Nana (Barnes & Noble Classics) - Emile Zola [232]
“Poor girl! I will go and shake hands with her. What’s the matter with her?”
“Small-pox,” replied Mignon.
The actor had already taken a step in the direction of the courtyard, but he retraced it, and with a shiver simply murmured, “Ah, the deuce!”
It was no joke catching small-pox. Fontan had nearly had it when he was five years old. Mignon related the story of one of his nieces who had died of it. As for Fauchery, he could talk of it, for he still bore the marks—three spots, which he showed to the others, close to his nose; and as Mignon pressed him again to go up, on the pretext that people never had it twice, he violently disputed that theory. He instanced cases, and called the doctors fools. But Lucy and Caroline, surprised at the vast increase of the crowd, interrupted them.
“Look there! look there! What a mob of people!”
The night was advancing, the lamps in the distance were being lighted one by one. One could, however, distinguish spectators at the windows; whilst under the trees the human tide swelled every minute, in one long stream, from the Madeleine to the Bastille. The vehicles rolled slowly along. A kind of buzz arose from that compact mass, dumb as yet, assembled together in the idle desire of forming a crowd, stamping, and excited with the same fever. But a huge commotion caused the crowd to fall back. In the midst of all the jostling, passing through the groups that made way for them, a band of men in caps and white blouses appeared, uttering this cry, to the time of hammers beating on the anvil,
“To Berlin! to Berlin! to Berlin!”
And the crowd looked on with a gloomy distrust, already attracted, nevertheless, and stirred with visions of heroic deeds, the same as when a military band passes by.
“Yes, yes; go and get your heads broken!” murmured Mignon, seized with a philosophic fit.
But Fontan thought it very grand. He talked of enlisting. When the enemy was at the frontier all citizens ought to rise in arms to defend the fatherland, and he assumed a posture worthy of Bonaparte at Austerlitz.
“Well, are you going up with us?” asked Lucy of him.
“Ah, no!” said he, “not to get ill!”
On one of the seats in front of the Grand Hotel sat a man, hiding his face in his handkerchief. Fauchery, on arriving, had drawn Mignon’s attention to him with a wink. So he was always there? Yes, he was always there; and the journalist stopped the two women to point him out to them. As he raised his head they recognised him, and uttered a slight exclamation. It was Count Muffat, who glanced upwards at one of the windows.
“You know he’s been there ever since this morning,” related Mignon. “I saw him at six o’clock, he has scarcely moved since. At the first words Labordette uttered, he came and posted himself there, with his handkerchief over his face. Every half hour he crawls as far as here, to inquire if the person upstairs is better, and then returns to his seat. Well! you know, it’s not healthy, that room. One may love people without wishing to croak.”
The count, with upturned eyes, did not appear to be aware of what was going on around him. No doubt he was ignorant of the declaration of war—he neither felt nor heard the crowd.
“Look!” said Fauchery, “here he comes; now just watch him.”
The count had indeed quitted his seat, and had entered under the lofty doorway; but the doorkeeper, who by this time had become accustomed to him, did not give him time to repeat his question. He said abruptly,
“Sir, she died just a minute ago.”
Nana dead! It was a blow for all of them. Muffat, without a word, returned to the seat, his face buried in his handkerchief. The others cried out, but their voices were abruptly drowned, as another