The Belly of Paris - Emile Zola [40]
Quenu let himself be talked into lavish expenditures—more than thirty thousand francs in marble, glass, and gilding. Lisa spent her time with the workers, giving her opinions on the most minute details. When at last she was installed behind the counter, customers lined up just to see the shop. The interior walls were lined in white marble from top to bottom. The ceiling was covered with an immense square mirror in an ornate gilded frame, while from the center hung a crystal chandelier with four arms. And behind the counter, on the left hand at the far end of the shop, were more mirrors, fitted between the marble panels and looking like doors that opened into an infinite series of brightly lit halls where meats were on display. To the right was a huge counter that was considered a particularly fine piece of work. At intervals along the front were diamond-shaped medallions of pink marble. The floor was covered in alternating pink and white tiles with a dark red pattern for a border. The neighborhood was proud of the charcuterie and no longer even mentioned the old one on rue Pirouette, where there had been a death. For a month, neighborhood women gathered on the sidewalk to look at Lisa across the cervelas and the caul fat11 sausages displayed in the window. They admired her white-and-pink flesh, which matched the marble. She seemed to be the soul, the living glow, the healthy, sturdy goddess of charcuteries. And from then on she was known as “Beautiful Lisa.”
To the right of the shop was a dining room, a spotless room with a buffet, a table, and light oak chairs with cane seats. The mat that covered the floor, the soft yellow wallpaper, the imitation oak oilcloth, all gave a coolness to the room, slightly softened by the shine of a brass lamp that hung from the ceiling and sprawled above the table with its large transparent porcelain shade. A door from the dining room led to the huge square kitchen. Beyond this was a small tile-floored courtyard used to store lumber, tubs, barrels, pans, and all sorts of tools that were not being used. To the left of a water faucet, by the side of a gutter that drained off greasy water, were pots of withered flowers, removed from the window display and at their last gasp.
Business was thriving. Quenu, who at first had been panicked, now had great respect for his wife, who, according to him, “had a great head on her shoulders.” At the end of five years they had almost eighty thousand francs in solid investments. Lisa would say that they were not overly ambitious and she had no desire to accumulate money too quickly otherwise she would have encouraged her husband to get into the wholesale pig trade. They were still young and still had time ahead of them, they didn't want to be in some seedy business. They would work at their own pace, without wearing themselves out, and live a good life.
“You know,” Lisa would add in her more expansive moments, “I have a cousin in Paris. I don't see him, because the two families aren't speaking to each other. He has changed his name to Saccard12 to let some things be forgotten. Well, they say this cousin has made millions. But he doesn't live well, he's always in a state of anxiety, always rushing here and there, doing business with the Devil. A man like that can't even eat his dinner in peace, can he? The rest of us, at least, can enjoy what we eat. You love money because you need it to live. It's natural to look after your own well-being. But to make money just for the sake of making money and giving yourself anxiety and more trouble than the pleasure it could bring, I tell you, I'd rather just sit here with my arms crossed. And I would just like to see my cousin's millions. I don't believe in millions like that. I happened to see him the other day in his