The Belly of Paris - Emile Zola [70]
Robine agreed to everything with a slight movement of his eyebrows. Logre would occasionally take on Charvet on the subject of salaries. But Charvet remained the despot of the group, the most authoritative and the best informed. For more than ten years Clémence and he had lived together under a mutual agreement strictly observed by the two of them. Florent, who was slightly thrown by the sight of the woman, finally remembered where he had seen her. She was none other than the tall, dark secretary at the fish market, who wrote with long, graceful fingers, like a well-taught young woman.
Rose appeared on the heels of these two newcomers and without saying a word deposited a stein of beer in front of Charvet and a tray in front of Clémence, who began preparing grog, pouring hot water over the lemon, which she crushed with a spoon, adding sugar and rum with a measure to avoid exceeding the correct amount.
Now it was time for Gavard to introduce Florent to the group, especially Charvet. He presented them to each other as fellow teachers and very capable men who would understand each other. But apparently Gavard had earlier let slip some indiscretion, for they all shook hands tightly, squeezing fingers in the manner of Masonic lodge brothers. Even Charvet was almost friendly.
“Did Manoury pay you in small change?” Logre asked Clémence.
She said that he had and showed a roll of one- and two-franc bills. Charvet looked at her and watched her movements as she rerolled the bundles of bills one by one in her pocket.
“We'll have to settle up,” he said in a half whisper.
“Sure, this evening,” she murmured. “I'd think this is about even. I had lunch with you four times, didn't I? But last week I loaned you a hundred sous.”
Florent, surprised, turned his head away so as not to intrude. Clémence, removing the last roll from view, took a sip of her grog, leaning against the glass paneling as she listened to the men talk politics. Gavard had again picked up the newspaper and was reading fragments of the speech from the throne that morning at the opening of Parliament, in a voice he tried to make sound comical. Charvet began to have fun at the expense of the official language. He didn't spare a line. They were particularly entertained by the sentence “We have every confidence, gentlemen, that, supported by your light and the conservative sentiments of the country, we shall succeed in increasing the public prosperity day by day.”
Logre stood up and pronounced this sentence, mimicking the emperor's drawling voice by speaking through his nose.
“Isn't it great, this prosperity,” said Logre. “Everyone's starving to death.”
“Trade is bad,” said Gavard.
“And what in the world is it supposed to mean, ‘supported by your light’?” continued Clémence, who prided herself on her literary background.
Even Robine released a little snicker from the depth of his beard. The conversation began to heat up. The group took on the Corps Législatif, tearing it apart. Logre did not let up. To Florent he was exactly the same as when shouting fish prices at the auction, his jaw stuck out, his waving hands hurling words into midair, and the posture of a snarling animal; he served up politics the way he would a tray full of sole.
Charvet, on the other hand, grew colder and quieter amid the pipe and gas fumes that were now filling the little room. His voice became dry and razor sharp, whereas Robine gently nodded his head without ever removing his chin from the head