, without yielding to my stupid pride, my obstinacy in refusing to leave them the business in a less prosperous state than it had been before? Had I done that she would now have the man she loved, and perhaps their youthful strength united would have accomplished the miracle that I have failed to work. But I am an old fool, and saw through nothing; I didn't know that people fell ill over such things. Really, he was an extraordinary fellow: he had such a gift for business, and such probity, such simplicity of conduct, he was so orderly in every way—in short, my pupil."
He raised his head, still defending his ideas, in the person of the shopman who had betrayed him. Denise, however, could not bear to hear him accuse himself, and carried away by her emotion, on seeing him so humble, with his eyes full of tears, he who used formerly to reign there as an absolute and scolding master, she told him everything.
"Uncle, pray don't excuse him," said she. "He never loved Geneviève, he would have run away sooner if you had tried to hasten the marriage. I have spoken to him myself about it; he was perfectly well aware that my poor cousin was suffering on his account, and yet you see that did not prevent him from leaving. Ask aunt."
Without opening her lips, Madame Baudu confirmed these words by a nod. The draper turned paler still, blinded by his tears. And then he stammered out: "It must have been in the blood, his father died last year through having led a dissolute life."
And once more he looked round the dim shop, his eyes wandering from the empty counters to the full shelves and then resting on Madame Baudu, who was still sitting erect at the pay-desk, waiting in vain for the customers who did not come.
"Well," said he, "it's all over. They've ruined our business, and now one of their hussies is killing our daughter."
No one spoke. The rolling of passing vehicles, which occasionally shook the floor, seemed like a funereal beating of drums in the still air, so stuffy under the low ceiling. But suddenly, amidst this gloomy sadness peculiar to old expiring shops, several dull knocks were heard proceeding from somewhere in the house. It was Geneviève, who had just awoke, and was knocking with a stick they had left beside her.
"Let's go up at once," said Baudu, rising with a start. "And try to be cheerful, she mustn't know."
He himself as he went upstairs rubbed his eyes, in order to remove the traces of his tears. As soon as he opened the door, on the first floor, they heard a frightened, feeble voice crying: "Oh, I don't like to be left alone. Don't leave me; I'm afraid to be left alone." However, when she perceived Denise, Geneviève became calmer, and smiled joyfully. "You've come, then! How I've been longing to see you since yesterday! I thought you also had abandoned me!"
It was a piteous spectacle. The young woman's room, a little room into which came a livid light, looked out on to the yard. At first her parents had put her in their room, in the front part of the house; but the sight of The Ladies' Paradise opposite affected her so deeply, that they had been obliged to bring her back to her own again. And there she lay, so very thin under the bed-clothes, that you could hardly divine the form and existence of a human body. Her skinny arms, consumed by the burning fever of consumption, were in a perpetual movement of anxious, unconscious searching; whilst her black hair, heavy with passion, seemed thicker still, and to be preying with its voracious vitality upon her poor face, that face in which was fading the final degenerateness of a long lineage, a family that had grown and lived in the gloom of that cellar of old commercial Paris. Denise, her heart bursting with pity, stood looking at her. She did not at first speak, for fear of giving way to tears. However, she at last murmured: "I came at once. Can I be of any use to you? You asked for me. Would you like me to stay?"
"No, thanks. I don't need anything. I only wanted to embrace you."
Tears filled her eyes. Denise quickly leant over and kissed her, trembling at the flame which came from those hollow cheeks to her own lips. But Geneviève, stretching out her arms caught hold of her and kept her in a desperate embrace. Then she looked towards her father.
"Would you like me to stay?" repeated Denise. "Perhaps there is something I can do for you."
"No, no." Geneviève's glance was still obstinately fixed on her father, who remained standing there with a bewildered air, almost choking. However, he at last understood her and went away, without saying a word. They heard his heavy footsteps descending the stairs.