The Belly of Paris - Emile Zola [50]
“That's twenty-four sous,” Lisa said, “and six sous for the larding strips, that makes thirty sous. Did you need anything else?”
La Sarriette said, “No.” Still laughing, showing her teeth, she paid. Staring at the men, her gray skirt a little off kilter and her carelessly tied red scarf revealing just a little bit of the white of her bosom. Just before leaving, she challenged Gavard again: “So you're not going to tell me what you were talking about as I came in. I could see you laughing from the middle of the street. Oh, you sly one, I won't love you anymore.”
She walked out and crossed the street. Lisa dryly observed, “Mademoiselle Saget sent her.”
Then it was back to silence. Gavard was taken aback by Florent's response to his proposition. Lisa spoke first.
“It's wrong of you to turn down the position of fish inspector, Florent. You know how hard it is to find a job, and you're hardly in a position to be choosy.”
“I have my reasons,” answered Florent.
Lisa shrugged. “Come on, you can't be serious. I understand how much you dislike the government, but it would be stupid to let that stop you from earning a living. Besides, dear, the emperor isn't a bad man. You don't believe, do you, that he knew of your suffering? How could he know if you were eating moldy bread and tainted meat? He can't be held responsible for everything that happens. You can see for yourself that he hasn't interfered with the rest of us. You're not being fair, not at all.”
Gavard was feeling more and more uncomfortable. He could not stand hearing these tributes to the emperor.
“Wait a minute, Madame Quenu,” he murmured. “You're going a bit too far. He really is trash.”
“Oh, you!” the energized Beautiful Lisa interrupted him. “With all your stories, you won't be satisfied until someday you get robbed and massacred. Don't talk politics to me, because it will make me mad. We're talking about Florent now and saying he should take the inspector job. Isn't that right, Quenu?”
Quenu, who until then had not breathed a word, was caught off guard by the abruptness of his wife's question. “It's a good position,” he said without committing himself.
Once again an awkward silence fell on the room, and Florent said, “Please, just forget it. My mind is made up. I'll wait.”
“You'll wait!” shouted Lisa, at the end of her patience.
Two reddish flames were burning on her cheeks. Planted firmly there in her white apron, her hips wide, she struggled to resist unleashing unkind words. Then another customer came into the shop, deflecting her anger. It was Madame Lecœur.
“Could you please give me a half-pound assorted plate at fifty sous a pound?” she asked. At first she pretended to have not seen her brother-in-law; then she greeted him with a nod. She studied the three men from the tops of their heads down to the tips of their toes, no doubt hoping to find their secret somewhere in the manner in which they were waiting for her to leave. She could sense that she had somehow disturbed them, and that made her look even sharper and more sour than usual in her drooping skirts, with her long spidery arms with their gnarled hands held under her apron. Gavard, ill at ease in the silence, detected a slight cough and asked, “Have you caught a cold?”
“No,” she said curtly. In the places where the bones neared the surface of her face, the skin was stretched brick red and the dark flame that touched her eyelids pointed to a liver ailment fed by the bitterness of her jealousies. She turned back to the counter and followed Lisa's every gesture with the untrusting eye of a customer convinced she is going to be cheated.
“Don't give me any cervelas,” she said. “I don't like them.”
Lisa cut the thin slices with a small knife. She moved to the smoked ham, then the ordinary ham, curling off fine slivers that curled in her hand as she leaned slightly forward to keep her eye on the knife. Her plump, ruddy hands, which worked around the meats with a light, dextrous