His Masterpiece, Émile Zola [essential reading txt] 📗

While filling the stove, Mahoudeau continued to relieve his mind.

“Well, you may believe me if you like, but when a fellow’s almost starving it isn’t disagreeable to keep quiet. Yes, one gets numb amidst silence; it’s like an inside coating that stills the gnawing of the stomach a bit. Ah, that Chaîne! You haven’t a notion of his peasant nature. When he had spent his last copper without earning the fortune he expected by painting, he went into trade, a petty trade, which was to enable him to finish his studies. Isn’t the fellow a sharp ’un, eh? And just listen to his plan. He had some olive oil sent to him from Saint-Firmin, his village, and then he tramped the streets and found a market for the oil among well-to-do families from Provence living in Paris. Unfortunately, it did not last. He is such a clodhopper that they showed him the door on all sides. And as there was a jar of oil left which nobody would buy, well, old man, we live upon it. Yes, on the days when we happen to have some bread we dip our bread into it.”

Thereupon he pointed to the jar standing in a corner of the shop. Some of the oil having been spilt, the wall and the floor were darkened by large greasy stains.

Claude left off laughing. Ah! misery, how discouraging it was! how could he show himself hard on those whom it crushed? He walked about the studio, no longer vexed at finding models weakened by concessions to middle-class taste; he even felt tolerant with regard to that hideous bust. But, all at once, he came across a copy that Chaîne had made at the Louvre, a Mantegna, which was marvellously exact in its dryness.

“Oh, the brute,” he muttered, “it’s almost the original; he’s never done anything better than that. Perhaps his only fault is that he was born four centuries too late.”

Then, as the heat became too great, he took off his overcoat, adding:

“He’s a long while fetching his tobacco.”

“Oh! his tobacco! I know what that means,” said Mahoudeau, who had set to work at his bust, finishing the whiskers; “he has simply gone next door.”

“Oh! so you still see the herbalist?”

“Yes, she comes in and out.”

He spoke of Mathilde and Chaîne without the least show of anger, simply saying that he thought the woman crazy. Since little Jabouille’s death she had become devout again, though this did not prevent her from scandalising the neighbourhood. Her business was going to wreck, and bankruptcy seemed impending. One night, the gas company having cut off the gas in default of payment, she had come to borrow some of their olive oil, which, after all, would not burn in the lamps. In short, it was quite a disaster; that mysterious shop, with its fleeting shadows of priests’ gowns, its discreet confessional-like whispers, and its odour of sacristy incense, was gliding to the abandonment of ruin. And the wretchedness had reached such a point that the dried herbs suspended from the ceiling swarmed with spiders, while defunct leeches, which had already turned green, floated on the tops of the glass jars.

“Hallo, here he comes!” resumed the sculptor. “You’ll see her arrive at his heels.”

In fact, Chaîne came in. He made a great show of drawing a screw of tobacco from his pocket, then filled his pipe, and began to smoke in front of the stove, remaining obstinately silent, as if there were nobody present. And immediately afterwards Mathilde made her appearance like a neighbour who comes in to say “Good morning.” Claude thought that she had grown still thinner, but her eyes were all afire, and her mouth was seemingly enlarged by the loss of two more teeth. The smell of aromatic herbs which she always carried in her uncombed hair seemed to have become rancid. There was no longer the sweetness of camomile, the freshness of aniseed; she filled the place with a horrid odour of peppermint that seemed to be her very breath.

“Already at work!” she exclaimed. “Good morning.” And, without minding Claude, she kissed Mahoudeau. Then, after going to shake hands with the painter in her brazen way, she continued:

“What do you think? I’ve found a box of mallow root, and we will treat ourselves to it for breakfast. Isn’t that nice of me now! We’ll share.”

“Thanks,” said the sculptor, “it makes my mouth sticky. I prefer to smoke a pipe.”

And, seeing that Claude was putting on his overcoat again, he asked: “Are you going?”

“Yes. I want to get the rust off, and breathe the air of Paris a bit.”

All the same, he stopped for another few minutes watching Chaîne and Mathilde, who stuffed themselves with mallow root, each taking a piece by turns. And though he had been warned, he was again amazed when he saw Mahoudeau take up the stick of charcoal and write on the wall: “Give me the tobacco you have shoved into your pocket.”

Without a word, Chaîne took out the screw and handed it to the sculptor, who filled his pipe.

“Well, I’ll see you again soon,” said Claude.

“Yes, soon⁠—at any rate, next Thursday, at Sandoz’s.”

Outside, Claude gave an exclamation of surprise on jostling a gentleman, who stood in front of the herbalist’s peering into the shop.

“What, Jory! What are you doing there?”

Jory’s big pink nose gave a sniff.

“I? Nothing. I was passing and looked in,” said he in dismay.

Then he decided to laugh, and, as if there were anyone to overhear him, lowered his voice to ask:

“She is next door with our friends, isn’t she? All right; let’s be off, quick!”

And he took the painter with him, telling him all manner of strange stories of that creature Mathilde.

“But you used to say that she was frightful,” said Claude, laughing.

Jory made a careless gesture. Frightful? No, he had not gone as far as that. Besides, there might be something attractive about a woman even though she had a plain face. Then he expressed his surprise at