Germinal - Emile Zola [215]
There was a sound of clogs, and La Levaque burst in like a gale, beside herself with fury and shouting at La Maheude from the open doorway:
‘So it was you that told everyone I made my lodger give me twenty sous each time he slept with me!’
La Maheude shrugged.
‘Leave me be. I never said such a thing…Anyway, who told you I did?’
‘Somebody told me, never mind who…And you said you could hear our dirty goings-on through the wall, and that my place was filthy because I was always flat on my back…Just try telling me again you never said it!’
Quarrels like this broke out every day as a result of the women’s constant gossiping, and, particularly between families who lived next door to each other, it was one daily round of rows and reconciliation. But never before had they gone for each other with such bitter ill-will. Since the start of the strike hunger had sharpened everyone’s grudges, and there was a general desire to come to blows: an argument between two women would end in a fight to the death between two men.
Indeed at that very moment Levaque himself arrived, dragging Bouteloup with him by force:
‘Here he is. Let’s hear him say whether he gave my wife twenty sous to sleep with her!’
Their meek lodger was shocked and started mumbling a protest into his beard:
‘What an idea. No, of course not. Never.’
At once Levaque turned nasty and shoved a fist under Maheu’s nose.
‘I’m not having it, you hear? When a man’s got a wife like that, he should beat some sense into her…Or maybe you actually believe what she’s been saying?’
‘What is all this, for Christ’s sake?’ Maheu exclaimed, furious at being roused from his gloom. ‘Who are you trying to stir up with all this ‘‘he said’’ and ‘‘she said’’? Haven’t we got enough problems already? Bugger off, or you’ll get this in your face! And anyway, who told you my wife said such a thing?’
‘Who told me?…I’ll tell you who told me! La Pierronne!’
La Maheude gave a shrill laugh and turned towards La Levaque:
‘So La Pierronne told you, did she?…Well, just let me tell you what she told me! Oh yes! She said you were sleeping with the two men at once, one beneath and one on top!’
After that any reconciliation was out of the question. Everybody was angry, and the Levaques retorted that La Pierronne had told them all sorts about the Maheus, like how they’d sold Catherine off, and how Étienne had caught a dose at the Volcano, and now the whole filthy lot of them had it, even the children.
‘She said that! She said that!’ Maheu screamed. ‘Right. I’m off. And if she admits to my face she said it, I’ll knock her bloody block off.’
Already he had rushed outside, pursued by the Levaques, who wanted to see this, while Bouteloup, who hated scenes, sloped off home. Incensed by the row, La Maheude, too, was about to leave when a moan from Alzire detained her. She pulled the ends of the blanket over the little girl’s shivering body and resumed her position by the window, where she gazed blankly into the distance. Still the doctor didn’t come!
Outside the Pierrons’ door Maheu and the Levaques ran into Lydie, who was pacing up and down in the snow. The house was shut up, but a chink of light could be seen through one of the shutters; and the child replied to their questions with some embarrassment: no, her father wasn’t in, he had gone to meet La Brûlé at the wash-house so as to carry the washing home. Then she became flustered and refused to say what her mother was doing. Eventually she revealed all, with a vindictive snigger: her mother had thrown her out because M. Dansaert was there and they couldn’t talk if she was around. Dansaert had been touring the village since morning in the company of two gendarmes in an attempt to recruit some workers, putting pressure on the weak and announcing to all and sundry that if they didn’t go back to work at Le Voreux next Monday the Company had decided to take on men from Belgium. And at dusk, finding La Pierronne alone, he had sent the gendarmes