The Beast Within - Emile Zola [48]
‘Goodness me,’ said Jacques, ‘I hope a train doesn’t come; there’d be a nasty accident!’
‘Oh, you needn’t worry,’ said Aunt Phasie. ‘Flore may be a bit weird sometimes, but she knows how to do her job. She keeps her eyes open. We haven’t had an accident for five years, thank God. Before we came here, there was a man who was cut in two. All we’ve had is a cow that nearly caused a derailment. Poor thing; they found its body here, and its head down there, by the tunnel. No, you can sleep easy when Flore’s around.’
The wagon had got across and they could hear the wheels bumping in the ruts as it lumbered off down the road.
‘Tell me, Jacques,’ said Aunt Phasie, when the wagon had disappeared, ‘are you feeling all right these days?’
She had an obsessive interest in people’s health: not only her own, but everyone else’s too.
‘Do you remember those funny turns you used to have when you were at home?’ she continued. ‘The doctor couldn’t work them out.’
A worried look crept into his eyes.
‘I feel fine,’ he said.
‘Are you sure you’re telling me the truth?’ she said. ‘Have they stopped? You used to get a splitting headache behind your ears, and sudden temperatures, and bouts of depression. You’d go and hide yourself away, like a frightened animal.’
Jacques was becoming more and more disturbed. He interrupted her.
‘Listen, Aunt,’ he said tersely, ‘I’m fine. There’s nothing wrong with me. Nothing at all!’
‘I’m glad to hear it,’ she said. ‘Anyway, if you were ill it wouldn’t make me any better, would it? Besides, you should be well at your age! Ah, good health, what could be better? It really was kind of you to come and see me when you could have gone and enjoyed yourself somewhere else. You can have some supper and you can sleep upstairs in the attic, in the room next to Flore’s.’
Once again she was interrupted by the sound of Misard’s horn. It was now dark outside, and as they looked through the window they could dimly make out the shape of her husband talking to someone else. It had just struck six, and he was handing over to the night man who was replacing him. At last he was relieved of duty, after a twelve-hour stint cooped up in his cabin, sitting on a little stool in front of a table underneath the instrument panel, with a stove that got so hot that for most of the time he had to leave the door wide open.
‘Here he comes; he’s finished work,’ murmured Aunt Phasie, all her fears returning. The train that had just been signalled was approaching, a long, heavy train, getting louder and louder. Aunt Phasie was so weak that Jacques had to lean forward so that she could hear him. It upset him to see the pitiful state she was in; he wished there was something he could do to comfort her.
‘Listen,’ he said, ‘if he really is up to something, it might make him think twice if he knew that he had me to reckon with. Why not let me look after your money for you?’
Once again she protested vehemently.
‘That thousand francs is mine!’ she insisted. ‘I wouldn’t give it to you any more than I’d give it to him! I tell you I’d sooner die.’
Just then the train went past, like a violent storm sweeping all before it. The house shook, buffeted by a great gust of wind. The train was heading for Le Havre and it was packed; there was to be a grand celebration on the following day, Sunday, for the launching of a new ship. Even though it was moving so fast, through the lighted carriage windows they caught sight of compartments crammed with passengers, rows of heads all in a line, tightly packed together, each with its own face on it. They rushed by, one after another, and disappeared. So many people! The same crowd endlessly streaming past their window, with the wheels of the carriages drumming in their ears, locomotives blowing their whistles, telegraphs buzzing and bells ringing! The railway was like a giant creature, a colossus that lay