Nana (Barnes & Noble Classics) - Emile Zola [199]
“That way, I shall know that I have performed a good action. You will love me all the more.”
Then there was silence. She closed her eyes, looking paler still on the pillow. He had listened to her, under the pretext of not wishing to tire her. At the end of a few minutes, she reopened her eyes, and murmured,
“And money, too? Where will you get money if you quarrel? Labordette came yesterday about the bill. I’m in want of everything; I’ve not a thing left to put on.”
Then, closing her eyes again, she appeared as though dead. A shade of intense anguish overspread Muffat’s face. In the blow that had come upon him, he had forgotten, ever since the night before, the monetary difficulties from which he no longer knew how to extricate himself. In spite of the most distinct promises, his note for a hundred thousand francs, already renewed once, had been put into circulation; and Labordette, affecting to be greatly vexed, made out it was all Francis’s fault, and said that he would never again compromise himself in an affair with an uneducated man. It would have to be paid, the count would never let his note be protested. Then, besides Nana’s innumerable claims, there was a most wasteful expenditure going on in his own home. On their return from Les Fondettes, the countess had suddenly developed a taste for luxury, an appetite for worldly enjoyments, which were rapidly devouring their fortune. People were beginning to talk of her ruinous caprices, a complete change of her household, five hundred thousand francs frittered away in transforming the old house in the Rue Miromesnil, and extravagant costumes, and large sums of money that had disappeared, melted, or been given away perhaps, without her troubling herself to render the least account. Twice Muffat had ventured to make some observations, being desirous of knowing; but she had looked at him so peculiarly, smiling the while, that he did not dare to ask any questions for fear of receiving too plain an answer. If he accepted Daguenet as a son-in-law from Nana, it was especially with the idea of being able to reduce Estelle’s dowry to two hundred thousand francs, and of making arrangements respecting the balance with the young man, who would be only too delighted at such an unexpectedly good marriage.
However, during the last week, in view of the necessity of immediately finding the hundred thousand francs for the bill, Muffat had only been able to think of one expedient, from which he recoiled. It was to sell a magnificent estate called Les Bordes, estimated at half-a-million, and which the countess had recently inherited from an uncle. Only, he needed her assent, and she also, by her marriage contract, could not dispose of it without his. The night before he had made up his mind to ask his wife for her consent. But now his plans were all upset, he could never accept such a compromise knowing what he did. This thought made the blow he had received all the harder. He understood what it was that Nana wished; for, in the increasing constraint that prompted him to confide in her regarding everything, he had complained about the difficulty he was in, he had told her how anxious he was to get the countess’s consent.
However, Nana did not appear to insist. She did not re-open her eyes. Seeing her so pale, he was frightened, and induced her to take a little ether. Then she sighed, and questioned him, but without naming Daguenet.
“When is the marriage coming off?”
“The contract is to be signed on Tuesday, in five days from now,” he replied.
Then, with her eyes still closed, as though she was speaking in the night of her thoughts, she added, “Well, ducky, think what you had better do. For myself, I want everyone to be pleased.”
He pacified her by taking her hand. Yes,