He chuckled with a wild look, and whispered:
"Stupid! Keep still! I tell you they're asleep; no one is looking."
At that moment, Palmyre's wan and agonised face appeared above the corn. She had turned round at the noise. But she didn't count, any more than if a cow had lifted up its muzzle. And, indeed, she returned, with indifference, to her sheaves. The cracking of her loins was again heard at each effort she made.
"Stupid," said Buteau. "Lise won't know."
At the mention of her sister, Françoise, who was on the eve of giving way, nerved herself for renewed resistance. From that moment she remained firm, beating him with her fists and kicking him with her bare legs. Was he hers, this fellow? Did he think she wanted some one else's leavings?
"Go and find my sister, you pig!" she exclaimed. And then she gave him such a kick in a tender part that he was forced to let her go, pushing her away so brutally that she had to stifle a cry of pain.
It was high time that the scene should finish, for Buteau, when he got up, perceived Lise returning with the snack. He walked on to meet her, and engaged her in talk, so as to allow Françoise the time to tidy her dress. The idea that she was going to tell everything made him regret not having stunned her with a kick. However, she said nothing, but sat down amid the bundles of wheat with a stubborn and insolent air. He had resumed his reaping, but she still stayed there idly, like a princess.
"What is it?" asked Lise, tired with her journey, and sitting down as well: "you're not working?"
"No, it bores me," replied Françoise, savagely.
Then Buteau, afraid to storm at her, fell foul of his wife. What was she up to, stretched out there like a sow, warming her belly in the sun? And a sweet thing, indeed, it was. A fine pumpkin to set out to ripen. At that phrase she began to laugh with all her old buxom gaiety. Maybe it was true that the warmth ripened the little one and brought it on; and so, under the flaming heavens, she rounded her huge figure, which seemed like the protuberance of some germ rising from the fruitful soil. But he did not laugh. He brutally made her get up, and insisted on her helping him. Inconvenienced by her condition, she was fain to kneel down, picking up the ears of corn with a side-long movement, and panting as she laboured on.
"As you're doing nothing," she said to her sister, "you might at least go back home and make the soup."
Françoise went off without a word. Although the heat was still stifling La Beauce had again assumed an aspect of activity. The little black specks of harvesters re-appeared, swarming to infinity. Delhomme was once more reaping with his two men, while La Grande, watching the growth of her stack, was leaning on her stick, quite prepared to bring it across the face of any idler. Fouan also went to have a look at the stack; next he again became absorbed in his son-in-law's work; and then he wandered retrospectively and regretfully to and fro, with heavy gait. Françoise, with her head still dizzy from the shock she had experienced, was going along the new road, when a voice called to her:
"Come along. This way!"
It was Jean, half hidden behind the sheaves which he had been carting from the neighbouring fields since the morning. He had just unloaded his waggon once more; and the two horses were waiting motionless in the sunshine. The erection of the large stack would not be begun till the morrow, and he had merely piled up some heaps, three walls which enclosed, as it were, a room; a deep snug nest of straw.
"Come along!" he said. "It's me!"
Françoise mechanically complied with the request. She did not even think of glancing back. Had she turned round, she would have noticed Buteau craning forward, surprised to see her leaving the road.
Jean now began jestingly:
"It's proud you're getting, to go by without giving a good-day to your friends!"
"Why, you're so hidden," she replied, "that you can't be seen."
Then he complained of the cold shoulder that the Buteaus now always turned upon him. But she was not composed enough to talk of that; she remained silent, or only let a brief word fall now and then. She had spontaneously dropped upon the straw, at the far end of the nook, as though she were thoroughly tired out. Her head was full of one thing, the attack of that man over yonder at the edge of the field; his hot hands, of which she still felt the powerful grip; his masculine approach, that she still seemed to expect, breathing short, in an anguish of desire, against which she struggled. She closed her eyes, choking.
Then Jean spoke no more. Seeing her thus, supine and yielding, the blood pulsed strongly through his veins. He had not calculated on this encounter, and he still held back, thinking that it would be a shame to take advantage of such a child. But the loud beating of his heart upset him. He had so long desired her! A vision of possession drove him frantic, as during his feverish nights. He lay down near her, contenting himself first with one of her hands, and then with both hands; which he crushed between his own, without so much as venturing to raise them to his lips. She did not draw them away, but re-opened her dreamy, heavy-lidded eyes, and looked at him without a smile, without any sign of shame, her face nervously strained. It was this mute, almost painful look of hers that all at once urged him to brutality. He made a dash, and seized her like the other.
"No, no," she faltered; "I entreat you."
But she made no defence. She only gave a cry of pain. It seemed as if the ground were giving way beneath her, and in her dizziness consciousness failed her.
When she re-opened her eyes, without saying a word, without making a movement, after remaining for a moment in a state of stupor, the thought of the other one came back to her. Jean, on his side, was displeased. Why had she yielded? She could not love a veteran like him! And he also remained motionless, aghast. Finally, with a discontented gesture, he tried to think of something to say, and failed. Embarrassed still further, he resolved to kiss her; but she at once recoiled, unwilling that he should touch her again.
"I must go," he muttered. "You stay here."
She made no answer, but stared vaguely up at the sky.
"Won't you? Come, wait five minutes, so that you mayn't be seen coming away at the same time as me."
Then she decided to open her lips.
"All right, be off!"
That was all. He smacked his whip, swore at his horses, and with his head bent trudged away by the side of his cart.
Meanwhile, Buteau's astonishment at Françoise's disappearance behind the sheaves continued; and when he saw Jean make off, he had a suspicion of the truth. Without confiding in Lise, he crept off like a wary hunter, and finally leapt full into the midst of the nook of straw. Françoise had not stirred, in the torpor that benumbed her; she was still gazing vaguely upwards.
"Oh, you strumpet! So that vagabond's your lover, and I'm only good to be kicked! Great God! We'll soon see about that."
He had already got hold of her; and she plainly realised by his heated look that he intended to take advantage of the opportunity. As soon as she again felt his burning hands, she once more resisted. Now that he was there, she no longer regretted or wanted him. Her whole nature revolted rancorously and jealously against him, albeit she was herself unconscious of the freaks of her will.
"Will you let me go, you swine!" she said. "I'll bite you!"
For the second time he had to leave go of her. He spluttered with fury, enraged at the thought that she yielded to another.
"Oh, I had a notion that there was something between you two," he said. "I ought to have kicked him out a long time ago, you hussy!"
Then he gave vent to a flood of filth. She, although maddened on her own side, remained stiff and pale, affecting perfect calmness, and replying curtly to all his dirty speeches:
"What's it got to do with you? Can't I do what I like?"
"Very well. Then I shall turn you out of the house immediately we get back! I shall tell Lise how I found you, and you may go and do as you like elsewhere."
He was now pushing her in front of him towards the field where his wife was waiting.
"Tell Lise!" said Françoise. "What do I care? I shall go away if I choose."
"If you choose! Oh, indeed! We shall see about that. You'll be kicked out, neck and crop!"
By way of taking a short cut, he was driving her across the field which had hitherto belonged in common to her sister and herself, and the partition of which he had always postponed. Suddenly he was seized with consternation. A new idea had just flashed like lightning through his mind. It had occurred to him that if he turned her away this field would be cut in two, and that she would take half of it, and perhaps give it to her gallant. The thought froze him, and both nipped his lust and wrath. No; that would be folly. He must not let everything go because a girl had baulked him for once. There was plenty of sport to be had any day; but if a fellow once got hold of some land, the thing was to stick to it.
He said nothing more, but slackened his pace, feeling puzzled as to how he might recall his violent words before he reached his wife. At length he made up his mind.
"Well, I'm not fond of making mischief," he said; "it's your seeming disgust of me that annoys me so. Otherwise, I hardly care to vex Lise, situated as she is."
She fancied that he, too, was afraid of being exposed.
"You may be sure of one thing," she answered; "if you speak, I shall do the same."
"Oh, I'm not afraid of that," he resumed, coolly and quietly. "I shall say you are lying, in revenge, because I caught you." Then, as they were getting near, he concluded, quickly: "So it sha'n't go any further. We must both of us talk it over some other time."
Lise, however, was beginning to feel surprised, unable to understand why Françoise was coming back with Buteau like that. He was explaining that the lazy thing had been sulking behind a hay-stack, down yonder, when suddenly a harsh cry interrupted him, and the matter was forgotten.
"What's that? Who screamed?"
It was a weird cry, a long screaming sigh, like the death-gasp of an animal having its throat cut. It rose up and died away amid the pitiless glare of the sun.
"Eh? What is it? A horse surely, with its bones broken!"
They turned round, and saw Palmyre still standing in the next field, amid the bundles of wheat. With her failing arms, she was pressing against her shrivelled bosom one last sheaf, which she was striving to bind. But, raising a fresh cry of agony, and letting the whole lot fall, she spun round and fell prone among the corn, struck down by the sun that had been scorching her for the last twelve hours.
Lise and Françoise ran up, Buteau following at a more careless pace; while everybody from the surrounding fields came forward: the Delhommes, Fouan, who was strolling about there, and La Grande, who was scattering the stones with the ferule of her stick.
"What's the matter?"
"Palmyre in a fit."
"I saw her fall from over there."
"Good Heavens!"
All of them stood round and watched her, not venturing too near, however, for they were struck with that mysterious awe which disease always inspires in the peasantry. She was stretched, face upwards, on the ground, with her arms extended as if she had been crucified on that earth, which, by the hard toil it exacted, had worn her out so soon, and was now killing her. Some vessel must have broken, for a streamlet of blood flowed from her mouth. Still, she was dying more from exhaustion, brought on by toil such as would have over-tasked a beast. A withered, shrunken thing she looked among the stubble, a mere fleshless, sexless bit of frippery, exhaling a last faint gasp amid the rich, fertile harvest.
La Grande, the grandmother who had renounced her and never spoke to her, at last came forward, saying:
"I really think she's dead." Then she prodded her with her stick. The body, with its eyes glaring vacantly in the brilliant light, and its mouth gaping as if to inhale boundless breezes, did not stir. On the chin the thread of blood was clotting. Then the grandmother added:
"Sure enough she's dead; better so, than to live at the expense of others."
They all stood motionless and aghast. Could anybody venture to touch her, without summoning the mayor? At first they spoke in whispers; then they began to shout again, to make themselves heard.
"I'll go and fetch my ladder from over yonder against the stack," said Delhomme eventually. "It'll serve as a stretcher. It's a bad thing to leave a corpse on the ground."
When he came back with the ladder, and they wanted to take some sheaves to make a bed for the body, Buteau grumbled.
"You shall have your corn back," they said.
"I should just hope so, indeed!" he answered.
Lise, a little ashamed of this meanness, added two bundles as a pillow, and Palmyre was laid upon the ladder, while Françoise, in a sort of dream, bewildered by this death, which had occurred so soon after her own adventure, could not take her eyes off the corpse. At sight of it she felt saddened, and, above all, she was astonished that that thing could ever have been a woman. She remained on guard with Fouan, pending the removal; and the old man said nothing either, though he seemed to think that those who died were very fortunate.
At sunset, when they all went home, two men came and took the stretcher away. The burden was not a heavy one, and there was hardly need of a relay. However, some others were in attendance, and quite a procession was formed. They cut across the field, to avoid a bend in the road. The corpse was stiffening on the sheaves, and some ears fell down behind the head, and swayed to and fro at each jolt of the bearers' measured tread.
In the sky above there now only remained the heat that had accumulated during the day, a ruddy heat that weighed heavily in the blue air. On the horizon, on the other side of the Loir valley, the sun, steeped in vapour, now cast over La Beauce a sheet of yellow rays on a level with the ground. Everything seemed tinged with the fine golden glow of the fair harvest evening. Such corn as was still standing displayed egrets of rosy flame, the stubble ends bristled with a ruddy gleam, and afar, projecting in all directions above the level, tawny sea, the stacks rose up one behind the other, apparently growing preposterously large. On the one side they seemed to be in flames, while on the other they were already black, casting shadows that stretched from end to end of the vast plain.
A solemn stillness fell, broken only by the song of a lark far aloft. None of the worn-out toilers spoke; they followed the corpse with bent heads, as resignedly as a flock of sheep. And there was no sound save a slight creaking of the ladder as the dead woman rocked to and fro on the way back through the ripe corn.
That night, Hourdequin paid off his harvesters, who had finished the work they had bargained to do. The men went away with a hundred and twenty francs a-piece, the women with sixty, for their month's work. It had been a good season; not too much corn blown down, to jag the scythe, nor a single storm during the cutting. Accordingly, it was amid loud acclamations that the foreman, at the head of his party of men, presented the harvest-home sheaf, with its ears woven cross-wise, to Jacqueline, who was looked upon as mistress of the household. The "Ripane," the traditional farewell meal, was very merry. Three legs of mutton and five rabbits were eaten, and the liquor circulated till so late into the night that they all went to bed more or less tipsy. Jacqueline, herself intoxicated, all but let herself be caught by Hourdequin while she was hanging round Tron's neck. Jean, quite dazed, had flung himself on the straw in his garret. Despite his fatigue, he could not sleep, for the image of Françoise had returned and tormented him. This surprised—in fact, it almost angered—him. He had had such little pleasure with the girl, after spending so many nights longing for her! He had subsequently felt so forlorn, that he had been inclined to vow that he would have nothing more to do with her. And yet now, scarcely was he lying down, when, evoked by carnal lust, she again uprose before his mind, and he again yearned for her as before. What had transpired had only whetted his fleshly appetite. How could he manage to see her again? Where could he clasp her on the morrow, during the following days, for ever? Suddenly a rustling made him start. A woman was nestling near him; it was the picker-up from Le Perche, who was astonished that he had not joined her on this last night. At first he repulsed her; but, finally, he stifled her with his embraces; and it seemed to him that she was that other one whom he would have crushed likewise, clinging, clinging, till they swooned.
At the same moment, Françoise, starting from her slumber, got up, and, longing for air, opened the dormer-window of her room. She had just dreamed of fellows fighting, and of dogs tearing down the door below. When the air had cooled her a little, her mind again ran upon the two men—the one who wanted her, and the other who had taken her. This was the limit of her reflections: the thought simply revolved in her mind, without her giving it any consideration or coming to any decision. Something at last caught her ear. It had not been a dream, then? A dog was howling, afar off, on the banks of the Aigre. Then she remembered: it was Hilarion, who, since night-fall, had been howling over Palmyre's corpse. They had tried to drive him away, but he had clung and bitten, refusing to leave the remains of his sister, his wife, his all in all; and he howled endlessly, with a howling that filled the night.
For a long time Françoise listened, shuddering.
CHAPTER V.
"I only hope La Coliche won't calve at the same time as me!" repeated Lise every morning.
Lost in thought she stood in the cow-house, gazing at the cow, whose belly was distended beyond measure. Never had any animal swollen to such an extent. She looked round as a barrel on her shrunken shanks. The nine months fell exactly on Saint-Fiacre's Day, for Françoise had been careful to note the date on which she had taken her to the bull. Lise, on her side, was unfortunately by no means certain, that is within a few days. Still the child would certainly be born somewhere about Saint-Fiacre's Day, perhaps on the day before, perhaps on the day after. So she repeated, forlornly:
"I only hope La Coliche won't calve at the same time as me! A pretty job that'd be! Yes, good gracious! We should be in a nice pickle!"
La Coliche, who had been ten years in the house, was greatly spoilt. She had come to be considered as one of the family. The Buteaus nestled near her in winter time, having no other firing than the warm exhalation from her flanks. She in return, displayed great affection, particularly towards Françoise, whom she could never see without a tender feeling moistening her large eyes. She would lick her with her rough tongue till the blood came; or seizing her skirt between her teeth she would pull her near, so as to have her all to herself. Accordingly she was taken great care of, now that her calving time drew near: warm mashes, excursions out at the best times of the day,—in fact, she met with hourly attention. All this was not merely due to their fondness for her; they remembered the five hundred francs she represented, as well as the milk, butter, and cheese she gave; quite a fortune, which would be lost in losing her.
A fortnight had elapsed since the harvest. Françoise had resumed her every-day life in the household, as though nothing had occurred between her and Buteau. He seemed to have forgotten; and she herself was glad to avoid thinking of these matters, which disturbed her. Jean, whom she had met and warned, had not called again. He used to watch for her beside the hedges, and implore her to slip out and meet him in the evening in ditches which he particularised. But she refused, in alarm, concealing her coldness under an assumption of great prudence. Later on, she said, when she wouldn't be so much wanted at home. One evening when he surprised her going down to Macqueron's to buy some sugar, she obstinately refused to accompany him behind the church; and talked to him the whole time about La Coliche, about her bones which were giving way, and her hind-quarters which were opening: sure signs, which made him remark that the time could not now be far off.
And now, just on Saint-Fiacre's Eve, Lise was seized with severe pains, as she went into the cow-house after dinner with her sister to look at the cow, who, with her thighs drawn apart by the swelling of her womb, was also in pain, lowing softly.
"What did I say?" cried Lise, furiously. "A nice mess we're in now."
Towards ten o'clock, Buteau, annoyed at nothing having happened, decided to go to bed, leaving Lise and Françoise obstinately remaining in the cow-house beside La Coliche, whose pains seemed to be increasing. They both began to feel uneasy. No progress was made, although, as far as the bones were concerned, the labour seemed at an end. There was the passage, so why did not the calf come out? They stroked the animal, encouraged her, and brought her dainties—sugar, which she refused, with her head bent and her croup profoundly agitated. At midnight, Lise, who had hitherto been writhing and groaning, found herself suddenly relieved. In her case it had only been a false alarm; some wandering pains. But she was convinced that she had driven it back, just as she would have repressed a need of nature. The whole night through she and her sister sat up with La Coliche, nursing her carefully, and even applying fomentations of hot rags; while Rougette, the other cow, the one last bought at Cloyes market, astonished by the lighted candles, watched their movements with her large, bluish, drowsy eyes.
At dawn of day, Françoise, seeing that nothing had yet come off, decided to run over and fetch their neighbour La Frimat, who was renowned for her knowledge, having assisted so many cows that people readily had recourse to her in ticklish cases, so as to avoid sending for the veterinary. On her arrival she made a grimace.
"She don't look well," she muttered. "How long has it been like this?"
"Why, for twelve hours."
She kept on walking round the animal, poking her nose everywhere, and alarming the other two with her dissatisfied grimaces and the way she jerked her chin.
When Buteau came in from the fields to breakfast, he also took fright, and talked of sending for Patoir, albeit shuddering at the idea of the expense.
"A veterinary!" said La Frimat tartly, "to kill her, hey? Old Saucisse's animal died before his very eyes. No! See here. I'll open the bladder, and I'll look after your calf for you!"
"Why," remarked Françoise, "Monsieur Patoir says the bladder shouldn't be opened. He says that the water inside is a help."
La Frimat shrugged her shoulders in exasperation. Patoir was an ass! Then she slit open the pocket with a pair of scissors. For a moment La Coliche breathed more easily, and the old woman triumphed. Lise and Françoise watched her with anxiously quivering eyelids, as she tried to ascertain the posture of the calf. Buteau himself, who had not gone back into the fields, waited breathless and still.
"I can feel the feet," she muttered, "but not the head. It's a bad sign when you can't feel the head."
"Better not bustle her," said La Frimat, sagely; "it'll come all right by-and-bye."
It was now three o'clock. They waited till seven. Nothing happened, however, and the house was a perfect hell. On the one hand, Lise, obstinately remaining on an old chair, was writhing and groaning; on the other, La Coliche was lowing incessantly amid shiverings and sweatings, which grew more and more serious. Rougette, the second cow, also began to low with fright. Françoise was at her wits' end, and Buteau kept swearing and bawling alternately. At last La Coliche, her strength failing her, fell on to her side, and lay stretched out upon the straw panting pitiably.
"We sha'n't get the brute!" declared Buteau; "and the mother will die as well!"
Françoise clasped her hands entreatingly.
"Do go and fetch Monsieur Patoir! Cost what it may, go and fetch Monsieur Patoir!"
Buteau had grown gloomy. Then, after a final struggle with himself, he got out the cart without saying a word.
La Frimat, who affected to pay no further heed to the cow since the veterinary had again been mentioned, was now getting anxious about Lise. The old woman was also good at accouchements; all the neighbourhood had passed through her hands. She seemed uneasy, and did not conceal her apprehensions from La Bécu, who called Buteau back as he was putting the horse to.
"Look here! Your wife's not well. Suppose you bring back a doctor at the same time?"
He stood mute and staring. What? Another of 'em to be coddled! Not likely that he was going to pay for everybody!
"No, no!" cried Lise, in an interval between two throes. "I shall be all right. We can't be throwing money into the gutter like that!"
Buteau hastily whipped up his horse, and the cart on its way to Cloyes vanished amid the falling shades of night.
When Patoir at last arrived, two hours later, everything was in the same state: La Coliche lay groaning on her side, and Lise, writhing like a worm, was half falling off her chair. Things had lasted thus for twenty-four hours.
"Which is my patient, hey?" asked the veterinary, who was of a jovial disposition.
And addressing Lise familiarly:
"Then, if it's not you, my fat beauty, please put yourself to bed. You want it badly."
She made no answer, nor did she go. He was already examining the cow.
"Heavens! she's in a wretched state, this beast of yours. You always come for me too late, you clumsy wretches!"
They all listened to him with a respectful, despondent, hang-dog look; that is, all of them excepting La Frimat, who screwed up her lips in high disdain. Patoir, taking off his coat and turning up his shirt sleeves, proceeded to make an elaborate examination.
"Of course," he resumed, after an instant's pause, "it's exactly as I thought. Let me tell you, my children, it's all up with this calf of yours. I've no wish to cut my fingers against his teeth, in turning him round. Besides, I shouldn't get him out any the more if I did so, and I should certainly damage the mother."
Françoise burst into sobs.
"Monsieur Patoir," said she, "I implore you, save our cow. Poor Coliche! she's so fond of me!"
Both Lise, sallow with a fit of griping, and Buteau, in rude health, so unfeeling as they were regarding the woes of others, now lamented and softened, making the same supplication.
"Save our cow, our old cow that has given us such good milk for years and years," they begged in chorus. "Pray save her, Monsieur Patoir."
"Well, one thing must be clearly understood: I shall be forced to cut up the calf."
"Who cares a curse for the calf? Save our cow, Monsieur Patoir, save her!"
Then the veterinary, who had brought a large blue apron with him, borrowed a pair of canvas trousers. Stripping himself quite naked in a corner, behind Rougette, he slipped on the trousers, and then tied the apron round his loins. When he re-appeared in this scanty costume, with his genial bull-dog face and his fat and dumpy figure, La Coliche lifted her head and, no doubt from astonishment, ceased to complain. However, no one even smiled, so wrung with anxiety was every heart.
"Light some candles!" said Patoir.
He set four on the ground, and then lay down flat on his stomach in the straw, behind the cow, who was now unable to get up. For a moment he remained flat, examining her. Near by he had placed a little box, and, having raised himself on his elbow, he was taking a bistoury out of it, when a husky groan startled him, and he at once assumed a sitting posture.
"What, still there, my stout matron? Well, I thought that couldn't be the cow!"
It was Lise, seized with the final pangs.
"For goodness sake go and get your business over in your own room, and leave me to do mine here! It disturbs me; it acts on my nerves, 'pon my honour it does, to hear you straining behind me. Come, come! It's not common sense! Take her away, the rest of you!"
La Frimat and La Bécu decided to take her each by an arm and lead her to her room. She surrendered herself, no longer having the strength to resist. But on crossing the kitchen, where a solitary candle was burning, she asked to have all the doors left open, with the idea that she would thus not be so far off. La Frimat had already prepared the bed of anguish according to rural custom—a simple sheet spread out in the middle of the room over a truss of straw, and three chairs turned down. Lise squatted down and stretched herself, with her back against one chair and one leg against each of the others. She was not even undressed.
Buteau and Françoise had remained in the cow-house to light Patoir; they squatted on their heels, each holding a candle, while the veterinary, again stretched out on his stomach, cut a section round the left ham with his bistoury. He loosened the skin, and then pulled at the calf's shoulder, which came away. Françoise, pale and faint, dropped her candle and fled with a shriek.
"My poor old Coliche," she exclaimed; "I won't see it! I won't see it!"
Thereupon Patoir lost his temper, the more so as he had to rise up and extinguish an incipient conflagration, caused by the fall of Françoise's candle among the straw.
"Drat the wench! She might be a princess, with her nerves. She'd smoke us like so many hams," he remarked in a peevish tone.
Françoise had run and flung herself on a chair in the room where her sister was being confined. The latter's exposure did not disturb her. It seemed a mere matter of course, after what she had just seen. She waved from her memory that vision of living severed flesh, and gave a stammering account of what was being done to the cow.
"It's sure to go wrong; I must go back," said Lise suddenly; and despite her sufferings, she made an effort to get up from among the three chairs. But La Frimat and La Bécu grew angry, and held her down.
"Good heavens! will you keep still! What on earth possesses you?" exclaimed La Frimat.
"So as to keep you quiet," said La Bécu, "I'll go myself and bring you the news."
From that moment La Bécu did nothing but run to and fro between the room and the cow-house. To save continually making the journey, she at last shouted out her report from the kitchen. The veterinary was still busily occupied with his nasty, troublesome job, and he emerged from it disgustingly filthy from head to foot.
"It's all right, Lise," exclaimed La Bécu; "don't be uneasy. We've got the other shoulder, and it will soon be all over now."
Lise saluted each phase of the operation with a heartrending sigh; and no one knew whether the lament was for herself or for the calf. There was not the slightest cessation of her travail, and she seemed to be seized with inconsolable despair.
"Oh, dear, how unlucky! Oh, dear, how unlucky to lose such a fine calf!"
Françoise likewise lamented, and the regrets they all expressed grew so aggressive, so full of implied hostility, that Patoir felt hurt. He hurried to them, stopping, however, outside the door, for decency's sake.
"I say! I give you warning. Just remember that you implored me to save your cow. I know you so well, you beggars. Now, don't you go about telling everybody that I killed your calf."
"That's right enough, right enough," muttered Buteau, going back with him into the cow-house. "All the same, it was you that cut it up."
As Lise lay prostrate among the three chairs, a kind of billow passed over her. Françoise, who in her desolation had so far seen nothing, became quite thunderstruck.
"A little more patience," said La Frimat. "It'll soon be all right."
Françoise, on her part, shook herself free from the fascination of the sight, and feeling embarrassed, went and took her sister's hand.
"My poor Lise," she said affectionately, "what great trouble you're in!"
"Oh, yes, yes! And no one pities me. If I only had some pity! Oh, dear! It's beginning again. Won't it ever be born?"
This kind of talk might have gone on for a considerable time, but some exclamations were heard in the cow-house. They came from Patoir, who, astonished to find La Coliche still quivering and moaning, had suspected the presence of a second calf. And, indeed, there was one. Buteau ran into his wife's room carrying the little animal, which hung its astonished head in a tipsy-like way.
Amid the general acclamations at the sight, Lise broke into an endless, irresistible peal of mad laughter, stuttering:
"Oh, how funny it looks! Oh! it's too bad to make me laugh like this! Oh, dear! Oh! oh! how I am suffering! No, no! don't make me laugh any more: I've had enough!"
The climax was at length reached.
"It's a girl," declared La Frimat.
"No, no!" said Lise, who felt disappointed, "I don't want one: I want a boy."
Patoir went away, after two quarts of sweetened wine had been given to La Coliche. La Frimat undressed Lise and put her to bed, while La Bécu, assisted by Françoise, cleared away the straw and swept up the room. In ten minutes' time all was in order. No one would have had any idea that a confinement had just taken place, except for the constant mewling of the baby, who was being washed in warm water. However, after being swathed, the infant gradually became quiet; while the mother, now utterly prostrate, fell into a leaden sleep, and lay with her face congested, almost black, between the thick brownish sheets.
Towards midnight, when the two neighbours had left, Françoise told Buteau that he had better go up into the hay-loft to sleep. She had laid a mattress on the floor, and meant to stay there for the night, so as not to leave her sister alone. He made no answer, but finished his pipe in silence. All was quiet, save for the heavy breathing of the sleeping Lise.
As Françoise was kneeling on her mattress, at the very foot of the bed, in a darkened corner, Buteau, still silent, suddenly came up behind her and laid her flat. She turned her head, and instantly grasped the situation, from the look of his drawn, flushed face. He was at it again; he had not relinquished his purpose, and, presumably, the longing was a violent one, since he attacked her thus beside his wife, and just after occurrences which were scarcely of an engaging kind. Françoise repulsed and overturned him, however, and then there was a suppressed, panting struggle.
With a snigger, and in a choking voice, he said:
"Come, come! Why should you mind? I'm equal to taking on the two of you."
He knew her well, and felt sure she would not scream. Nor did she. She resisted without a word, too proud to call to her sister, unwilling to acquaint any one, even Lise, with her business. He was stifling her, however, and seemed on the point of succeeding.
"It'll be so convenient, as we're living together, and shall be always with each other," he said.
But suddenly he gave a cry of pain. She had silently dug her nails into his neck. Then he grew mad, and spoke of Jean, saying:
"Don't think you'll marry him, that blackguard fellow of yours. Never, so long as you're under age."
As he was now doing her brutal violence, she kicked him so vigorously that he howled aloud. Then he bounded up in alarm, looking anxiously towards the bed. His wife was sleeping so soundly, however, that she had not stirred. Nevertheless, he went off, with a terrible threatening gesture.
When Françoise had stretched herself on the mattress, amid the deep stillness of the room, she lay there with her eyes open. She would never let him have his way, that she wouldn't, even although she herself were perchance desirous. And she felt astonished at it all; for the idea that she might marry Jean had never yet occurred to her.
CHAPTER VI.
Jean had been engaged for a couple of days in some fields which Hourdequin owned near Rognes, and where he had set up a steam threshing-machine, hired from a Châteaudun engine-builder, who sent it about from Bonneval to Cloyes. With his cart and his two horses, the young man brought the sheaves from the surrounding ricks, and then took the grain to the farm; while the machine, puffing away from morning till night, scattered golden dust in the sunlight, and filled the country-side with a terrific, incessant snorting.
Jean was not well, and was ransacking his brains as to how he might best recover possession of Françoise. A month had already gone by since he had clasped her, on that very spot, among the wheat which they were now threshing; and since then she had always escaped from him, apprehensively. He began to despair of renewing the intercourse; and yet his desire was increasing, becoming an all-absorbing, maddening passion. As he drove his horses, he wondered why he should not go to the Buteaus and roundly ask for Françoise's hand. There had been no open definitive rupture between them. He still bade them good-day as he passed, and, if he did not call on them, it was solely because he was influenced by the disquietude of guilt. As soon as this idea of marriage occurred to him, as the only means of getting the girl back, he persuaded himself that it was the path of duty, and that he should be acting dishonourably if he did not marry her. The next morning, however, when he returned to the machine, he was seized with fear; and he would never have dared to risk the step had he not seen Buteau and Françoise set off together for the fields. He then bethought himself that Lise had always been favourable to him, and that, with her, he would possess more confidence. So he slipped away for a few moments, leaving his horses in charge of a fellow-servant.
"Why, Jean!" cried Lise, sturdily up and about again after her confinement; "no one ever sees you now. What's up?"
He made some excuses, and then, with the brusqueness of shy people, he hurriedly broached the subject, in such an awkward way, however, that at first it was open for her to think that he was making her a declaration. For he reminded her that he had loved her, and that he would willingly have taken her to wife. However, he at once added:
"And that's why I'd all the same marry Françoise if she were given me."
Lise stared at him in such astonishment that he began to stammer:
"Oh, I'm well aware that it can't be settled straight off. I only wanted to talk to you about it!"
"Well, it takes me by surprise," she replied at length, "because I hardly expected such a thing, on account of your ages. First of all, we must know what Françoise thinks."
He had come formally resolved to tell the whole tale, thus hoping to make the marriage inevitable. But at the last moment a scruple restrained him. If Françoise had not confessed to her sister, if no one knew anything about it, had he the right to speak? He was discouraged, and felt ridiculous, on account of his thirty-three years of age.
"Most certainly," he muttered, "she should be consulted. Nobody would force her."
Lise, however, having once got over her astonishment, looked at him as genially as ever. Evidently the idea did not displease her. She was even quite gracious.
"It shall be as she chooses, Jean. I'm not like Buteau, who thinks her too young. She's getting on for eighteen, and she has the build for two men, let alone one. And, besides, love is all very well between sister and sister, of course; but now that she's a woman, I'd rather have a servant under orders in her place. If she says yes, take her! You're a good sort, and the old cocks are often the best."
She had been unable to restrain these words of complaint anent the gradual estrangement which was irresistibly increasing between herself and her younger sister: that hostility, aggravated by little daily jars, a secret leaven of jealousy and hatred which had been doing its stealthy work ever since a man had come into the house with his will and his lust.
Jean, in his delight, kissed Lise warmly on both cheeks.
"It happens that we're just christening the baby," she added, "and we shall have the family to dinner this evening. I invite you, and you shall make your proposal to old Fouan, who's the guardian, that is if Françoise will have you."
"Agreed!" cried he. "I'll see you to-night!"
He rapidly strode back to his horses, and drove them all day long, making his whip resound with clacks which rang out like gun-shots on the morning of a fête.
The Buteaus were, indeed, having their child baptised after a deal of delay. First of all, Lise had insisted on waiting till she was quite strong and well again, wishing to join in the feast. Next—on ambitious thoughts intent—she had obstinately resolved to have Monsieur and Madame Charles for godfather and godmother, and they having condescendingly consented, it had been necessary to wait for Madame Charles, who had just started for Chartres to lend a helping hand in her daughter's establishment, for as it was now the time of the September fair, the house in the Rue aux Juifs was always full. However, as Lise had told Jean, the christening was to be simply a family gathering, with Fouan, La Grande, the Delhommes, and the godparents.
At the last moment there had been serious difficulties with the Abbé Godard, who was now incessantly at loggerheads with Rognes. So long as he had cherished the hope that the Municipal Council would indulge in the luxury of a priest of its own, he had been content to bear his troubles patiently: such as the four miles or so which he had to walk for each mass, and the vexatious demands which this irreligious village made upon him. But he could now no longer deceive himself with false hopes. Every year the council regularly refused to repair the parsonage. Hourdequin, the mayor, declared that the expenses were already too heavy; and Macqueron, the assessor, alone paid court to the priesthood, in furtherance of certain hidden ambitious designs. So the Abbé Godard, no longer having any reason to keep on good terms with Rognes, became severe in his treatment of the village, and only vouchsafed it the strictest minimum of worship. He did not treat the inhabitants to any extra prayers, or any display of tapers and incense for amusement's sake. He was always quarrelling with the women of the village. In June there had been quite a pitched battle on the subject of the first communion. Five children—two little girls and three boys—had been attending his catechism class on Sundays after mass, and to avoid having to return to confess them, he insisted on their coming to him at Bazoches-le-Doyen. Thereupon a first sedition arose among the women. A pretty thing, indeed! Three-quarters of a league to go there, and the same distance back! Who was to know what might happen, with boys and girls running about together? Next, there was a terrible storm when he refused point-blank to celebrate the full ceremony at Rognes: high mass, with singing, and so forth. He intended to hold this celebration in his own parish, whither the five children were free to repair, if they wished to do so. For a whole fortnight the women raved with fury round the fountain. What! He christened them, married them, and buried them in their own village, and now he wouldn't give them a decent communion! He was obstinate, however, and merely officiated at low mass, dismissing the five communicants without even a blossom or an oremus by way of consolation. When the women, vexed even to tears at seeing such a paltry ceremony, entreated him to have vespers sung in the afternoon, he flew into a passion! Nothing of the kind! He gave them their due. They would have had high mass, vespers, and everything else at Bazoches if their obstinacy had not made them rebel even against the blessed God Himself! After this quarrel a rupture seemed imminent between the Abbé Godard and Rognes, and the least jar would certainly bring about a catastrophe.
When Lise went to see the priest about the christening of her baby, he talked of fixing it for the Sunday, after mass. But she begged of him to return on the Tuesday at two o'clock, for the godmother would not return from Chartres till the morning of that day; and he eventually consented, recommending the party to be punctual, for he was determined, he cried, that he would not wait a second.
On the Tuesday, at two o'clock precisely, the Abbé Godard reached the church, panting from his journey, and damp owing to a sudden shower. No one had yet arrived. There was only Hilarion, who, at the entrance of the nave, was engaged in clearing up a corner of the baptistery, encumbered with fragments of old flag-stones, which had always been seen there. Since the death of his sister, the cripple had lived on public charity, and it had occurred to the priest, who used to slip odd francs into the poor fellow's hand from time to time, to employ him on this work of clearance, which had been resolved upon scores of times but always deferred. For a few moments he interested himself in watching Hilarion's task. Then he was taken with a first fit of anger.
"Good gracious! are they making a fool of me? It's already ten minutes past two," he exclaimed.
Then, as he looked at the Buteaus' silent, sleepy-looking house across the square, he noticed the rural constable waiting under the porch, and smoking his pipe.
"Ring the bell, Bécu!" he cried; "that'll bring the sluggards along."
So Bécu, who was very drunk, as usual, hung on to the bell-rope, while the priest went to put on his surplice. He had drawn up the entry in the register on the previous Sunday, and he intended to perform the ceremony by himself, without the help of the choir-children, who brought him to the verge of distraction. When all was ready, he again became impatient. Ten minutes more had elapsed, and the bell still rang out, with exasperating persistence, amid the deep silence of the deserted village.
"What on earth are they about? They ought to have some one at their backs with a stick!" said the priest.
At last he saw La Grande come forth from the Buteaus' house, walking along in her spiteful, old-queen-like way, dry and upright, like a thistle, despite her eighty-five years.
A great worry was distracting the family. All the guests were there, excepting the godmother, who had been vainly awaited since the morning. Monsieur Charles, quite dumbfounded, declared over and over again that it was most surprising, that he had received a letter only the night before, and that Madame Charles, who was detained perhaps at Cloyes, would certainly arrive in a minute or two. Lise, anxious, and knowing that the priest was not over-fond of waiting, finally took it into her head to despatch La Grande to him, so as to keep him patient.
"What's the meaning of this?" he asked her, from a distance. "Are we going to begin to-day or to-morrow? Perhaps you think that God Almighty is at your beck and call?"
"In a moment, your reverence; in a moment," replied the old woman, with her impassive calmness.
Hilarion was just then bringing out the last fragments of the flag-stones, and he went by carrying an immense block against his stomach. He swayed from side to side on his crooked shanks, but he did not bend, being as firmly set as a rock, with muscles strong enough to have carried an ox. His hare-lip was dribbling, but not a drop of sweat moistened his hardened skin.
The Abbé Godard, provoked by La Grande's equanimity, fell upon her at once.
"Look here, La Grande," said he, "now that I've got hold of you, is it charitable of you, who are so well off, to let your only grandson beg his bread along the roads?"
"The mother disobeyed me; the child is nothing to me," she answered harshly.
"Well, I've given you fair warning, and I tell you again that if you're so hard-hearted as that you'll go to Hell. He would have starved to death the other day but for what I gave him, and now I'm obliged to invent a job for him."
On hearing the word "Hell" La Grande slightly smiled. As she herself said, she knew too much about it: the poor folks' Hell was on this earth. The sight of Hilarion carrying paving-stones set her thinking, however, far more than the priest's threats did. She was surprised; she would never have imagined that he was so strong, with his jacket-sleeve shanks.
"If it's work he wants," she replied at last, "I daresay he can be found some."
"His proper place is with you. Take him, La Grande," said the priest.
"We'll see. Let him come to-morrow."
Hilarion, who had understood, began to tremble to such a degree that he all but crushed his feet as he dropped his last slab. As he went off he cast a furtive glance on his grandmother, like a whipped, terrified, submissive animal.
Another half-hour went by. Bécu, tired of ringing, was smoking his pipe once more in the sunshine. La Grande remained there, silent and imperturbable, as if her mere presence sufficed as a mark of respect to the priest; while the latter, whose exasperation was on the increase, kept running every instant to the church door to cast a fiery look across the empty square towards the Buteaus' house.
"Ring, Bécu, why don't you!" he shouted all at once. "If they're not here in three minutes' time, I'm off!"
Then as the bell pealed out madly once more, and set the aged ravens a-fluttering and a-cawing, the Buteaus and their party were seen to leave the house one by one and cross the square. Lise was in consternation; the godmother had still not arrived, and so they settled to stroll quietly over to the church, in hopes that perhaps that would bring her a little quicker. But they were only a hundred yards away, and the Abbé Godard at once began to hurry them up.
"I say, you know, are you trying to make a fool of me?" he called. "I consult your convenience, and in return I'm kept waiting an hour! Make haste! Make haste!"
Then he pushed them all towards the baptistery: the mother carrying her newly-born child, the father, grandfather Fouan, uncle Delhomme, aunt Fanny, and even Monsieur Charles, who, in his black frock-coat, looked very dignified as a godparent.
"Your reverence," said Buteau, with an exaggerated air of humility, in which a sniggering slyness lurked, "if you would only be so good as to wait a tiny bit longer——"
"Wait! What for?"
"Why, for the godmother, your reverence!"
The Abbé Godard became so red that apoplexy seemed imminent. Half suffocating, he stuttered out:
"Get somebody else!"
They all looked at each other. Delhomme and Fanny shook their heads; and Fouan declared:
"Impossible. It would be bad breeding."
"A thousand pardons, your reverence," said Monsieur Charles, who thought that it devolved upon him as a person of good breeding to explain matters; "it's partly our fault, but not quite. My wife had expressly written me that she would be back this morning. She's at Chartres."
The Abbé Godard started, and, losing all control, breaking all bounds, he shouted:
"At Chartres! At Chartres, indeed! I regret for your sake that you have a finger in this pie, Monsieur Charles. But the thing sha'n't go on. No, no! I won't put up with it any longer!"
Then he burst forth:
"No one here cares what outrage he offers God in my person; I get a fresh buffet every time I come to Rognes. I've threatened long enough, and now I'll do it. I leave to-day, and I will never return. Tell your mayor that, and find a priest and pay him, if you want one. I'll speak to the bishop, and tell him who you are; I'm sure he will approve of my course. We'll soon see who'll get the worst of it. You shall live priestless, like brute beasts."
They were all staring at him curiously, with the inward indifference of practical folk who no longer feared the God of wrath and chastisement. What was the use of quaking and prostrating themselves, and purchasing forgiveness, when the very idea of the devil now made them smile, and when they had ceased to believe that the wind, the hail, and the thunder were controlled by an avenging Master? It was certainly waste of time. It was better for them to keep their respect for the Government gendarmes, who held the reins of power.
Despite their assumed air of deferential gravity, the Abbé Godard saw that Buteau was sniggering, that La Grande was disdainful, and that even Delhomme and Fouan were perfectly unmoved; and this loss of influence completed the rupture.
"I'm perfectly aware that your cows have more religion than you have," said he. "Well, good-bye! Dip your barbarian child into the pond, and christen it like that!"
Then he ran away and tore off his surplice, crossed the church again, and bolted in such a whirl of wrath that the christening party, thus left in the lurch, could not even get in a word, but stood open-mouthed and open-eyed.
The worst of it was that at that very moment, as the Abbé Godard was going down Macqueron's new street, they saw a covered cart coming up the high-road—a cart containing Madame Charles and Elodie. The former explained that she had stopped at Châteaudun to kiss the child, who had been granted a two days' holiday. She seemed extremely sorry for the delay, and declared that she had not even gone on to Roseblanche with her trunk.
"Some one must run after the priest," said Lise; "it's only dogs that are left unchristened."
Buteau ran off, and was heard trotting down Macqueron's street. But the Abbé Godard had got a good start; and Buteau crossed the bridge and mounted the slope, only catching sight of the priest when he reached the crest of it, just where the road turned.
"Your reverence, your reverence!"
At last the priest turned round and waited.
"What is it?" he asked.
"The godmother's there. Christening isn't a thing to refuse one."
For an instant the Abbé stood motionless. Then he came back down the hill behind the peasant, at the same furious pace; and thus they re-entered the church without exchanging another word. The ceremony was hurried through. The priest mangled the godparents' Credo, anointed the child, applied the salt, and poured out the water, all with the same violence. He had soon got to the signing of the register.
"Your reverence," now said Madame Charles, "I've a box of sweetmeats for you, but it's in my trunk."
He thanked her in dumb-show and went off, after turning to them all once more and repeating:
"Good-bye, again!"
The Buteaus and their party, breathless at having been carried along at such a pace, watched him as he disappeared at the corner of the square, with his black cassock flying behind him. All the villagers were in the fields; there were merely a few urchins about, on the chance of obtaining some plaster-of-Paris sweetmeats. Amid the deep silence one only heard the distant snorting of the steam thrasher, which never rested.
On re-entering the Buteaus' house, at the door of which the cart with the trunk was waiting, they all agreed to have a little something to drink, and then to separate until dinner in the evening. It was now only four o'clock, so what would they have done in each other's company till seven? Then, when the glasses and the two quarts of wine were set out on the kitchen table, Madame Charles absolutely insisted on having her trunk got down, so as to make her presents there and then. Opening the trunk, she first took out the baby's dress and cap—which came somewhat behind time—and next six boxes of sweetmeats, which she gave to the mother.
"Do these come from mamma's confectionery shop?" asked Elodie, who was looking at them.
For a second Madame Charles felt embarrassed. Then she calmly replied:
"No, my darling; your mother does not keep this kind."
And, turning towards Lise, she added: "I thought of you, too, in the matter of linen. There is nothing so useful in a house as old linen; so I asked my daughter for some, and ransacked all her drawers."
Hearing linen mentioned, everybody had drawn near—La Grande, the Delhommes, and Fouan himself. Gathering in a ring round the trunk, they watched the old lady unpack a whole lot of rags, all clean and white, and exhaling, despite the washing, a persistent odour of musk. First came some fine linen sheets, in tatters; then a quantity of chemises, all slit down, with the lace palpably torn off.
Madame Charles unfolded the things, shook them out, and explained:
"The sheets are not new. They've been quite five years in use; and in time, what with friction and so on, they wear out. You see that they've all a large hole in the middle, but the edges are still good, and a host of things may be cut out of them."
They all stuck their noses into the sheets, and felt them, with approving nods, particularly the women—La Grande and Fanny, whose pinched-up lips were expressive of suppressed envy. Buteau was indulging in silent laughter, tickled by certain jocular ideas which he kept to himself, for propriety's sake; while Fouan and Delhomme testified by their extreme gravity to the respect they felt for linen, which was the only wealth, worth calling so, next to land.
"As for the chemises," resumed Madame Charles, unfolding them in their turn, "see for yourselves. They're not worn at all. Lots of slits in them, no doubt! They're torn to ruination! And as they can't always be sewn up again, because that would make thick seams, and look a little paltry, why, they're thrown away for old linen. But they'll come in handy for you, Lise—"
"Why, I'll wear them," cried the peasant woman. "It makes no odds to me to wear a mended chemise."
"As for me," declared Buteau, with a sly wink, "I shall be glad enough if you'll make me some handkerchiefs out of them."
This set them laughing undisguisedly. Little Elodie, who had not taken her eyes off a single sheet or chemise, now cried out:
"Oh, what a funny smell! How strong! Was all that linen mamma's?"
Madame Charles did not hesitate a moment.
"Why, certainly, darling. That is, it's the linen of her shop-girls. A lot of girls are wanted in business, I can tell you!"
As soon as Lise had put the whole lot away in her wardrobe, with Françoise's help, they clinked glasses and drank the health of the baby, whom the godmother had christened Laure, after herself. Then they tarried for a moment, lost in conversation; and Monsieur Charles, sitting on the trunk, was heard questioning Madame Charles, without waiting to get her alone, so great, indeed, was his impatience to hear how things were going on over yonder. It was still a passion with him; his head was always running upon the house so energetically established in days gone by, and so deeply regretted since! The news was not good. True enough, their daughter Estelle had a hand and a head; but their son-in-law Vaucogne, that milksop Achilles, did not give her proper support. He spent the whole day smoking his pipe, and let everything go to rack and ruin. The curtains of No. 3 were stained, the mirror in the small red drawing-room was cracked, the water-jugs and basins were chipped all over the house; and he never so much as raised a finger. And a man's arm was so necessary to ensure due respect for one's goods and chattels! At every fresh piece of damage thus brought under his notice, Monsieur Charles fetched a sigh, and became paler. One last grievance, communicated in a whisper, finished him off.
"Lastly, he himself goes upstairs with that stout woman of No. 5——"
"What's that you say?"
"Oh, I'm sure of it; I've seen them."
Monsieur Charles, who was quivering, clenched his fists in a burst of exasperated indignation.
"The wretch! Disgracing himself in that way! That beats everything!"
With a gesture, Madame Charles silenced him, for Elodie was coming back from the yard, where she had been to see the hens. Another quart bottle was drained, and the trunk was again placed in the cart, which Monsieur and Madame Charles followed on foot as far as their house. All the others also went off to give a glance indoors while awaiting the feast.
As soon as Buteau was alone, feeling dissatisfied with this waste of an afternoon, he took off his jacket and set to work threshing in the paved corner of the yard; he wanted a sack of corn for the morrow. However, he soon got tired of threshing alone. To warm him to his work he needed the cadence of two flails, keeping time together. So he called to Françoise, who frequently helped him in this work, as her loins were strong, and her arms as hard-set as a young man's. In spite of the slowness and the fatigue of this primitive method of threshing, Buteau had always refused to buy a machine, saying, like all petty landowners, that he preferred to thresh at a time just the quantity he needed.
"Hallo, Françoise! Are you coming?" he called.
Lise, who was leaning over some veal stewing with carrots, after commissioning her sister to look after a loin of roast-pork, wanted to prevent the girl obeying. But Buteau, who was not in the best of temper, threatened them both with a hiding.
"You cursed females! I'll smack your saucepans across your heads for you! One may well sweat for one's bread when you'd go and fry the whole house, to gobble it down with other people!"
Françoise, who had already slipped on a working dress for fear of getting her best clothes stained, was obliged to follow him. She took a flail with handle and flap of cornel wood, secured together with leather buckles. It was her own, polished by friction, and closely bound with string to prevent its slipping. Swinging it round over her head with both hands she brought it down on the wheat, striking the latter smartly with the whole length of the flap. She went on without stopping, raising the flail very high, turning it as upon a hinge, and then banging it down again with the mechanical, rhythmical movement of a blacksmith; while Buteau, opposite her, swung his flail in alternation. They soon became hot. The rhythm was accelerated, and nothing could now be seen but the flying flaps, rebounding every time and whirling behind their necks like birds tied by the feet.
After ten minutes or so, Buteau gave a slight cry. The flails stopped, and he turned the sheaf round, whereupon the flails started again. At the end of another ten minutes he ordered a new pause, and laid the sheaf open. It had to pass thus six times under the flaps before the grain was fully separated from the ears, and the straw could be tied up. Sheaf succeeded sheaf, and for two hours the regular noise of the flails pervaded the house, though above it, in the distance, there arose the prolonged snorting of the steam-thresher.
Françoise's cheeks were now flushed and her wrists swollen, and from all her glowing skin there emanated a kind of flame that quivered visibly in the air. Her open lips were panting. Bits of straw had become entangled in the loose locks of her hair. At every stroke, as she raised the flail, her right knee stretched her petticoat, her hip and bosom expanded, straining her dress, while the contour of her well-set frame showed roughly through the fabric. A button flew off her bodice, and Buteau saw her white skin beneath the sun-burnt line of her neck—an eminence of flesh that kept rising with the swing of her arms in the powerful play of the shoulder-muscles. This seemed to excite him still more; and the flails still fell, while the grain leapt and fell like hail under the panting strokes of the coupled threshers.
At a quarter to seven, at close of day, Fouan and the Delhommes presented themselves.
"We must finish this," shouted Buteau to them, without stopping. "Keep it up, Françoise!"
She stuck to it, striking still harder in the enthusiasm prompted by the labour and noise. And thus it was that Jean found them when he in his turn arrived. He felt a spasm of jealousy, and looked at them as if he had surprised them together. Busy with this warm work, each striking true in turn, both perspiring, so heated and so disarranged, they seemed to be engaged in some other more private business than that of threshing wheat. Perhaps Françoise, who was going at it so zealously, had the same idea, for she suddenly stopped short in embarrassment. Then Buteau, turning round, remained motionless for an instant, with surprise and wrath.
"What do you want here?" he cried.
Lise was just then coming out to meet Fouan and the Delhommes. She drew near in their company, and cried in her sprightly way:
"Ah, yes! I forgot to tell you. I saw Jean this morning and asked him to come in to-night."
Her husband's face was so terribly inflamed that she added, by way of apology:
"I've a notion, Fouan, that he has a request to make of you."
"What about?" said the old man. Jean flushed and stammered, feeling very vexed that the matter should be broached so abruptly and publicly. However, Buteau violently cut him short, the smiling look which his wife cast upon Françoise having sufficed to enlighten him.
"Do you come here to make a laughing-stock of us? She's not for the likes of you, you ugly bird!"
This brutal reception gave Jean back his courage. He turned his back and addressed the old man.
"This is the matter, Fouan. It's a very simple thing. As you are Françoise's guardian, I ought to apply to you for her, oughtn't I? Well, if she will have me, I'll have her. I ask her in marriage."