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By Root 1252 0

the platform, which extended like a narrow jetty out into the inky blackness of the night. A line of gas lamps ran along it like a string of little smoky stars. It had just stopped raining, and there was a cold, damp chill in the air. A mist had gathered. Through it, across the vast, open space beyond, could be seen the little pale lights of the houses in the Rue de Rome. There was a sombre grandeur about it all. Everything was still wet from the rain; here and there a red light pierced the night like a splash of blood; dark shapes loomed out of the mist — locomotives, freight wagons and rows of empty carriages waiting in the sidings. From the depths of this lake of darkness there emerged sounds — giant gasps of breath like someone dying of a fever, sudden sharp whistles like the screams of women being violated, the dismal wailing of horns and the rumble of traffic in the nearby streets. Someone was shouting orders to attach another carriage to the train. The locomotive waiting at the head of the express released a great jet of steam from its safety valve, which rose high into the night sky and dispersed as tiny flecks of cloud drifting like white tears across the funereal blackness that draped the heavens.

At twenty past six Roubaud and Séverine appeared on the platform. Séverine had just taken the key back to Madame Victoire on her way past the lavatories next to the waiting rooms. Roubaud was pushing her forward like the typical husband in a hurry whose wife has kept him waiting, he brusque and impatient with his hat pushed back, she holding her hat-veil tightly to her face and walking more hesitantly, as if about to faint with weariness. A stream of passengers was making its way up the platform. The couple joined the crowd and walked along the train looking for an empty first-class compartment. All around them people were hurriedly trying to get things ready for the train to leave; porters were wheeling barrows of luggage up to the luggage van at the front; one of the inspectors was trying to find a compartment for a large family; the assistant traffic manager was checking the couplings, shining his signal lamp down between the carriages to make sure that they were all in place and the screws properly tightened.17 Roubaud eventually found an empty compartment and was about to help Séverine get into it when he was spotted by the stationmaster, Monsieur Vandorpe, who happened to be walking past with his assistant for the mainline section, Monsieur Dauvergne, both of them with their hands behind their backs, watching the preparations for attaching the extra carriage to the train. They exchanged greetings and felt obliged to stop and chat.

The two men were keen to know about Roubaud’s brush with the Sub-Prefect. He assured them that everything had been sorted out and that the matter was now closed. They told him that there had been an accident at Le Havre that morning; it had come through on the telegraph. Apparently one of the locomotives that worked the 6.30 express on Thursdays and Saturdays, a locomotive named La Lison, had broken a coupling-rod just as it was coming into the station. It was being repaired, but the engine driver, Jacques Lantier, who came from the same part of the world as Roubaud, and his fireman, Pecqueux, Madame Victoire’s husband, would both be stuck in Le Havre for the next two days. Séverine stood waiting by the open door of the compartment while her husband affected a show of high spirits, laughing and joking with his two colleagues. Suddenly the train moved backwards several metres with a violent jolt, as the engine reversed the leading carriages on to the one that was being added, carriage number 293. It had a coupé compartment18 that had been individually reserved. Dauvergne’s son, Henri, who was travelling on the train as one of the guards, had recognized Séverine through her veil and had quickly pulled her to one side to stop her being hit by the open door. He smiled and offered a polite apology. He told her that the private compartment was for one of the directors of the railway company,