Germinal - Emile Zola [217]
‘That pig’s a disgrace to me.’
The street was once again deserted, with not a shadow to blot the bare whiteness of the snow; and the village, having relapsed into its state of mortal inactivity, continued to starve to death surrounded by the intense cold.
‘Any sign of the doctor?’ Maheu asked, closing the door after him.
‘He’s not been,’ replied La Maheude, who was still standing by the window.
‘Are the little ones back?’
‘No, not yet.’
Maheu resumed his heavy pacing, from one wall to the other, like some dazed ox. Old Bonnemort, sitting stiffly on his chair, had not even raised his head. Alzire, too, was silent and tried not to shiver, so as not to upset them; but despite her courage in the midst of her suffering she sometimes shook so violently that one could hear her thin, ailing young body almost rattling under the blanket. Meanwhile her big, wide eyes stared up at the ceiling where the pale reflection from the white gardens outside filled the room as though with moonlight.
They had reached their final hour: the house had been completely emptied, stripped terminally bare. The mattress covers had followed the wool stuffing to the second-hand shop; then the sheets had followed, and their linen, anything that could be sold. One evening they had got two sous for one of Grandpa’s handkerchiefs. Tears were shed over each object that the penniless household found it had to part with, and La Maheude still rued the day she had taken along the little pink box, an old present from Maheu, wrapped in her skirt, as though she were taking an infant off to abandon it on someone’s doorstep. They were destitute, and all they had left to sell was the skin on their bodies, which in any case was so damaged and used that no one would have paid a penny for it. So now they didn’t even bother to search for something to sell, they knew there wasn’t anything, that the end had come, that there was no hope of their ever again having a candle or a piece of coal or a potato; and as they waited to die, their only grievance was on behalf of the children, for they were outraged by the pointless cruelty of the little girl being afflicted with illness before she then starved to death anyway.
‘At last. Here he comes!’ said La Maheude.
A dark shape passed the window. The door opened. But it was not Dr Vanderhaghen. Instead they recognized the new priest, Father Ranvier, who did not appear in the least surprised to find the house dead, without light or fire or bread. He had just come from three other neighbouring households, doing the rounds of the families in an effort to recruit men of goodwill to his cause, just as Dansaert had done earlier in the company of the gendarmes. At once he explained his purpose in the feverish voice of the fanatic:
‘Why did you not come to Mass last Sunday, my children? You are wrong, only the Church can save you…Now then, promise me you’ll come next Sunday.’
Maheu had paused to see who it was and then resumed his heavy pacing, without a word. It was La Maheude who replied:
‘To Mass, Father? Whatever for? When the good Lord couldn’t care less about us?…Look! What harm did my little girl ever do Him? Yet now she’s got the fever. We weren’t suffering enough, I suppose, so He had to make her ill just when I haven’t even got a warm drink to give her.’
The priest stood there and held forth at great length. He was using the strike – the terrible poverty, the sense of grievance sharpened by hunger – with the ardour of a missionary preaching to savages for the greater glory of his religion. He said that the Church was on the side of the poor and that one day it would cause justice to triumph by calling down the wrath of God upon the iniquities of the rich. And that day would soon dawn, for the rich had usurped God’s place and were even now governing without God, having wickedly stolen His power. But if the workers were seeking the fair distribution of the fruits of the earth, then they should begin by placing their faith