The Beast Within - Emile Zola [233]
4 sous: The official unit of currency during the Second Empire was the franc, which was divided into one hundred centimes. In daily usage people referred (and still do) to an obsolete unit of currency, the sou, which was then worth five centimes. The extent of Roubaud’s gambling debts becomes apparent later in the novel (see chapter IX, note 1).
5 écarté: A game of cards for two players, similar to piquet (see chapter III, note 3). The players may discard (écarter in French; hence the name) any or all of the cards dealt and replace them from the pack.
CHAPTER VII
1 the snowplough could easily clear a depth of one metre: Snow-ploughs were not standard fittings on early French locomotives. Evidently a snowplough had been attached to La Lison before leaving the shed.
2 detonators: These were small explosive devices clipped to the track and activated by the wheels of the locomotive as they ran over them. They were used to warn engine drivers of any danger ahead.
3 the damper: A flap or door in the ash-pan underneath the fire grate, operated by means of a ratchet in the driver’s cab and allowing the driver or fireman to control the amount of air entering the bottom of the firebox.
4 ten atmospheres: The ‘atmosphere’ is a measurement of pressure. I atmosphere is a notional measurement of air pressure at the earth’s surface (14.7 lb on the square inch).
5 Yes, monsieur, from New York: In 1869, transatlantic crossings took over a week. Either the two men are talking at cross purposes or the American is exaggerating.
6 and placed it at the side of the cutting: Zola based this extraordinary exploit on an account of a similar occurrence described by Pol Lefèvre, which Lefèvre had witnessed, involving a train caught in the snow near Rouen in the winter of 1879 — 80.
CHAPTER VIII
1 she reached the fourth floor: A minor discrepancy. At the beginning of the novel (chapter I), Zola situates the room on the fifth floor.
2 She recognized the sound of the chimes, deep and resonant: The cuckoo clock is evidently one which both chimes and cuckoos. Wordsworth owned such a clock. The clock is one of several details used here which serve to reinforce the parallel between this scene and the opening scene of the novel.
3 Malaga: A white wine from the south of Spain.
4 he had been able to slip upstairs without anyone noticing: The concierge was often one of the first people to be questioned by the police in the event of any suspicious circumstance or criminal investigation. Séverine and Jacques’s clandestine relationship and their concern to be unobserved reflect Zola’s own experience at the time he was writing this novel. In 1888 he had begun a relationship with Jeanne Rozerot and had installed her in an apartment in the Rue Saint-Lazare, where he visited her secretly. Zola’s wife, Alexandrine, knew nothing of the affair until 1891, by which time Jeanne had provided Zola with two children.
5 her shudder of desire became a shudder of death: This is a macabre variation on a very old literary conceit — sexual ecstasy as a form of death. Killing is given sexual connotations throughout the novel.
6 communication cord: Although it had become clear since the Poinsot murder in 1860 (see Introduction) that the incidence of crime committed on trains was increasing, the Compagnie de l’Ouest did not in fact introduce any form of alarm system until 1882. The earliest communication system was a cord and bell arrangement, which enabled passengers to alert the guard if there was an emergency. When trains were fitted with continuous vacuum brakes (from 1890 onwards), the communication cord enabled passengers to apply the brakes themselves.
7 I found myself outside on the footboard, clinging with both hands to the brass handrail:Although Séverine and Roubaud perform this hazardous operation in only one direction, moving away from the coupé back to their own compartment, this is precisely the sort of scenario which Denizet had earlier dismissed as impossible (see chapter IV, note 9).
8 life seems one long holiday: It was the spread