Nana, Émile Zola [reading list txt] 📗

>tower built by a Vandeuvres under Philip Augustus. He was mad for

ruin and thought it a great thing to leave the last golden bezants

of his coat of arms in the grasp of this courtesan, whom the world

of Paris desired. He, too, accepted Nana’s conditions, leaving her

entire freedom of action and claiming her caresses only on certain

days. He was not even naively impassioned enough to require her to

make vows. Muffat suspected nothing. As to Vandeuvres, he knew

things would take place for a certainty, but he never made the least

allusion to them and pretended total ignorance, while his lips wore

the subtle smile of the skeptical man of pleasure who does not seek

the impossible, provided he can have his day and that Paris is aware

of it.

 

From that time forth Nana’s house was really properly appointed.

The staff of servants was complete in the stable, in the kitchen and

in my lady’s chamber. Zoe organized everything and passed

successfully through the most unforeseen difficulties. The

household moved as easily as the scenery in a theater and was

regulated like a grand administrative concern. Indeed, it worked

with such precision that during the early months there were no jars

and no derangements. Madame, however, pained Zoe extremely with her

imprudent acts, her sudden fits of unwisdom, her mad bravado. Still

the lady’s maid grew gradually lenient, for she had noticed that she

made increased profits in seasons of wanton waste when Madame had

committed a folly which must be made up for. It was then that the

presents began raining on her, and she fished up many a louis out of

the troubled waters.

 

One morning when Muffat had not yet left the bedroom Zoe ushered a

gentleman into the dressing room, where Nana was changing her

underwear. He was trembling violently.

 

“Good gracious! It’s Zizi!” said the young woman in great

astonishment.

 

It was, indeed, Georges. But when he saw her in her shift, with her

golden hair over her bare shoulders, he threw his arms round her

neck and round her waist and kissed her in all directions. She

began struggling to get free, for she was frightened, and in

smothered tones she stammered:

 

“Do leave off! He’s there! Oh, it’s silly of you! And you, Zoe,

are you out of your senses? Take him away and keep him downstairs;

I’ll try and come down.”

 

Zoe had to push him in front of her. When Nana was able to rejoin

them in the drawing room downstairs she scolded them both, and Zoe

pursed up her lips and took her departure with a vexed expression,

remarking that she had only been anxious to give Madame a pleasure.

Georges was so glad to see Nana again and gazed at her with such

delight that his fine eyes began filling with tears. The miserable

days were over now; his mother believed him to have grown reasonable

and had allowed him to leave Les Fondettes. Accordingly, the moment

he had reached the terminus, he had got a conveyance in order the

more quickly to come and kiss his sweet darling. He spoke of living

at her side in future, as he used to do down in the country when he

waited for her, barefooted, in the bedroom at La Mignotte. And as

he told her about himself, he let his fingers creep forward, for he

longed to touch her after that cruel year of separation. Then he

got possession of her hands, felt about the wide sleeves of her

dressing jacket, traveled up as far as her shoulders.

 

“You still love your baby?” he asked in his child voice.

 

“Oh, I certainly love him!” answered Nana, briskly getting out of

his clutches. “But you come popping in without warning. You know,

my little man, I’m not my own mistress; you must be good!”

 

Georges, when he got out of his cab, had been so dizzy with the

feeling that his long desire was at last about to be satisfied that

he had not even noticed what sort of house he was entering. But now

he became conscious of a change in the things around him. He

examined the sumptuous dining room with its lofty decorated ceiling,

its Gobelin hangings, its buffet blazing with plate.

 

“Yes, yes!” he remarked sadly.

 

And with that she made him understand that he was never to come in

the mornings but between four and six in the afternoon, if he cared

to. That was her reception time. Then as he looked at her with

suppliant, questioning eyes and craved no boon at all, she, in her

turn, kissed him on the forehead in the most amiable way.

 

“Be very good,” she whispered. “I’ll do all I can.”

 

But the truth was that this remark now meant nothing. She thought

Georges very nice and would have liked him as a companion, but as

nothing else. Nevertheless, when he arrived daily at four o’clock

he seemed so wretched that she was often fain to be as compliant as

of old and would hide him in cupboards and constantly allow him to

pick up the crumbs from Beauty’s table. He hardly ever left the

house now and became as much one of its inmates as the little dog

Bijou. Together they nestled among Mistress’s skirts and enjoyed a

little of her at a time, even when she was with another man, while

doles of sugar and stray caresses not seldom fell to their share in

her hours of loneliness and boredom.

 

Doubtless Mme Hugon found out that the lad had again returned to

that wicked woman’s arms, for she hurried up to Paris and came and

sought aid from her other son, the Lieutenant Philippe, who was then

in garrison at Vincennes. Georges, who was hiding from his elder

brother, was seized with despairing apprehension, for he feared the

latter might adopt violent tactics, and as his tenderness for Nana

was so nervously expansive that he could not keep anything from her,

he soon began talking of nothing but his big brother, a great,

strong fellow, who was capable of all kinds of things.

 

“You know,” he explained, “Mamma won’t come to you while she can

send my brother. Oh, she’ll certainly send Philippe to fetch me.”

 

The first time he said this Nana was deeply wounded. She said

frigidly:

 

“Gracious me, I should like to see him come! For all that he’s a

lieutenant in the army, Francois will chuck him out in double-quick

time!”

 

Soon, as the lad kept returning to the subject of his brother, she

ended by taking a certain interest in Philippe, and in a week’s time

she knew him from head to foot—knew him as very tall and very

strong and merry and somewhat rough. She learned intimate details,

too, and found out that he had hair on his arms and a birthmark on

his shoulder. So thoroughly did she learn her lesson that one day,

when she was full of the image of the man who was to be turned out

of doors by her orders, she cried out:

 

“I say, Zizi, your brother’s not coming. He’s a base deserter!”

 

The next day, when Georges and Nana were alone together, Francois

came upstairs to ask whether Madame would receive Lieutenant

Philippe Hugon. Georges grew extremely white and murmured:

 

“I suspected it; Mamma was talking about it this morning.”

 

And he besought the young woman to send down word that she could not

see visitors. But she was already on her feet and seemed all aflame

as she said:

 

“Why should I not see him? He would think me afraid. Dear me,

we’ll have a good laugh! Just leave the gentleman in the drawing

room for a quarter of an hour, Francois; afterward bring him up to

me.”

 

She did not sit down again but began pacing feverishly to and fro

between the fireplace and a Venetian mirror hanging above an Italian

chest. And each time she reached the latter she glanced at the

glass and tried the effect of a smile, while Georges sat nervously

on a sofa, trembling at the thought of the coming scene. As she

walked up and down she kept jerking out such little phrases as:

 

“It will calm the fellow down if he has to wait a quarter of an

hour. Besides, if he thinks he’s calling on a tottie the drawing

room will stun him! Yes, yes, have a good look at everything, my

fine fellow! It isn’t imitation, and it’ll teach you to respect the

lady who owns it. Respect’s what men need to feel! The quarter of

an hour’s gone by, eh? No? Only ten minutes? Oh, we’ve got plenty

of time.”

 

She did not stay where she was, however. At the end of the quarter

of an hour she sent Georges away after making him solemnly promise

not to listen at the door, as such conduct would scarcely look

proper in case the servants saw him. As he went into her bedroom

Zizi ventured in a choking sort of way to remark:

 

“It’s my brother, you know—”

 

“Don’t you fear,” she said with much dignity; “if he’s polite I’ll

be polite.”

 

Francois ushered in Philippe Hugon, who wore morning dress. Georges

began crossing on tiptoe on the other side of the room, for he was

anxious to obey the young woman. But the sound of voices retained

him, and he hesitated in such anguish of mind that his knees gave

way under him. He began imagining that a dread catastrophe would

befall, that blows would be struck, that something abominable would

happen, which would make Nana everlastingly odious to him. And so

he could not withstand the temptation to come back and put his ear

against the door. He heard very ill, for the thick portieres

deadened every sound, but he managed to catch certain words spoken

by Philippe, stern phrases in which such terms as “mere child,”

“family,” “honor,” were distinctly audible. He was so anxious about

his darling’s possible answers that his heart beat violently and

filled his head with a confused, buzzing noise. She was sure to

give vent to a “Dirty blackguard!” or to a “Leave me bloody well

alone! I’m in my own house!” But nothing happened—not a breath

came from her direction. Nana seemed dead in there! Soon even his

brother’s voice grew gentler, and he could not make it out at all,

when a strange murmuring sound finally stupefied him. Nana was

sobbing! For a moment or two he was the prey of contending feelings

and knew not whether to run away or to fall upon Philippe. But just

then Zoe came into the room, and he withdrew from the door, ashamed

at being thus surprised.

 

She began quietly to put some linen away in a cupboard while he

stood mute and motionless, pressing his forehead against a

windowpane. He was tortured by uncertainty. After a short silence

the woman asked:

 

“It’s your brother that’s with Madame?”

 

“Yes,” replied the lad in a choking voice.

 

There was a fresh silence.

 

“And it makes you anxious, doesn’t it, Monsieur Georges?”

 

“Yes,” he rejoined in the same painful, suffering tone.

 

Zoe was in no hurry. She folded up some lace and said slowly:

 

“You’re wrong; Madame will manage it all.”

 

And then the conversation ended; they said not another word. Still

she did not leave the room. A long quarter of an hour passed, and

she turned round again without seeming to notice the look of

exasperation overspreading the lad’s face, which was already white

with the effects of uncertainty and constraint. He was casting

sidelong glances in the direction of the drawing room.