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By Root 1750 0

instances of people setting fire to their own town in order to halt the enemy and vague stories about mothers saving their children from slavery by smashing their skulls on the ground, and men starving themselves to death rather than eat the bread of tyrants. His spirits soared and his black thoughts began to glow with the warm cheer of optimism, banishing all doubt and making him ashamed of his momentary cowardice. And as his confidence returned, so did his swelling pride, bearing him up on a wave of joy at being the leader, at seeing men and women ready to sacrifice themselves in the execution of his orders, and he was consumed with his ever-evolving dream of the power he would enjoy on the night of victory. He could see it all now, the moment of simple grandeur as he refused to take the reins of power and, as their master, handed authority back to the people.

But he was roused with a start by the voice of Maheu, who told him of his good fortune in catching a superb trout and selling it for three francs. They would have their soup. Étienne told Maheu to return to the village on his own, that he would be along later. Then he went and sat at a table in the Advantage, waiting for a customer to leave before telling Rasseneur firmly that he intended to write and tell Pluchart to come at once. He had made up his mind: he was going to organize a private meeting, for victory seemed assured if the colliers of Montsou would join the International en masse.

IV

The meeting was fixed for the following Thursday at two o’clock in the Jolly Fellow, the bar run by Widow Desire. She was outraged by the suffering being inflicted on her children and was in permanent high dudgeon about the situation, especially since people had stopped coming to her bar. She had never known less thirst during a strike, the heavy drinkers having shut themselves away at home for fear of disobeying the order to stay out of trouble. The result was that the main street of Montsou, once seething with people during the ducasse, now lay gloomily silent, a place of desolation. With no more beer running off the counters or out of people’s bladders, the gutters were dry. The only thing to be seen along the road outside Casimir’s bar and the Progress was the pale faces of the landladies anxiously looking out for approaching customers; while in Montsou itself the whole row of bars and taverns was deserted, from Lenfant’s at one end past Piquette’s and the Severed Head to Tison’s at the other. Only the Saint-Éloi, where the deputies went, was still serving the occasional beer. Even the Volcano was empty, and its ladies unemployed, bereft of takers, even though they would have cut their price from ten sous to five, since times were hard. It was as though someone had died and broken everyone’s heart.

‘God damn it!’ Widow Desire had exclaimed, slapping both hands on her thighs. ‘It’s all the fault of the men in blue. I don’t care if they do put me in bloody prison. I’ll soon show ’em!’

For her all representatives of authority, like all bosses, were ‘the men in blue’, a term of general abuse in which she included all enemies of the people. Therefore she had accepted Étienne’s request with delight: her entire establishment was at the miners’ disposal, they could use the dance-hall at no charge, and she would send out the invitations herself if that was what the law required. Anyway, so much the better if the law wasn’t happy! She’d like to see a long face on it! The next day Étienne brought her fifty letters to sign, which he had got copied by neighbours in the village who were able to write; and then they sent the letters off to all the mines, to the men who had been part of the deputation and to others they were sure of. The ostensible agenda was to discuss whether or not to continue the strike; but in reality they would be coming to hear Pluchart, and they were relying on him to give a speech that would lead to people joining the International en masse.

On Thursday morning Étienne was getting worried because his old foreman had still not arrived, having sent a